Managing Agriculture to Manage
Climate Change
Soil types in the Yaqui Valley, Mexico: Farmers who have cared for the soil are less likely to be harmed by climate change.
How Will Climate Change Affect Intensive Farming?
CIMMYT scientists, with researchers at Stanford University's Department of Geological Science and Environmental Studies, have concluded that farmers are not totally at the mercy of climate change. They arrived at this conclusion through satellite observations of Mexico's Yaqui Valley. Conducted in three successive years, the observations confirmed that farmers could reduce the negative impact of weather on their crops by using appropriate farming practices.
The Yaqui Valley is ideal for studying the long-term effects of an intensive farming system on neighboring environments and the implications for global warming.* Since agricultural conditions in the Valley are representative of the irrigated environments that produce 40% of the developing world's wheat, study results will be applicable in those environments. This is extremely useful, considering that those environments will have to produce 90% or more of the grain needed to feed a population slated to increase steadily over the next 25 years.
As crop production intensifies, ecological damage and the emission of greenhouse gases will have to be brought under control. The results reported here namely that certain farming practices are not only more benign for the ecology, but help sustain farm production in the face of climate change should motivate farmers to adopt those practices.
Protecting the Environment by Protecting Agriculture
Researchers conducting this study chose four main soil types in the Yaqui Valley, and in each year they looked at average wheat yields from those soils. The three years of satellite observation showed great contrasts. The first was one of the warmest on record, the last was one of the coolest, and the other was intermediate. In a relatively short time, researchers could learn how wheat yields in the four soil types were affected by different climatic conditions, something that otherwise could have taken many years.
Based on these findings, the research team concluded that farmers on good soils are little affected even by marked climate changes, whereas farmers who have low-quality or degraded soils are more affected. Developing cropping practices that improve soil quality is thus critical not only for increasing yields, but also for diminishing vulnerability to climate change and avoiding soil erosion.
* See Nature 418:812-814.
For more information:
Ivan Ortiz-Monasterio
(i.ortiz-monasterio@cgiar.org)
August, 2004