Topic 14: Integrated modelling of farmers’ climate change impact and adaptation appraisal to inform regional human river nexus management

Introduction/background

Climate change can severely affect agricultural production systems, and extreme events such as droughts are likely to increase in frequency and intensity in the next decades. Farmers respond differently to climate change and extreme events, and uncoordinated autonomous adaptation may not only threaten the availability of land and water resources at the regional scale, but also affect economic prosperity and compliance with environmental policy targets. Hence, integrated approaches are required to model the complex interactions between farmers’ climate change impact and adaptation appraisal and the regional human river nexus management of food, energy and water resources.

Main objective/research question/hypothesis

The main objective of this PhD is to develop an Integrated Modelling Framework (IMF) to analyze interactions and impact cascades for a variety of climatic conditions including extreme events in agricultural regions as well as for alternative adaptation responses by farmers. Typical adaptation measures for farmers include irrigation management and adopting drought tolerant crops in crop rotations, but also establishing agro-PV systems and restoring landscape elements such as riparian buffer strips to support beneficial micro-climates. Furthermore, outcomes of alternative principles and criteria such as efficiency, social acceptance and justice are investigated with the IMF to inform regional nexus management strategies of food, energy and water resources.

Approach/methods and time frame

The IMF will systematically couple disciplinary models and data such as climate scenario data, bio-physical process models, and spatial explicit, bottom-up field-farm-landscape or regional agricultural economic optimization models. Survey data will serve as a basis to reflect the behavioral diversity of responses by farmers in the economic modelling and the aggregation of responses at regional scale. The PhD researcher will (i) review literature, (ii) develop a concept for an IMF of a case-study region (e.g. the Austrian Marchfeld region as former floodplain of the Danube), (iii) assemble data for IMF application, (iv) establish and apply an IMF, (v) conduct in-depth interviews with farmers and experts in the case-study region, (vi) develop and analyze scenarios to model effects and responses in the case-study region. The results of the PhD project will be published in renown international journals and inform regional governance processes and efficient nexus policy instruments’ design (e.g. regional food, water and energy governance).