Managing Climate Variability Research Articles

Increases in understory plant cover and richness persist following restoration treatments inPinus ponderosaforests

AbstractA combination of forest thinning followed by prescribed burning is widely applied in the western United States to increase ecosystem resistance and resilience to disturbances. Understory plant community responses may be driven by both management treatments and climatic factors. Thus, responses to treatments during a 20‐year megadrought have implications for the role of management in fostering adaptive capacity to climate change.We used a network of five sites (600 plots) spanning an environmental gradient in ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa) forests of the American Southwest, an ecosystem that is broadly distributed and actively managed throughout the western United States. We used repeated long‐term monitoring data to quantify plant community responses to treatment 1–5‐, 6–10‐ and >10‐year post‐implementation. Specifically, we focussed on the effects of treatment and abiotic conditions on native and non‐native plant cover and species richness and the proportion of native species with northern (cool‐mesic) biogeographic affinities.Overall, thinning and prescribed burning nearly doubled native cover and increased native species richness by about 50% relative to untreated controls. These effects persisted for over a decade after treatment, even under the influence of significant and persistent drought. Cover and richness were also greater on intermediate to wet sites. Finally, native species with northern biogeographic affinities were reduced for up to 5 years after treatment relative to those with southern (warm‐xeric) affinities, and in dry years, indicating that both management and interannual climate variability may foster shifts to plant communities that are more resilient to a warming climate.Synthesis and applications. In ponderosa pine forests of the American Southwest, tree thinning followed by prescribed burning will generally promote restoration goals of increasing resilience to climate change by enhancing the diversity and abundance of native understory plant species, even during a persistent 20‐year megadrought.

Climate Services for Agriculture: Tools for Informing Decisions Relating to Climate Change and Climate Variability in the Wine Industry

Background and Aims. Australia’s changing climate is already impacting the agriculture sector and will continue to do so in the future. To help respond to these impacts, the Climate Services for Agriculture (CSA) platform presents readily accessible climate data, including future climate projections, relevant to specific agricultural commodities. This wine industry example aims to demonstrate the functionality and utility of the CSA for national use across a broad range of commodities. Methods and Results. The platform includes commodity-relevant climate indices designed in consultation with experts to ensure that they are as salient to producers as possible; the wine-grape specific indices include measures of growing season temperature, rainfall, extreme heat, and frost. Here, we describe the research behind the wine-grape specific indices and present sample outputs from the CSA platform for a site within a selected winegrowing region. We note the CSA platform has been developed through an extensive and continuing user engagement initiative, ensuring it meets the needs of the agriculture community as they grapple with how to make decisions based on longer term climate projections. Conclusions. Provision of past, seasonal outlook, and future climate information for Australia and for a range of important agricultural commodities can help improve on-farm planning and decision-making to respond to climate risks. The wine industry provides a leading example of how to use these data for decision-making, noting ongoing adjustments will be needed. Significance of the Study. The CSA platform brings together historical climate data, seasonal climate outlooks, and future climate projections to assist agricultural producers to better manage climate variability and climate change. It aims to nationalise this information for all major agricultural commodities in Australia. We use wine production as a demonstration case here.

An Exigency for Ice Core Studies to Determine Spatio-temporal Variability in Moisture Sources and Impact of Black Carbon – Mineral Aerosols on the Himalayan Glaciers

Himalayan glaciers‒ the store house of fresh water outside the polar region contributes ~45% of the total river flow by glacial melt in the Indus, Ganga and Brahmaputra watersheds which supports the livelihood of ~500 million people . The sustainability of these rivers is being questioned because of the growing evidences of accelerated glacier retreat in the recent decades, which is expected to have cascading effects on the mountainous areas and their surrounding lowlands. The rapid melting of Himalayan glaciers reveals their sensitivity to ongoing changes in climate dynamics, and if the current trend continues, rivers that rely heavily on snow/ice melt are expected to suffer hydrological disruptions to the point where some of the most populous areas may ‘run out of water’ during the dry season. Therefore, efforts are being made to study the glacier mass balance trends in order to understand the patterns and causes of recent recessional trend. Despite their importance, the absence of long-term mass-balance and remote sensing data restricts our knowledge of the Himalayan glaciers’ sensitivity/ response to climate change. Furthermore, such studies may be insufficient unless are compared to long-term glacier fluctuations (millennial and multi-millennial time scales), which aid in better understanding the natural trends of and human impacts on climate change, as well as assessing the causes and possible future of contemporary shrinking glaciers. This will also improve our understanding of past glacier behaviour in the context of primary causes of glacier change, which is critical for water resource management and understanding climate variability in high alpine areas where alternative proxy climate archives are typically scarce. Therefore, it is pertinent to pool our scientific resources and energy (i) towards understanding the Himalayan glaciers’ feeders (precipitation sources) and how they changed over time (geological and historical), as well as the causes of glaciers recession, one of which has been identified as (ii) black soot (carbon) in aerosol pollution.

Going with the Trend: Forecasting Seasonal Climate Conditions under Climate Change

AbstractFor managing climate variability and adapting to climate change, seasonal forecasts are widely produced to inform decision-making. However, seasonal forecasts from global climate models are found to poorly reproduce temperature trends in observations. Furthermore, this problem is not addressed by existing forecast postprocessing methods that are needed to remedy biases and uncertainties in model forecasts. The inability of the forecasts to reproduce the trends severely undermines user confidence in the forecasts. In our previous work, we proposed a new statistical postprocessing model that counteracted departures in trends of model forecasts from observations. Here, we further extend this trend-aware forecast postprocessing methodology to carefully treat the trend uncertainty associated with the sampling variability due to limited data records. This new methodology is validated on forecasting seasonal averages of daily maximum and minimum temperatures for Australia based on the SEAS5 climate model of the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts. The resulting postprocessed forecasts are shown to have proper trends embedded, leading to greater accuracy in regions with significant trends. The application of this new forecast postprocessing is expected to boost user confidence in seasonal climate forecasts.

Transforming Food Systems in Africa under Climate Change Pressure: Role of Climate-Smart Agriculture

Low-income producers and consumers of food in Africa are more vulnerable to climate change, owing to their comparatively limited ability to invest in more adapted institutions and technologies under increasing climatic risks. Therefore, the way we manage our food systems needs to be urgently changed if the goal is to achieve food security and sustainable development more quickly. This review paper analyzes the nexus “climate-smart agriculture-food systems-sustainable development” in order to draw sound ways that could allow rapid transformation of food systems in the context of climate change pressure. We followed an integrative review approach based on selected concrete example-experiences from ground-implemented projects across Africa (Ghana, Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, in West Africa, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, and Tanzania in East Africa). Mostly composed of examples from the Climate Change, Agriculture, and Food Security (CCAFS) Research Program of the CGIAR (former Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research) and its partners, these also included ground initiatives from non-CGIAR that could provide demonstrable conditions for a transformative agriculture and food systems. The lessons learnt from the ground implementation of climate-smart agriculture (CSA), in the African context, were instrumental to informing the actions areas of the food-system transformation framework suggested in this paper (reroute, de-risk, reduce, and realign). Selected CSA example-cases to inform these action areas included 24 initiatives across Africa, but with a focus on the following studies for an in-depth analysis: (1) the climate-smart village approach to generate knowledge on climate-smart agriculture (CSA) technologies and practices for their scaling, (2) the use of climate information services (CIS) to better manage climate variability and extremes, and (3) the science–policy interfacing to mainstream CSA into agricultural development policies and plans. The analysis of these examples showed that CSA can contribute driving a rapid change of food systems in Africa through: (1) the implementation of relevant climate-smart technologies and practices to reroute farming and rural livelihoods to new climate-resilient and low-emission trajectories; (2) the development and application of weather and climate information services (WCIS) that support de-risking of livelihoods, farms, and value chains in the face of increasing vagaries of weather and extreme events; (3) the use of climate-smart options that minimize waste of all the natural resources used for growing, processing, packaging, transporting, and marketing food, and therefore mitigating the carbon footprint attached to this food loss and waste; and (4) the realignment of policies and finance that facilitate action in the four proposed action areas through the identification of news ways to mobilize sustainable finance and create innovative financial mechanisms and delivery channels.

Accelerating Seed Germination and Juvenile Growth of Sorghum (Sorghum bicolor L. Moench) to Manage Climate Variability through Hydro-Priming

Agriculture in Mali, a country in Sahelian West Africa, strongly depends on rainfall and concurrently has a low adaptive capacity, making it consequently one of the most vulnerable regions to climate change worldwide. Since early-season drought limits crop germination, and hence growth, ultimately yield during rain-fed depending on production is commonly experienced nowadays in Mali. Germination and establishment of key crops such as the staple sorghum could be improved by seed priming. The effects of hydro-priming with different water sources (e.g., distilled, tap, rain, river, well water) were evaluated respectively for three priming time durations in tepid e.g., at 25 °C (4, 8, and 12 h) and by hot water at 70 °C (in contrast to 10, 20, and 30 min.) in 2014 and 2015. Seed germination and seedling development of nine sorghum genotypes were monitored. Compared to non-primed seed treatments, hydro-priming significantly [p = 0.01] improved final germination percentage, germination rate index, total seedling length, root length, root vigor index, shoot length, and seedling dry weight. The priming with water from wells and rivers resulted in significant higher seed germination (85%) and seedling development, compared to the three other sources of water. Seed germination rate, uniformity, and speed were enhanced by hydro-priming also. It is argued that hydro-priming is a safe and simple method that effectively improve seed germination and seedling development of sorghum. If used in crop fields, the above most promising genotypes may contribute to managing early season drought and avoid failure of seed germination and crop failure in high climate variability contexts.

Impact of recent vegetation greening on temperature and precipitation over China

Changes in land-use management and natural climate variability has led to significant vegetation greening in China over the past decades, as evidenced by satellite observations. In this study, we used a high-resolution land-atmosphere coupled regional climate model to assess the impacts of recent greening on China's regional summer climate. Our results inferred a country-averged surface cooling of 0.11 °C and a precipitation increase of 0.02 mm/d during summer in response to China's widespread greening. We also identified significant regional variability in the climatic responses to vegetation change. The regions of northern China showed significant cooling, including the Northeast China Plain, Loess Plateau, and the eastern areas of the Northern arid and semi-arid region; however, no significant temperature changes were simulated in southern China. Summer precipitation decreased in southern China and increased in the Huang-Huai-Hai Plain and the northern Loess Plateau. Variations in moisture flux convergence had a stronger influence on the precipitation patterns relative to evapotranspiration. Furthermore, our results suggested that vegetation greening would influence the occurrence of extreme climate events by decreasing the number of heatwave days (by 1–3 days, particularly in northern China), reducing the number of continuous drought events in northern China, and minimizing the risks of floods in southern China.

Farmers’ Beliefs and Concerns about Climate Change: An Assessment from Southern Saudi Arabia

Climate change constitutes a major threat to agricultural production, food security, and natural resource management. Saudi Arabia is particularly susceptible to increasing temperatures and extreme climatic events, such as arid weather and drought. The purpose of this study is to assess farmers’ beliefs and concerns as regards climate change. Extensive interviews were conducted with 164 farmers in the Jazan region. Results revealed that 89.6% of the farmers believed that climate change is due to human activities and 93.3% believed that it is because of natural change. Seventy-five percent of the farmers were concerned about insects and 73% about the prevalence of weeds on their farms. Findings of cluster analysis revealed that farmers who are more likely to believe in climate change are more in agreement with the role of extension services in capacity building. Farmers’ beliefs about climate change were significantly influenced by membership of agricultural cooperatives, access to loans, use of extension services, age, farm size, and level of soil fertility. Access to loans was the only significant factor to explain the differences in farmers’ concerns. These results suggest the need for capacity-building activities targeted at improving farmers’ adaptability to manage climate variability.

Runoff water quantity and quality data from native tallgrass prairie and crop–livestock systems in Oklahoma between 1977 and 1999

Erosion and sedimentation pose serious threats to soil and water quality worldwide, including in the U.S. southern Great Plains. To better understand these processes in agricultural landscapes, eight 1.6-ha watersheds were established and instrumented in 1976 at the USDA-ARS Grazinglands Research Laboratory, ∼50 km west of Oklahoma City near El Reno, OK, to measure precipitation and surface runoff quantity and quality. Prior to construction, all watersheds were in native grass, primarily big bluestem (Andropogon gerardii Vitman.), little bluestem [Schizachyrium scoparium (Michx.) Nash], and Indiangrass [Sorghastrum nutans (L.) Nash]; afterwards, four of the eight watersheds were cropped initially into winter wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) (two conventionally tilled and two minimally or no-till). Although there have been many peer-reviewed papers from the Water Resources and Erosion (WRE) watersheds, none included all the datasets collected during the period 1977-1999. The objectives of this paper were (a) to present and discuss all archived historical data, including methods of collection and analysis, (b) to provide summary analyses of the variability in each dataset, and (c) to provide details about how to access these datasets. These datasets are valuable resources to improve modeling in relation to land use and management changes, climate variability, and other environmental factors and may be useful in developing strategies to mitigate environmental impacts of agricultural systems. They are available at https://doi.org/10.15482/USDA.ADC/1518421.

Sub-seasonal to seasonal climate predictions for wind energy forecasting

Both renewable energy supply and electricity demand are strongly influenced by meteorological conditions and their evolution over time in terms of climate variability and climate change. However, knowledge of power output and demand forecasting beyond a few days remains poor. Current methodologies assume that long-term resource availability is constant, ignoring the fact that future wind resources could be significantly different from the past wind energy conditions. Such uncertainties create risks that affect investment in wind energy projects at the operational stage where energy yields affect cash flow and the balance of the grid. Here we assess whether sub-seasonal to seasonal climate predictions (S2S) can skilfully predict wind speed in Europe. To illustrate S2S potential applications, two periods with an unusual climate behaviour affecting the energy market will be presented. We find that wind speed forecasted using S2S exhibits predictability some weeks and months in advance in important regions for the energy sector such as the North Sea. If S2S are incorporated into planning activities for energy traders, energy producers, plant operators, plant investors, they could help improve management climate variability related risks.

Extreme Dry Years in the 21st Century at the Level of the Agricultural Areas of Muntenia, Romania

Abstract The global climatic changes consisting of the increased in the average air temperature and changes in the rainfall regime have led in the last decades to the extension of the agricultural areas affected by the drought phenomenon, both worldwide and in Romania. During the last half century, the drought and the phenomena associated with it, namely aridization and desertification, are a major problem for mankind. The limiting factor affecting field crops on the largest surface is the drought, the extent and intensity of this type of risk causing annual reduction of agricultural production by at least 30-50%. Drought represents the natural phenomenon determined by the amounts of precipitations below the normal values. The absence of rainfall is due to the predominance of the anti-cyclonic type. The most frequent phenomena occur in the extra-Carpathian agricultural regions of southern and south-eastern Romania Muntenia is located in the drought-sensitive area, where the influx of continental anti-cyclones is higher. Although this phenomena is possible in all seasons and in all agricultural areas, it doesn’t occur simultaneously and doesn’t have the same intensity. In the 21st century, the agricultural years 2001-2002, 2002-2003, 2006-2007, 2011-2012 and 2014-2015 are included in the list of the most recent years in terms of rainfall quantities, the heat units recorded in the warm season, as well as the soil moisture reserve available to winter wheat and maize plants during maximum water consumption. The objective of this paper is to highlight the correlation between the pluviometric regime analyzed during periods of maximum consumption of water from winter wheat and maize crops, the phenomenon of "heat" and the soil moisture reserve. The analysis of these specific indices helped us characterize the mentioned agricultural years, in the context of analysing the phenomenon of pedological drought with an impact in agriculture in Muntenia Region. An important element in the development of agricultural management strategies is to improve scientific knowledge and capacities to better manage climate variability by examining climate data and risks and opportunities analysis. The decrease in production of winter wheat and maize wheat crops occurs in extreme dry agricultural years due to the shortening of the vegetation season as a result of the increase in air temperature and water stress during the period of accumulation of the dry matter in the grain (the filling phase grain) caused by the reduction of precipitation amounts. Drought periods are increasingly common in Romania and are a major problem for agriculture with high impact on the agricultural production.

Recent changes in southern Australian frost occurrence: implications for wheat production risk

Frost damage remains a major problem for broadacre cropping, viticulture, horticulture and other agricultural industries in Australia. Annual losses from frost events in Australian broadacre agriculture are estimated at between $120 million and $700 million each year for this sector. Understanding the changing nature of frost risk, and the drivers responsible, are important steps in helping many producers manage climate variability and change. Our analysis, using Stevenson screen temperature thresholds of 2°C or below as an indicator of frost at ground level, demonstrates that across southern Australia, despite a warming trend of 0.17°C per decade since 1960, ‘frost season’ length has increased, on average, by 26 days across the whole southern portion of Australia compared with the 1960–1990 long-term mean. Some areas of south-eastern Australia now experience their last frost an average 4 weeks later than during the 1960s. The intersection of frost and wheat production risk was quantified at 60 sites across the Australian wheatbelt, with a more in-depth analysis undertaken for 15 locations across Victoria (i.e. eight sites common to both the National and Victorian assessments and seven sites exclusive to the Victorian analysis). The results of the national assessment highlight how frost-related production risk has increased by as much as 30% across much of the Australian wheatbelt, for a range of wheat maturity types, over the last two decades, in response to an increase in later frost events. Across 15 Victorian sites, sowing dates to achieve anthesis during a period with only a 10% chance of a 0°C night occurring shifted by 23 days (6 June) for the short-season variety, 20 days (17 May) for the medium-season variety and 36 days later (9 May) for the long-season variety assessed.

Measuring freshwater aquatic ecosystems: The need for a hyperspectral global mapping satellite mission

Freshwater ecosystems underpin global water and food security, yet are some of the most endangered ecosystems in the world because they are particularly vulnerable to land management change and climate variability. The US National Research Council's guidance to NASA regarding missions for the coming decade includes a polar orbiting, global mapping hyperspectral satellite remote sensing mission, the Hyperspectral Infrared Imager (HyspIRI), to make quantitative measurements of ecosystem change. Traditionally, freshwater ecosystems have been challenging to measure with satellite remote sensing because they are small and spatially complex, require high fidelity spectroradiometry, and are best described with biophysical variables derived from high spectral resolution data. In this study, we evaluate the contribution of a hyperspectral global mapping satellite mission to measuring freshwater ecosystems. We demonstrate the need for such a mission, and evaluate the suitability and gaps, through an examination of the measurement resolution issues impacting freshwater ecosystem measurements (spatial, temporal, spectral and radiometric). These are exemplified through three case studies that use remote sensing to characterize a component of freshwater ecosystems that drive primary productivity. The high radiometric quality proposed for the HyspIRI mission makes it uniquely well designed for measuring freshwater ecosystems accurately at moderate to high spatial resolutions. The spatial and spectral resolutions of the HyspIRI mission are well suited for the retrieval of multiple biophysical variables, such as phycocyanin and chlorophyll-a. The effective temporal resolution is suitable for characterizing growing season wetland phenology in temperate regions, but may not be appropriate for tracking algal bloom dynamics, or ecosystem responses to extreme events in monsoonal regions. Global mapping missions provide the systematic, repeated measurements necessary to measure the drivers of freshwater biodiversity change. Archival global mapping missions with open access and free data policies increase end user uptake globally. Overall, an archival, hyperspectral global mapping mission uniquely meets the measurement requirements of multiple end users for freshwater ecosystem science and management.

Simulating forage crop production in a northern climate with the Integrated Farm System Model

Jégo, G., Rotz, C. A., Bélanger, G., Tremblay, G. F., Charbonneau, E. and Pellerin, D. 2015. Simulating forage crop production in a northern climate with the Integrated Farm System Model. Can. J. Plant Sci. 95: 745–757. Whole-farm simulation models are useful tools for evaluating the effect of management practices and climate variability on the agro-environmental and economic performance of farms. A few process-based farm-scale models have been developed, but none has been evaluated in northern regions with boreal and hemiboreal climates characterized by a short growing season and a long period with snow cover. The study objectives were to calibrate the grass sub-model of the Integrated Farm System Model (IFSM) and evaluate its predictions of yield and nutritive value of timothy and alfalfa, grown alone or in a mixture, using experimental field data from across Canada, andto assess IFSM's predictions of yield of major annual crops grown on dairy farms in eastern Canada using regional yield data from two contrasting regions. Several timothy and alfalfa datasets combining sites, years, harvests, and N fertilization rates were used to calibrate and evaluate the model. For timothy and alfalfa, the model's accuracy was globally satisfactory in predicting dry matter yield and neutral detergent fiber concentration with a normalized root mean square error (NRMSE)<30%. For N uptake, the scatter was a bit larger, especially for timothy (NRMSE= 49%), mainly because of a small range in the measured data. The model's accuracy for predicting the yield of annual crops was generally good, with an NRMSE<30%. Adding timothy and alfalfa to the grass sub-model of IFSM and verifying the model's performance for annual crops confirmed that IFSM can be used in northern regions of North America. In addition, the model was able to simulate the yield and nutritive value of a timothy–alfalfa mixture, which is the most common perennial mixture used in Canada.

Livelihood adaptations to climate variability: insights from farming households in Ghana

Climate variability poses a significant threat to many sectors of Sub-Saharan Africa’s economy. Agriculture is one of the most climate sensitive sectors because of its dependence on rain-fed cultivation. This paper identifies the main adaptation strategies used by farming households in the Sudan savannah and forest-savannah transitional agro-ecological zones of Ghana, in order to reduce the adverse impacts of climate variability on their livelihood activities. It combines questionnaire surveys, key informant interviews and a range of participatory methods. Results show that households employ a range of on- and off-farm adaptation strategies including changing the timing of planting, planting early maturing varieties, diversification of crops, support from family and friends, and changing their diets to manage climate variability. Results reveal that most households use adaptation strategies linked to livelihood diversification to adapt to the increased climate variability seen in recent decades. Most households now engage in multiple non-arable farming livelihood activities in an attempt to avoid destitution because of crop failure linked to climate variability (particularly drought). The findings suggest that policy makers need to formulate more targeted climate adaptation policies and programmes that are linked to enhancing livelihood diversification, as well as establishing communication routes for farming communities to better share their knowledge on successful local climate adaptation strategies.

Managing Climate Variability in Agriculture

Recent unseasonal weather events and assessments of the potential impacts of climate change and variability on agriculture reveal that there is a pressing need to consider the range of adaptation options available to farmers, including their technical suitability, economic viability and environmental impact. This paper reviews the potential role of weather forecasting with reference to agriculture, including a brief assessment of its current status and uptake, its suitability and target use, issues associated with investment and benefit, and the constraints to wider uptake.

Managing Climate Variability in Australia, South Africa, United States and Spain

This report describes the first stage of a project that is comparing water governance in southern Australia, South Africa, southwest USA and Spain. The river systems examined are subject to highly variable climates and have a long history of drought management. Underlying assumptions are that the stress of drought reveals strengths and weaknesses in institutional systems that are often hidden in wetter times and that the way a given management system responds to drought is a good indication of how it will respond to climate change. This is a study of the past to prepare for the future. The report also outlines a proposed governance evaluation framework which focuses in particular on the impact of federal political systems. The capacity to manage large rivers that cross borders within federal systems is almost invariably at threat from ongoing intergovernmental and interagency conflict, low decision making transparency and accountability, high transaction costs and ad hoc deals between competing governments, and between them and powerful stakeholders. The aim of the evaluation framework – as it develops over the course of the project – will be to highlight transaction costs and governance features that work well. The river catchments investigated by this project are all in the midst of major water reform programs, albeit with different aims under different circumstances. The report makes some tentative comments about the way these reform programs are progressing.

The social organisation of adaptation to climate variability and global change: The case of a mountain farming community in Norway

Local strategies to manage climate variability are key to adapting to climate change in the long term. We investigate how local adaptive strategies are socially organised through a study of Øystre Slidre, a Norwegian mountain farming community operating close to the climatic margins. Farmers actively use informal social relations in accessing equipment and labour in order to secure production and quality of life. The importance of such relations in managing climate variability persists even with a dramatic shift towards larger scale production, increasing formalisation and economic diversification. Despite social innovations and adaptations such as the re-forming of social relationships and institutions, the concurrent reduction in the number of people involved in farming may be putting the flexibility of social networks and practices of collaboration under pressure, potentially undermining adaptive capacity to climate change. Future research and policy need to focus on ensuring social innovation in the social organisation of adaptation.

The reluctance of resource-users to adopt seasonal climate forecasts to enhance resilience to climate variability on the rangelands

As the impacts of climate-change on resource-dependent industries manifest, there is a commensurate effort to identify and implement strategies to reduce them. Yet, even when useful knowledge and tools exist, there can be poor adoption of adaptation strategies. We examine the reasons behind sub-optimal adoption of seasonal climate forecasts by graziers for managing climate variability. We surveyed 100 graziers in north-east Queensland, Australia and examined the influence of adaptive capacity, resource-dependency and forecast-perception on uptake. Technical perceptions were not important. Strategic skills, environmental awareness and social capital were. Results suggest that social factors (but not technical factors) are significant. These insights are important for adaptation planning and for maximising the resilience of communities and industries dependent on climate-sensitive resources.

Financial adaptation to disaster risk in the European Union

Increasing losses from weather related extreme events coupled with limited coping capacity suggest a need for strong adaptation commitments, of which public sector responses to adjustments to actual and expected climate stimuli are key. The European Commission has started to address this need in the emerging European Union (EU) climate adaptation strategy; yet, a specific rationale for adaptation interventions has not clearly been identified, and the economic case for adaptation to extremes remains vague. Basing the diagnosis on economic welfare theory and an empirical analysis of the current EU and member states’ roles in managing disaster risk, we discuss how and where the public sector may intervene for managing climate variability and change. We restrict our analysis to financial disaster management, a domain of adaptation intervention, which is of key concern for the EU adaptation strategy. We analyse three areas of public sector interventions, supporting national insurance systems, providing compensation to the affected post event as well as intergovernmental loss sharing through the EU solidarity fund, according to the three government functions of allocation, distribution, and stabilization suggested by welfare theory, and suggest room for improvement.