Production and Adaptation Assessments of Agricultural Crops under Climate Change in the Southeastern United States

We use multiple Global Climate Models (GCMs) data from the 5th phase of the Coupled Model Inter-comparison Project (CMIP5) in a point based crop simulation model, Decision Support System for Agro-technology Transfer (DSSAT), to investigate the impact of climate variability and change on crop yields in the southeastern United States. The input data consists of maximum and minimum temperatures, precipitation and solar radiation at daily time-scale, covering 40 years (1960-1999) in the baseline period, and 90 years (2010-2100) in the future period under the baseline emissions scenario of Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) 8.5. The DSSAT model has been calibrated for 29 sites, representing the study area, using field experiment data. The input soil parameters for DSSAT include soil classification, surface slope, color, permeability, and drainage. For the analyses of projected changes, we divide the 21st century into the near-term (2010-2049) and long-term (2050-2100) periods and focus on comparing the yields of major crops grown at the selected sites, during each future period, with the corresponding yields in the baseline period. In particular, we investigate the effect of changes in mean and extreme hydro-meteorological characteristics on crop yields in the region. Given the projected changes in the crop yields in the future periods, we focus on the adaptation strategies at the local level based on the optimal management practices such as irrigation, fertilization, sowing date that will be needed to cope with climate variability and change in the region.