Record Details

Potentially Obtainable Yields in the Semi-Arid Tropics

OAR@ICRISAT

View Archive Info
 
 
Field Value
 
Relation http://oar.icrisat.org/198/
 
Title Potentially Obtainable Yields in the Semi-Arid Tropics
 
Creator Fischer, G
Velthuizen, H V
Hizsnyik, E
Wiberg, D
 
Subject Agriculture-Farming, Production, Technology, Economics
 
Description Close to one billion people in the world are undernourished and world population is expected to increase
by 30% to approximately 9 billion by 2050 while food demand is expected to double. There is increasing
competition for land and water resources from other sectors and increasing competitive demand for agricultural
products for biofuel production. The UN’s Millenium Development Goal of reducing the number of
undernourished to less than 420 million by 2015 has placed additional emphasis on the question of how
we can secure food for the current and future populations and where the additional food requirement can
be produced. One world region that possesses significant potential for improvements in agricultural output
is the Semi-Arid Tropics (SAT), which lie primarily in developing countries where agriculture is almost entirely
rainfed and largely comprises poor, smallholder farms. Due to a variety of factors including high climatic
variability in time and space, poverty and poor education, poor policy and institutional support, and political
instability, many areas within the SAT are far from reaching their potential agricultural production. Developing
their full agricultural potential would help these areas feed their often rapidly growing populations as well
as reduce poverty, boost their economies and provide more food for world markets. In this report, IIASA’s
Agro-Ecological Zones (AEZ) methodology is applied to assess the agricultural potential of the semi-arid
tropics and compare it to currently reported yields. Yield potentials are calculated for rain-fed conditions
under high inputs and advanced management to show how much yields can be improved. Furthermore, the
AEZ methodology is adjusted to model the impacts on yield potentials of water management techniques
such as rainwater harvesting and soil moisture management. Bio-physical constraints to agriculture and
the impacts of climate change are also analyzed with AEZ. Results indicate that modeled potential yields
under high inputs and advanced management are on average 3.6 times more than the current average
yields in countries under the SAT. Soil moisture management and rainwater harvesting practices could add an
additional 10% on average to these high input potentials while further reducing the variability in yields and
number of failure years. Climate change impacts are slightly positive for the SAT as a whole, but all results
in the study vary considerably depending on the crop and the region.
 
Publisher International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics
 
Date 2010
 
Type Monograph
NonPeerReviewed
 
Format application/pdf
 
Language en
 
Rights —
 
Identifier http://oar.icrisat.org/198/1/316_2009_GTAE_55_Poten_obt_yield_in_SAT.pdf
Fischer, G and Velthuizen, H V and Hizsnyik, E and Wiberg, D (2010) Potentially Obtainable Yields in the Semi-Arid Tropics. Monograph. International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics. (In Press)