The Only Path to Address Climate Change and Intensifying Drought: Global Interdisciplinary Cooperation

Climate change is having an accelerating impact on the Earth’s arid and semi-arid regions, which are home to over two billion people. There is an urgent need for solutions that combine scientific innovation, ecological knowledge, and fair governance. Recent studies in hydrology, climatology, and agroecology paint a worrying picture: rising temperatures, irregular rainfall, and long-term droughts are not future threats but current crises that are changing landscapes and people’s livelihoods. From the shrinking aquifers in the Taklimakan Desert to the decreasing river flows in Tunisia, the link between water scarcity, food insecurity, and socio-economic vulnerability highlights the need for transformative action [1,2,3,4]. Different countries and regions are closely interconnected in the face of climate change. A drought problem in any one area can cause ecological, economic, and social problems that transcend borders. Therefore, it is imperative for interdisciplinary cooperation on a global scale.

The vulnerability of arid zones is mainly due to the conflict between agricultural needs and limited water resources. In northwestern China, Zhang et al. [1] found that in hyper-arid areas, irrigation methods are increasingly depleting groundwater reserves, which leads to unsustainable regional development. The same pattern can be seen in the U.S., India, Central Asia, Africa, and many other places around the world. Unsustainable water extraction, caused by water-intensive crops like cotton and wheat, shows a global contradiction: while agriculture is crucial for food security, it is also weakening the hydrological basis it depends on. There are many ways to mitigate the impact of climate change by irrigation technologies, such as drip systems and soil moisture sensors [5]. In practice, there are many successful experiences (e.g., in Israel’s Negev Desert and China’s Taklimakan Desert), where sensor-guided irrigations have significantly increased agricultural water productivities. However, technology alone is not enough. Along with infrastructure upgrades, diversifying crops to drought-resistant species, as in Ethiopia’s adoption of teff and sorghum, is necessary to break the link between food production and resource depletion. Moreover, global collaboration can facilitate the sharing of these successful technologies and practices, enabling regions with limited resources to access and implement them more effectively.

Accurate climate forecasting is the basis of adaptive planning, but model uncertainties still exist in areas where topography and microclimates are difficult to simulate with low-resolution models. In the high-altitude plains of Tibet, Guo et al. [2] found that using multi-objective metrics to calibrate soil temperature models can significantly reduce spatial complexities and enhance forecasting performance. This is a significant breakthrough for pastoralists who raise livestock in extremely cold conditions. Similarly, Shiferaw et al. [6] showed that choosing region-specific parameterizations in Ethiopia’s Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) models can improve seasonal rainfall predictions by 5-10%, which is very important for farmers planning their planting seasons. These local improvements are in line with the broader view of Giorgi et al. [7], who believe that high-resolution regional climate models (RCMs) can account for topographic effects, such as the upwelling in Ethiopia’s Great Rift Valley, which increases convective rainfall. Zhang et al. [8] further proved that integrating satellite data with machine learning significantly reduces soil temperature forecast biases, offering scalable solutions for data-scarce regions. However, the computational costs are still too high for many countries. New solutions, like machine learning emulators trained on RCM outputs, are still unlikely to make local forecasts in communities from the Sahel to Central Asia.

In recent years, more extreme weather events are being reported all around the world. Over the past 60 years, China has experienced a significant decrease in low-temperature events and an increase in high-temperature events, particularly in warm nights, with these trends closely correlated with specific atmospheric circulation patterns in certain regions [9]. Extreme heat, which quietly increases climate risks, is changing the limits of human survival. Liu et al. [3] predicted that, with a 2 °C increase in temperature, China’s population exposure to heatwaves will markedly increasing by 14 times until the 2100s, over 20 million person-days at risk of dangerous heatwaves. This is consistent with global analyses by Mora et al. [10], who found that lethal heat events have increased tenfold since 2000, and the urban poor, who often lack air conditioning and green spaces, are the most affected. In the slums of Delhi and the informal settlements of Cairo, the mortality rate during heatwaves is 80% higher than the city average. This shows that thermal vulnerability is related to inequality as well as climatology.

Climate changes are causing a series of hydrological, ecological, and socio-economic problems. In Tunisia’s Siliana Basin, El Ghoul et al. [4] predicted a 69% decrease in summer runoff by 2070s under RCP 8.5, which revealed longer and more intense droughts. Similar research by Marx et al. [11] shows that in Mediterranean basins, earlier snowmelt and increased evapotranspiration are reducing the soil moisture available for summer crops. Making the situation worse, Knight and Elbasit [12] found that extreme rainfall variability in southern Africa leads to increase in soil erosion during El Niño years, which, interspersed with periods of dryness, result in significant variability in erosivity values. Diffenbaugh et al. [13] put these regional trends in a global context, showing that global warming has doubled the probability of rare, erosive storms. This was clear in 2023’s catastrophic Cyclone Freddy, which displaced 500,000 people in Malawi and Madagascar. To stabilize these systems, integrated water resources management (IWRM) is needed. Global collaboration is crucial for the successful implementation of IWRM, as it involves sharing data, expertise, and best practices across borders.

Ecological restoration in drylands is a cost-effective way to deal with climate extremes. A good example is the “Three-North Shelter Forest Program of China”, which has effectively treated 7.87 million hectares of desertified land and brought 61% of soil erosion areas under effective control, thereby significantly combating desertification and reducing carbon emissions on a global scale. Ma et al. [14] showed that strategically cutting Haloxylon ammodendron shrubs in China’s Ulan Buh Desert can increase sap flow efficiency, helping this key species survive long-term droughts. Physiological studies by Klein et al. [15] explain the mechanism: removing part of the canopy reduces the risk of xylem embolism while maintaining photosynthetic capacity, a balance that has evolved over thousands of years in the desert. To scale up these nature-based solutions, we need to rethink conservation incentives. Niger’s farmer-managed natural regeneration (FMNR) movement has restored 12 million hectares of degraded land by selectively pruning drought-adapted tree species, increasing groundwater recharge and crop yields. These experiences can be learned and improved by bridging science and technology on a global scale.

The study of Liu et al. [16] reveals that maize and soybean yields in major food-producing countries like China, the United States, and Brazil are highly sensitive to drought, with future high-emission scenarios increasing drought risks during crop growing seasons, and highlights the need for global policy measures to address multi-country drought events and enhance food security. We need to break down the barriers between different disciplines and bring together climatologists, agronomists, and policymakers. Three things are especially important: First, we need to ensure the integrity and accuracy of research data. For example, the multiscale observation network on the Tibetan Plateau could improve regional soil temperature forecasts [17]. Second, we should make sure that adaptation financing is fair. Currently, a large amount of global climate funds still cannot reach grassroots organizations. Finally, we have to view air, water, and plants as shared resources rather than commodities. The Danube River basin countries have jointly signed agreements to establish effective coordination mechanisms, engaging in multi-level international cooperation to protect water resources and riparian plants, providing a good example of comprehensive research and management.

As arid regions are warming twice as fast as the global average, there is less room for mistakes. The studies reviewed here show both the scale of the challenge and the tools we can use to face it, from AI-enhanced climate models to physical water-harvesting methods. The message is clear: resilience depends on our ability to listen to the land and its people, and to turn science into stories that can influence policy and behavior. In the dry soils of Africa, Central Asia, America, and China, there are not only signs of the climate crisis but also the seeds of adaptation, waiting to be developed through international collaborative efforts.