Mrs.drs. P. Reidsma: "Adaptation to climate change: European agriculture"

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19 Nov 2007 13:30
Unit: Wageningen University
Location: Aula, building 362, Gen. Foulkesweg 1, Wageningen
Organisation: Wageningen University
Promotor: prof.dr.ir. R. Leemans (Integrated Modelling of Land and Landuse)
Co Promotor: Prof.dr.ir. A. Oude Lansink (Promotor), F. Ewert

 Climate change influences agriculture. Most studies that address the vulnerability of agriculture have focussed on the potential impacts of climate change. Socio-economic conditions and farm management which influence adaptation are often not taken into account. However, farmers continuously adapt to changes and will also do so in the future.

This study assessed the adaptation of farmers and regions in the European Union to climate change and climate variability in the last decades, in the context of other conditions and changes. Results indicate that adaptation has a large influence on the actual impacts of climate change and climate variability on crop yields and farmers’ income. Farmers adapt to prevailing conditions; therefore the actual impacts are often smaller in regions where the potential impacts are the largest, as in Mediterranean regions. One of the adaptations that causes this is the larger farm diversity at regional level. Because different farms respond differently, the vulnerability at regional level is smaller.

For reliable projections of the impacts of climate change on agriculture, adaptation should thus not be seen anymore as a last step in a vulnerability assessment, but as integrated part of the models used to simulate crop yields, farmers’ income and agriculture biodiversity.
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