4.6 Article

Impact of climate change on the yield of tropical root and tuber crops vs. rice and potato in India

Journal

FOOD SECURITY
Volume 14, Issue 2, Pages 495-508

Publisher

SPRINGER
DOI: 10.1007/s12571-021-01226-z

Keywords

Climate change; Root and tuber crops; Yield; Crop model; WOFOST; LARS-weather generator

Funding

  1. Women Scientist Scheme, Department of Science & Technology, India (DST WOS-A)
  2. ICAR-Central Tuber Crops Research Institute (ICAR-CTCRI), Thiruvananthapuram, India
  3. All India Coordinated Research Project on Tuber Crops (AICRP-TC)

Ask authors/readers for more resources

This study examined the impact of climate change on tropical root and tuber crops in India using the crop model WOFOST. Results indicated that future crop yields will vary depending on climate change. Based on predicted yield variations and economic factors, cassava, sweet potato, greater yam, elephant foot yam, and taro can be considered as preferred crops in the future.
The current study focused on the impact of climate change on tropical root and tuber crops of India over some of the major growing areas using the crop model, WOFOST. As part of this study, the impact of climate change on the yield of rice and potato is also carried out using the same crop model to understand the advantages of root and tuber crops over the yield variations of rice and potato. The LARS weather generator is used to derive future climate for 2030, 2050, and 2070 for the two representative concentration pathways (RCPs)-4.5 and 8.5. The future climate projections in the study locations indicate an increment in minimum and maximum temperatures up to a value of 3.4 and 3.8 oC respectively. The rainfall also indicates a drastic fluctuation from -721 to 448 mm in the future. The results reveal that the predicted crop yield varies from one location to another depending on the future climate. Cassava (-13 to 12%, -17 to 8%), sweet potato (-32 to 14%, -38 to 13%), greater yam (-11 to 8, -14 to 6), elephant foot yam (-10 to 6, -12 to 4), and taro (-16 to 19, -28 to 18) can be considered as future crops based on their predicted yield variations and economics compared to that of rice (-26 to 15%, -50 to 18%) and potato (-37 to 7%, -59 to 8.5%) for both the RCPs. Among other crops, sweet potato has the same crop duration as rice and potato and can be recommended to increase food access. These crops can be recommended for enhancing the availability of food based on their superiority in dry matter production.

Authors

I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.

Reviews

Primary Rating

4.6
Not enough ratings

Secondary Ratings

Novelty
-
Significance
-
Scientific rigor
-
Rate this paper

Recommended

No Data Available
No Data Available