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This article examines the growth of Indigenous grassroots community groups across Hawai'i, whose efforts are pivotal to place-based climate change resilience and community well-being. Instead of focusing on specific ecosystem resilience actions, it highlights the people and places that make this movement of community organizations resilient, leveraging both social and cultural strengths to adapt to climate impacts. For many Indigenous peoples, climate change is not new; adaptation has already been integral to relationships between environment and culture. These changes require culturally responsive approaches, not short-term engineering solutions such as coastal hardening or stream channelization. A collaboration between a grassroots artist mapping initiative ('ÃINAVIS) and a university's community-based research project ('ÃINA KUPU), this study utilizes a novel data index compiled using publicly available information to inform a series of in-depth student interviews with community groups across Hawai'i whose mission, vision, and work are dedicated to caring for 'ãina. We find that these "'Ãina Organizations" articulate climate resilience in multi-faceted and culturally grounded ways, maintaining reciprocal and mutual relationships with 'ãina, the Hawaiian term for land meaning "that which feeds." Facing various challenges and needing different systems of support, our work maps the dynamic adaptability of 'ãina expressed through community networks of collaborative care with emphasis on the importance of intergenerational knowledge and genealogical connection to place shared and passed onto future generations. The article concludes by emphasizing the importance of working on 'ãina as an exercise of Indigenous sovereignty, expanding climate resilience with cultural practice and social justice as both outcome and process of climate change adaptation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mungbean plays a significant role in global food and nutritional security. However, the recent drastic rise in atmospheric temperature has posed an imminent threat to mungbean cultivation. Therefore, this study investigates the growth and physiological changes of 87 mungbean germplasm lines under heat stress. Genotypes were examined using parameters including leaf area, chlorophyll content, membrane stability index (MSI), stomatal conductance, pollen viability, number of pods per cluster, number of pods per plant, number of seeds/pod, 100-seed weight and grain yield/plant under heat stress and control environments. A wide range of variation was observed for these traits among genotypes under heat stress and control environments. Genotypes were also identified with variable responses under both environments. The phenotypic expression of selected promising accessions was also validated in control environment conditions at the National Phytotron facility. The selected promising genotypes viz., IC76475, IC418452 and IC489062 validated their heat tolerance behavior for key candidate genes revealed by quantitative realtime PCR (qRT-PCR). These mungbean genotypes can act as potential resources in the mungbean improvement programs for heat stress tolerance. This study also provides a comprehensive understanding of the key mechanisms underlying heat tolerance in mungbean. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous research has found that nature connectedness, an experiential close connection to nature with cognitive, affective and physical benefits, profoundly impacts individual wellbeing and subsequently increases pro-environmental behaviors. However, little is known about the personal and contextual factors that predict nature connectedness. Testing theory derived from a qualitative interpretative phenomenological analysis study, this research addresses the lacuna in the literature. A structural equation model analysis finds that interoceptive awareness significantly predicts nature connection, that secure attachment to nature significantly explains this relationship, and that these inter-related constructs predict both pro-environmental behavior and wellbeing. This revised model of nature connection indicates important antecedents for the human-nature bond, illuminating in particular that the interpersonal relational processes foundational for close bonding with humans also occur in bonding with nature. Structural equation modeling indicates that emotional awareness is the dimension of interoceptive awareness that most significantly predicts nature connection, suggesting that the more aware a person is of the connection between inner bodily sensations and emotions, the more likely they can bond with nature. Given that interoceptive awareness indicates a coherent relationship with the self, including effective communication between body, mind and feelings, this process is therefore implicated in the capacity for humans to bond with nature. In sum, this present research points to the efficacy of an embodied, secure attachment with nature to help close both the human-nature disconnection chasm, and the environmental value-action gap. Theoretical and methodological implications for research and policy are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pearl millet is a nutri-cereal that is mostly grown in harsh environments, making it an ideal crop to study heat tolerance mechanisms at the molecular level. Despite having a better-inbuilt tolerance to high temperatures than other crops, heat stress negatively affects the crop, posing a threat to productivity gain. Hence, to understand the heat-responsive genes, the leaf and root samples of two contrasting pearl millet inbreds, EGTB 1034 (heat tolerant) and EGTB 1091 (heat sensitive), were subjected to heat-treated conditions and generated genome-wide transcriptomes. We discovered 13,464 differentially expressed genes (DEGs), of which 6932 were down-regulated and 6532 up-regulated in leaf and root tissues. The pairwise analysis of the tissue-based transcriptome data of the two genotypes demonstrated distinctive genotype and tissue-specific expression of genes. The root exhibited a higher number of DEGs compared to the leaf, emphasizing different adaptive strategies of pearl millet. A large number of genes encoding ROS scavenging enzymes, WRKY, NAC, enzymes involved in nutrient uptake, protein kinases, photosynthetic enzymes, and heat shock proteins (HSPs) and several transcription factors (TFs) involved in cross-talking of temperature stress responsive mechanisms were activated in the stress conditions. Ribosomal proteins emerged as pivotal hub genes, highly interactive with key genes expressed and involved in heat stress response. The synthesis of secondary metabolites and metabolic pathways of pearl millet were significantly enriched under heat stress. Comparative synteny analysis of HSPs and TFs in the foxtail millet genome demonstrated greater collinearity with pearl millet compared to proso millet, rice, sorghum, and maize. In this study, 1906 unannotated DEGs were identified, providing insight into novel participants in the molecular response to heat stress. The identified genes hold promise for expediting varietal development for heat tolerance in pearl millet and similar crops, fostering resilience and enhancing grain yield in heat-prone environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change poses a growing threat to the livestock industry, impacting animal productivity, animal welfare, and farm management practices. Thus, enhancing livestock climatic resilience (CR) is becoming a key priority in various breeding programs. CR can be defined as the ability of an animal to be minimally affected or rapidly return to euthermia under thermally stressful conditions. The primary study objectives were to perform genome-wide association studies for 12 CR indicators derived from variability in longitudinal vaginal temperature in lactating sows under heat stress conditions. A total of 31 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) located on nine chromosomes were considered as significantly associated with nine CR indicators based on different thresholds. Among them, only two SNPs were simultaneously identified for different CR indicators, SSC6:16,449,770 bp and SSC7:39,254,889 bp. These results highlighted the polygenic nature of CR indicators with small effects distributed across different chromosomes. Furthermore, we identified 434 positional genes associated with CR. Key candidate genes include SLC3A2, STX5, POLR2G, and GANAB, which were previously related to heat stress responses, protein folding, and cholesterol metabolism. Furthermore, the enriched KEGG pathways and Gene Ontology (GO) terms associated with these candidate genes are linked to stress responses, immune and inflammatory responses, neural system, and DNA damage and repair. The most enriched quantitative trait loci are related to “Meat and Carcass”, followed by “Production”, “Reproduction”, “Health”, and “Exterior (conformation and appearance)” traits. Multiple genomic regions were identified associated with different CR indicators, which reveals that CR is a highly polygenic trait with small effect sizes distributed across the genome. Many heat tolerance or HS related genes in our study, such as HSP90AB1, DMGDH, and HOMER1, have been identified. The complexity of CR encompasses a range of adaptive responses, from behavioral to cellular. These results highlight the possibility of selecting more heat-tolerant individuals based on the identified SNP for CR indicators.

IntroductionThis research investigates into the complex dynamics of climate finance in Somalia, a vulnerable region facing the dire consequences of climate change. The study aims to assess how financial inputs for climate-related projects align with the actual needs and identify critical factors that influence funding effectiveness.MethodsA dual-methodological approach was employed, integrating both multiple regression analysis and Support Vector Machine (SVM) techniques. This mixed-method analysis facilitates a robust examination of climate finance data to dissect the relationships and impacts of various determinants on funding effectiveness.ResultsThe results indicate that adaptation finance, robust governance, and the scale of financial interventions significantly enhance the effectiveness of climate finance flows. However, mitigation finance and aspects related to gender equality displayed less significant impacts. Notably, the study identifies a pervasive underfinancing of climate projects in Somalia, illustrating a significant gap between the needed and actual funds disbursed.DiscussionThe findings underscore the need for enhanced governance frameworks and targeted large-scale financial interventions to optimize the allocation and impact of climate finance in vulnerable regions like Somalia. By quantifying the influence of adaptation finance and governance, this study contributes new insights to the literature on climate finance effectiveness and suggests practical strategies for policymakers and practitioners to improve climate resilience initiatives.

This article examines the growth of Indigenous grassroots community groups across Hawaiʻi, whose efforts are pivotal to place-based climate change resilience and community well-being. Instead of focusing on specific ecosystem resilience actions, it highlights the people and places that make this movement of community organizations resilient, leveraging both social and cultural strengths to adapt to climate impacts. For many Indigenous peoples, climate change is not new; adaptation has already been integral to relationships between environment and culture. These changes require culturally responsive approaches, not short-term engineering solutions such as coastal hardening or stream channelization. A collaboration between a grassroots artist mapping initiative (‘ĀINAVIS) and a university’s community-based research project (‘ĀINA KUPU), this study utilizes a novel data index compiled using publicly available information to inform a series of in-depth student interviews with community groups across Hawai‘i whose mission, vision, and work are dedicated to caring for ‘āina. We find that these “ʻĀina Organizations” articulate climate resilience in multi-faceted and culturally grounded ways, maintaining reciprocal and mutual relationships with ʻāina, the Hawaiian term for land meaning “that which feeds.” Facing various challenges and needing different systems of support, our work maps the dynamic adaptability of ‘āina expressed through community networks of collaborative care with emphasis on the importance of intergenerational knowledge and genealogical connection to place shared and passed onto future generations. The article concludes by emphasizing the importance of working on ‘āina as an exercise of Indigenous sovereignty, expanding climate resilience with cultural practice and social justice as both outcome and process of climate change adaptation.

Mungbean plays a significant role in global food and nutritional security. However, the recent drastic rise in atmospheric temperature has posed an imminent threat to mungbean cultivation. Therefore, this study investigates the growth and physiological changes of 87 mungbean germplasm lines under heat stress. Genotypes were examined using parameters including leaf area, chlorophyll content, membrane stability index (MSI), stomatal conductance, pollen viability, number of pods per cluster, number of pods per plant, number of seeds/pod, 100-seed weight and grain yield/plant under heat stress and control environments. A wide range of variation was observed for these traits among genotypes under heat stress and control environments. Genotypes were also identified with variable responses under both environments. The phenotypic expression of selected promising accessions was also validated in control environment conditions at the National Phytotron facility. The selected promising genotypes viz., IC76475, IC418452 and IC489062 validated their heat tolerance behavior for key candidate genes revealed by quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR). These mungbean genotypes can act as potential resources in the mungbean improvement programs for heat stress tolerance. This study also provides a comprehensive understanding of the key mechanisms underlying heat tolerance in mungbean.

Climate change increases stressors that will challenge the resiliency of global agricultural production. Just three crops, wheat, maize, and rice, are estimated to sustain 50% of the caloric demand of the world population, meaning that significant loss of any of these crops would threaten global food security. However, increasing cropping system diversity can create a more resilient food system. One crop that could add diversity to wheat-dominated cropping systems in the inland Pacific Northwest is proso millet, a climate-resilient, small-seeded cereal crop that is highly water efficient, able to grow in low fertility soils, and has a desirable nutritional profile. Proso millet shows potential for adoption in this region due to its short growing season, compatibility with regional equipment, and environmental requirements, however US cultivars have been developed for the Great Plains and little research has been conducted outside of this region. To better understand the potential for adoption in the inland PNW, seven commercially available varieties were planted in a researcher-run trial in Pullman, WA and in a series of producer-run trials across the region in 2022. Samples were analyzed for mineral concentration (Zn, Fe, Cu, Mn, Mg, Ca, P, and K), seed morphology phenotypes (seed area, seed eccentricity, thousand seed weight, and seed color), and agronomic phenotypes (grain yield, plant height, days to heading, days to maturity, and percent emergence). Varieties from the researcher-run trial showed significant differences for all traits excluding percent emergence. Samples from producer-run trials showed differences by location for concentration of all minerals and for all seed morphology traits but were not analyzed for agronomic phenotypes. Samples from producer-run trials showed no difference by variety for mineral concentration but showed varietal differences for all seed morphology phenotypes. Most minerals were positively correlated with one another (0.28

Introduction: As the world is engulfed with the growing impacts of climate change, the integration of climate adaptation measures into building performance requirements is essential. In the era of the fourth industrial revolution, smart buildings are expected to be the next frontier in the realm of building rating systems after sustainability-based one. Smart buildings can play a pivotal role in addressing the evolving challenges of changing climate due to their temporal and spatial cross-scale nature. Methods: This study assesses the integration of climate hazard adaptation options within four prominent smart building rating systems (SBRS). Using a sectoral analysis approach and a 4-point Likert scale, we systematically evaluate the extent to which these rating systems incorporate climate adaptation measures directly or indirectly across multiple building sectors. We identify strengths and weaknesses in each system's approach, highlighting areas where adaptation options are more profoundly addressed and sectors that require further attention. Results: The evaluation results reveal variations in the comprehensiveness of climate adaptation integration among the smart building rating systems. The SRBS show a high level of integration of climate adaptation measures in the urban sectors intrinsically tied to the smart building paradigm, such as communication sector, and the human wellbeing and organization sector. Nevertheless, the study also revealed that SBRS almost universally fall short in covering other vital domains such as building envelope and structure, water and sanitation, and blue and green infrastructure. Discussions: Complementing the SBRS with sustainability rating systems (GBRS) can effectively address the limitations in climate adaptation integration within SBRS. Moreover, the inherent interconnectedness of smart buildings with their surrounding infrastructure and the broader urban environment underscores the importance of the cross-scale consideration in the building rating domain in general and in climate related topics in particular, this interconnectedness also highlights a smart building's reliance on its surrounding context for optimal functionality and the interdependency between the building and urban scale. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pearl millet is a nutri-cereal that is mostly grown in harsh environments, making it an ideal crop to study heat tolerance mechanisms at the molecular level. Despite having a better-inbuilt tolerance to high temperatures than other crops, heat stress negatively affects the crop, posing a threat to productivity gain. Hence, to understand the heat-responsive genes, the leaf and root samples of two contrasting pearl millet inbreds, EGTB 1034 (heat tolerant) and EGTB 1091 (heat sensitive), were subjected to heat-treated conditions and generated genome-wide transcriptomes. We discovered 13,464 differentially expressed genes (DEGs), of which 6932 were down-regulated and 6532 up-regulated in leaf and root tissues. The pairwise analysis of the tissue-based transcriptome data of the two genotypes demonstrated distinctive genotype and tissue-specific expression of genes. The root exhibited a higher number of DEGs compared to the leaf, emphasizing different adaptive strategies of pearl millet. A large number of genes encoding ROS scavenging enzymes, WRKY, NAC, enzymes involved in nutrient uptake, protein kinases, photosynthetic enzymes, and heat shock proteins (HSPs) and several transcription factors (TFs) involved in cross-talking of temperature stress responsive mechanisms were activated in the stress conditions. Ribosomal proteins emerged as pivotal hub genes, highly interactive with key genes expressed and involved in heat stress response. The synthesis of secondary metabolites and metabolic pathways of pearl millet were significantly enriched under heat stress. Comparative synteny analysis of HSPs and TFs in the foxtail millet genome demonstrated greater collinearity with pearl millet compared to proso millet, rice, sorghum, and maize. In this study, 1906 unannotated DEGs were identified, providing insight into novel participants in the molecular response to heat stress. The identified genes hold promise for expediting varietal development for heat tolerance in pearl millet and similar crops, fostering resilience and enhancing grain yield in heat-prone environments.

Climate change is a global phenomenon with profound effects on ecosystems, including lakes, which are an important source of fresh water, fisheries, and biodiversity conservation. Africa, with its limited freshwater resources, remains vulnerable to climate change impacts. This study systematically reviews the literature to understand the impact of climate change on four major African lakes (Chad, Victoria, Tanganyika, and Malawi/Nyasa/Niassa) and to identify pathways for enhancing their resilience and society’s dependent on them. The review was conducted in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta Analyses (PRISMA) 2020 guideline using journal articles extracted from the Scopus and Google Scholar databases and analysed using ATLAS.ti 24 software. The study found that climate change and extreme climate events (ECEs) are disproportionately affecting the physical, chemical, and biological characteristics of the lakes, leading to changes in lake levels, aquatic life, nutrient mixing, and the provision of ecosystem services. This result in far-reaching implications for the socioeconomic activities and livelihoods that depend on these water bodies. While some lake associations are taking measures to enhance lakes’ resilience to climate change, a lot more needs to be done. To enhance the climate resilience of African lakes and societies, lake associations are encouraged to implement watershed and water level management, invasive species management practices and enforcement of buffer zones around lakes. There is also a need for community engagement and education on climate-resilient practices, development of ECEs early warning systems and agricultural adaptation if lake dependent communities are to be climate-resilient.Systematic review registrationhttps://www.prisma-statement.org/.

This article discusses the concept of knowledge co-creation for community resilience to sustainability challenges. It emphasizes the importance of engaging diverse actors, including scientists, practitioners, and community members, in the research process to collectively generate actionable insights and solutions. The article highlights various case studies that demonstrate the value of knowledge co-production in addressing sustainability issues, such as youth engagement in territorial governance, advancing agroecological transitions, and citizen contributions to environmental science. The authors emphasize the need for building trust, sharing power, and facilitating learning among all research participants to achieve meaningful and impactful results. [Extracted from the article]

This work develops microgrid dispatch algorithms with a unified approach to model predictive control (MPC) to (a) operate in grid-connected mode to minimize total operational cost, (b) operate in islanded mode to maximize resilience during a utility outage, and (c) utilize weighting factors in the grid-connected objective function to preserve islanded capability (on-site fuel reserves, battery state of charge) to enhance resilience in the potential event of an unplanned grid outage. Resilience is defined using microgrid survivability (probability to serve 100% of critical load), autonomy (duration of time to serve 100% of critical load), and unserved energy (curtailed critical load) for a target of 7 days during a grid outage. The developed methods are applied to a military microgrid with 2,250 kW of diesel generation, 3,450 kW/13,800 kWh battery storage, and 16,479 kW of solar photovoltaics. Sensitivity analysis is conducted to determine the selection of weighting factors to have the best impact on three developed objectives: grid-connected economics, islanded resilience, and carbon intensity. Optimal weighting factors reduce operating costs by 0.1%, increase survivability by 3.9%, increase autonomy by 16.7%, reduce unserved energy by 94.1%, and increase carbon intensity by 2.5%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rice followed by wheat is the dominant cropping system in the middle Indo-Gangetic plains (IGP). Lower productivity (4.8 t ha-1) of this cropping system in Bihar, compared to the national average (6.8 t ha-1) due to several climateand production-related issues, is a matter of concern for the farmers and the policymakers. Keeping all these in view, an experiment with rice-wheat cropping system was carried out during 2020-21 and 2021-22 in 17 adopted villages of 13 districts of Bihar under the Project "Climate Resilient Agriculture Program (CRAP)" to evaluate the feasibility of early transplanting of rice in the month of June with the aim of achieving higher system productivity by early harvesting of rice and subsequent timely sowing of wheat before 15 November with the provision of assured irrigation. In this study, the concept of an innovative community irrigation approach and single-phase 3-hp submersible pump was employed. Longduration rice variety (150 days) Rajendra Mahsuri-1 was sown during 20-25 May in the nursery and transplanted through puddling operation during 15-20 June in 17 locations. Under delayed conditions, the nursery sowing and transplanting window were 10-15 June and 10-15 July, respectively. Timely sown rice grown with the provision of a community irrigation system achieved a grain yield of 5.2 t ha-1 and 85.8% higher water productivity, compared to late-sown crops. Following the harvest of rice, the HD-2967 variety of wheat was planted in the first fortnight of November and harvested in the first week of April, yielding 4.9 t ha-1 with the application of 2-3 irrigations based on soil type and evaporative demand. Timely harvesting of wheat facilitated farmers of the region to take an additional crop of summer green gram. With an assured irrigation system and shifting planting dates and thereby managing climatic risks, the overall productivity of the rice-wheat cropping system was achieved to the tune of 10.1 t ha-1 with a cropping intensity of 300% for better adaptation and sustainable production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction:As the world is engulfed with the growing impacts of climate change, the integration of climate adaptation measures into building performance requirements is essential. In the era of the fourth industrial revolution, smart buildings are expected to be the next frontier in the realm of building rating systems after sustainability-based one. Smart buildings can play a pivotal role in addressing the evolving challenges of changing climate due to their temporal and spatial cross-scale nature.Methods:This study assesses the integration of climate hazard adaptation options within four prominent smart building rating systems (SBRS). Using a sectoral analysis approach and a 4-point Likert scale, we systematically evaluate the extent to which these rating systems incorporate climate adaptation measures directly or indirectly across multiple building sectors. We identify strengths and weaknesses in each system’s approach, highlighting areas where adaptation options are more profoundly addressed and sectors that require further attention.Results:The evaluation results reveal variations in the comprehensiveness of climate adaptation integration among the smart building rating systems. The SRBS show a high level of integration of climate adaptation measures in the urban sectors intrinsically tied to the smart building paradigm, such as communication sector, and the human wellbeing and organization sector. Nevertheless, the study also revealed that SBRS almost universally fall short in covering other vital domains such as building envelope and structure, water and sanitation, and blue and green infrastructure.Discussions:Complementing the SBRS with sustainability rating systems (GBRS) can effectively address the limitations in climate adaptation integration within SBRS. Moreover, the inherent interconnectedness of smart buildings with their surrounding infrastructure and the broader urban environment underscores the importance of the cross-scale consideration in the building rating domain in general and in climate related topics in particular, this interconnectedness also highlights a smart building’s reliance on its surrounding context for optimal functionality and the interdependency between the building and urban scale.

This work develops microgrid dispatch algorithms with a unified approach to model predictive control (MPC) to (a) operate in grid-connected mode to minimize total operational cost, (b) operate in islanded mode to maximize resilience during a utility outage, and (c) utilize weighting factors in the grid-connected objective function to preserve islanded capability (on-site fuel reserves, battery state of charge) to enhance resilience in the potential event of an unplanned grid outage. Resilience is defined using microgrid survivability (probability to serve 100% of critical load), autonomy (duration of time to serve 100% of critical load), and unserved energy (curtailed critical load) for a target of 7 days during a grid outage. The developed methods are applied to a military microgrid with 2,250 kW of diesel generation, 3,450 kW/13,800 kWh battery storage, and 16,479 kW of solar photovoltaics. Sensitivity analysis is conducted to determine the selection of weighting factors to have the best impact on three developed objectives: grid-connected economics, islanded resilience, and carbon intensity. Optimal weighting factors reduce operating costs by 0.1%, increase survivability by 3.9%, increase autonomy by 16.7%, reduce unserved energy by 94.1%, and increase carbon intensity by 2.5%.

Rice followed by wheat is the dominant cropping system in the middle Indo-Gangetic plains (IGP). Lower productivity (4.8 t ha−1) of this cropping system in Bihar, compared to the national average (6.8 t ha−1) due to several climate- and production-related issues, is a matter of concern for the farmers and the policymakers. Keeping all these in view, an experiment with rice–wheat cropping system was carried out during 2020–21 and 2021–22 in 17 adopted villages of 13 districts of Bihar under the Project “Climate Resilient Agriculture Program (CRAP)” to evaluate the feasibility of early transplanting of rice in the month of June with the aim of achieving higher system productivity by early harvesting of rice and subsequent timely sowing of wheat before 15 November with the provision of assured irrigation. In this study, the concept of an innovative community irrigation approach and single-phase 3-hp submersible pump was employed. Long-duration rice variety (150 days) Rajendra Mahsuri-1 was sown during 20–25 May in the nursery and transplanted through puddling operation during 15–20 June in 17 locations. Under delayed conditions, the nursery sowing and transplanting window were 10–15 June and 10–15 July, respectively. Timely sown rice grown with the provision of a community irrigation system achieved a grain yield of 5.2 t ha−1 and 85.8% higher water productivity, compared to late-sown crops. Following the harvest of rice, the HD-2967 variety of wheat was planted in the first fortnight of November and harvested in the first week of April, yielding 4.9 t ha−1 with the application of 2–3 irrigations based on soil type and evaporative demand. Timely harvesting of wheat facilitated farmers of the region to take an additional crop of summer green gram. With an assured irrigation system and shifting planting dates and thereby managing climatic risks, the overall productivity of the rice–wheat cropping system was achieved to the tune of 10.1 t ha−1 with a cropping intensity of 300% for better adaptation and sustainable production.

The global temperature increase of 1.1°C over the past decade and human population growth are already escalating competition for water in locations where water is scarce, adversely affecting agriculture. Water-smart farming was developed to address challenges associated with the availability, access and use of agricultural water. It complements practices and goals related to agricultural water in climate-smart agriculture. It encompasses several climate-responsive food cropping systems, water-saving methods, tools, and technologies to grow food sustainably. Effective implementation of water-smart farming can ameliorate the pressing burden of agricultural water competition. Therefore, the conceptual framework of water-smart farming and its principal elements or ideology are introduced in this review. The major pillars of water-smart cropping, which include conditioning and improving the soil’s capacity to capture and hold moisture, basic infrastructure for water harvesting, storage and use as nature-based cropping solutions were elaborated. Further examples of technologies and best practices in water-smart crop farming, such as breeding for drought-tolerant crop varieties, promoting dryland cropping systems, alternate wetting and drying technology, water drainage and control structures, rainwater harvesting, utilization of irrigation reservoirs, cover cropping and intercropping for enhancing soil moisture conservation were presented. The review also briefly shows the contribution of some of these best practices and adaptive technologies of water-smart cropping toward promoting water-saving methods used for growing rice, maize, legumes, cassava and peri-urban vegetables.

Cassava (Manihot esculenta) is a starchy root crop that supports over a billion people in tropical and subtropical regions of the world. This staple, however, produces the neurotoxin cyanide and requires processing for safe consumption. Excessive consumption of insufficiently processed cassava, in combination with protein-poor diets, can have neurodegenerative impacts. This problem is further exacerbated by drought conditions which increase this toxin in the plant. To reduce cyanide levels in cassava, we used CRISPR-mediated mutagenesis to disrupt the cytochrome P450 genes CYP79D1 and CYP79D2 whose protein products catalyze the first step in cyanogenic glucoside biosynthesis. Knockout of both genes eliminated cyanide in leaves and storage roots of cassava accession 60444; the West African, farmer-preferred cultivar TME 419; and the improved variety TMS 91/02324. Although knockout of CYP79D2 alone resulted in significant reduction of cyanide, mutagenesis of CYP79D1 did not, indicating these paralogs have diverged in their function. The congruence of results across accessions indicates that our approach could readily be extended to other preferred or improved cultivars. This work demonstrates cassava genome editing for enhanced food safety and reduced processing burden, against the backdrop of a changing climate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces a new framework to quantify costs and benefits for resilience-related outcomes of agricultural innovations targeting smallholder farmers. The framework employs a non-unitary household model with expected utility to quantify welfare benefits associated with non-monetary outcomes that are important from a development perspective, such as improved consumption smoothing, empowerment, and changes in time use. We demonstrate the application of the framework using a case study of climate information services (CIS) in Ghana. We develop a set of individual bargaining weights based on the women’s empowerment in agriculture index, to demonstrate how benefits from CIS are distributed among men and women within households. We find that for the average risk-averse farmer, using CIS is associated with a 37-percent increase in expected utility, but male household heads benefit more than women living in male-headed households. Cost–benefit analyses that do not consider the intrahousehold distribution of benefits associated with agricultural innovations will overestimate benefits accruing to women with low bargaining power.

IntroductionNeglected and underutilized crop species (NUCS) or forbidden crops offer tremendous potential to combat malnutrition, poverty, and global hidden hunger. Since overdependence on a few dominant cereal crops, viz., rice, maize, and wheat, is insufficient to meet the global food energy intake, the identification, genetic improvement, and implementation of various policies for wenumerates comprehensive comparative analyses of the nutrient profile of staple crops vs. potent underutilized crops with reference to cultivation constraints and climate resilience with different agro-diversification strategies.MethodologyThe research databases Scopus, JSTOR, Web of Science, EBSCO, Google Scholar, ScienceDirect, PubMed, and Academic Search were searched using relevant research queries.ResultOut of 2,345 hits, 99 articles pertinent to the subject domain showed that underutilized crops are nutritionally superior, contain health-promoting bioactive components, and are more climate resilient than cereal crops. However, several constraints hinder the efficient utilization of these crops.DiscussionDespite underutilized crops’ many health benefits, improved cultivation techniques for the large-scale production of these crops are still in their infancy. Most of the time, however, the scientific knowledge gleaned from various study domains stays within the scientific community. The most crucial need of the hour, therefore, is an efficient network structure connecting governments, farmers, researchers, and people in business. Moreover, care must be taken to ensure that the policies of governments and INGOs/NGOs are properly implemented within a NUCS framework.

Underutilized/orphan legumes provide food and nutritional security to resource-poor rural populations during periods of drought and extreme hunger, thus, saving millions of lives. The Leguminaceae, which is the third largest flowering plant family, has approximately 650 genera and 20,000 species and are distributed globally. There are various protein-rich accessible and edible legumes, such as soybean, cowpea, and others; nevertheless, their consumption rate is far higher than production, owing to ever-increasing demand. The growing global urge to switch from an animal-based protein diet to a vegetarian-based protein diet has also accelerated their demand. In this context, underutilized legumes offer significant potential for food security, nutritional requirements, and agricultural development. Many of the known legumes like Mucuna spp., Canavalia spp., Sesbania spp., Phaseolus spp., and others are reported to contain comparable amounts of protein, essential amino acids, polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs), dietary fiber, essential minerals and vitamins along with other bioactive compounds. Keeping this in mind, the current review focuses on the potential of discovering underutilized legumes as a source of food, feed and pharmaceutically valuable chemicals, in order to provide baseline data for addressing malnutrition-related problems and sustaining pulse needs across the globe. There is a scarcity of information about underutilized legumes and is restricted to specific geographical zones with local or traditional significance. Around 700 genera and 20,000 species remain for domestication, improvement, and mainstreaming. Significant efforts in research, breeding, and development are required to transform existing local landraces of carefully selected, promising crops into types with broad adaptability and economic viability. Different breeding efforts and the use of biotechnological methods such as micro-propagation, molecular markers research and genetic transformation for the development of underutilized crops are offered to popularize lesser-known legume crops and help farmers diversify their agricultural systems and boost their profitability.

AimThe climate and ecological crises are considered fundamental threats to human health. Healthcare workers in general and doctors in particular can contribute as change agents in mitigation and adaptation. Planetary health education (PHE) aims to harness this potential. This study explores perspectives among stakeholders involved in PHE at German medical schools on the characteristics of high-quality PHE and compares them to existing PHE frameworks.MethodsIn 2021, we conducted a qualitative interview study with stakeholders from German medical schools involved in PHE. Three different groups were eligible: faculty members, medical students actively involved in PHE, and study deans of medical schools. Recruitment was performed through national PHE networks and snowball sampling. Thematic qualitative text analysis according to Kuckartz was used for the analysis. Results were systematically compared to three existing PHE frameworks.ResultsA total of 20 participants (13 female) from 15 different medical schools were interviewed. Participants covered a wide range of professional backgrounds and experience in PHE education. The analysis revealed ten key themes: (1) Complexity and systems thinking, (2) inter- and transdisciplinarity, (3) ethical dimension, (4) responsibility of health professionals, (5) transformative competencies including practical skills, (6) space for reflection and resilience building, (7) special role of students, (8) need for curricular integration, (9) innovative and proven didactic methods, and (10) education as a driver of innovation. Six of our themes showed substantial overlap with existing PHE frameworks. Two of our themes were only mentioned in one of the frameworks, and two others were not explicitly mentioned. Few important elements of the frameworks did not emerge from our data.ConclusionsIn the light of increased attention regarding the connections of the climate and ecological crises and health, our results can be useful for anyone working toward the integration of planetary health into medical schools' and any health professions' curricula and should be considered when designing and implementing new educational activities.

Climate change, land degradation, demographic change and persistent poverty pose major challenges to smallholder farmers in the arid and semi-arid lands of sub-Saharan Africa. Though many studies have focused on how resilient these households are to shocks, very few studies deal with how household resilience varies over time. We provide a longitudinal analysis to assess how the resilience of smallholder households in south-eastern Kenya has varied from 2012 to 2015. We use the Livelihood Resilience Indicator Framework to examine the linkages between livelihood outcomes and livelihood resilience (buffer capacity, self-organization and capacity for learning). We collected data from 134 households on three resilience dimensions: buffer capacity, self-organization, and capacity for learning. We performed principal component analysis to identify the key components of these dimensions and examine their relevance for livelihood outcomes. Our findings show that under drought conditions in 2012, conservation agriculture practices significantly contributed to maize yields. In both years 2012 and 2015, there was a positive correlation between resilience dimensions and food security. Key components of this relation were land area, income, conservation agriculture practices, climate forecasts and actions taken for the upcoming growing season.

Multisectoral models of regional bio-physical systems simulate policy responses to climate change and support climate mitigation and adaptation planning at multiple scales. Challenges facing these efforts include sometimes weak understandings of causal relationships, lack of integrated data streams, spatial and temporal incongruities with policy interests, and how to incorporate dynamics associated with human values, governance structures, and vulnerable populations. There are two general approaches to developing integrated models. The first involves stakeholder involvement in model design -- a participatory modeling approach. The second is to integrate existing models. This can be done in two ways: by integrating existing models or by a soft-linked confederation of existing models. A benefit of utilizing existing models is the leveraging of validated and familiar models that provide credibility. We report opportunities and challenges manifested in one effort to develop a regional food, energy, and water systems (FEWS) modeling framework using existing bio-physical models. The C-FEWS modeling framework (Climate-induced extremes on the linked food, energy, water system) is intended to identify and evaluate response options to extreme weather in the Midwest and Northeast United States thru the year 2100. We interviewed ten modelers associated with development of the C-FEWS framework and ten stakeholders from government agencies, planning agencies, and non-governmental organizations in New England. We inquired about their perspectives on the roles and challenges of regional FEWS modeling frameworks to inform planning and information needed to support planning in integrated food, energy, and water systems. We also analyzed discussions of meetings among modelers and among stakeholders and modelers. These sources reveal many agreements among modelers and stakeholders about the role of modeling frameworks, their benefits for policymakers, and the types of outputs they should produce. They also identify challenges to developing regional modeling frameworks that couple existing models and balancing model capabilities with stakeholder preferences for information. The results indicate the importance of modelers and stakeholders engaging in dialogue to craft modeling frameworks and scenarios that are credible and relevant for policymakers. We reflect on the implications for how FEWS modeling frameworks comprised of existing bio-physical models can be designed to better inform policy making at the regional scale.

Climate-related transitional and physical risks are relevant to the building industry. This paper focuses on the physical risk as mitigated and embedded into the design of buildings and infrastructures at the Milan Innovation District (MIND). MIND is an Italian development piloting the transition to resilient green urban planning. This paper discusses the methodology adopted at the early stages of urban and building design to assess the local climate change risks and impacts to be mitigated. As per the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the climate change scenarios are based on projected temperature changes under representative concentration pathways (RCPs). The scenarios considered are 4.5 and 8.5. Climate projections are from the World Bank Change Knowledge Portal and the projected epw Weatherfiles for Milano Linate. These were generated using IES and Weathershift™ tool. The analysis focused on the temperature raise including the masterplan sunlight analysis, the spatial thermal comfort analysis, and the climate change visualization. Results show that the risk of overheating increases. These were discussed in climate change adaptation and resilience planning workshops with a broad range of stakeholders to identify key strategies and functional distribution de-risking strategies. Climate change poses a significant risk to society and resiliency and decarbonization priorities may differ by region. Although, This paper proposes a replicable high-level assessment that can help developers and business leaders in mapping and mitigate the climate capital-related downside risks that have a material impact on their business overall risk profile and capital adequacy.

The phenomena of climate change pose multifaceted challenges to crop and livestock farming, with severe implications on smallholder farmers' income and livelihoods. Climate change has profound implications (economic, environmental, and social) predominantly on rainfed regions in developing countries like India, where agriculture constitutes the backbone of the economy. In this context, the current study analyzes how farmers perceive climate change in the rainfed ecosystem in India, farmers' adaptation strategies, and their major determinants in addressing climate change. Data were collected from 400 sample farmers in South India. Discriminant and multinomial logit models were employed to identify the adaptation strategies of the farmers. It was evident that the factors such as off-farm income, farm income, and farming experience significantly influenced the adaptation strategies for tackling climate change. Furthermore, access to climate change information and literacy level are vital determinants in different climate change adaptation strategies, including crop diversification, integrated farming system, contingency plans for farm operations, and adoption of soil and water conservation techniques. However, the study highlights the increasing role of institutions (government and private) in future to safeguard the interests of farmers by offering a wide range of policy, research, and technology interventions. In a nutshell, R&D focus on climate-resilient agriculture, application of ICTs in agro-advisory services, and creation off-farm employment opportunities for the farmers is crucial to sustaining their livelihoods as these serve as potential mitigation strategies to impart resilience to climate-sensitive sectors like agriculture in rainfed ecosystems in India or any other countries.

Climate change is expected to influence crop growth through frequent drought and heat extremes, and thus, drought and heat tolerance are of increasing importance as major breeding goals for cereal crops in Central Europe. Plant physiological water status traits are suitable for phenotyping plant drought/heat tolerance. The objective of this study was to determine whether relative leaf water content (RLWC), plant canopy temperature (CT), and carbon isotope discrimination (CID) are suitable for phenotyping the drought/heat resistance of German winter wheat for future climate resilience. Therefore, a comprehensive field evaluation was conducted under drier and warmer conditions in Moldova using a space-for-time approach for twenty winter wheat varieties from Germany and compared to twenty regionally adapted varieties from Eastern Europe. Among the physiological traits RLWC, CT, and CID, the heritability of RLWC showed the lowest values regardless of year or variety origin, and there was no significant correlation between RLWC and grain yield regardless of the year, suggesting that RLWC did not seem to be a useful trait for distinguishing origins or varieties under continental field conditions. Although the heritability of CT demonstrated high values, the results showed surprisingly low and nonsignificant correlations between CT and grain yield; this may have been due to a confounding effect of increased soil temperature in the investigated dark Chernozem soil. In contrast, the heritability of CID in leaves and grain was high, and there were significant correlations between grain yield and CID, suggesting that CID is a reliable indirect physiological trait for phenotyping drought/heat resistance for future climate resilience in German wheat. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fusarium head blight, a devastating cereal crop disease, can cause significant yield losses and contaminate grain with hazardous fungal toxins. Concerningly, recent evidence indicates that substantial grain protein content loss is likely to occur in wheat that is moderately resistant to head blight when it is grown at elevated CO2. Although wheat breeders in North America utilize a number of resistance sources and genes to reduce pathogen damage, the Fhb1 gene is widely deployed. To determine whether Fhb1 is associated with the protein content loss at elevated CO2, twelve near-isogenic spring wheat lines from either a susceptible or moderately susceptible genetic background, and with, or without the Fhb1 QTL, were grown at ambient and elevated CO2 conditions. The near-isogenic lines were evaluated for differences in physiology, productivity, and grain protein content. Our results showed that the Fhb1 QTL did not have any significant effect on plant growth, development, yield, or grain protein content at ambient or elevated CO2. Therefore, other factors in the moderately susceptible wheat genetic background are likely responsible for the more severe grain protein loss at elevated CO2. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change is expected to influence crop growth through frequent drought and heat extremes, and thus, drought and heat tolerance are of increasing importance as major breeding goals for cereal crops in Central Europe. Plant physiological water status traits are suitable for phenotyping plant drought/heat tolerance. The objective of this study was to determine whether relative leaf water content (RLWC), plant canopy temperature (CT), and carbon isotope discrimination (CID) are suitable for phenotyping the drought/heat resistance of German winter wheat for future climate resilience. Therefore, a comprehensive field evaluation was conducted under drier and warmer conditions in Moldova using a space-for-time approach for twenty winter wheat varieties from Germany and compared to twenty regionally adapted varieties from Eastern Europe. Among the physiological traits RLWC, CT, and CID, the heritability of RLWC showed the lowest values regardless of year or variety origin, and there was no significant correlation between RLWC and grain yield regardless of the year, suggesting that RLWC did not seem to be a useful trait for distinguishing origins or varieties under continental field conditions. Although the heritability of CT demonstrated high values, the results showed surprisingly low and nonsignificant correlations between CT and grain yield; this may have been due to a confounding effect of increased soil temperature in the investigated dark Chernozem soil. In contrast, the heritability of CID in leaves and grain was high, and there were significant correlations between grain yield and CID, suggesting that CID is a reliable indirect physiological trait for phenotyping drought/heat resistance for future climate resilience in German wheat.

Fusarium head blight, a devastating cereal crop disease, can cause significant yield losses and contaminate grain with hazardous fungal toxins. Concerningly, recent evidence indicates that substantial grain protein content loss is likely to occur in wheat that is moderately resistant to head blight when it is grown at elevated CO2. Although wheat breeders in North America utilize a number of resistance sources and genes to reduce pathogen damage, the Fhb1 gene is widely deployed. To determine whether Fhb1 is associated with the protein content loss at elevated CO2, twelve near-isogenic spring wheat lines from either a susceptible or moderately susceptible genetic background, and with, or without the Fhb1 QTL, were grown at ambient and elevated CO2 conditions. The near-isogenic lines were evaluated for differences in physiology, productivity, and grain protein content. Our results showed that the Fhb1 QTL did not have any significant effect on plant growth, development, yield, or grain protein content at ambient or elevated CO2. Therefore, other factors in the moderately susceptible wheat genetic background are likely responsible for the more severe grain protein loss at elevated CO2.

Given the interrelated problems of climate change, energy and resource scarcity, and the challenge of supporting critical natural systems in cities, urban dwellers may be exceptionally vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. While a number of programs and policies have been developed and implemented to help reduce the environmental and social impacts of climate change on communities, we argue that effective and sustainable programs must not only consider how the changing environment impacts communities, but also how communities interact with and impact the environment. Specifically, drawing on a case study of the needs assessment of the Healthy Soils for Healthy Communities Initiative conducted in Los Angeles (LA) County, CA as a model for a Virtuous Cycle Framework, we attempted to better understand how urban residents interact with land, green spaces, and soil as a means of finding ways to address some of the environmental and health disparities that many urban residents experience, while also exploring ways to improve soil health to support its capacity to provide essential ecosystem services (e.g., carbon sequestration, water filtration, food and biomass production). A unique feature of our approach is that it involved an interdisciplinary and multi-level partnership composed of a well-established environmental organization dedicated to urban forestry, environmental justice, and climate resilience, university faculty researchers who study human behavior and human-nature relationships, government partners, and, most importantly, community members, among others. The first step in understanding how community members interact with their environment involved collecting survey and focus group data from residents of LA County to assess attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors around land and soil. Results were used to explore strategies for deepening community engagement, addressing knowledge gaps, and shaping policies that would benefit not just people who live/work in LA, but also the soil and other natural systems that rely on soil. This article integrates our previously published survey and focus group findings with new results that pertain specifically to the Virtuous Cycle Framework, and demonstrates how the data are being used to inform our community-based interventions (e.g., policy change, public education and community engagement, and demonstration projects).

While water resource managers and river scientists recognize the inherent interconnections among hydrology, river structure, biophysical processes and ecological patterns, management of environmental flows still pays insufficient attention to the ecological and geomorphological functionality of particular aspects of the flow regime. Implementation of more natural flow regimes has improved habitat conditions for native species in many moderately impaired rivers but mimicking a natural flow regime in heavily modified riverine landscapes cannot be expected to yield successful ecological outcomes unless such flows trigger functional processes. For example, the restoration of peak flows may not regenerate habitats if the river is starved of sediment or if the river channel is highly confined. High biodiversity is supported when variable flow regimes interact with spatially variable (heterogeneous) river channel and floodplain forms. In contrast, as rivers become homogeneous, biodiversity decreases when these dynamic spatiotemporal interactions are limited by flow alterations, blocked by channel levees, or perturbed by sediment deficit or surplus. Thus, the design of a more natural environmental flow regime without consideration of the implications for sediment transport and implicit recognition of channel–floodplain geomorphology is likely to have limited success in river management and restoration. To enhance the functionality of environmental flows, considerations of physical, biogeochemical, and ecological processes and the inherent heterogeneity of the riverine landscape must be included. A Functional Flows approach enhances the benefits from limited environmental flow allocations by focusing on the ecological and geomorphological functionality of particular aspects of the flow regime, considering geomorphic context, and emphasizing spatiotemporal diversity at key locations in the riverscape, such as adjacent floodplains or tributary junctions. In this paper, we outline and illustrate the concept of Functional Flows using a flow-chain model and provide two case study examples from Australia and the United States, where improvements in channel habitat and reconnection with the floodplain help to achieve the desired functionality of environmental flows.

In the agrifood systems of developing countries, local adaptation actions and pathways often interact with other climate and development responses, creating new trade-offs, uncertainties, and potentially maladaptive outcomes. While knowledge on the interacting pathways of adaptation is expanding, previous studies have focused on complex systems dynamics, and studies that address the human, social, and political forces that drive the cascading of risks between different coupled social-ecological systems are few. This paper aims to examine climate adaptation trade-offs, uncertainties, and maladaptation through an interdisciplinary analysis of two interacting pathways of transformational adaptation in the Philippines: the post 2004 disaster rural transformations in the coconut-producing municipality of Infanta and a state-led urban water resilience strategy for the capital region of Metro Manila. Data were collected from January 2021 to March 2022 through ethnographic field visits, participant observation, focus group discussions, semi-structured interviews, geospatial analysis, multicriteria mapping sessions, and review of planning documents and secondary data sources. Key findings suggest that the pathways of transformation and their entanglement are rooted in historical processes of change and that maladaptation is contingent on the political relations between the “central” and “peripheral” pathways. Overall, the paper offers a significant contribution to adaptation research in the agrifood systems of developing countries as it calls for a deeper kind of collective reflexivity and action that can transform narrow notions and practices of resilience and sustainable development.

The world has been hit by consequential pandemics in the past two millennia. The COVID-19 pandemic has taken center stage, paralyzing vulnerable communities in the global south impacted by unprecedented climate vagaries. The focus of this study is COVID-19 and climate resilience communication rhetoric. In this context, we embed this study in response to the resilience of rural livelihoods to the COVID-19 crisis and climate resilience education communication rhetoric. We posit our review based on the following questions: Has COVID-19 worsened the climate resilience pathway for rural communities in coastal Kenya? Is the COVID-19 pandemic a proxy for climate resilience in rural livelihoods? How does COVID-19 communication rhetoric undermine climate resilience for vulnerable coastal communities in Kenya? Through a resilient theoretical paradigm, we enclose our view based on the existing literature along with climate resilience and COVID-19 proliferation. In light of the current state of COVID-19, the focus has shifted to the pandemic that will cover climate resilience. From the review, climate resilience pathway has been impacted by corona virus with noted funding response variations, in addition, even with the corona virus pandemic, climate resilience communication should be on-going rather than sporadic. Increasing the discursive process about climate change challenges is critical among Kenyan coastal communities. We recommend inclusion of climate resilience communication in existing policy frameworks as a salient solution to notable information discourse bottlenecks.