极端天气影响全球

Ren Fumin, chief expert at China's National Climate Center, reviews the major weather disasters that have occurred so far this year.

"In North America, high temperatures and low precipitation have caused a severe drought, affecting corn and soybean crops. In Northeast Asia, heat waves have caused people to suffer and led to 50 deaths in Japan alone. Meanwhile, heat waves and droughts have also occurred in some regions in Europe."

Turning to China, Ren says the country has experienced uNPRecedented heavy rains and above-normal-level typhoons this summer.

"There have been more torrential rains than ever. Our statistics show that uNPRecedented heavy rains fell at more than 40 monitoring locations across 16 provincial-level regions. In extreme cases, some places witnessed 300 millimeters of precipitation a day. Meanwhile, stronger typhoons have made landfall on a wide range of coastal regions from Guangdong to the north of Jiangsu."

Ren Fumin explains that the abnormal typhoon season China is seeing was because the subtropical anticyclone over the Western Pacific moved a little north than normal in August.

The latest official figures show that in the first half of August the typhoons caused more than 50 deaths in China.

While such extreme weather caused damage in the areas directly affected by it, some weather disasters produced global ramifications.

Because of the drought in the U.S., the country's agricultural officials forecast that this year's corn yields will drop by 13 percent from last year to the lowest level since 2006.

Meanwhile, soybean yields are forecast to drop by 12 percent year-on-year.

This situation has caused concern about the food supply around the world as corn and soybean prices are on the rise.
 
But Nie Fengying, a food security expert at the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, says there is no need to worry too much.

"In general, the output of grains, especially corn and soybeans, will decline to some extent due to droughts in the United States and Russia. But the supplies and stockpiles of grains are still adequate in the world. Moreover, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has predicted a good harvest for wheat this year, so I think global food security can be ensured in general despite some structural shortfalls."

The expert adds that the world's most populous nation will continue to have an adequate food supply and stable grain prices as a good harvest here in China is in sight.

For CRI, I'm Xiangwei.