Land suitability levels for rainfed maize under current conditions and climate change projections in Mexico

2018 ◽  
Vol 47 (3) ◽  
pp. 181-191 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jorge López-Blanco ◽  
José Luis Pérez-Damián ◽  
Ana Cecilia Conde-Álvarez ◽  
Jesús David Gómez-Díaz ◽  
Alejandro Ismael Monterroso-Rivas

An assessment of land suitability classes for rainfed maize (spring–summer agricultural cycle) with current climate conditions (1950–2000) and projected climate change scenarios was carried out for Mexico. The method considered the most restrictive factors or agroclimatic requirements from different variables needed by rainfed maize. These factors were analyzed spatially in a geographic information systems (GIS) context, resulting in areas classified into four suitability levels: high, medium, low, and not suitable for maize. We considered two general circulation models (GCM): HADGEM2-ES and MPI-ESM-LR; one radiative forcing concentration representative concentration pathways (RCP) 8.5 Wm−2 and the far period (2075–2099). Results at a national-level analysis showed that under actual conditions, 57.5% of the area of Mexico presents some level of suitability for rainfed maize. The high suitability class is 11.4% of the country, while 20.7% and 25.3% had medium and low suitability levels, respectively. Other results showed that with the HADGEM2-ES and MPI-ESM-LR projections of climate change models, 50.4% and 46.7%, of Mexico’s continental area, respectively, present some level of suitability for the rainfed maize crop. In the first case, with respect to the present climate conditions, the HADGEM2-ES model presented an area decrease of −2.4% and the MPI-ESM-LR model of −5.5% in the high suitability level for the rainfed maize crop. Results at a state-level analysis showed there are five states (Jalisco, Campeche, Oaxaca, Chiapas, and Michoacán) in the interval of more than 50,000 km2 of surface with high and medium suitability levels, with a maximum extent change between the present to the projected climate conditions of −46% for the HADGEM2-ES and −57% for the MPI-ESM-LR. In general, the MPI-ESM-LR model showed the most adverse projected conditions for rainfed maize growth.

Forests ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (12) ◽  
pp. 1710
Author(s):  
Xiuting Wang ◽  
Wenwen Zhang ◽  
Xin Zhao ◽  
Huiqin Zhu ◽  
Limiao Ma ◽  
...  

Akebia trifoliata (Thunb.) Koidz., Akebia trifoliata subsp. australis (Diels) T. Shimizu and Akebia quinata (Houtt.) Decne. are the source plants of the traditional Chinese medicines AKEBIAE CAULIS and AKEBIAE FRUCTUS, and have high pharmaceutical value. However, the resource reserve of these plants has dramatically declined due to habitat destruction, which has seriously affected their adequate supply and sustainable utilization. A poor knowledge of the potential distribution of these medicinal materials would seriously constrain the protective exploitation of wild resources and the establishment of new cultivations. In this study, based on the scenarios of SSP1-2.6, SSP2-4.5, SSP3-7.0 and SSP5-8.5, the maximum entropy model was used to predict the potential distribution of these three Akebia taxa under current and future (2030s, 2050s, 2070s and 2090s) climate conditions. Our findings showed that the potentially suitable areas of these three Akebia taxa were mainly distributed in China at 101.8–121.9° E and 23.5–34.6° N. Temperature played a more significant role than precipitation in affecting the distribution. The dominant bioclimatic variable that affected the distribution of A. trifoliata and A. quinata in China was the minimum temperature of the coldest month (BIO06). For A. trifoliata subsp. australis, the mean diurnal range (BIO02) was the dominant variable influencing its distribution. Compared with current conditions, the moderate- and high-suitability areas of these three Akebia taxa were predicted to shrink towards the core areas, while the low-suitability areas were all observed to increase from the 2030s to the 2090s. With the increase in radiative forcing of SSP, the low-impact areas of these three Akebia taxa showed a decreasing trend as a whole. Our results illustrate the impact of climate change on the distribution of Akebia, and would provide references for the sustainable utilization of Akebia’s resources.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ernesto Pasten-Zapata ◽  
Paul Royer-Gaspard ◽  
Rafael Pimentel ◽  
Torben O. Sonnenborg ◽  
Anthony Lemoine ◽  
...  

<p>Commonly, the analysis of climate change impacts on hydrology involves a series of steps that begin with a General Circulation Model followed by the application of a downscaling or bias correction method and then coupling the climate outputs to a hydrological model. Nevertheless, frequently the hydrological models employed in these analyses are not tested to assess their skill to simulate the hydrology of a catchment under changing climate regimes. We evaluate such skill by applying a Differential Split Sampling Test (DSST) using the available observations. The models are calibrated during the three most extreme dry (or wet) years and evaluated on the three most wet (or dry) years. The DSST is applied on three catchments located across Europe: Denmark, France and Spain. This spatial distribution allows us to evaluate the method on diverse climatic and hydrological regimes. Furthermore, the DSST is applied to three different models in each of the catchments and case-specific metrics are evaluated to determine the practical usefulness of the models. Based on the DSST results, we assign a weight to the hydrological models and drive them with six Euro-CORDEX Regional Climate Models to assess climate change scenarios for the case-specific metrics. This methodology allows us to increase the confidence of our projections considering the hydrological model uncertainty for transient climatic conditions.</p>


Forests ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 119
Author(s):  
Antonio Fidel Santos-Hernández ◽  
Alejandro Ismael Monterroso-Rivas ◽  
Diódoro Granados-Sánchez ◽  
Antonio Villanueva-Morales ◽  
Malinali Santacruz-Carrillo

The tropical rainforest is one of the lushest and most important plant communities in Mexico’s tropical regions, yet its potential distribution has not been studied in current and future climate conditions. The aim of this paper was to propose priority areas for conservation based on ecological niche and species distribution modeling of 22 species with the greatest ecological importance at the climax stage. Geographic records were correlated with bioclimatic temperature and precipitation variables using Maxent and Kuenm software for each species. The best Maxent models were chosen based on statistical significance, complexity and predictive power, and current potential distributions were obtained from these models. Future potential distributions were projected with two climate change scenarios: HADGEM2_ES and GFDL_CM3 models and RCP 8.5 W/m2 by 2075–2099. All potential distributions for each scenario were then assembled for further analysis. We found that 14 tropical rainforest species have the potential for distribution in 97.4% of the landscape currently occupied by climax vegetation (0.6% of the country). Both climate change scenarios showed a 3.5% reduction in their potential distribution and possible displacement to higher elevation regions. Areas are proposed for tropical rainforest conservation where suitable bioclimatic conditions are expected to prevail.


2021 ◽  
Vol 263 ◽  
pp. 108069
Author(s):  
Lu Feng ◽  
Hongyan Wang ◽  
Xiaowei Ma ◽  
Hongbo Peng ◽  
Jianrong Shan

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mook Bangalore ◽  
Andrew Smith ◽  
Ted Veldkamp

Abstract. With 70 percent of its population living in coastal areas and low-lying deltas, Vietnam is highly exposed to riverine and coastal flooding. This paper examines the exposure of the population and poor people in particular to current and future flooding in Vietnam and specifically in Ho Chi Minh City, using new high-resolution flood hazard maps and spatial socioeconomic data. The national-level analysis finds that a third of today’s population is already exposed to a flood, which occurs once every 25 years, assuming no protection. For the same return period flood under current socioeconomic conditions, climate change may increase the number exposed to 38 to 46 percent of the population. Climate change impacts can make frequent events as important as rare ones: the estimates suggest a 25-year flood under future conditions can expose more people than a 200-year flood under current conditions. Although poor districts are not found to be more exposed to floods at the national level, the city-level analysis of Ho Chi Minh City provides evidence that slum areas are highly exposed. The results of this paper show the benefits of investing today in flood risk management, and can provide guidance as to where future investments may be targeted.


2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Leonel Lara-Estrada ◽  
Livia Rasche ◽  
Uwe A. Schneider

AbstractCoffee cultivation in Central America provides goods and services at local, national, and international levels. Climate change is likely to affect the magnitude and continuity of these benefits by reducing the land suitability for coffee cultivation. To quantify the impacts of climate change on land suitability, we use the Bayesian network model Agroecological Land Evaluation for Coffea arabica L. (ALECA) and estimate the land suitability for coffee production in 2000, 2050, and 2080 under three climate change scenarios based on relative concentration pathways (RCPs) 2.6, 4.5, and 8.5. Results indicate that even under the less severe climate scenarios, over half of the current coffee area in Central America will experience a decline in its land suitability for coffee production, from excellent or good to moderate and marginal, and that the change will not happen in the more distant future of 2080, but by 2050. Under RCP 8.5, most coffee areas become of marginal and moderate suitability. The findings show that the continuity of coffee cultivation in a large portion of coffee areas in Central America is under threat and that farmers and policy-makers should develop adaptation portfolios for their farms and regions in a timely manner.


Author(s):  
Dao Nguyen Khoi ◽  
Truong Thao Sam ◽  
Pham Thi Loi ◽  
Bui Viet Hung ◽  
Van Thinh Nguyen

Abstract In this paper, the responses of hydro-meteorological drought to changing climate in the Be River Basin located in Southern Vietnam are investigated. Climate change scenarios for the study area were statistically downscaled using the Long Ashton Research Station Weather Generator tool, which incorporates climate projections from Coupled Model Intercomparison Project 5 (CMIP5) based on an ensemble of five general circulation models (Can-ESM2, CNRM-CM5, HadGEM2-AO, IPSL-CM5A-LR, and MPI-ESM-MR) under two Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) scenarios (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5). The Soil and Water Assessment Tool model was employed to simulate streamflow for the baseline time period and three consecutive future 20 year periods of 2030s (2021–2040), 2050s (2041–2060), and 2070s (2061–2080). Based on the simulation results, the Standardized Precipitation Index and Standardized Discharge Index were estimated to evaluate the features of hydro-meteorological droughts. The hydrological drought has 1-month lag time from the meteorological drought and the hydro-meteorological droughts have negative correlations with the El Niño Southern Oscillation and Pacific Decadal Oscillation. Under the climate changing impacts, the trends of drought severity will decrease in the future; while the trends of drought frequency will increase in the near future period (2030s), but decrease in the following future periods (2050 and 2070s). The findings of this study can provide useful information to the policy and decisionmakers for a better future planning and management of water resources in the study region.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emmanuel Junior Zuza ◽  
Yoseph Negusse Araya ◽  
Kadmiel Maseyk ◽  
Shonil A Bhagwat ◽  
Kaue de Sousa ◽  
...  

Climate change is altering suitable areas of crop species worldwide, with cascading effects on people and animals reliant upon those crop species as food sources. Macadamia is one of Malawi's most important and profitable crop species. Here, we used an ensemble model approach to determine the current distribution of macadamia producing areas across Malawi in relation to climate. For future distribution of suitable areas, we used the climate outputs of 17 general circulation models (GCM's) based on two climate change scenarios (RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5). We found that the precipitation of the driest month and isothermality were the climatic variables that strongly influenced macadamia's suitability in Malawi. These climatic requirements were fulfilled across many areas in Malawi under the current conditions. Future projections indicated that large parts of Malawi's macadamia growing regions will remain suitable for macadamia, amounting to 36,910 km2 (39.1%) and 33,511 km2 (35.5%) of land based on RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5, respectively. Of concern, suitable areas for macadamia production are predicted to shrink by −18% (17,015 km2) and −22% (20,414 km2) based on RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5, respectively, with much of the suitability shifting northwards. Although a net loss of area suitable for macadamia is predicted, some currently unsuitable areas will become suitable in the future. Notably, suitable areas will increase in Malawi's central and northern regions, while the southern region will lose most of its suitable areas. In conclusion, our study provides critical evidence that climate change will significantly affect the macadamia sub-sector in Malawi. Therefore area-specific adaptation strategies are required to build resilience.


PeerJ ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
pp. e12311
Author(s):  
Jingyun Guan ◽  
Moyan Li ◽  
Xifeng Ju ◽  
Jun Lin ◽  
Jianguo Wu ◽  
...  

Desert locusts are notorious for their widespread distribution and strong destructive power. Their influence extends from the vast arid and semiarid regions of western Africa to northwestern India. Large-scale locust outbreaks can have devastating consequences for food security, and their social impact may be long-lasting. Climate change has increased the uncertainty of desert locust outbreaks, and predicting suitable habitats for this species under climate change scenarios will help humans deal with the potential threat of locust outbreaks. By comprehensively considering climate, soil, and terrain variables, the maximum entropy (MaxEnt) model was used to predict the potential habitats of solitary desert locusts in the 2050s and 2070s under the four shared socioeconomic pathways (SSP126, SSP245, SSP370, and SSP585) in the CMIP6 model. The modeling results show that the average area under the curve (AUC) and true skill statistic (TSS) reached 0.908 ± 0.002 and 0.701, respectively, indicating that the MaxEnt model performed extremely well and provided outstanding prediction results. The prediction results indicate that climate change will have an impact on the distribution of the potential habitat of solitary desert locusts. With the increase in radiative forcing overtime, the suitable areas for desert locusts will continue to contract, especially in the 2070s under the SSP585 scenario, and the moderately and highly suitable areas will decrease by 0.88 × 106 km2 and 1.55 × 106 km2, respectively. Although the potentially suitable area for desert locusts is contracting, the future threat posed by the desert locust to agricultural production and food security cannot be underestimated, given the combination of maintained breeding areas, frequent extreme weather events, pressure from population growth, and volatile sociopolitical environments. In conclusion, methods such as monitoring and early warning, financial support, regional cooperation, and scientific prevention and control of desert locust plagues should be further implemented.


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