Impacts of Present and Future Climate Variability on Agriculture and Forestry in the Temperate Regions: Europe

Abstract

Agriculture and forestry will be particularly sensitive to changes in mean climate and climate variability in the northern and southern regions of Europe. Agriculture may be positively affected by climate change in the northern areas through the introduction of new crop species and varieties, higher crop production and expansion of suitable areas for crop cultivation. The disadvantages may be determined by an increase in need for plant protection, risk of nutrient leaching and accelerated breakdown of soil organic matter. In the southern areas the benefits of the projected climate change will be limited, while the disadvantages will be predominant. The increased water use efficiency caused by increasing CO 2 will compensate for some of the negative effects of increasing water limitation and extreme weather events, but lower harvestable yields, higher yield variability and reduction in suitable areas of traditional crops are expected for these areas. Forestry in the Mediterranean region may be mainly affected by increases in drought and forest fires. In northern Europe, the increased precipitation is expected to be large enough to compensate for the increased evapotranspiration. On the other hand, however, increased precipitation, cloudiness and rain days and the reduced duration of snow cover and soil frost may negatively affect forest work and timber logging determining lower profitability of forest production and a decrease in recreational possibilities. Adaptation management strategies should be introduced, as effective tools, to reduce the negative impacts of climate change on agricultural and forestry sectors.Climatic Change (2005) 70: 117-135 c Springer 2005

Responses of Winter Wheat Yields to Warming-Mediated Vernalization Variations Across Temperate Europe

“…Winter wheat grown in temperate continental regions with drier spring and summer suffers water stress during the growing season (Ciais et al, 2005;Maracchi et al, 2005;Wu et al, 2014). Thus, winter wheat yields exhibit a positive response to variations in water supply, and this conclusion was confirmed by the positive relationship between winter wheat yields and total growing-season precipitation in temperate continental regions ( Figure 1C).…”

“…Increase in water use efficiency caused by increasing carbon dioxide concentration could partly compensate for some of the negative effects of increasing water limitation. However, lower harvestable yields, higher yield variability and reduction in suitable areas for winter wheat are expected in these areas (Maracchi et al, 2005;Lavalle et al, 2009). …”

Desempenho agronômico do milho em diferentes cenários climáticos no Centro-Oeste do Brasil

“…Indo de encontro aos resultados encontrados neste estudo para o Mato Grosso e Mato Grosso do Sul, Maracchi et al (2004) esperam pequenos aumentos na produtividade agrícola da Europa. Giorgi & Lionello (2008) também seguem o mesmo raciocínio para o Norte da Europa e regiões dos Alpes, porém afirmam que o aumento inicial na produtividade agrícola (em níveis moderados de aquecimento) tende a ser suprido por inundações mais frequentes e aumento da instabilidade do solo.…”

Dryness dynamics of the Baltic Sea region

“…Most of the scientific investigations are concentrated on the spatial and temporal distribution of droughts (Hisdal et al 2001;Loyd-Hughes, Saunders 2002; and on the impact of droughts on hydrological cycles (Bordi et al 2009;Wilson et al 2010;Tallaksen et al 2011). Droughts are analyzed in a very wide context of scientific researches: drought impact on agro-ecosystems (Sakalauskaitė 2006;Schindler et al 2007;Kalbarczyk 2010;Rad, Zandi 2012) and on forest life (Maracchi et al 2005;Lindner et al 2007;MacKay et al 2012); interactions with water bodies (Peters et al 2006;Jakimavičius, Kovalenkovienė 2010;Hän-ninen, Vuorinen 2011) and water quality (Sakalauskiene, Ignatavicius 2003;van Vliet, Zwolsman 2008;Zielinski et al 2009). Palaeoclimatological drought conditions are discovered using sediments (Dippner, Voss 2004) and tree rings (Vitas, Erlickytė 2008;Bünt-gen et al 2010;Drobyshev et al 2011) data analysis.…”