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Project properties |
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| Title | Adapting to climate change through land and water management system innovations
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| Group | Soil Physics and Land Management group |
| Project type | thesis |
| Credits | 24-39 |
| Supervisor(s) | Luuk Fleskens and Olivier Crespo |
| Examiner(s) | Coen Ritsema |
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| Begin date | 2020/02/09 |
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| Description | Problem context
Smallholder agricultural systems in Southern Africa are often operating in marginally suitable agroclimatic conditions and therefore particularly sensitive to a changing climate. Yet, their productivity needs to be sustained and even enhanced to support the livelihoods of farming communities, and increasing population. Land degradation already poses a real challenge to long-term system productivity, and is likely to be exacerbated by climate change. Adaptive land and water management are hypothesised to play a key role in supporting sustainable intensification, particularly when implemented in conjunction with other system innovations. As yet, there is a need for a more systematic approach of appraising the impact of such system innovations to understand their merits and limitations in current and future climatic conditions. Research Objective/Question How can farming system suitability be assessed dynamically through a systematic characterization of climatic conditions, and crop suitability thresholds? Can this framework be applied to assess the adaptation potential of land and water management system innovations under current and future climatic conditions? What is expected from the student (type of research) Characterize climatic suitability thresholds for (a specific) farming system(s). Assess how land and water management system innovations would amend/transform/improve the crop suitability to climate. Verify whether these innovations would constitute effective adaptation options. You could work on conceptualization, participatory assessment of suitability thresholds, GIS analysis of spatial suitability, and modelling. |
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