Diversity buffers winegrowing regions from climate change losses

Agrobiodiversity—the variation within agricultural plants, animals, and practices—is often suggested as a way to mitigate the negative impacts of climate change on crops [S. A. Wood et al., Trends Ecol. Evol. 30, 531–539 (2015)]. Recently, increasing research and attention has focused on exploiting the intraspecific genetic variation within a crop [Hajjar et al., Agric. Ecosyst. Environ. 123, 261–270 (2008)], despite few relevant tests of how this diversity modifies agricultural forecasts. Here, we quantify how intraspecific diversity, via cultivars, changes global projections of growing areas. We focus on a crop that spans diverse climates, has the necessary records, and is clearly impacted by climate change: winegrapes (predominantly Vitis vinifera subspecies vinifera). We draw on long-term French records to extrapolate globally for 11 cultivars (varieties) with high diversity in a key trait for climate change adaptation—phenology. We compared scenarios where growers shift to more climatically suitable cultivars as the climate warms or do not change cultivars. We find that cultivar diversity more than halved projected losses of current winegrowing areas under a 2 °C warming scenario, decreasing areas lost from 56 to 24%. These benefits are more muted at higher warming scenarios, reducing areas lost by a third at 4 °C (85% versus 58%). Our results support the potential of in situ shifting of cultivars to adapt agriculture to climate change—including in major winegrowing regions—as long as efforts to avoid higher warming scenarios are successful.

Download Full-text

Adapting to climate change for food security in the Rift Valley dry lands of Ethiopia: supplemental irrigation, plant density and sowing date

The Journal of Agricultural Science ◽

10.1017/s0021859616000897 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 155 (5) ◽

pp. 703-724 ◽

Cited By ~ 15

Author(s):

A. MULUNEH ◽

L. STROOSNIJDER ◽

S. KEESSTRA ◽

B. BIAZIN

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Food Security ◽

Plant Density ◽

Maize Yield ◽

Sowing Date ◽

Supplemental Irrigation ◽

Dry Spells ◽

Negative Impacts ◽

Improve Food Security ◽

Impacts Of Climate Change

SUMMARYStudies on climate impacts and related adaptation strategies are becoming increasingly important to counteract the negative impacts of climate change. In Ethiopia, climate change is likely to affect crop yields negatively and therefore food security. However, quantitative evidence is lacking about the ability of farm-level adaptation options to offset the negative impacts of climate change and to improve food security. The MarkSim Global Climate Model weather generator was used to generate projected daily rainfall and temperature data originally taken from the ECHAM5 general circulation model and ensemble mean of six models under high (A2) and low (B1) emission scenarios. The FAO AquaCrop model was validated and subsequently used to predict maize yields and explore three adaptation options: supplemental irrigation (SI), increasing plant density and changing sowing date. The maximum level of maize yield was obtained when the second level of supplemental irrigation (SI2), which is the application of irrigation water when the soil water depletion reached 75% of the total available water in the root zone, is combined with 30 000 plants/ha plant density. It was also found that SI has a marginal effect in good rainfall years but using 94–111 mm of SI can avoid total crop failure in drought years. Hence, SI is a promising option to bridge dry spells and improve food security in the Rift Valley dry lands of Ethiopia. Expected longer dry spells during the shorter rainy season (Belg) in the future are likely to further reduce maize yield. This predicted lower maize production is only partly compensated by the expected increase in CO2 concentration. However, shifting the sowing period of maize from the current Belg season (mostly April or May) to the first month of the longer rainy season (Kiremt) (June) can offset the predicted yield reduction. In general, the present study showed that climate change will occur and, without adaptation, will have negative effects. Use of SI and shifting sowing dates are viable options for adapting to the changes, stabilizing or increasing yield and therefore improving food security for the future.

Download Full-text

Staying Alive: Science Fiction in the Age of the Anthropocene — Philip K. Dick’s Pessimistic Humanism

Brief Encounters ◽

10.24134/be.v3i1.147 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 3 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Tallulah Harvey

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Science Fiction ◽

Environmental Politics ◽

Public Awareness ◽

Human Species ◽

The Earth ◽

Scientific Advancement ◽

Negative Impacts ◽

The Relationship ◽

Impacts Of Climate Change

In recent years, literary studies have become increasingly invested in environmentalism. As science reveals the negative impacts of climate change, and demonstrates a growing concern for humanity’s contribution, literature operates as a form of cultural documentation. It details public awareness and anxieties, and acts as a conduit for change by urging empathetic responses and rendering ecological controversy accessible.To explore the relationship between literature and environmental politics, this paper will focus on the work of science fiction writer Philip K. Dick, and his dystopian visions. In his particular brand of sci-fi, there is no future for humanity. Science and technology fail to pave the way for a better and fairer society, but rather towards, as far as Dick is concerned, extinction. He argues that scientific advancement distances us from reality and from a sense of “humanness”. His pessimistic futures are nihilistic but tender; nurturing a love for humanity even in, what he considers to be, its final hours.Unlike the work of other prominent sci-fi writers, Dick’s fiction does not look towards the stars, but is in many ways a return to earth. The barren landscapes of Mars and other planets offer no comfort, and the evolution of the human into cyborgs, androids and post human species is depicted as dangerous and regressive. Dick’s apocalyptic visions ground his readers in the reality around them, acting in the present for the sake of the earth and humanity’s survival. His humanism is critical of grand enlightenment ideas of “progressivism”, and instead celebrates ordinariness. In the shadow of corporate capitalism and violent dictatorial governments, Dick prefers the little man, the ordinary everyday domestic hero for his narratives. His fiction urges us to take responsibility for our actions, and prepares us for the future through scepticism and pessimism, and a relentless fondness for the human.

Download Full-text

Mediterranean Sea climatic indices: monitoring long term variability and climate changes

10.5194/essd-2018-51 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Athanasia Iona ◽

Athanasios Theodorou ◽

Sarantis Sofianos ◽

Sylvain Watelet ◽

Charles Troupin ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Time Series ◽

Mediterranean Sea ◽

Climate Changes ◽

Salt Content ◽

Climatic Indices ◽

In Situ Observations ◽

The Mediterranean

Abstract. We present a new product composed of a set of thermohaline climatic indices from 1950 to 2015 for the Mediterranean Sea such as decadal temperature and salinity anomalies, their mean values over selected depths, decadal ocean heat and salt content anomalies at selected depth layers as well as their long times series. It is produced from a new high-resolution climatology of temperature and salinity on a 1/8° regular grid based on historical high quality in situ observations. Ocean heat and salt content differences between 1980–2015 and 1950–1979 are compared for evaluation of the climate shift in the Mediterranean Sea. The spatial patterns of heat and salt content shifts demonstrate in greater detail than ever before that the climate changes differently in the several regions of the basin. Long time series of heat and salt content for the period 1950 to 2015 are also provided which indicate that in the Mediterranean Sea there is a net mean volume warming and salting since 1950 with acceleration during the last two decades. The time series also show that the ocean heat content seems to fluctuate on a cycle of about 40 years and seems to follow the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation climate cycle indicating that the natural large scale atmospheric variability could be superimposed on to the warming trend. This product is an observations-based estimation of the Mediterranean climatic indices. It relies solely on spatially interpolated data produced from in-situ observations averaged over decades in order to smooth the decadal variability and reveal the long term trends with more accuracy. It can provide a valuable contribution to the modellers' community, next to the satellite-based products and serve as a baseline for the evaluation of climate-change model simulations contributing thus to a better understanding of the complex response of the Mediterranean Sea to the ongoing global climate change. The product is available here: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1210100.

Download Full-text

TRANSFORMASI ADAPTASI BANGUNAN DI PERMUKIMAN INFORMAL TEPI SUNGAI KAHAYAN

Jurnal Arsitektur ARCADE ◽

10.31848/arcade.v4i1.339 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 4 (1) ◽

pp. 57

Author(s):

Nindita Kresna Murti ◽

Atiek Suprapti ◽

Agung Budi Sardjono

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Environmental Changes ◽

Residential Buildings ◽

Informal Settlements ◽

Global Environment ◽

River Bank ◽

Building Adaptation ◽

Negative Impacts ◽

The City ◽

Impacts Of Climate Change

Abstract: Many informal settlements in Indonesia have been unable to survive, this is due to changes that occur in the neighborhood. This change resulted in the not surviving of informal settlements, but this did not affect the informal settlements in the city of Palangkaraya, settlements on the banks of the Kahayan river were even more developed, and began to develop towards the mainland.As climate change and the global environment increase, there is a tendency for people to conceptualize adaptation in residential buildings as a process of survival and how adaptation is practiced by people who face the negative impacts of climate change, for example in informal settlements on the Kahayan river bank, where residents adapt to building their homes to be able to withstand environmental changes. Where the neighborhood is located there are tides of the river, as well as other environmental factorsThis study is to find out how the Kahayan River settlement communities can survive, with changes that occur in the environment by analyzing using 6 strategies in building adaptation, namely: Adjustable, Versatile, Refitable, Convertible, Scalable, and Movable (Robert Schmid, 2009). Adaptation that occurs in these settlements, namely on building houses that follow climate change, times, and the environment.Keyword: Informal Settlements, Kahayan River Edge, Adaptation, Transformation.Abstrak: Permukiman Informal di Indonesia banyak yang sudah tidak dapat bertahan, hal ini di karenakan adanya perubahan yang terjadi di lingkungan permukiman tersebut. Perubahan ini berakibat tidak bertahannya permukiman informal, namun hal ini tidak mempengaruhi permukiman informal di Kota Palangkaraya, permukiman yang berada di tepi sungai kahayan ini malah semakin berkembang, dan mulai berkembang menuju ke daratan.Seiring dengan meningkatnya perubahan iklim dan lingkungan global, ada kecenderungan masyarakat untuk membuat konsep adaptasi pada bangunan rumah tinggal sebagai proses untuk bertahan dan bagaimana adaptasi dipraktikkan oleh orang-orang yang menghadapi dampak negatif perubahan iklim, sebagai contoh pada permukiman informal yang berada di tepi sungai Kahayan, di mana warga beradaptasi pada bangunan rumah mereka untuk dapat bertahan terhadap perubahan lingkungan. Di mana lingkungan permukiman ini terdapat pasang surut air sungai, serta faktor lingkungan lainnya.Penelitian ini untuk mengetahui cara masyarakat permukiman tepi Sungai Kahayan dapat bertahan, dengan perubahan yang terjadi di lingkungan dengan menganalisa menggunakan 6 strategi dalam adaptasi bangunan, yaitu: Adjustable, Versatile, Refitable, Convertible, Scalable, dan Movable (Robert Schmid, 2009). Adaptasi yang terjadi pada permukiman ini, yaitu pada bangunan rumah yang mengikuti perubahan iklim, jaman, dan lingkungan.Kata Kunci: Permukiman Informal, Tepi Sungai Kahayan, Adaptasi, Transformasi.

Download Full-text

Metaphors in climate discourse: an analysis of Swedish farm magazines

Journal of Science Communication ◽

10.22323/2.10040201 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 10 (04) ◽

pp. A01 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Therese Asplund

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Discourse Analysis ◽

Critical Discourse Analysis ◽

Natural Science ◽

Critical Discourse ◽

Media Reports ◽

Negative Impacts ◽

Impacts Of Climate Change ◽

Positive Impacts

This article examines communicative aspects of climate change, identifying and analysing metaphors used in specialized media reports on climate change, and discussing the aspects of climate change these metaphors emphasize and neglect. Through a critical discourse analysis of the two largest Swedish farm magazines over the 2000–2009 period, this study finds that greenhouse, war, and game metaphors were the most frequently used metaphors in the material. The analysis indicates that greenhouse metaphors are used to ascribe certain natural science characteristics to climate change, game metaphors to address positive impacts of climate change, and war metaphors to highlight negative impacts of climate change. The paper concludes by discussing the contrasting and complementary metaphorical representations farm magazines use to conventionalize climate change.

Download Full-text

Potential Impacts of Climate Change on the Inland Fisheries of Arid and Semi-Arid Regions of Africa

Advances in Environmental Engineering and Green Technologies - Climate Change and Its Impact on Ecosystem Services and Biodiversity in Arid and Semi-Arid Zones ◽

10.4018/978-1-5225-7387-6.ch011 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 196-216

Author(s):

Imefon Udo Udo ◽

Imekan Isaac Akpan

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Sea Level ◽

Arid Regions ◽

Local Institutions ◽

Inland Fisheries ◽

Negative Impacts ◽

Planned Adaptation ◽

Semi Arid ◽

Fish Yields ◽

Impacts Of Climate Change

Inland fisheries of arid and semi-arid regions of Africa are seriously threatened by negative impacts of climate change. Literature and several models show increase in temperature of 1.1oC in some areas. Sea level rise is projected to increase to 0.8 m by the year 2100. Fish yields have increased almost linearly by around half a million metric tons per decade over the past 60 years, while clear cyclical variations in the residuals of about 20 years' periodicity above and below the trend line have been observed. Although fisher folks, their communities, and local institutions are already constantly adapting to various forms of change, flimsiness in the wider governance and macro-economic environment has weakened the overall adaptive capacity of these regions and fishers are vulnerable to projected climate change. For significant benefits of inland fisheries to be accomplished, planned adaptation at scales from the local to the regional is very necessary.

Download Full-text