Climate change is now high on the political and public agenda. In the developing countries, special attention is being paid to the impact this global phenomenon will have on agriculture. This is because climate change has the potential to seriously affect the food security of a vast majority of the world's poor.

On the other hand, the northern latitude countries could benefit from the increased growing period due to increase in temperatures. Areas that cover the ice will be used more than the areas that cover the sand on this planet. Thus, climate change could contribute to the widening of inequality between the developing and the developed countries.

Global studies focussing on agriculture so far, have indicated that the climate change impact could be relatively minor in the first half of the 21st century and even beneficial for a few countries. There are two broad approaches relating to the agriculture-related impact on climate change: agronomic-economic approach and the Ricardian approach. In the first, the physical impacts (namely, changes in yield and/or area), are assessed through detailed crop simulation exercises, and the results are introduced into an economic model exogenously as Hicks neutral technical changes.

Since the scope for adaptation is rather limited in the agronomic-economic approach, the Ricardian approach was evolved in mid-1990s as an alternative. This is similar to the Hedonic pricing approach adopted for environmental valuation. While all possible adaptation are accounted for in the impact estimation based on this largely statistical approach, the constant relative assumption could lead to biases. Carbon dioxide, the key greenhouse gas responsible for climate change, can act as aerial fertiliser and boost crop yields. However, to benefit from this carbon fertilisation effects, the crops must not be limited by other crucial inputs.

While northern latitude countries could make use of more lands for agriculture, farming and mining purposes, the developed and poor countries of southern latitude will face many natural disasters which will lead to refugee problems. It is overwhelmingly the poorer third world states that do not close their borders and accept millions of refugees, some of whom remain for years, like Bangladeshis in India and African people in South Africa.

Today, among developed countries, the US, Sweden and Finland offer temporary shelter to victims of natural disasters, and Denmark accepted some Afgan drought victims from 2001 to 2006.Global warming, however, is already on a point of creating a new category -the climate refugee. According to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), current mitigation efforts could result in a global average temperature rise of 3 degrees Celsius rather than two degrees. In that event, the Economic Review of Climate Change suggests,550 million more people would be at risk of hunger, and 170 million more would suffer coastal floods. Crop yields would fall sharply, and there would be more droughts interspersed with more severe flooding.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) says that climate change may displace 150 million people by 2050; the Stern Review puts the figure at 200 million. Largely, climate change poses potentially gigantic refugee problems. To start with, it is harder to identify the victims of slower processes than those of sudden natural disasters. Secondly, the victims of wider climate change fall through the net of definitions in international law.

The current UN treaty, the Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees, dates from 1951, and applies only to those who fear or flee persecution. As far internal displacement is concerned, the current UN document, Guiding Principles on Internal displacements, dates from 1998 and is not legally binding, though it seems to cover most of those who flee natural disasters but do not cross national borders.

The problem with more severe climate change is that those who cross national borders will not be covered by any UN instrument, as they will not satisfy the 1951 definition of refugees. Reopening the 1951 convention would be legally risky because the original negotiations that brought it into being were very difficult, and it may be easier to reach an agreement now. The difficulty of reaching, let alone enforcing any agreement, will be compounded by the fact that it is the poorest in the poorest countries who will suffer most and in the greatest numbers.

The principle of common but differentiated responsibilities is the core of the many climate arrangements arrived at so far, including the Kyoto Protocol (1997) and the Bali Plan of Action (2007). The differentiated responsibilities aim to meet the special needs of developing countries for accelerated and equitable economic development.

At Copenhagen, the industrialised countries proposed limiting the rise in mean temperature to 2C above normal. Even this seems to be unattainable in the context of the present rate of emission of greenhouse gases (GHG). Hence, the principle of common but differentiated impact of 2 degrees change in mean temperature is essential for prioritising climate victims. For example, small islands like Tuvalu in the Pacific Ocean, the Maldives, Lakshadweep and the Andaman and Nicobar, as well as Sunderbans in West Bengal, Kuttanad in Kerala and many locations along the coast will face the prospect of submergence.

Floods will become more serious and frequent in the Indo-Ganges plains. Drought induced food and water security will become more acute. South Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa and the small islands will be the worst victims. In contrast, countries in the northern latitudes will benefit due to longer growing seasons and higher yields. We are now in the midst of a steep rise in the prices of essential commodities, and food items.

2009 has been characterised by both extensive drought and severe floods. The gap between demand and supply is high and the absence of a farmer-centric market system aggravates both food inflation and rural poverty. The task of ensuring food security will be quite formidable in an era of increasing climate risks and diminishing farm productivity. China which was reluctant in Copenhagen to join other developing countries in efforts to restrict the rise in mean temperature to 1 to 1.5 degrees C, has already built strong defences against the adverse impact of climate change. Chinese farmlands are however, mostly irrigated, unlike in India where 60 per cent of the area still remains rain-fed. Food and drinking water are the first among our hierarchical needs. Hence while assessing the common and differentiated impact of a 2 degree rise in temperature, priority should go to agriculture and rural livelihoods.

What are the steps we should take in the fields of both mitigation and adaptation? The largest opportunity in mitigation lies in increasing soil carbon sequestration and for building up soil carbon banks. Increase in soil carbon pool in the root zone by 1 ton C/ha/yr will help to increase food production substantially, since one of the major deficiencies in soil health is low soil organic matter content. There should be a movement for planting a billion "fertiliser trees" which can simultaneously sequester carbon and enhance soil nutrient status.

We can also contribute to the reduction in methane emission in the atmosphere from animal husbandry by spreading biogas plants. A biogas plant and a pond on every farm will make a substantial contribution to both reducing GHG emission and ensuring energy and water security. Similarly the neem-coated urea will help to reduce ammonia volatilisation and thereby, the release of nitrus oxide into the atmosphere.

2010 is the International Year of Biodiversity. We can classify our crops into those which are climate resilient and those which are climate sensitive. Anticipatory analysis and action hold the key to climate risk management. The major components of an Action Plan for achieving a Climate Resilient National Food Security System will be the following: Establish with the help of ISRO, a Village Resource Centre with satellite connection; develop Drought and Food codes; organise Seed and Grain Banks; Train one man and one woman of every Panchayat to become Climate Risk Managers; strengthen coastal defences against a rise in a sea level; establish Agro-Meteorological Station with the help of the Ministry of Earth Sciences; establish a Climate Risk Management Research and Extension Centre in agro-climate sub-zones and organise a Content Consortium for each centre consisting of exports in different fields to provide guidance on alternative cropping patterns.

Integrated coastal zone management procedures involving concurrent attention to both the landward and seaward site of the ocean, and to coastal forestry and agro-forestry as well as capture and culture fisheries, are urgently needed.

About 45,000 people travelled to the UN climate summit in Copenhagen - the vast majority conceived of the need for a few global agreements on climate change. So why did the summit end without one? Key governments do not want a global deal: Until the end of the summit, it appeared that all governments wanted to keep the keys to combating climate change within the UN climate convention.

In Copenhagen everyone talked, but no one really listened. The end of the meeting saw US and BASIC countries hammering out the last minute deal, neglecting others. The chief Danish negotiator Thomas Beker was sacked just weeks before the summit. This destroyed the atmosphere of trust that developing country negotiators had established with Mr Becker. The strategy of the major developing nations provided a reprieve from the danger of the breakdown of global negotiations. But their compromise highlights the dilemma of engaging the United States without allowing it to dictate the global climate agenda.

It is evident that the Copenhagen climate summit has failed to produce an equitable and viable plan to combat global warming that responds to both scientific and moral imperative. Undoubtedly, the success of the United States in forcing the Copenhagen Accord on to the agenda, with the active collusion of several developed countries, constitutes a serious threat to equitable and transparent global environment governance under United Nations' auspices.

Following the personal intervention of President Obama with select leaders, the drafting of the accord, drawn up in a series of closed-door meetings with select participants setting aside the outcomes of earlier negotiations, completely ignored the norms of equality of all nations and transparency that are at the core of the UN process. Nevertheless one of the Copenhagen's most valuable outcomes has been the guarantee of the continuity of UNFCCC negotiations, which will now continue at least for another year, despite the Copenhagen Accord.

The developing countries have thus managed to ensure that the primary agenda of the developed countries in the run-up to Copenhagen, that sought to dilute or erase the principle of 'common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities", has been pushed back to some measure. The attempts to set aside or replace the Kyoto Protocol and alter significantly the terms of the UNFCCC have not succeeded at the formal level, though the Copenhagen Accord itself is likely to be used for fresh attempts in this direction.

Developed nations are only expected to voluntarily declare their emission reduction commitments by 31st January,2010. But the domestic legislative process of the United States may not allow it to make any significant commitment to the emissions reduction at all. The climate science demands more emissions cuts from developed nations to match with scientific truth, whereas the oil and coal lobbies of US refuse to comply with it.

On the other hand, the developing countries have conceded that all their mitigation action will be subject to international consultation and analysis, under clearly defined guidelines that will ensure that national sovereignty is respected. Despite the strident criticism of sections of climate change activists, it is clear that the BASIC Four (Brazil, South Africa, India and China) had little room for manoeuvre at Copenhagen. In retrospect, the only way they could have evaded high-level political negotiations, would have been to reject at the outset itself, the leader-driven process promoted by the Danish Prime Minister on behalf of the US.

But faced with the climate negotiations, and unwilling to risk being held responsible for pre-determining the summit's failure, the four major developing nations, to varying degrees, were clearly willing to explore the Danish proposals. The BASIC Four demonstrated that they recognise their special responsibilities while deflecting potential criticism of standing in the way of drawing United States into global climate action. The summit also exposed the weakness inherent in the developing nations' strategy in uniting BASIC Four with G-77 in climate negotiations. The US, on the other hand, successfully used justified concerns regarding the emissions of the major developing economies, to impose mitigation demands on the entire developed world. Looking beyond Copenhagen, one can anticipate an even thornier path for future negotiations due to short-sighted and parochial domestic problems of the US.