Climate Changes in the Mediterranean Region: Physical Aspects and Effects on Agriculture
While agriculture is a complex sector, the system is still dependent on climate, because heat, light, and water are the main drivers of crop growth. Plant diseases and pest infestations, as well as the supply of and demand for irrigation water are also de
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1 Background While agriculture is a complex sector, the system is still dependent on climate, because heat, light, and water are the main drivers of crop growth. Plant diseases and pest infestations, as well as the supply of and demand for irrigation water are also dependent on climate. There is now concern that the effects of climate variability on food production and costs will be exacerbated due to global warming with its potential for affecting the climatic regimes of entire regions (IPee, 2001). Furthermore, such shifts in climate in different nations may have different effects on agricultural productivity and costs. The effects of climate change on agriculture are thus likely to vary between different regions and different scales (global, regional and local). As a result, it is most important that impact assessments be undertaken for as many different locations as possible and for different sizes of study region, focusing not only in final production, but in other indicators of vulnerability of the agricultural sector. This will only be useful, however, if the methods of assessment are broadly compatible, enabling the generation of sets of results that can be compared and integrated into a wider picture. The purpose of this chapter is to provide guidance toward a set of approaches that will enable progress toward this objective. The Third Assessment Report of the IPee concludes that projected adverse impacts of climate change include a general reduction in potential crop yields in most tropical, subtropical and mid-latitude regions, and decreases in the water availability for agriculture and population in those regions. In addition, the assessment concludes that potential change in climate extremes could have major consequences, and those impacts are expected to fall disproportionately on the poor.
2 Why is Climate Change of Concern in Agriculture? World food production varies by several percent from year to year, largely as a result of weather conditions such as the inter-annual climatic variability in the Mediterranean and Sahel regions. But agriculture in some regions is more sensitive than in others. Typically, sensitivity to weather is greatest firstly in developing H.-J. Bolle (ed.), Mediterranean Climate © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2003
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countries, where technological buffering to droughts and floods is less advanced, and secondly in those regions where the main physical factors affecting production (soils, terrain and climate) are less suited to farming. A key task facing those concerned with conducting climate impact assessments is to identify those regions likely to be most vulnerable to climate change, so that impacts can be avoided (or at least reduced) through implementation of appropriate measures of adaptation.
3 Understanding Agriculture
the
Vulnerability
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Mediterranean
Current crop production in the Mediterranean region often fails to meet planned internal demand and/or export targets, thus altering the economic balance of nations in the region. Mediterran
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