From resilience to risk: Climate change and crop pests endanger African indigenous crops

As the planet warms and weather becomes more erratic, we are seeing alarming ripple effects on food systems, particularly through rising pressures from pests and diseases. Climate change and crop pests are now emerging as major threats to agriculture. Yet amid this crisis, the plight of indigenous and underutilised crops (IUCs) remains underexplored and under-addressed.

Often hailed for their resilience, biodiversity value, and adaptability to local conditions, IUCs like Bambara groundnut, cowpea, sorghum, and African leafy vegetables such as spider plant are touted as a sustainable solution for nutrition and food security. However, their potential is being quietly eroded by the loss of indigenous knowledge, rising temperatures, erratic rainfall patterns, and the migration of pests and diseases due to global warming.

A new frontier of vulnerability

For centuries, IUCs have thrived in marginalised environments, such as semi-arid zones, nutrient-poor soils, and low-input systems. They have traditionally been seen as “climate-smart” crops. However, changing climate dynamics are exposing even these hardy crops to emerging plant diseases and invasive pests.

Farmers in southern Africa, for instance, report increased cases of seed rot, fungal infections, and new pests attacking crops like cowpea and African nightshade, which are problems they have never had on an alarming scale before. With limited scientific research and low commercial interest in these crops, there is little support for disease diagnostics or pest management.

Worse still, IUCs lack formal breeding programs that mainstream crops like maize and wheat benefit from. That makes them especially vulnerable to new pest-pathogen complexes, which are becoming more frequent under climate stress.

The cost of inaction

When we overlook the growing impact of climate change and crop pests on IUCs, we risk losing crops that are critical to food security in a warming world. These crops support millions of smallholder farmers, many of them women, and contribute to more diverse, nutritious diets.

Their underutilisation is not just a consequence of neglect, but also of growing vulnerability. Without proper pest and disease surveillance, early warning systems, and climate-resilient breeding, we risk reversing the gains made in promoting these crops.

Reimagining support for IUCs

This crisis presents an opportunity to rethink how we support indigenous and underutilised crops. First, we need to integrate them into climate adaptation and pest management strategies. They must no longer be treated as peripheral to agricultural development. Investments should go toward community-based seed systems, participatory breeding, and farmer-led surveillance of pest and disease outbreaks. Traditional knowledge on crop protection, especially from women, can be blended with science to build more resilient systems.

Policymakers, researchers, and development partners must collaborate with farming communities to build tailored solutions that recognise the unique challenges IUCs face.

A call to action

If we are serious about building resilient food systems, we must take the threat of pest migration due to global warming seriously, especially as it relates to IUCs. These crops have a vital role to play in securing livelihoods, nutrition, and agro-biodiversity. But that role is now under threat.

It is time to shift the narrative. Rather than celebrating IUCs as “resilient by default”, we must begin to treat them as crops that deserve the same protection and investment as their commercial counterparts. Otherwise, climate change will quietly take away the very crops that over a billion people rely on to survive.

This opinion piece was written by Ethel E. Phiri, Co-Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Underutilised Crops Research.

The Editors-in-Chief, Ethel E. Phiri and Sydney Mavengahama, invites manuscript submissions to the Journal of Underutilised Crops Research that explore innovative solutions, research, and strategies to support indigenous and underutilised crops in the face of climate change. Share your insights and contribute to this critical conversation. Visit https://underutilisedcrops.org/ for submission guidelines.