Building Climate Resilience for Mediterranean Agrifood Systems: Adaptation Strategies for Wheat, Grape, and Olive

Dear Colleagues,

Climate change is widely regarded as one of the greatest challenges facing agriculture across the world. Rising temperatures, unpredictable rainfall patterns, and increased frequency of extreme meteorological phenomena, including heat waves and prolonged droughts, are having devastating impacts on the agricultural sector. Wheat (Triticum aestivum L.), grapes (Vitis vinifera L.), and olives (Olea europaea L.) have immense cultural, economic, and ecological importance and are the basis for producing bread and pasta, wine, and oil products. The severity and uneven distribution of the expected climate change threats across climate-sensitive agricultural areas call for crop- and region-specific adaptation strategies to mitigate the negative impacts to crop yield and quality.

To date, there is limited understanding of the linkages between expected climate change impacts and key agriculture-related decisions for these crops. Such knowledge can help enhance those key decisions by supporting the development of climate services that are able to adequately provide the climate information required to address future climate change. Therefore, research areas in this Special Issue may include, but are not limited to, the following topics:

• Assessing crop resilience with crop simulation models;
• Evaluating agroecological practices (like organic farming or crop diversification) to manage water scarcity and heat;
• Effects of data (like meteorological) inaccuracy in adaptation strategy performance;
• AI- and precision farming-based applications to optimize resource use and boost crop yields;
• Water management optimization using the Water–Energy–Food Ecosystem (WEFE) Nexus approach;
• Enhancement of the circular economy using compost and reclaimed by-products to enhance soil quality and reduce waste.

Prof. Dr. Mavromatis Theodoros
Guest Editor

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