Manufactured commodities and climate change

Abstract

The diversity of processes involved in manufacturing and the range of commodities that are traded on the global market makes analysing climate change impacts a challenging task. A methodology for systematically evaluating the large-scale impacts of climate change on manufactured goods in the global market is presented. The effects of climate change on the security of electricity supply, the availability of transportation, and access to water are examined. The manufacturing industry has a large geographical spread and there are several ways in which climate change will probably affect the manufacturing process. Most of the potential impacts will be detrimental by the 2040s and, without effective global action to limit climate change, it is likely that they will worsen in the second half of the century. However, a large proportion of manufacturing exports is from those regions that are best positioned to adapt to a changing climate and thus minimize adverse impacts.

Policy relevance

This article takes a broad view of globally manufactured commodities and their vulnerability to climate change, to inform policy makers of the potential impacts of a changing climate on the global commodities market. The aim is to highlight key areas of concern, to focus attention on the most significant vulnerabilities, and to inform more detailed investigation of this complex issue. The analysis shows that climate change is expected to affect global commodities, but that those regions responsible for the majority of manufacture exports are also those most able to adapt to a changing climate.

Keywords:

• climate change
• climate impacts
• country risk
• energy sector
• transportation sector
• water

Notes

An additional important factor in the security of supply and price of manufactured goods is the availability of human resources and the cost of labour. This is indirectly affected by climate change because the availability of basic resources (e.g. food and water) affects population health, migration, national security, and stability. Although an evaluation of the climate change impacts on these factors is outside the scope of this analysis, it is safe to say that these factors will certainly contribute to how manufactured goods will be affected by climate change, both for the 2040s and beyond to 2100.

Some of the exports in the UN Comtrade database are classed as being from ‘Other’ regions (e.g. ‘Other Africa’, ‘Other Asia’). The most significant such region is ‘Other Asia’, which consists largely of imports from Taiwan. In Figure 1, all exports and imports from ‘Other Asia’ have been attributed to Taiwan.

Consider, for example, the temperature tolerance of rail tracks across the Australian Outback as compared to those in the UK.

As noted, permafrost provides the foundation for oil and gas pipelines across Russia. It is arguable whether the thawing of permafrost in Russia would constitute a catastrophic impact.

See Rev. 4 of the UN SITC, available at http://unstats.un.org/unsd/cr/registry/regcst.asp?Cl=28.