As climate change resilience is only 1 of many concurrent crises facing agriculture, it is essential that researchers and policy makers begin researching and supporting the development of multifunctional and ecologically based agriculture systems that provision multiple ecosystem services. I suugest you read the following articles which provides both a quantitative synthesis of the existing literature (2012) on biologically diversified farming systems as compared to conventionally managed monoculture cropping systems, and a policy analysis pointing to a future research and development agenda in agroecology.

1. http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol17/iss4/art40/

2. http://www.agdevjournal.com/volume-3-issue-4/380-closing-knowledge-gap-commentary.html?catid=141%3Aresearch-commentaries

Albie

Developing climate ready varieties is one of the interventions to contribute to climate resilient agriculture. Together with appropriate varieties (short duration, submergence tolerant, etc) integrated natural resource management, improved access to climate and technological information, institutional innovations have significantly contributed to achieve climate resilience. but the existing systems in the developing countries have to go a long way to achieve climate resilience through convergence of important actors.

Thanks Dr.Albie Miles for the link you have provided. I read it which is highly interesting. It is a job of several experts who are working on the aspects. I understand only varieties will not work. Along with varieties, crop management as well as social aspects will also play important roles. And first of all we should work together for achieving the specific gain.

The resiliency of agriculture with the challenges posed by global climate change is a multifaceted problem that (in my opinion) should be tackled from different angles. Plant breeding is definitely important however, this should not be the only approach. I think that agroecology offers a broader spectrum of approaches that all together may serve the cause of counteracting the negative impacts of climate change on food production. Among these agrobiodiversity is a must do by farmers and, on the same token, increasing the biodiversity also below the soil. This can be achieved through various agronomic techniques like: crop rotations, green manuring cover crops cultivation and a management of crops residues that builds carbon levels in the soil. An employment of livestock species is also recommendable as animals provide a variety of ecological services (being manure the most important one). Please consider the work of agronomist: Salvatore Ceccarelli and his team on evolutionary plants breeding. Here below is the RG link to his profile. Salvatore Ceccarelli Thank You!

I echo what Albie Miles and Bruno Borsari said insofar as diversification of agricultural production being one of the most important changes we can make to food systems.

Agroecoloists tends to look at this diversification not only from an ecological point of view, but also in a social one. I read Albie Miles' comment as one that highlights the importance of "top down" policy changes that can encourage transitions to more resilient agricultural systems.

In addition to top down policy changes, I think that supporting "bottom up" social changes (farmer coops, peer knowledge and resource sharing, etc) that are already in place is a highly complimentary aspect of bringing about climate resilient agriculture.

I think that taking a "bottom up" approach to plant breeding is also important. This would be more of a "user-based" approach that can help hone in on the traits most helpful to improve (drought tolerance, flood tolerance, disease tolerance, etc). In general, climate models are pointing to higher climate variability across the board so I think we have to be focusing on developing traits that can aid plants in being productive in the face of such variability (ex: indeterminately flowering varieties so that crops are not lost with early or late frosts, drought & flood tolerance, rapid yielding varieties to take advantage of shorter growing seasons in situations of drought, etc, etc).

At the end of the day, no one plant adaptation can help in all contexts and developing specific traits can take a lot of time and resources. Taking a systems approach and diversifying production is a safer bet with the pace of climate change.

Dear R. K. Sarkar

I think this paper can help you

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Nice to see this good discussion. The climate change is real and it has to be addressed in a holistic manner focusing on both adaptation and mitigation. Not only positive action in terms of climate smart technologies but we also need to examine our many actions, policies and practice which are continuously making agri-food systems more vulnerable to climate change. Few examples are policies promoting inefficient use and extraction of water, a big proportion of the food is wasted every. Global coordinated efforts are required to ensure resilience of our agri-food systems and Eco-systems services.

hi all, good conversation. Thank you for your constructive comments.

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this is piece I wrote several years ago that tried to pull a number of diverse elements together. The argument here is that in order to build greater climate change resilience we need to address all aspects of the food and agricultural system. Ultimately our concern I will argue is about ecologically sustainable food production and feeding people adequate amounts of nutritious health-promoting foods. To do so, We need to build an engine of food system transformation. Here are a number of my policy recommendations building off of prior biophysical science research.

Albie Miles I like the "push and pull" framework in your paper and the emphasis on whole system change. It broadens the focus of the original question, which I interpreted as being focused on individual technologies (especially breeding plant varieties that are resilient to climate extremes), to considering the agroecosystem as a whole. I would love hear how R. K. Sarkar envisions such a whole systems approach guiding research in rice agroecosystems.