Farming profitably in a changing climate: a risk management approach

Climate science has made enormous progress over the last two decades in understanding the nature of earth's climate and the changes that are taking place. Under climate change projections, we can say with some confidence that the Australian climate will continue to become hotter, and temperature-related extreme events are likely to increase in frequency. However, we cannot yet project with any reasonable level of confidence changes to rainfall and the occurrence of drought. So although there is strong evidence for the reality of climate change, there is still considerable uncertainty associated with projections of precisely how climate change will unfold in the future, particularly at regional and local scales where most farming management decisions are made. Adapting to such an uncertain future demands a flexible approach based on assessing, analysing and responding to the risks posed by a changing climate. This paper examines a risk management approach to farming in a variable and changing climate, based on experience gained in the insurance industry which is one of the first major industries to be impacted by climate change losses. Governments, businesses and individuals must consider the implications of a variable and changing climate as a normal part of decision-making based on risk, just as they would for other risks, such as market price and fuel price movements, labour costs etc. The paper also discusses briefly how advances in information technology have enabled information to be accessed and widely distributed, and showcases four best practice spatial IT website tools developed by the BRS to assist farmers and policy makers to manage risk - the National Agricultural Monitoring System (NAMS), the Meat and Livestock Australia (MLA) Rainfall to Pasture Growth Outlook Tool, the Multi-Criteria Analysis Shell (MCAS-S), and the Rainfall Reliability Wizard. There are also several tools under current development in BRS which continue with this theme. These are Water 2010 - National Water Balance and Information for Policy and Planning, the Climate Change Wizard and Climate Change Impacted Data Sets.Climate change, risk management, Environmental Economics and Policy, Risk and Uncertainty,

Computer-Based Forage Management Tools: Historical, Current, and Future Applications

Forage management has been an important human activity since the beginning of civilization. By comparison, the personal computer has been available only in the immediate past. The software developed to deal with the complexity of climate, soil, plant, animal, and socioeconomic factors has seen huge changes in a few decades. Mainframe computers facilitated numerical calculations for exploring relationships among dozens of variables. Personal computers opened the door for more individual scientist creativity and routine communication. Web-based communication globalised the option for multidisciplinary teams to tackle problems. Forage-related computer applications abound, allowing farmers, ranchers, and others to more effectively manage the land. This paper describes historical, current, and future computer-based applications that improve understanding and efficiency leading to more economically and environmentally sustainable forage-livestock systems

TWINLATIN: Twinning European and Latin-American river basins for research enabling sustainable water resources management. Combined Report D3.1 Hydrological modelling report and D3.2 Evaluation report

Water use has almost tripled over the past 50 years and in some regions the water demand already exceeds supply (Vorosmarty et al., 2000). The world is facing a “global water crisis”; in many countries, current levels of water use are unsustainable, with systems vulnerable to collapse from even small changes in water availability. The need for a scientifically-based assessment of the potential impacts on water resources of future changes, as a basis for society to adapt to such changes, is strong for most parts of the world. Although the focus of such assessments has tended to be climate change, socio-economic changes can have as significant an impact on water availability across the four main use sectors i.e. domestic, agricultural, industrial (including energy) and environmental. Withdrawal and consumption of water is expected to continue to grow substantially over the next 20-50 years (Cosgrove & Rijsberman, 2002), and consequent changes in availability may drastically affect society and economies. One of the most needed improvements in Latin American river basin management is a higher level of detail in hydrological modelling and erosion risk assessment, as a basis for identification and analysis of mitigation actions, as well as for analysis of global change scenarios. Flow measurements are too costly to be realised at more than a few locations, which means that modelled data are required for the rest of the basin. Hence, TWINLATIN Work Package 3 “Hydrological modelling and extremes” was formulated to provide methods and tools to be used by other WPs, in particular WP6 on “Pollution pressure and impact analysis” and WP8 on “Change effects and vulnerability assessment”. With an emphasis on high and low flows and their impacts, WP3 was originally called “Hydrological modelling, flooding, erosion, water scarcity and water abstraction”. However, at the TWINLATIN kick-off meeting it was agreed that some of these issues resided more appropriately in WP6 and WP8, and so WP3 was renamed to focus on hydrological modelling and hydrological extremes. The specific objectives of WP3 as set out in the Description of Work are

A distributed sediment delivery ratio concept for sediment yield modelling.

Thesis (M.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2004.Identifying areas of the hillslope that are most sensitive to soil erosion and contribute significantly to sediment yield is a primary concern in environmental protection and conservation. Therefore the ability to predict the magnitude and variability of soil erosion and sediment yield is important to catchment managers in order to select the appropriate conservation practices that keep soil erosion and sediment yield within the tolerable limits. A number of models have been developed for simulating soil erosion and sediment yield from a catchment. However, none of them are universally applicable and most of them require extensive data which are extremely costly, time consuming and sometimes not available except in research catchments. Hence it was concluded that the combined use of an empirically based soil loss model, RUSLE, Geographic Information Systems (GIS) techniques, and a Sediment Delivery Ratio (SDR) concept would be a candidate modelling tool, which would be a compromise between the advantages of simplicity, data availability, the complex spatial variability of hydrological and geomorphological characteristics of a catchment and the economic limitation of field data measurements in sediment yield studies. Such a modelling tool was developed in this research and was able to identify sediment source areas and predict annual sediment yield from catchments. Data from the Henley catchment, South Africa have been used for demonstrating the potential use of the model in soil erosion and sediment yield studies. Arcview GIS grid functions were used to define the flow direction, accumulation, pathways, and velocity in a catchment as a function of topography and land use and to describe spatially variable input and output information. In addition the Arcview GIS grid function was used to discretise the catchment into hydrologically homogeneous grid cells to capture the catchment heterogeneity. The gross soil erosion in each cell was calculated using the soil loss model RUSLE while a distributed topography based SDR parameter was used to determine the mass of eroded sediment that would be transported to the nearest stream and ultimately to the catchment outlet. The average annual soil loss and sediment yield values were 26 t. ha-1.yr -1 and 1.6 t. ha-1.yr -1 respectively. High soil erosion and sediment yield rates are evident in the residential and agricultural areas, which are characterised by degradation due to overgrazing and traditional and peri-urban settlements with mixed crops. The average annual SDR value was 0.19 for the Henley catchment and large SDR values are associated with areas adjacent to the channel system. This can be explained by recognizing that the SDR is significantly influenced by characteristics of the drainage system. Comparison of event based simulations of sediment yields to those estimated from measurements demonstrated that the proposed model predictions ranged between 13 % and 60 % of the measured estimates, consistently over predicting. This is because the SDR component of the model is developed as a mean annual parameter, assuming that over a long period a stream system must intimately transport all the sediments delivered to it. Hence the channel network sediment delivery parameters would have to be considered at short temporal scales. Comparing the results of the model prediction against other sediment modelling techniques in South Africa demonstrated the usefulness of the model as an effective catchment management tool. The model has advantages over these other techniques since it includes a distributed grid based component, which enables the identification of sediment source areas in the catchment. The sensitivity analysis shows that the model was highly sensitive to parameters derived from topography and land use of the catchment. Future research with the model should include further testing and analysis of its components on different catchments. The topography based SDR concept which is a key component in sediment routing for prediction of either long term average sediment yield or isolated storm event simulation from a catchment warrants specific attention. Effort in future should focus on identifying parameters which affect the sediment delivery within a catchment. This may be achieved by incorporating processes describing the movement of sediments in the channel network of the catchment

Crop Updates 2010 - Farming Systems

This session covers twenty papers from different authors: Pests and Disease 1. Preserving phosphine for use in Grain Storage Industry, Christopher R Newman, Department of Agriculture and Food Farming Systems Research 2. Demonstrating the benefits of grazing canola in Western Australia, Jonathan England, Stephen Gherardi and Mohammad Amjad, Department of Agriculture and Food 3. Buloke barley yield when pasture-cropped across subtropical perennial pastures, David Ferris, Department of Agriculture and Food, Phil Ward and Roger Lawes, CSIRO 4. Is pasture cropping viable in WA? Grower perceptions and EverCrop initiatives to evaluate, David Ferris, Tim Wiley, Perry Dolling, Department of Agriculture and Food, Philip Barrett-Lennard, Evergreen farming 5. Best-bet management for dual-purpose canola, John Kirkegaard, Susan Sprague, Hugh Dove and Walter Kelman, CSIRO, Canberra, Peter Hamblin, Agritech Research, Young, NSW 6. Pasture in cropping systems – with and without sheep, Brad Nutt and Angelo Loi, Department of Agriculture and Food 7. Can technology substitute for a lupin break? Wayne Parker, Department of Agriculture and Food 8. Canola row spacing with and without long term stubble retention on a sandy clay loam at Merredin, Glen Riethmuller, Department of Agriculture and Food 9. Impact of stubble retention on water balance and crop yield, Phil Ward1, Ken Flower2,3, Neil Cordingley2 and Shayne Micin1, 1CSIRO, Wembley, Western Australia, 2Western Australian No-Till Farmers Association, 3University of Western Australia Analysis and Modelling 10. Using POAMA rainfall forecasts for crop management in South-West WA, Senthold Asseng1, Peter McIntosh2,3, Mike Pook2,3, James Risbey2,3, Guomin Wang3, Oscar Alves3, Ian Foster4, Imma Farre4 and Nirav Khimashia1, 1CSIRO Plant Industry, Perth, 2CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research, Hobart, 3Centre for Australian Weather and Climate Research (CAWCR), A partnership between the Australian Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO, Melbourne, 4Department of Agriculture and Food 11. Adaption to changing climates and variability – results of the Agribusiness Changing Climates regional workshop, Anderson W3, Beard D3, Blake J3, Grieve R1, Lang M3, Lemon J3, McTaggart R3, Gray D3, Price M2 and Stephens D3, 1Roderick Grieve Farm Management Consultants, 2Coffey International P/L, 3Department of Agriculture and Food 12. Farmers’ management of seasonal variability and climate change in WA, DA Beard, DM Gray, P Carmody, Department of Agriculture and Food 13. Is there a value in having a frost forecast for wheat in South-West WA? Imma Farre1, Senthold Asseng2, Ian Foster1 and Doug Abrecht3, 1Department of Agriculture and Food, CSIRO, Floreat, 2CSIRO Plant Industry, Perth 3Department of Agriculture and Food, Centre for Cropping Systems 14. Does buying rainfall pay? Greg Kirk, Planfarm Agricultural Consultants 15. Which region in the WA wheatbelt makes best use of rainfall? Peter Rowe, Bankwest Agribusiness 16. POAMA – the Predictive Ocean-Atmosphere Model for Australia, Guomin Wang and Oscar Alves, Centre for Australian Weather and Climate Research (CAWCR), A partnership between the Australian Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO, Melbourne 17. Exploring the link between water use efficiency and farm profitability, Cameron Weeks, Planfarm and Peter Tozer, PRT Consulting Precision Agriculture 18. A plethora of paddock information is available – how does it stack up? Derk Bakker, Department of Agriculture and Food 18. Variable rate prescription mapping for lime inputs based on electromagnetic surveying and deep soil testing, Frank D’Emden, Quenten Knight and Luke Marquis, Precision Agronomics, Australia 19. Trial design and analysis using precision agriculture and farmer’s equipment, Roger Lawes, CSIRO Sustainable Ecosystems, Centre for Environment and Life Sciences, Floreat 20. Farmer perspectives of precision agriculture in Western Australia: Issues and the way forward, Dr Roger Mandel, Curtin Universit

Vulnerability of water resources to climate change and human impact: scenario analysis of the Zayandeh Rud river basin in Iran

Water supplies have been meeting strict experiments all over the world and the tendencies of reducing precipitations and rising temperatures in the arid and semi-arid of the Middle-East region (such as Iran) aggravate this condition during the last few decades. A proper water planning needs productive Integrated Water Resource Management models that can respond these complicated troubles. The aim of this study was to develop a structure for applicable and efficient risk control of water supplies through drought. This management structure combines hydrological, socio-economic and water organization models. The methodology has three factors: 1) the statistical possessions of drought characterisation and drought trend in terms of space-time were examined and thresholds of drought warning are evaluated to assist as drivers for control programmes. 2) A water-planning model was applied to combine water accessibility and demand and examine the reliability of the water system to deliver the water to demand sites during the normal and drought episodes. 3) The model was used to estimates the future impacts of climate alteration, through driving them with simulations from an ensemble of statically downscaled CMIP5 model for the severest scenario in the 21st century. Moreover, some potential management plans that decrease the future hazard of water shortage were evaluated. The methods were tested in a case study in the Zayandeh Rud River basin in Iran. The results indicated the important roles of both meteorological and anthropogenic elements on occurrence of drought and water shortages for past and future time

Impacts of Climate Change on Rainfall Extremes and Urban Drainage Systems

Impacts of Climate Change on Rainfall Extremes and Urban Drainage Systems provides a state-of-the-art overview of existing methodologies and relevant results related to the assessment of the climate change impacts on urban rainfall extremes as well as on urban hydrology and hydraulics. This overview focuses mainly on several difficulties and limitations regarding the current methods and discusses various issues and challenges facing the research community in dealing with the climate change impact assessment and adaptation for urban drainage infrastructure design and managemen

Current Issues of Water Management

There is an estimated 1.4 billion km3 of water in the world but only approximately three percent (39 million km3) of it is available as fresh water. Moreover, most of this fresh water is found as ice in the arctic regions, deep groundwater or atmospheric water. Since water is the source of life and essential for all life on the planet, the use of this resource is a highly important issue. "Water management" is the general term used to describe all the activities that manage the optimum use of the world's water resources. However, only a few percent of the fresh water available can be subjected to water management. It is still an enormous amount, but what's unique about water is that unlike other resources, it is irreplaceable. This book provides a general overview of various topics within water management from all over the world. The topics range from politics, current models for water resource management of rivers and reservoirs to issues related to agriculture. Water quality problems, the development of water demand and water pricing are also addressed. The collection of contributions from outstanding scientists and experts provides detailed information about different topics and gives a general overview of the current issues in water management. The book covers a wide range of current issues, reflecting on current problems and demonstrating the complexity of water management

The National Transport Data Framework

Report by Professor Peter Landshoff (Cambridge University) and Professor John Polak (Imperial College London) on a project for the Department for Transport. emails: [email protected] [email protected] NTDF is designed to be a resource for data owners to deposit descriptions into a central catalogue, so that people can search for data and find data and understand their characteristics. The value of this is to individuals, to commercial organizations, and to public bodies. For example, services that provide better information to travellers will help to make their journey less stressful and persuade them to make more use of public transport. Transport operators need very diverse information to help them plan developments to their services: demographic, geographical, economic etc. And policy makers need a similar range of information to help them decide how to divide their budget and afterwards to evaluate how valuable it has been.This work was supported by the Department for Transport (DfT)