Quantitative Assessment of Impact of Climate Change on Crop Yield over Sikkim and Central Region of India

Abstract

AbstractThe present work focuses on (1) assessing the yield of rice, wheat crop under RCPs scenario 4.5 and 8.5 using AquaCrop yield simulating model and (2) determining the best sowing date of crops for maximum yield output across Sikkim and Central region of India. The bias corrected GCM outputs were utilised to simulate the yields of wheat and rice. The AquaCrop model was first calibrated (1998–2007), validated (2008–2015) and then future yield of wheat and rice was simulated for years 2021–2099. The Aquacrop simulated results over Sikkim shows an increase in yield of 0.5–20% for rice crop and 2–44% for wheat crop during the future years 2021–2099. For the Central region of India, the result depicts the highest impact of future climate with reduction in crop yields particularly during for future period (2081–2099) under RCP 8.5 climate scenario. Under the changed climate over Central India, shifting of planting date of rice (5 days later for period 2021–2060, 10 days later for period 2061–2099) and for wheat (15 days later for period 2021–2099) is proposed as a practical adaptation measure for sustaining the future yields.KeywordsAquacropClimate scenariosGCMsRCP 4.5RCP 8.5