Impact of Climate-induced Stress on Food Safety and Quality of Agricultural Produce: Pathways, Evidence and Risk-Management Priorities

Abstract

Climate change is intensifying heat extremes, drought, heavy rainfall, flooding, salinity intrusion, and warming of freshwater and marine environments. These climate-induced stresses reshape agricultural hazards and quality attributes through tightly coupled biological and chemical pathways that operate from field production to postharvest handling and distribution. This review synthesizes evidence on how climatic stress modifies (i) microbiological risks via altered survival, growth, and dispersal of foodborne pathogens and spoilage organisms; (ii) mycotoxin risks via shifts in fungal ecology and toxin biosynthesis under temperature–water-activity regimes; (iii) chemical hazards via changes in pesticide use patterns, residue fate, and contaminant mobilization; and (iv) nutritional and sensory quality via stress-driven remodeling of plant metabolism and compositional “dilution” effects under elevated atmospheric carbon dioxide. A structured literature search was conducted using Web of Science, Scopus, PubMed, and Google Scholar to identify peer-reviewed studies (January 2006-November 2025) on climate variables and food safety hazards or produce quality outcomes. Search strings combined climate and hazard/quality terms, with inclusion criteria prioritizing studies with mechanistic insight, quantitative associations, or predictive modelling relevant to agricultural produce. The literature indicates that risk is increasingly driven by extremes and variability, not only by changes in long-term means, and that impacts often arise from compound events (for example, drought followed by intense rainfall). Fresh produce safety is especially sensitive to climate-mediated water quality and episodic contamination, while cereals and nuts show strong vulnerability to hot–dry conditions that favour aflatoxin risk. Aquatic food systems face increasing hazards from warming-linked Vibrio ecology and expanding harmful cyanobacterial blooms. Effective risk management will require integrating climate information into hazard analysis, strengthening water and postharvest controls, developing predictive early-warning tools for mycotoxins and aquatic hazards, and aligning adaptation with nutrition-sensitive quality objectives.