Lenka Bartošová

Climate Change Impacts on Czech Agriculture

Chapter summarizes the major impacts of changing climatic conditions in the Czech agriculture. Specific case studies are performed for the whole country (arable land) and are processed through GIS in the spatial grid 500 x 500 m respectively 1 x 1 km if middle Europe is considered. Contribution presents the impacts of climate change on the production of two major field crops (winter wheat and spring barley) in the Czech Republic for different future time horizons (2030, 2050 and 2100). The yield study includes not only the effect of climatic conditions but also the fertilization effect of carbon dioxide. Study is completed by effects of rising temperatures on the spread of temperature-depending biotic factors (selected pests) and changes in agroclimatic conditions for field crops. The basic data which are needed and used are long-term database of the national meteorological service and agricultural organizations which was used for evaluation of growth models (e.g. CERES). Other used tools are models which allow describe the evolution of pests in new climate conditions (e.g. CLIMEX or ECAMON) and various meteorological indieces. Description of expected weather conditions are based on two emission scenarios, according to the IPCC (mostly SRES-A2 and -B1) and three GCM models (NCAR-PCM, ECHAM5 and HadCM3). Their open access monthly outputs are published for the individual time horizons (e.g. 2030, 2050 and 2100) and are prepared in the daily time step by stochastic weather generator. The impacts of climate change are determined by comparing the current and expected state observed phenomena.