Sensitivity of potato yield to climate change

Abstract

One significant impact of climate change is the effect upon agriculture. As many evidences indicated that some remarkable changes could happen in climate scenario, the present work is mainly directed to discuss sensitivity of climate change upon the potato production in Egypt. The selection of potato product is mainly dependent upon that potato represent strategic crop cultivated in Egypt. The SUBSTOR potato model was employed to simulate physiological processes and yield of potato production. SUBSTOR model is a mechanistic, process-oriented model for tuber yield includes crop development. The present work introduces two possible cases of climate changes for the sake of climate crop production relationship. The actual measurements for potato production characteristics were used in the comparison with present and predicted. The climate change data is used from two general circulation models (CSIRO and HadCM3) for A1 greenhouse gases Scenario during 2050. The results of the work indicated that the potato yield decrease from 11 to 13% under climate change and the climate change data output from HadCM3 model gave the highest value of potato yield comparing with CSIRO model. And Valor cultivar gave the highest potato yield compared to Dezareah cultivar when the irrigation treatment taken place under current and future climate. © 2010, INSInet Publication.