Many U.S. farmers, especially in parts of the country that have snow during the winter, plant crops earlier in the growing season than they did in the past century because spring comes earlier now. Increased tolerance for cold and hot temperatures, high winds, drought, and other factors that limit production, have been bred into many of the crop seeds that farmers plant, but there is something more going on.

According to a 2021 survey of farmers by the National Institutes of Health, 80 percent of the farmers sampled said climate change affects them, due mostly to natural changes. Eight years earlier, a four-state survey of farmers said climate change didn’t affect their crop yields.

An article written by Melissa Godin and published in the July 25, 2023, edition of YES Magazine, reported, “Climate change is upending farmers’ livelihoods – and exacerbating a mental health crisis.” She cited a 2022 survey by the National Young Farmers Coalition which concluded, “More than half of young farmers said they experience climate impacts either very or extremely often.”

Godin added, “For farmers, wildfires, drought, floods and pests are not just an inconvenience – they are an existential threat.” She referenced a 2022 study published by the Giannini Foundation of Agricultural Economics at the University of California, which found that “extreme heat is positively associated with farmer suicide.”

Godin also wrote, “A 2021 study by a Colorado-based suicide prevention group found that when drought conditions increased in the state, so did the suicide rate among farmers.”

For disclosure purposes, I mention that Godin contacted me prior to writing her article. The conclusions of this article are mine.

Some people disagree that Earth is warming and dispute that humans help to cause global warming.

Skeptics about the claims of climate changes note that any shifts in climate are a natural cycle of temperature changes on our planet and aren’t caused by humans.  Could they be right?

Even though the current temperature is not as warm as the era when dinosaurs roamed this planet, the changes clearly are a reversal of the Ice Age 20,000 years ago when glaciers covered much of the northern hemisphere. The current trend toward a warming Earth is rapid and coincides with similarly rapid increases in Earth’s human population, mechanization, and reliance on fuels that produce carbon and other gases as biproducts when burned.

James Hansen, a National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) scientist, warned in 1988 that our globe is warming. Harvard University professor of meteorological history, Naomi Oreskes, added in 2004 that humans are contributing to global warming.

The temperature of the oceans has risen 1.5 degrees F since 1901 and is rising faster lately, according to the National Environmental Education Foundation, which keeps track of such things. NASA scientists affiliated with its Goddard Institute for Space Studies say the ambient air temperature of Earth has warmed 1.4 degrees F since 1880; the temperature of Earth’s atmosphere is currently rising faster every year.

NASA and the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change agree that as carbon dioxide, methane, and other gases that absorb heat radiating from the earth increase, the gases block the distribution of the heat into Earth’s atmosphere.

TDoes a warming Earth contribute to behavioral health perils of agricultural producers? Yes, but how isn’t fully understood.

Scientific data about the effects of global warming on farmers’ mental health consist mainly of polls, observational reports, and opinions. There are many correlational studies that measure statistical associations of global warming and the incidence of behavioral health symptoms, but few cause-and-effect studies that directly measure farmers’ behavioral reactions to climate change.

Measuring farmers’ behavioral well-being in response to global warming might also be conducted by using time series analyses which compare one era against another, such as a pattern of years when the farmers’ environment is warming versus an era when the temperature of the same farmers’ environment remains mostly stable.

Studies of global warming also need to account for the influences of other factors on farmers, such as crop diseases and the use of pesticides.

Further scientific research is needed which examines how climate shifts cause behavioral health perils among farmers. In today’s sophisticated scientific arena, it’s possible to undertake this type of research.

It’s already known that factors beyond farmers’ control, such as a prolonged drought, exacerbate farmers’ anxieties, which may lead to depression, and even suicide, without adequate behavioral health support. Research already shows that increases in the temperature globally are impacting farmers’ stress and making agriculture a more perilous way of life.

Still, more clarifying research is needed.

Dr. Rosmann’s email address is mike@agbehavioralhealth.com.