Adaptation in Agricultural Systems

Building climate-resilient agricultural and food systems

How to establish climate-resilient agricultural and food systems around the world? In the face of climate change, agricultural production will become more challenging in many regions of the world, especially in parts of Africa, Asia and Latin America. Therefore, suitable adaptation strategies are needed to help farmers cope with current and future climate impacts. PIK’s working group “Adaptation in Agricultural Systems” (AAS) analyses climate impacts and risks in the agricultural sector and evaluates targeted adaptation strategies. This work is based on the three pillars of anticipation (the forecasting of climatic changes and related impacts on natural resources, crop yields and livestock production), adaptation (the identification, assessment and recommendation of suitable adaptation strategies for smallholder farmers and pastoralists) and attribution (the identification, quantification and allocation of observed climate impacts to human-made climate change). The working group thus investigates the intersection between climate change, agriculture and development in a holistic way, aiming to inform adaptation policies and investments for climate-resilient agricultural and food systems.

The AAS working group is composed of climate scientists, agricultural scientists, crop modellers, economists (agricultural, development, behavioral), geographers, and social scientists. For dissemination, the working group engages with different stakeholders from the public and private sector, such as representatives from agricultural ministries, local farmer organisations or insurance companies.

Key research areas

• Anticipation
• Modelling high-resolution real-time crop losses and seasonal forecasts of crop yields based on statistical crop models and machine learning techniques to inform insurance solutions, early-warning systems and short-term adaptation planning
• Quantification of medium to long-term future climate change and related impacts on sectors like water or agriculture by combining data from global climate and impact models as well as regional process-based and statistical crop models
• Adaptation
• Evaluating suitable adaptation strategies for different types of smallholder farmers to cope with climate-change-related challenges like droughts or flooding, and to address further aims, including food and nutrition security and better livelihoods in rural communities
• Developing targeted and evidence-based policy advice for decision makers at different levels, in particular in support of the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and National Adaptation Plans (NAPs)
• Attribution
• Quantifying the contribution of climate change to observed crop yield losses on global and regional scales by combining methods from attribution science with crop modelling
• Developing concepts to integrate attribution science, loss and damage quantification, and existing damage and loss methodologies from disaster risk reduction contexts
• Scrutinising the roles which attribution results and climate-scientific evidence can and should (not) play for the different pillars of international finance and in society
  
  

Research methods, models and data

We combine biophysical and empirical impact models with econometric and qualitative approaches: 

• Crop suitability and yield modelling
  
• Suitability models based on machine learning
• Semi-statistical crop models, e.g. AMPLIFY
• Process-based crop models, e.g. DSSAT and APSIM
• Econometric analyses such as mental models, randomized control trials and quasi-experimental approaches based on household survey data, weather data, agricultural data and administrative data to evaluate socio-economic weather/climate impacts and adaptation strategies
• Qualitative methods to assess the socio-economic context through e.g. in-depth interviews and focus groups

Selected projects

For an overview of all projects, please click here.

• Agrica: The goal of this project is to develop comprehensive climate risk analyses for the agricultural sector, covering the entire impact chain from climate impacts on key natural resources and crop production to the assessment of suitable adaptation strategies. These analyses serve as guidance for policy and decision makers in identifying and evaluating effective adaptation strategies. This project focuses on sub-Saharan Arica and is funded by the BMZ and jointly implemented with the GIZ. See also: www.agrica.de
  Duration: Sep. 2018-Dec. 2023
• DecLaRe: DecLaRe aims to develop recommendations for sustainable crop production and animal husbandry with a focus on sustainable land management in northern Benin and northern Ghana. The project combines local scientific knowledge with national/regional models to build a decision support system (DSS) for land use and land management which can guide a variety of stakeholders towards sustainable land management. DecLaRe will bring together science, policy and the private sector to facilitate effective use of the DSS in the partner countries and beyond. The project is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the German Aeroscape Center (DLR).
  Duration: Nov. 2022-Oct. 2026
• AfriValue: The goal in AfriValue is to analyze climate risks for the coffee value chain and identify and evaluate effective adaptation strategies. The knowledge gained in this project provides actors along different agricultural value chains as well as decision-makers from politics and development cooperation with science-based evidence for sound adaptation planning and investment. This project focuses on Eastern Africa (Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda) and is funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).
  Duration: Dec. 2022-Dec. 2026