Institut für Landwirtschaftliche Betriebslehre

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hohpublica.uni-hohenheim.de/handle/123456789/16

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Climate on the edge: impacts and adaptation in Ethiopia’s agriculture
(2025) Feleke, Hirut Getachew; Amdie, Tesfaye Abebe; Rasche, Frank; Mersha, Sintayehu Yigrem; Brandt, Christian; Younos, Tamim; Lee, Juneseok; Parece, Tammy E.
Climate change poses a significant threat to Ethiopian agriculture, impacting both cereal and livestock production through rising temperatures, erratic rainfall, prolonged droughts, and increased pest and disease outbreaks. These challenges intensify food insecurity, particularly for smallholder farmers and pastoralists who rely on climate-sensitive agricultural systems. This systematic review aims to synthesize the impacts of climate change on Ethiopian agriculture, with a specific focus on cereal production and livestock feed quality, while exploring effective adaptation strategies that can support resilience in the sector. The review synthesizes 50 peer-reviewed publications (2020–2024) from the Climate Change Effects on Food Security project, which supports young African academics and Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in addressing Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Using PRISMA guidelines, the review assesses climate change impacts on major cereal crops and livestock feed in Ethiopia and explores adaptation strategies. Over the past 30 years, Ethiopia has experienced rising temperatures (0.3–0.66 °C), with future projections indicating increases of 0.6–0.8 °C per decade resulting in more frequent and severe droughts, floods, and landslides. These shifts have led to declining yields of wheat, maize, and barley, shrinking arable land, and deteriorating feed quality and water availability, severely affecting livestock health and productivity. The study identifies key on-the-ground adaptation strategies, including adjusted planting dates, crop diversification, drought-tolerant varieties, soil and water conservation, agroforestry, supplemental irrigation, and integrated fertilizer use. Livestock adaptations include improved breeding practices, fodder enhancement using legumes and local browse species, and seasonal climate forecasting. These results have significant practical implications: they offer a robust evidence base for policymakers, extension agents, and development practitioners to design and implement targeted, context-specific adaptation strategies. Moreover, the findings support the integration of climate resilience into national agricultural policies and food security planning. The Climate Change Effects on Food Security project’s role in generating scientific knowledge and fostering interdisciplinary collaboration is vital for building institutional and human capacity to confront climate challenges. Ultimately, this review contributes actionable insights for promoting sustainable, climate-resilient agriculture across Ethiopia.
Investigating the environmental Kuznets curve between economic growth and chemical fertilizer surpluses in China: a provincial panel cointegration approach
(2022) Yu, Xiaomin; Schweikert, Karsten; Doluschitz, Reiner
This study investigated the relationship between fertilizer nitrogen (N) and phosphate (P) surpluses and economic development on the regional level in China. With a balanced panel dataset covering 30 provinces of mainland China from 1988 to 2019, we employed panel cointegrating polynomial regression (CPR) analysis using fully modified OLS (FM-OLS) estimators. Our results suggested that all provinces exhibit a long-run cointegrated relationship between fertilizer surpluses and real per capita gross regional product (GRP). A total of 22 provinces out of 30 showed a significant inverted U-shaped environmental Kuznets curve (EKC). Among those, 14 provinces are considered to have reached the peak and 8 provinces are considered to be before the peak. The group-mean turning points on the EKC are CNY 7022, CNY 9726, CNY 4697, CNY 3749, and CNY 5588 per capita GRP (1978 = 100) for the Northeast, Northcentral, Middle, and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, Southwest and Northwest China, respectively. The overall turning point of China is CNY 6705 per capita real gross domestic product (GDP), which was reached in circa 2012. This shows a general improvement of chemical fertilizer management in China. However, six provinces still exhibit linear growth in fertilizer surpluses when the economy grows. These regions are characterized by high cash-crop ratios and are mostly located along the southeast coast. Therefore, more effort and attention should be given to these regions to promote further fertilizer reduction. At the same time, nutrient use efficiencies should be improved, especially for cash crops such as fruit and vegetables.
The need for consumer-focused household food waste reduction policies using dietary patterns and socioeconomic status as predictors: a study on wheat bread waste in Shiraz, Iran
(2022) Ghaziani, Shahin; Ghodsi, Delaram; Schweikert, Karsten; Dehbozorgi, Gholamreza; Rasekhi, Hamid; Faghih, Shiva; Doluschitz, Reiner
Current household food waste (HFW) reduction plans usually focus on raising consumer awareness, which is essential but insufficient because HFW is predominantly attributed to unconscious behavioral factors that vary across consumer groups. Therefore, identifying such factors is crucial for predicting HFW levels and establishing effective plans. This study explored the role of dietary patterns (DP) and socioeconomic status (SES) as predictors of HBW using linear and non-linear regression models. Questionnaire interviews were performed in 419 households in Shiraz during 2019. A multilayer sampling procedure including stratification, clustering, and systematic sampling was used. Three main DPs, i.e., unhealthy, Mediterranean, and traditional, were identified using a food frequency questionnaire. Results indicated that a one-unit rise in the household’s unhealthy DP score was associated with an average increase in HBW of 0.40%. Similarly, a one-unit increase in the unhealthy DP score and the SES score increased the relative likelihood of bread waste occurrence by 25.6% and 14.5%, respectively. The comparison of findings revealed inconsistencies in HFW data, and therefore the necessity of studying HFW links to factors such as diet and SES. Further investigations that explore HFW associations with household characteristics and behavioral factors will help establish contextual and effective consumer-focused plans.
On the effects that motivate pesticide use in perspective of designing a cropping system without pesticides but with mineral fertilizer - a review
(2023) Pergner, Isabell; Lippert, Christian
In the future, a cropping system that guarantees food security by delivering high yields and, simultaneously, protects our environment is desperately needed. This can be achieved through a cropping system that waives chemical synthetic plant protection products, which endanger, for example, biodiversity and water resources. However, such a system, referred to here as the mineral-ecological cropping system (MECS), should still allow for the usage of mineral fertilizers to ensure high yields. It can be thought of as a compromise between the current conventional and organic cropping systems. This article presents a comprehensive literature review on the economic, social, and environmental effects of pesticides and the resulting reasons farmers have to use (or not use) them. Hereby, regarding future pesticide reduction, we identify hindrances and potential benefits that could be mobilized to design the MECS. The major points are the following: in a MECS, (1) it is expected that yields and temporal stability of yields will be higher than in organic farming, but lower than in conventional farming; (2) profitability might suffer due to high input costs and energy consumption; (3) it is expected that soil fertility and biodiversity protection will increase along with the promotion of alternative disease and pest control measures; (4) crop rotations will be wider and more diverse than in conventional farming; (5) mineral fertilizer cannot be optimally used by the crops unless a balanced supply of nitrogen is achieved. Farmers who want to switch to MECS should be compensated as they are likely to experience higher costs and lower yield and yield stability. The lessons learned from this review will help to progress toward an innovative and sustainable cropping system. Further research should focus on rational farmers’ adaptation possibilities when abandoning pesticides while still using mineral fertilizers.
Pathways for biodiversity enhancement in German agricultural landscapes
(2025) Sponagel, Christian; Thompson, Amibeth; Paetow, Hubertus; Mupepele, Anne‐Christine; Bieling, Claudia; Sommer, Martin; Klein, Alexandra‐Maria; Settele, Josef; Finger, Robert; Huber, Robert; Albert, Christian; Filser, Juliane; Jansen, Florian; Kleemann, Janina; Schreiner, Vera; Lakner, Sebastian
Conserving biodiversity, especially in agricultural landscapes, is a major societal challenge. Broad scientific evidence exists on the impacts of single drivers on biodiversity, such as the intensification of agriculture. However, halting biodiversity decline requires a systemic understanding of the interactions between multiple drivers, which has hardly been achieved so far. Selecting Germany as a case study, the goal of our analysis is (i) to understand how various socio‐economic drivers of biodiversity in agricultural landscapes interact at the national scale, (ii) to identify plausible pathways that most likely will lead to an improvement of biodiversity in agricultural landscapes and (iii) to discuss guiding principles for policy‐making based on the pathways. We applied the expert‐based Cross‐Impact‐Balance (CIB) methodology to the German agri‐food system (target year 2030). Seven descriptors that represent the most relevant socio‐economic drivers of biodiversity (here, we focus on species richness) in agricultural landscapes in Germany were defined. In three workshops with different groups of experts, we assessed all the interactions and impacts between these descriptors. From the workshops, seven overlapping scenarios were identified and aggregated into four main future pathways for enhancing biodiversity in agricultural landscapes. These pathways are: (1) ‘Innovation and stricter legislation’, (2) ‘Major change in protein production and CAP shift’, (3) ‘Major change in protein production and national legislation’ and (4) ‘Major social changes compensate for a lack of innovation in food production’. Socio‐economic drivers interact to varying degrees. Societal values have a strong active influence on the system, e. g. agricultural policy, whereas the orientation and objectives of agriculture, e. g. focus on public goods, are rather passively determined. Conserving biodiversity thus depends upon the evolution of societal values, European and national nature conservation and agricultural policies, innovations in plant and protein production as well as on global commodity markets. A key message for policymakers is that there are generally different, complementary options for achieving the objective of improving biodiversity. This is important when specific drivers such as the CAP cannot be steered in a particular desired direction.

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