Union of Concerned Scientists

Introduction
From the Appalachian foothills to the floodplains of the Mississippi River to the coastal wetlands and barrier islands near the Gulf Coast shores, Mississippi encompasses a wide variety of ecosystem types. Approximately half of the land area of Mississippi is forested, and hundreds of thousands of migrating birds fly through the state each year. The critically threatened—and non-migratory—Mississippi sandhill crane only inhabits the wet pine savannas and marshes of the Magnolia State.

Mississippi's natural resource industries—including agriculture, forestry, and fisheries—are important components of the state's economy. The state is fourth in the nation in corn and cotton production, and fifth in poultry production. Mississippi also has the most valuable aquaculture industry in the country, producing food fish, baitfish, crawfish, and oysters; Mississippi's fishing industry is the second largest of the five Gulf Coast states. Hunting, fishing, and other outdoor recreational activities are popular throughout the state.

The impacts of a changing climate could have significant effects on Mississippi's natural systems and the goods and services they provide. Click on the links to find out about future climate projections for Mississippi and how these changes may impact Mississippi's agriculture, forestry, recreation and tourism, fisheries and aquaculture, freshwater resources, coastal development, and human health.

After you've learned about the threats a changing climate poses to Mississippi, why don't you take a couple of minutes to tell policymakers to get busy tackling the problem? It's easy to do on our action pages.