Climate change poses potentially devastating effects on India’s agriculture. While the overall parameters of climate change are increasingly accepted — a 1°C average temperature increase over the next 30 years, sea level rise of less than 10 cm in the same period, and regional monsoon variations and corresponding droughts — the impacts in India are likely to be quite site and crop specific. Some crops may respond favourably to the changing conditions, others may not. This emphasizes the need to promote agricultural research and create maximum flexibility in the system to permit adaptations.
The key ingredient for “drought proofing” is the managed recharge of aquifers. To ensure continued yields of important staple crops (e.g. wheat), it may also be necessary to shift the locations where these crops are grown, in response to temperature changes as well as to water availability. The latter will be a key factor in making long-term investment decisions.
For example, water “runoff” from the Himalayas is predicted to increase over the next 30 years as glaciers melt, but then decline substantially thereafter. It will be critical to provide incentives to plan for these large-scale shifts in agro-ecological conditions.
India needs to make long-term investment in research and development in agriculture.
India is likely to experience changed weather patterns in future.

According to the passage, why is it important to promote agricultural research in India?

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