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Agrometeorology Research for Sustainable Development Goals

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Air, Climate Change and Sustainability".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 May 2026 | Viewed by 2517

Special Issue Editors


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Guest Editor
Research Group Interaction Biosphere-Atmosphere and Micrometeorology on Amazonia (IBAMA), Federal University of Western Pará (UFOPA), Santarém 68040-255, Brazil
Interests: crop evapotranspiration; GHG balance; energy and radiation balance; bioeconomy and climate change
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

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Guest Editor
Embrapa Eastern Amazon, Santarem 68010-180, Brazil
Interests: crop evapotranspiration; GHG balance; energy and radiation balance

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Guest Editor
Climate Sciences Post-Graduate Program (PPGCC), Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte, Av. Senador Salgado Filho, 3000, Natal 59078-970, Brazil
Interests: crop evapotranspiration; GHG balance; energy and radiation balance

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The present cpntext increasingly highlights the need for dialogue between science and society. In this context, scientific journals play a very important role in filtering “what will be passed on” as science to people. We live in an environment of increasing need for accurate, precise and reliable information, not only because it is an intrinsic part of the scientific method but also because this information should serve justification for the adoption of public policies to solve the problems raised in research. There is a consensus among the scientific community that the key issue at present is “climate change”, and one of the elements of the system that most correlatea with climate is agricultural production and its relation to terrestrial biomes and their vast biodiversity with complex ecohydrological and biophysical mosaics. This topic justifies a Special Issue, which would determine which approaches are guiding discussions on the subject and priority areas for the scientific community. However, we need to go further, because Earth is our only planet. This fact had made us reflect on our role in the search for a more sustainable and environmentally conscious planet for cause-versus-effect activities, which are usually the main focus of the works. In order to not only to obtain answers in a world dominated by questions but also adopt the conclusions as a constructive part of our critical sense about the planet, such as its needs, its potential and the best ways of using its resources, this Special Issue offers agrometeorology numerous tools related to achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals. The potential topics of this Special Issue include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • Carbon and other-element cycling and greenhouse gas emissions;
  • The interactions of vegetation and hydrology with climate change and human disturbances;
  • The responses of microbial communities and functions to climate change and human disturbances;
  • Greenhouse and plant factory environment simulation;
  • Eddy covariance measurements in agriculture;
  • Water use monitoring and irrigation management;
  • Crop nutrient monitoring and sustainable fertilization.

Dr. Gabriel Brito Costa
Dr. Lucieta Guerreiro Martorano
Dr. Bergson Guedes Bezerra
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • GHG balance
  • energy balance
  • water use efficiency
  • carbon use efficiency
  • water demand
  • evapotranspiration
  • remote sensing on agriculture

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

32 pages, 19907 KB  
Article
Global Patterns of Ecosystem Transpiration and Carbon–Water Coupling: An Intercomparison of Four Partitioning Models Using Eddy Covariance Data for Sustainable Water Management
by Haonan Wang, Shanshan Yang, Wilson Kalisa, Ruiyun Zeng, Jingwen Wang, Dan Cao, Sha Zhang, Jiahua Zhang and Ayalkibet M. Seka
Sustainability 2026, 18(7), 3245; https://doi.org/10.3390/su18073245 - 26 Mar 2026
Viewed by 548
Abstract
Ecosystem transpiration (T) is the core process in terrestrial water and carbon cycles. Accurately estimating T is critical to improving evapotranspiration (ET) models and understanding global ecosystem responses to climate change. In this study, we evaluated four ET partitioning methods (TEA, Z16, L19, [...] Read more.
Ecosystem transpiration (T) is the core process in terrestrial water and carbon cycles. Accurately estimating T is critical to improving evapotranspiration (ET) models and understanding global ecosystem responses to climate change. In this study, we evaluated four ET partitioning methods (TEA, Z16, L19, and Y21) using 368 global eddy covariance (EC) sites and 15 sap flow sites. Intercomparison results showed that TEA, Z16, and Y21 maintained good consistency, whereas L19 exhibited lower agreement, primarily due to its high sensitivity to energy closure errors and poor non-linear fitting accuracy under extreme conditions. Validation against sap flow data indicated that Z16 performed best (R2 = 0.45, KGE = 0.52), followed by Y21, while TEA had the lowest accuracy due to systematic overestimation driven by unremoved persistent background soil evaporation in its training dataset. Global analysis revealed that mean annual T ranged from 213 mm yr−1 (Z16) to 294 mm yr−1 (TEA), with annual T/ET varying between 0.45 (Z16) and 0.63 (TEA). Trend analysis further showed consistent increasing trends across all four methods for both annual T (0.33–0.83 mm·yr−2) and annual T/ET (0.0015–0.0019 yr−1). Additionally, a notably stronger relationship was found between gross primary productivity (GPP) and T than between GPP and ET. Despite substantial differences in model structures, these methods effectively capture the temporal dynamics of T and the coupled relationships between ecosystem carbon and water fluxes. Our findings provide critical benchmarks for terrestrial water cycle modeling and sustainable water resource management under a changing climate. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Agrometeorology Research for Sustainable Development Goals)
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35 pages, 1056 KB  
Article
Digital Economy, Green Innovation, and Agricultural Carbon Emission Reduction: Spillover Effects and Analyses of Mechanisms
by Kejun Lin, Taobo Ye, Shilong Xi and Chuanjian Yi
Sustainability 2025, 17(22), 10420; https://doi.org/10.3390/su172210420 - 20 Nov 2025
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1296
Abstract
Against the backdrop of the global imperative for carbon neutrality, in this study, we systematically assessed the roles of spatial spillover and underlying mechanisms along with threshold characteristics of the digital economy on agricultural carbon emissions as related to green innovation. Using provincial [...] Read more.
Against the backdrop of the global imperative for carbon neutrality, in this study, we systematically assessed the roles of spatial spillover and underlying mechanisms along with threshold characteristics of the digital economy on agricultural carbon emissions as related to green innovation. Using provincial panel data from China, as obtained over the period from 2013 to 2022, we determined agricultural carbon emissions as measured using the emission coefficient method and constructed a comprehensive digital economy index via the entropy weight method. An array of econometric models, including linear regression, the Spatial Durbin Model (SDM), mediation effect models, and panel threshold models were employed to examine both direct and indirect pathways, spatial interactions, and nonlinear moderating effects of digital economy. The results indicate that the following findings: (1) The digital economy significantly reduces agricultural carbon emissions, with a coefficient of approximately –2.051 in the baseline model. (2) Green innovation serves as a key mediator. The mediation effect analysis revealed that green innovation has a mediation effect value of 1.896 in the digital economy’s carbon reduction effect. (3) Significant negative spatial spillovers were observed upon reducing neighboring regions’ digital development of local emissions, with indirect effects ranging from –1.434 to –2.708 under different spatial matrices. (4) Urbanization rates exhibit a dual-threshold effect (73.38% and 74.79%), with the carbon reduction effect of the digital economy showing a notable strengthening when these rates extend beyond these thresholds. Heterogeneity analysis reveals a stronger effect in western China (coefficient: –6.079), attributable to higher marginal returns from digitalization as compared with that observed in less developed regions. Limitations associated with this study include the use of provincial-level data which may mask sub-regional heterogeneity, reliance on green patent counts as a proxy for green innovation output, and omissions of effects of exogenous policy programs such as the “Dual Carbon” policy. Future research would markedly benefit from micro-level data and more dynamic tests of the mechanisms involved. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Agrometeorology Research for Sustainable Development Goals)
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