Climate change, food consumption and food security: Evidence from Ghana

• Most deviations from long-term rainfall means are right-skewed. • Significant positive short-term effect of rainfall shocks on food expenditure. • High temperature pushes households away from consuming diversified foods. • Household (farm) income and agricultural yield emerged as crucial mechanisms. Climate change is considered a principal global threat to human existence and livelihood. A significant manifestation of climate change has been experienced through the occurrence of life-threatening weather conditions such as temperature and rainfall. This study sheds light on food consumption, rainfall and temperature shocks, household food access, household dietary diversity and food security based on four objectives. These include examining the impacts of climate change on food consumption and food security; examining how climate change affects alternative dimensions of food security; evaluating the extent to which these effects vary across heterogeneous groups; and exploring possible channel(s) through which climate change affects food consumption and food security. The study relied on the three waves of the Ghana Socioeconomic Panel dataset, covering the period, 2009–2019. The temperature and rainfall data are collected from the ERA5-Land Climate Reanalysis dataset by the European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF). We find significant effects of climate change on household food security and food expenditure. Our results indicate that high temperature pushes households away from consuming diversified foods. Household (farm) income and agricultural yield emerged as a crucial mechanism through which climate change influences household food security.