January 6, 2015
Global warming could cut wheat yields by 6% per rise in temperature
The world's wheat yields may slid by 6% for each degree of centigrade increase in the earth's temperature as a result of global warming, according to a recent research conducted by a UK group.
Also of concern is the rising variability of yields across regions and seasons due to the potent climatic effect.
Conducted by an international group of agronomists, the research employed computer modeling technologies, field and artificial heating experiments to study wheat conditions under high temperatures.
Two past data sets from field experiments had been compared with about 30 crop models. In those experiments, wheat was exposed to a 15-32C range of growing-season mean temperatures.
To tackle the adverse effects of global warming on wheat crops, Dr. Mikhail Semenov, one of the researchers, suggested that late-maturing cultivars with longer grain filling should be cultivated to recover loss of biomass and grain yield due to temperature.
"(This) could be beneficial as long as exposure to heat stress and terminal drought does not become counter-productive," he said. "Optimising this trade-off should be region specific, and crop modeling is a key exploration tool to underpin crop adaptation for a changing climate."