Chapters authored
Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation Strategies for Agronomic Crops
Climate change is a serious threat to agriculture and food security. Extreme weather conditions and changing patterns of precipitation lead to a decrease in the crop productivity. High temperatures and uncertain rainfall decrease the grain yield of crops by reducing the length of growing period. Future projections show that temperature would be increased by 2.5°C up to 2050. The projected rise in temperature would cause the high frequent and prolong heat waves that can decline the crop production. The rise in temperature results in huge reduction in yield of agronomic crops. Sustaining the crop production under changing climate is a key challenge. Therefore, adaptation measures are required to reduce the climate vulnerabilities. The adverse effect of climate change can be mitigated by developing heat tolerant cultivars and some modification in current production technologies. The development of adaptation strategies in context of changing climate provides the useful information for the stakeholders such as researchers, academia, and farmers in mitigating the negative effects of climate change.
Part of the book: Climate Change and Agriculture
Climate Smart Interventions of Small-Holder Farming Systems
Agriculture is very vulnerable to temperature and drought in semi-arid and arid regions. Farming communities are especially vulnerable to the potential impact of climate change on crop and livestock. For Pakistan, a potential increase of 2.8°C for the maximum day temperature and 2.2°C decrease in night temperature by the mid-century has been reported. The goal of this chapter is to introduce climate-smart interventions as mitigation and adaptation strategies coupled with crop diversification through the introduction of climate resilient crops in existing cropping systems. Firstly, it describes the impacts of climate change in context to current food security situation in Pakistan and, secondly, potential climate smart interventions to combat changes in the country. Crop models, their application for developing adaptations, modeling technique and its integration with breeding, remote sensing and its application, policy interventions and resource smart interventions in context to changing climate are imperative means to favor the farming community in future farming. Introducing climate resilient crops can be rescued and recognized in dry and hot areas of Pakistan using climate smart interventions and resource use efficiency may be determined with the aid of computer and decision support IT tools in resource inefficient areas.
Part of the book: Climate Change and Agriculture