Sustainable Management and Regulation of Agricultural Water Resources in the Context of Global Climate Change, 2nd Edition

Dear Colleagues,

Water management for agriculture is becoming increasingly complex in the context of global climate change, which has intensified the risks of agricultural water management. In particular, climate change will add substantial economic and social challenges in regions where water scarcity is already a concern. While some aspects of climate change such as increased precipitation and CO₂ concentration may bring some localized benefits, it will have a range of adverse impacts on agricultural production, including reduced water availability and more frequent extreme weather. Therefore, efforts to develop adaptation strategies through the sustainable management and regulation of agricultural water resources can enable the more efficient use of limited agricultural water resources by enhancing our understanding of the possible risks and adaptation strategies. These understandings could assist in developing priority measures for managing water resources for agricultural production. Evaluating and characterizing the efforts and benefits of agronomic and policy measures for agricultural water use is essential for climate change adaptation and ensuring food security. Finally, this advanced knowledge of agricultural water management can help policymakers to formulate robust measures to reduce the vulnerability of the agricultural sector to climate change and increase the system's resilience.

This Special Issue will identify historical and future trends and changes in crop evapotranspiration and irrigation to evaluate the effects of agronomic measurements, irrigation technologies, biological water-saving technologies, and water policy regulation on improving water use efficiency, as well as to propose sustainable pathways for adapting to future climate change, especially future extreme climate events.

In this Special Issue, original research articles and reviews on experiments and modeling are all welcome. Research areas may include (but are not limited to) the following:

• Map the temporal and spatial variations in crop evapotranspiration;
• Observe and project the impacts of climate change on agricultural or crop water use;
• Evaluate agronomic and irrigation water-saving technologies for enhancing the adaptation of food production to climate change;
• Biological water-saving technologies including cultivars and physiology for improving agricultural water use efficiency;
• Water policy initiatives for sustainable agriculture water management under climate change conditions;
• Scale effect of agricultural water use estimation;
• Contribution of blue water and green water toward water scarcity mitigation.

Dr. Xiaolin Yang
Prof. Dr. Wenfeng Liu
Prof. Dr. Wen Yin
Guest Editors

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