A Different Kind of Investor Climate

Weather has become a geoeconomic variable. Extreme heat, drought, weak rainfall and flooding can alter the geography of production, restrict export availability, raise transport and input costs, and redistribute economic advantages between food exporters and import-dependent countries. In a global food system already exposed to high energy costs, disruption around the Black Sea and constraints on major trade routes, simultaneous weather shocks across several producing regions can therefore have consequences well beyond the farm gate.

The important question this summer was not whether the Northern Hemisphere was experiencing unusually severe heat but where inclement weather was occurring, which crops were exposed (and at what stage of development) and whether that exposure translated into lower agricultural production…