Subsistence Agriculture Productivity and Climate Extreme Events

Tásia Moura Cardoso Do Vale,Pollyanne Evangelista Da Silva,Bergson Guedes Bezerra,Lara De Melo Barbosa Andrade,Maria Helena Constantino Spyrides

doi:10.3390/atmos11121287

Tásia Moura Cardoso Do Vale, Pollyanne Evangelista Da Silva + Show 3 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos11121287

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Abstract

The occurrence of rainfall extreme events leads to several environmental, social, cultural, and economic consequences, heavily impacting agriculture. The analysis of climate extreme indices at the municipal level is of the uttermost importance to the overall study of climate variability and regional food security. Corn, bean, and cassava are among the most cultivated temporary subsistence crops. Thus, the objective of this study was to analyze the relationship between subsistence agriculture productivity and the behavior of rainfall extreme indices in the Rio Grande do Norte state in the period from 1980 to 2013. We used the dataset provided by Xavier (2016) and the climate extreme indices obtained through the Expert Team on Climate Change Detection and Indices. Crop productivity data were retrieved from the Municipal Agriculture Survey from the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics system. The methodology evaluated the behavior and the relationship between agricultural productivity time series and extreme precipitation indicators. We applied the following statistical techniques: descriptive analysis, time series trend analysis by the Mann-Kendall test, cluster analysis, and analysis of variance to check for equal means between identified groups. Cluster analysis was considered an adequate tool for the comprehension of data spatial distribution, allowing the identification of five homogenous subregions with different precipitation patterns. Rainfall extreme indices allowed the analysis of regional conditions regarding consecutive dry days, annual precipitation in wet days, and heavy rainfall. Trends were identified in these indices and they were significantly correlated with dryland crops productivity, indicating a direct relationship between water availability and regional agroclimatic stress.

Highlights

Scientific discussions on global climate variability and its environmental impacts have driven the need to better understand the effects of climate extreme events on food production systems [1,2,3].research and actions towards water security and the environmental pressure caused by climate extreme events should be emphasized [4,5,6].Periods of drought or heavy rainfall have immediate and long-term consequences for agriculture, leading to socioeconomic impacts due to these climate-related stresses [7,8]
The present study identified five homogeneous groups based on the occurrence of rainfall extreme events in the Rio Grande do Norte (RN) state
Productivity of subsistence agriculture, such as corn, bean, and cassava, in RN state was positively correlated with wet days and extreme rainfall indices, and higher yields were strongly associated with wetter years

Summary

Introduction

Scientific discussions on global climate variability and its environmental impacts have driven the need to better understand the effects of climate extreme events on food production systems [1,2,3].research and actions towards water security and the environmental pressure caused by climate extreme events should be emphasized [4,5,6].Periods of drought or heavy rainfall have immediate and long-term consequences for agriculture, leading to socioeconomic impacts due to these climate-related stresses [7,8]. Several studies reported that adversities caused by climate extreme events significantly impact agriculture production over a given a region [7,9,10]. Future climate scenarios projected by the Panel Climate Chance–IPCC report [11] showed that the increasing trend in the frequency of climate extreme events is a reality and agriculture in developing countries will face further water conflicts because sustainable food security is heavily dependent on natural resources [1]. Changes in climate extreme events such as: fewer cold days, longer heat waves, more frequent heavy rainfall, and drought episodes, severely impact the relationship between man and agriculture [12,13,14]

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