Decreasing Resource Availability Research Articles

SEASONALITY CHALLENGES AND FINANCIAL STABILITY IN UZBEKISTAN’S MINERAL ENTERPRISES

Background: The reliance on mineral resources is crucial for the economic vitality of regions like Deposit, Uzbekistan; however, the seasonality of resource availability poses significant challenges. Specific Background: This study focuses on how fluctuating access to mineral resources impacts the financial and operational stability of local enterprises, particularly during off-peak seasons. Knowledge Gap: Despite the importance of understanding these dynamics, there is a lack of literature addressing context-specific strategies for mitigating seasonal impacts on resource-dependent enterprises in Uzbekistan. Aims: This research aims to identify and analyze the financial and operational challenges faced by enterprises in Deposit, as well as the strategies they employ to cope with these seasonal disruptions. Results: Through qualitative analysis of semi-structured interviews with 110 participants, including enterprise managers, workers, and policymakers, the study finds that decreased resource availability and erratic cash flow are primary concerns. Many enterprises resort to short-term cost-cutting measures, which, while providing immediate financial relief, threaten long-term operational efficiency and workforce retention. Novelty: This study uniquely contributes to the literature by highlighting the specific challenges faced in Deposit and examining the effectiveness of current coping strategies in a resource-dependent economy. Implications: The findings suggest that targeted government interventions, such as tax incentives during off-peak seasons and improvements in infrastructure, are essential for alleviating these challenges. Additionally, promoting diversification into complementary industries could enhance year-round financial stability. This research lays the groundwork for future studies on implementing these strategies and exploring alternative financial approaches in similar economies.

Theory-Guided Care of Intimate Partner Violence Trauma Patients in the Acute Care Setting Using the Vulnerable Populations Conceptual Model.

Background and Purpose: Vulnerable populations are social groups at increased risk for poor health outcomes. According to the vulnerable populations conceptual model (VPCM) nursing theory, vulnerable groups such as survivors of intimate partner violence (IPV) are at risk for disease, morbidity, and mortality due to limited resources. The purpose of this article is to propose the VPCM as an organizing theoretical framework in the acute care setting of trauma patients suffering from IPV by outlining the factors affecting the care of this vulnerable population. Results: This synthesis of the literature outlines the decreased resource availability and increased relative risk encountered by IPV survivors, which results in poor health, which supports the application of the VPCM as a guiding theory. The VPCM provides a structure for understanding IPV patients and equips nursing with a framework for taking action through engagement, assessment, intervention, and evaluation of practice when caring for this vulnerable trauma population in the acute care setting. Implications for Practice: Using a theory-based model provides a framework for clinical practice interventions. Further research in the application of the VPCM as a theoretical basis for caring for trauma patients who are survivors of IPV is needed.

Decoupled spatiotemporal patterns of avian taxonomic and functional diversity

Each year, seasonal bird migration leads to an immense redistribution of species occurrence and abundances,1,2,3 with pervasive, though unclear, consequences for patterns of multi-faceted avian diversity. Here, we uncover stark disparities in spatiotemporal variation between avian taxonomic diversity (TD) and functional diversity (FD) across the continental US. We show that the seasonality of species richness expectedly3 follows a latitudinal gradient, whereas seasonality of FD instead manifests a distinct east-west gradient. In the eastern US, the temporal patterns of TD and FD are diametrically opposed. In winter, functional richness is highest despite seasonal species loss, and the remaining most abundant species are amassed in fewer regions of the functional space relative to the rest of the year, likely reflecting decreased resource availability. In contrast, temporal signatures for TD and FD are more congruent in the western US. There, both species and functional richness peak during the breeding season, and species' abundances are more regularly distributed and widely spread across the functional space than during winter. Our results suggest that migratory birds in the western US disproportionately contribute to avian FD by possessing more unique trait characteristics than resident birds,4,5 while the primary contribution of migrants in the eastern US is through increasing the regularity of abundances within the functional space relative to the rest of the year. We anticipate that the uncovered complexity of spatiotemporal associations among measures of avian diversity will be the catalyst for adopting an explicitly temporal framework for multi-faceted biodiversity analysis.

Agriculture intensity and landscape configuration influence the spatial use of wildcats across Europe

Land use intensification is increasing worldwide and affects wildlife movements, particularly of specialist carnivores. Resource availability and anthropogenic activities drive the extent and shape of home range size. Wildlife may respond to decreased resource availability under intensification scenarios by increasing their home ranges; however they may be less affected when inhabiting sustainable agricultural landscapes. We investigate whether agricultural practices and landscape configuration influence the spatial behaviour of wildcats, a medium-sized specialist carnivore inhabiting landscapes with different degrees of agricultural presence across Europe. We focus on the effect of the proportions of high impact and low impact agriculture, forest integrity and forest edge density on wildcat home range size. We found that wildcat home range increased along with the proportion of high impact agriculture and the forest integrity, whereas it decreased when forest edge density increased. Forest edge density buffered the detrimental effects caused by high impact agriculture. To enhance the long term conservation of wildcats in Europe it is crucial to protect the sustainable mosaic-structured landscapes and prevent its conversion to homogenous intensified agricultural landscapes.

The Integrated Defense System: Optimizing Defense against Predators, Pathogens, and Poisons.

Insects, like other animals, have evolved defense responses to protect against predators, pathogens, and poisons (i.e., toxins). This paper provides evidence that these three defense responses (i.e., fight-or-flight, immune, and detoxification responses) function together as part of an Integrated Defense System (IDS) in insects. The defense responses against predators, pathogens, and poisons are deeply intertwined. They share organs, resources, and signaling molecules. By connecting defense responses into an IDS, animals gain flexibility, and resilience. Resources can be redirected across fight-or-flight, immune, and detoxification defenses to optimize an individual's response to the current challenges facing it. At the same time, the IDS reconfigures defense responses that are losing access to resources, allowing them to maintain as much function as possible despite decreased resource availability. An IDS perspective provides an adaptive explanation for paradoxical phenomena such as stress-induced immunosuppression, and the observation that exposure to a single challenge typically leads to an increase in the expression of genes for all three defense responses. Further exploration of the IDS will require more studies examining how defense responses to a range of stressors are interconnected in a variety of species. Such studies should target pollinators and agricultural pests. These studies will be critical for predicting how insects will respond to multiple stressors, such as simultaneous anthropogenic threats, for example, climate change and pesticides.

Investigating the Impact of Resilience, Responsiveness, and Quality on Customer Loyalty of MSMEs: Empirical Evidence

Due to the importance of the micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) sector and the negative implications of COVID-19, which resulted in decreasing resource availability, shortages of supply, declining consumer demand and requirements, and a lack of consumer satisfaction and loyalty, this research investigates the impact of resilience, responsiveness, and quality on customer loyalty in MSMEs. An online questionnaire was conducted on MSMEs’ end consumers in the Egyptian context. The analysis was conducted through Amos and SPSS, and the research hypotheses were tested through covariance-based structural equation modelling for 891 valid questionnaires. The findings exposed that there is a positive significant impact for operational resilience (flexibility and technology adoption), responsiveness (delivery fulfillment and speed and after-sale service), and product/service quality on customer loyalty in terms of behavioral, attitudinal dimensions. It contributes to understanding how MSMEs could enhance their sustainable performance (resilience, responsiveness, quality) to reach better customer loyalty. This research presents insights on how the MSMEs sector can adapt to the dynamic business environment in terms of COVID-19 crisis and consumer behavior, which has changed the nature and needs of the market and consumers. In addition, this research extends the theories of Resource-Based View (RBV), Dynamic Capability View (DCV), and Theory of Consumption Value (TCV) in an empirical contribution through filling the gap in understanding consumers’ needs in terms of resilience, responsiveness, and quality.

Integrating Environmental and Economic Perspectives in Building Design

With increasing environmental damage and decreasing resource availability, sustainability assessment in the building sector is gaining momentum. A literature review shows that the related methods for environmental and economic performance, Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Life Cycle Costing (LCC), show great potential for answering a multitude of questions related to building performance. Prevalent topics are the implications of LCA and LCC for retrofit solutions and the trade-offs between environmental and economic considerations in building design. A detailed review of 30 case studies shows the range of differing result integration methods and sheds light on the use of monetary valuation of environmental indicators for an integrated assessment. While a quasi-dynamic approach, accounting for the changing value of money over time, is common in LCC, such an approach is largely absent from LCA. The analysis of common metrics shows that the studies employ strongly differing system boundaries and input parameters. Moreover, a clear description of the methodological framework is missing in most studies. Therefore, this research develops an “Eco2” framework, integrating LCA and LCC for application in building design. Potential further developments for Eco2 building assessment are related to extending the system boundaries by including mechanical systems and end-of-life phases, data collection and structuring, and streamlining the approach for continuous application to all stages of building design processes. Additionally, the influence on design decisions of employing temporal parameters in both LCA and LCC and of choosing particular result integration methods should be investigated further.

FOOD RESOURCE SHARING AMONG BENTHIC AND NEKTONIC STREAM FISH SPECIES

Several tropical freshwater fish species are generally generalistic feeders, sometimes followed by a diet reduction during the period of decreased resource availability. This study aimed to analyze the dietary overlap between nektonic and benthic fish species. The stomachs of 82 obligatory nektonics and 52 benthic were removed. The diet composition for each individual was determined based on the analysis of the stomach content, and the contents were grouped into 11 categories. For the analysis of food items, the method of degree of food preference was used. To verify the niche overlap between benthic and nectonic, the Pianka index was applied. Benthic species consumed items across all 11 food categories and nektonic species consumed nine. The diet composition of species with nektonic and benthic habits showed a significant difference. Dietary overlapping suggests a supply of the same resources, as they are shared by both groups. The high concentration of water insect larvae in the food content of all sampled fish species, regardless of the position in the water column, shows the importance of insects in the water ecosystems. The composition of ecosystem diets is helpful towards understanding the community structure and can explain the coexistence between different fish’s groups where live in different micro-habitats and how tactics used to capture food which may minimize the effects of overlapping and competitive exclusion.

Synchrony erodes spatial portfolios of an anadromous fish and alters availability for resource users.

Environmental forces can create spatially synchronous dynamics among nearby populations. However, increased climate variability, driven by anthropogenic climate change, will likely enhance synchrony among spatially disparate populations. Population synchrony may lead to greater fluctuations in abundance, but the consequences of population synchrony across multiple scales of biological organization, including impacts to putative competitors, dependent predators or human communities, are rarely considered in this context. Chinook salmon Oncorhynchus tshawytscha stocks distribute across the Northeast Pacific, creating spatially variable portfolios that support large ocean fisheries and marine mammal predators, such as killer whales Orcinus orca. We rely on a multi-population model that simulates Chinook salmon ocean distribution and abundance to understand spatial portfolios, or variability in abundance within and among ocean distribution regions, of Chinook salmon stocks across 17 ocean regions from Southeast Alaska to California. We found the expected positive correlation between the number of stocks in an ocean region and spatial portfolio strength; however, increased demographic synchrony eroded Chinook salmon spatial portfolios in the ocean. Moreover, we observed decreased resource availability within ocean fishery management jurisdictions but not within killer whale summer habitat. We found a strong portfolio effect across both Southern Resident and Northern Resident killer whale habitats that was relatively unaffected by increased demographic synchrony, likely a result of the large spatial area included in these habitats. However, within the areas of smaller fishing management jurisdictions we found a weakening of Chinook salmon portfolios and increased but inconsistent likelihood of low abundance years as demographic synchrony increased. We suggest that management and conservation actions that reduce spatial synchrony can enhance short-term ecosystem resilience by promoting the stabilizing effect multiple stocks have on aggregate Chinook salmon populations and overall resource availability.

Increased Mortality in Underinsured Penetrating Trauma Patients.

It remains unclear whether an increased mortality risk in uninsured patients exists across Injury Severity Score (ISS) classifications. We hypothesized that penetrating trauma self-pay patients would have a similarly increased mortality risk across all ISS categories. The National Trauma Data Bank (2013-2015) was queried for patients presenting with penetrating firearm, explosive, or stab wound injuries. 115651 patients were identified and a stratified multivariable logistic regression model was used. In the >15 ISS group, self-pay patients had a lower median total hospital Length of Stay (LOS) (3 vs 8, P < .001), lower median Intensive Care Unit LOS (1 vs 3, P < .001), and lower median ventilator days (0 vs 1, P < .001). Self-pay patients had an increased risk for mortality compared to patients with private insurance in both the ≤15 ISS group (OR 2.68, P < .001) and >15 ISS group (OR 1.56, P < .001). Uninsured patients have an increased mortality risk in both low and high ISS groups. A higher mortality risk among uninsured patients in the high ISS group can be explained by decreased resource availability and lower ICU days and ventilator time. However, more studies are needed to determine why there is an even greater mortality risk among uninsured patients with mild ISS.

Diminished growth and vitality in juvenile Hydractinia echinata under anticipated future temperature and variable nutrient conditions

In a warming climate, rising seawater temperatures and declining primary and secondary production will drastically affect growth and fitness of marine invertebrates in the northern Atlantic Ocean. To study the ecological performance of juvenile hydroids Hydractinia echinata we exposed them to current and predicted water temperatures which reflect the conditions in the inter- and subtidal in combination with changing food availability (high and low) in laboratory experiments. Here we show, that the interplay between temperature stress and diminished nutrition affected growth and vitality of juvenile hydroids more than either factor alone, while high food availability mitigated their stress responses. Our numerical growth model indicated that the growth of juvenile hydroids at temperatures beyond their optimum is a saturation function of energy availability. We demonstrated that the combined effects of environmental stressors should be taken into consideration when evaluating consequences of climate change. Interactive effects of ocean warming, decreasing resource availability and increasing organismal energy demand may have major impacts on biodiversity and ecosystem function.

Abiotic and biotic interactions as drivers of plant reproduction in response to fire frequency

Plant reproduction is influenced by abiotic resources and biotic mutualistic and antagonistic interactions, which in turn can be affected by anthropogenic disturbances such as increased fire frequency. Because frequent fires deplete soil fertility and thus decrease resource availability for plants, we hypothesize that increased fire frequency decreases specific leaf area (SLA) and reproductive success. In addition, lower SLA levels in frequently burned sites should decrease herbivore damage because of reduced leaf palatability. Finally, increased fire frequency will have stronger negative effects on specialist insects (seed predators) as compared to generalist feeding insects such as herbivores and pollinators, which can have direct consequences on plant reproduction. Through an integrative path analytical approach, we assess fire frequency effects on the reproductive success of two resprouting legumes from the Chaco Serrano (Desmodium uncinatum and Rhynchosia edulis), estimating the relative importance of SLA along with pollination, insect herbivory and seed predation interactions. Increased fire frequency decreased SLA but it did not affect biotic interactions in both plant species, with the exception of increased leaf herbivory in R. edulis. Sexual reproduction of D. uncinatum was reduced in burned sites but it remained similar across burned and unburned sites in R. edulis. Within burned areas, both species efficiently maximized the allocation to reproduction, showing a conservative strategy in the use of resources when SLA levels are extremely low. Decreased plant fecundity, especially in D. uncinatum, is likely to impact on the density and long-term viability of populations growing in anthropogenic high fire frequency areas.

Movement rules determine nomadic species' responses to resource supplementation and degradation.

In environments that vary unpredictably, many animals are nomadic, moving in an irregular pattern that differs from year to year. Exploring the mechanisms of nomadic movement is needed to understand how animals survive in highly variable environments, and to predict behavioural and population responses to environmental change. We developed a network model to identify plausible mechanisms of nomadic animal movement by comparing the performance of multiple movement rules along a continuum from nomadism to residency. Using simulations and analytical results, we explored how different types of habitat modifications (that augment or decrease resource availability) might affect the abundance and movement rates of animals following each of these rules. Movement rules for which departure from patches depended on resource availability and/or competition performed almost equally well and better than residency or uninformed movement under most conditions, even though animals using each rule moved at substantially different rates. Habitat modifications that stabilized resources, either by resource supplementation or degradation, eroded the benefits of informed nomadic movements, particularly for movements based on resource availability alone. These results suggest that simple movement rules can explain nomadic animal movements and determine species' responses to environmental change. In particular, landscape stabilization and supplementation might be useful strategies for promoting populations of resident animals, but would be less beneficial for managing highly mobile species, many of which are threatened by habitat disruption and changes in climate.

Per‐gram competitive effects and contrasting soil resource effects in grasses and woody plants

Abstract Plant species differ in their competitive effects by decreasing resource availability via uptake, but in some cases may increase resource availability via non‐uptake pathways. Here we explore differences between grasses and woody plants in their competitive effects, and relate these to differences in resource effects. We grew five species each of grasses and woody plants in monocultures for 8 years. In the final two growing seasons, competitive effects were measured by growing transplants in all monocultures and in plots without neighbours. Total competitive effects were significantly greater for woody plants than that for grasses. In contrast, the competitive effect per gram of grasses was about 17 times greater than that of woody plants. For grasses, soil water (SoilW) and soil available N (SoilN) decreased significantly with increasing biomass. In contrast, for woody plants, SoilW and SoilN increased significantly with increasing biomass. The results suggest that the intense per‐gram competitive effects in grasses are related to the uptake of soil resources, and that the significantly lower per‐gram competitive effects of woody plants may be related to their positive effects on soil resources. Synthesis. The results link differences in competitive effects between grasses and woody plants to differences in the direction of their effects on soil resources. These differences may contribute to the entrainment of negative feedback in grasslands, excluding trees by means of strong competition, and the entrainment of positive feedback beneath woody plants establishing in grasslands, resulting in a state change from grassland to woody vegetation.

Incorporating Diversity Into Animal Production Systems Can Increase Their Performance and Strengthen Their Resilience

Animal production systems (APSs) have long been transformed through intensification, specialization and geographical concentration, leading them to become major anthropogenic drivers of pollution, climate change, and biodiversity loss. Agroecology, organic farming and sustainable intensification have been proposed as alternative models to invert those trends. Diversity is highly valued in agroecology and organic farming, in which it is assumed not only to increase farm performance but also to strengthen farm resilience. Here, we examine how the diversity of system components and interactions among these components can increase productivity, resource-use efficiency and farm resilience in aquaculture, rabbit, monogastric and ruminant systems. In doing so, we reveal that the same processes can occur in very different systems. For instance, the higher performance of multi-species aquaculture or ruminant grazing systems results from (i) the complementary feeding habits of animal species that exploit resources from different ecological niches more efficiently; and (ii) facilitation or competitive exclusion, which results in a species increasing or decreasing resource availability for another species. The benefits of diversity are observed not only in relatively extensive systems but also in intensive indoor systems. For instance, genetic diversity is associated with herd and social immunity in rabbit production, while trade-offs between life functions play a major role in dairy herd performance. In the last section, we discuss how management options nested in system component diversity and their interactions can enhance system resilience. Strategic and tactical management of APS diversity can promote farm buffering and adaptive capabilities, respectively, via the abovementioned processes. By stabilizing the farm financial situation and facilitating access to short supply channels, transformative changes, such as a diversification of the animal species bred or development of a processing enterprise on farm, expand options for increasing the resilience of APSs to market price fluctuations and climatic shocks. However, the need for new technical skills and sometimes high initial investments can act as strong inhibitors of farm diversification. We conclude with a description of some of the research or action that is needed for these principles to be more widely implemented in commercial farms.

Assessment of climate change impacts on energy capacity planning in Ontario, Canada using high-resolution regional climate model

Climate change may alter energy demand as well as energy supply, thus posing a threat to energy security. This study investigates the long-term energy security responses to climate change for Ontario from a planning perspective. A regional climate model (RCM) is employed to assess the climate-driven changes in energy sectors at a 25 km × 25 km resolution. Reliable projections of changes in climatic variables are provided to assess their impacts on cooling degree days, heating degree days, and energy availability. Quantified sensitivities of residential and commercial energy consumptions to degree days are incorporated with future projections to estimate energy demand changes. We then estimate the impact of climate change on the primary power sources, including nuclear power, hydropower, gas, wind energy, and solar energy from a capacity planning perspective. Results indicate that winter warms more rapidly than summer in Ontario. This leads to heating degree days decreasing 2 times faster than cooling degree days increasing. Changes in degree days result in an increase in summer electricity demand and a reduction in winter gas consumption. We also find that efficiencies of hydropower and wind energy could be reduced in different scales because of decreased resource availability. The efficiency of nuclear power is sensitive to the temperature rise, but relatively less reduced compared to other energy sources. Solar energy production can benefit from climate change for the perspective of a decrease in rainy and cloudy days. With the increased electricity demand and decreased availability of water and wind resources, more green energy capacities are expected to build to ensure the long-term energy security for Ontario.

Investigating the Dynamics of Elk Population Size and Body Mass in a Seasonal Environment Using a Mechanistic Integral Projection Model.

Environmentally mediated changes in body size often underlie population responses to environmental change, yet this is not a universal phenomenon. Understanding when phenotypic change underlies population responses to environmental change is important for obtaining insights and robust predictions of population dynamics in a changing world. We develop a dynamic integral projection model that mechanistically links environmental conditions to demographic rates and phenotypic traits (body size) via changes in resource availability and individual energetics. We apply the model to the northern Yellowstone elk population and explore population responses to changing patterns of seasonality, incorporating the interdependence of growth, demography, and density-dependent processes operating through population feedback on available resources. We found that small changes in body size distributions can have large impacts on population dynamics but need not cause population responses to environmental change. Environmental changes that altered demographic rates directly, via increasing or decreasing resource availability, led to large population impacts in the absence of substantial changes to body size distributions. In contrast, environmentally driven shifts in body size distributions could occur with little consequence for population dynamics when the effect of environmental change on resource availability was small and seasonally restricted and when strong density-dependent processes counteracted expected population responses. These findings highlight that a robust understanding of how associations between body size and demography influence population responses to environmental change will require knowledge of the shape of the relationship between phenotypic distributions and vital rates, the population status with regard to its carrying capacity, and importantly the nature of the environmentally driven change in body size and carrying capacity.

Howler monkey tolerance to habitat shrinking: Lifetime warranty or death sentence?

Habitat loss and fragmentation are major threats to the conservation of nonhuman primates. Given that species differ in their responses to fragmented landscapes, identifying the factors that enable them to cope with altered environments or that cause their extirpation is critical to design conservation management strategies. Howler monkeys (Alouatta spp.) are good models for studying the strategies of tolerant arboreal taxa and how they cope with spatial restriction, because they live in habitats ranging from vast pristine forests to small disturbed fragments and orchards. While some aspects of their ecology and behavior are conserved, others vary in predictable ways in response to habitat shrinking and decreasing resource availability. We argue that the ability of individual howler monkeys to inhabit low-quality environments does not guarantee the long-term persistence of the small populations that live under these conditions. Their local extirpation explains why few forest fragments below a given area threshold are frequently inhabited in landscapes where recolonization and gene flow are compromised by long isolation distances or less permeable matrices. In sum, howlers' ability to cope with habitat restriction at the individual level in the short-term may mask the inevitable fate of isolated populations, thereby compromising the persistence of the species at a regional scale in the long-term if howlers' need for protection in large forests is undervalued.

Impact of exotic pastures on epigeic arthropod diversity and contribution of native and exotic plant sources to their diet in the central Brazilian savanna

Much of the Brazilian savanna (known locally as the Cerrado) has been converted to pasture of African C4 grasses (exotic pastures) for livestock production. The resulting habitat simplification and decreased resource availability may be significant factors underlying the impact on some soil arthropod groups, although it is still unclear how the different soil groups respond to this impact in the Brazilian savanna. We sampled epigeic arthropods in exotic pastures, adjacent woodland savanna fragments (cerrado sensu stricto), and savanna-pasture boundaries to investigate the impact of pasture on their diversity and activity, identifying the arthropods that contribute most to the between-habitat dissimilarities and those most vulnerable to pasture implementation. We also estimated the contribution of native and exotic plants to the diets of frequently observed arthropods in each habitat using carbon and nitrogen stable isotope analysis. We found lower richness and diversity of epigeic arthropods in pastures, where we also observed decreased activity of predator groups, whereas the activity of Symphypleona and Poduromorpha springtails increased. Springtail orders and Myrmicinae morphospecies were the main contributors to the between-habitat dissimilarities. Staphylinidae, Ptiliidae, and Zodariidae morphospecies seem to be vulnerable to exotic pastures. Our isotopic models show that woodland savanna arthropods feed preferentially on native C3-plant sources, while also showing signs of exotic C4 sources in their diet. These outcomes indicate that foraging or dispersal events may occur between habitats since arthropods captured in pastures also show signs of native sources in their diet.

Simulated climate change deferentially impacts phenotypic plasticity and stoichiometric homeostasis in major food crops

Grain yield and product quality responses of major food crops to variation in resource availability continue to be important considerations in agronomic research, particularly under abiotic stresses. Indices of grain quality and phenotypic plasticity of crop cultivars with C3 or C4 metabolic pathways and producing seed with either carbohydrate, protein, oil; or a combination of carbohydrate-protein or oil-protein as their major product, were quantified for six years under two phases of single and multiple abiotic stresses. Decreasing resource availability caused by short growing season and high population density, singly or in combination, resulted in significant changes in allometric relationships among most traits under study. Temporal quantitative and qualitative differences between “heatmaps” of stress phases, partitioning and analysis of total variance due to fixed and random factors, and functional relationship at hierarchical levels of organization, indicated a shift over time of phenotypic plasticity and quality indices. Moreover, relationships of phenotypic plasticity and quality index with biomass, grain yield, macro- and micronutrients, and nutrient ratios were largely modulated by differences between crop products within metabolic pathways. However, further research is needed for in-depth understanding and insights into the interdependencies of the large number of traits that crop plants should optimize to produce economic yield combined with adequate nutritional quality under abiotic stress.