Monitoring of climate change and its impact on grain production in the Saratov region using remote sensing data

Abstract

The relevance of the topic of the article is due to the increase in the number of adverse climatic phenomena and the strengthening of their influence on the basic branch of agriculture - crop production. The differential manifestation of negative weather factors in the most productive regions leads to fluctuations in yields and agricultural production, disruption of food chains and a decrease in food stocks, thereby jeopardizing sustainable agricultural production and creating risks for ensuring the food security of the Russian Federation. This necessitates the study of regional features of the manifestation of dangerous weather phenomena for the subsequent substantiation of organizational and economic measures to mitigate the consequences and adapt agriculture to global climate change. As an example, we took the Saratov region, as a region with a significant amount of sown (planting) areas and a high share of crop production in the total crop production of the Russian Federation. Using satellite monitoring data, a number of adverse meteorological (weather) phenomena have been established that manifested themselves in the period from 1991 to 2019 in the Saratov region. The tendency to their growth and increase in duration in the territory of the given region is revealed. The dependence of the main indicators of grain production in the Saratov region on the growing influence of negative climatic factors has been studied. The necessity of taking into account the impact of hazardous meteorological (weather) phenomena in the system of strategic priorities, as well as in the preparation of forecasts for the socio-economic development of the region, modeling the impact of negative climatic factors on the structural balance of the agro-industrial complex, is substantiated.