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Described as "meat of the poor", beans are a key food source
for more than 400 million people across the developing world,
but the area suitable for growing them could drop 50 percent by
2050 because of global warming, endangering tens of millions of
lives, scientists said.
"Small farmers around the world are living on the edge even
during the best situation," Steve Beebe, a senior bean
researcher told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
"Climate change will force many to go hungry, or throw in the
towel, sell their land and move into urban slums if they don't
get support."
Many of the new varieties, bred to resist droughts and higher
temperatures, put traits from less popular strains, such as the
tepary bean, into pinto, black, white and kidney beans.
Beebe said the new varieties were bred through traditional
crossing of different species, rather than more controversial
genetic engineering whereby traits are artificially transferred.
The discovery was made after scientists examined thousands of
strains of beans stored in "gene banks". They were actually
searching for types of beans that could withstand poor soils
when they found genes to help create the "heat-beater" beans,
Beebe said.
Some of the 30 new types also have higher iron content to help
increase their nutritional value, CGIAR, the research group
backing the new discoveries, said in a statement.
New heat tolerant beans might be able to handle average global
temperature increases of 4 degrees, the medium-term worst case
scenario for global warming, researchers said.
If the new strains can handle even a 3 degree rise in average
temperatures, the bean production area lost to climate change
would be limited to about 5 percent, they said.
Bean growers in Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa - including
Nicaragua, Haiti, Brazil, Honduras, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and
the Democratic Republic of Congo - are likely to be the worst
hit by global warming, researchers said.
Some of these countries, dependent on small farmers to feed
themselves, are not in good positions to adapt to a warming
planet.
Clayton Campanhola, director of plant production and protection
at the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, said the
discovery of new "climate smart" bean strains is a big deal.
"It's important to have innovation," Campanhola said. "We need
to promote access to these seeds for small farmers... it's an
major achievement."
(Reporting By Chris Arsenault, editing by Alisa Tang)
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