Climate Change Threatens the Future of Food Supply Chains

St. Petersburg, FL (February 27, 2025) – Joe Adamski, Senior Director at ProcureAbility, was featured in a recent article from SupplyChainBrain on how agricultural supply chains are particularly vulnerable to climate change and the need to increase crop yields while addressing climate impacts.

As climate change has intensified, extreme weather events, shifting temperatures and unpredictable rainfall have disrupted global food supply chains, threatening the stability of everything from staple crops to the cans on supermarket shelves.

In the years to come, the effects of climate change on the price and availability for a variety of foods are going to be substantial, says food scientist Dr. Bryan Quoc Le.

“It’s going to be more difficult to grow anything,” he warns, using natural vanilla as just one example, of which the vast majority comes from Madagascar. There, the increasing frequency of tropical cyclones has devastated farms in recent years. “As weather patterns become more erratic, harvests will continue to dwindle or experience unpredictable supply over the coming years.” Le says that longer summers and shorter winters brought on by rising global temperatures are also likely to make blights and pestilence far more common, given that winter can be a critical period for killing off pests sensitive to colder weather.

Already in 2025, we’ve seen the direct and indirect impacts of climate change on the price and availability of essential foods. In the U.S., extreme weather across the country led to a shift in the migratory patterns of birds, exacerbating the spread of avian flu, and eventually driving egg prices to record levels, as farms were forced to cull millions of egg-laying hens. In Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana — where 60% of the world’s cocoa is produced — months of unseasonably dry weather saw global cocoa production fall by 14% in the 2023-24 growing period, causing Oreo parent company Mondelēz International to warn of “unprecedented cost inflation” for the crop as a result.

The effects of more intense droughts and dryer weather aren’t exactly a new development either, says Amy Barnes, the head of sustainability and climate change strategy for insurance broker and risk advisor Marsh. As Taiwan faced its worst drought in nearly a century in 2023, the country’s government began paying farmers not to plant rice, in order to conserve water for semiconductor manufacturers. Years before that, in California, wildfires brought on by dry conditions in Napa and Sonoma damaged an estimated 500 vineyards, and led to roughly $75 million in economic losses for the region’s wine industry.

Read the full article on SupplyChainBrain.

About Joe Adamski

Joe Adamski has more than 12 years of advisory and consulting experience centered on strategic procurement and large-scale transformations. He has deep experience in launching and executing programs focused on strategic sourcing, supply chain, procurement strategy, organizational design, and transformations.

Earlier in his career, Joe was an Air Force pilot before joining A.T. Kearney in their consumer practice. He has consulted with numerous Fortune 500 companies in a variety of industries, including utilities, CPGs, grocery, retail, telecom, apparel, food and beverage, and government.

Joe holds a B.S. degree in Physics from the United States Air Force Academy and an MBA from Emory University’s Goizueta Business School. He enjoys boating, hiking, and spending time in the outdoors.

About ProcureAbility

ProcureAbility, a Jabil company, is the leading provider of procurement services, offering advisory, managed services, digital, staffing, and recruiting solutions. For more than 25 years, we have focused exclusively on helping clients elevate their procurement function.

We combine leading methodologies, analytics, market intelligence, and industry benchmarks with our uniquely flexible and customizable service delivery model. Global organizations of all sizes trust ProcureAbility to transform their procurement operations, drive growth, and reimagine what’s possible.

Let ProcureAbility help you reimagine your procurement capabilities.

Media contact:

Kathleen M. Pomento
Chief Marketing Officer | ProcureAbility
kpomento@procureability.com