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Roggero, P. P., Seddaiu, G., Ledda, L., Doro, L., Deligios, P., Nguyen, T. P. L., et al. (2014). Combining modeling and stakeholder involvement to build community adaptive responses to climate change in a Mediterranean agricultural district. FACCE MACSUR Mid-term Scientific Conference, 3(S) Sassari, Italy.
Abstract: The case study area (54,000 ha) is located at Oristano, Italy. The main cropping systems are based on forages (silage maize, Italian ryegrass and alfalfa under irrigation, winter cereals and grasslands under rainfed conditions), rainfed cereals (durum wheat, barley), vegetables (e.g. artichokes), rice, citrus, olives and vineyards. Some 36,000 ha are served by irrigation. The area includes the dairy cows cooperative system of Arborea (30,000 cows, 5500 ha, nitrate vulnerable zone). The rainfed dairy sheep includes 372,000 sheep and a number of small milk processing plants. The research aims to support adaptive responses to climate change through the combination of modeling approaches and stakeholder engagement. Present (2000-2010) and future (2020-2030) climatic scenarios were developed by combining global climate models with Regional Atmospheric Modelling Systems to produce calibrated time series of daily temperature and precipitation for the case study. The EPIC model was calibrated to simulate the impact of climate scenarios on the main cropping systems. The impact of THIndex on milk yield, milk quality and mortality was also simulated for dairy cows. A territorial farm-type Discrete Stochastic Programming model was implemented to simulate choices for thirteen farming typologies as influenced by crop yields and water consumptions. Participatory activities, including field experiments, interviews, focus groups and interactive workshops, involved farmers and other stakeholders in the most critical phases of the research. The assessment of uncertainties and opportunities were proposed as a basis for discussion with policy makers to identify priorities for agro-climatic measures in 2014-2020.
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Lacetera, N., Vitali, A., Bernabucci, U., & Nardone, A. (2014). Relationships between temperature humidity index, mortality, milk yield and composition in Italian dairy cows. FACCE MACSUR Mid-term Scientific Conference, 3(S) Sassari, Italy.
Abstract: The aim of this presentation is to illustrate the activities performed by the LiveM-Task L1.2. group based at the University of Tuscia, Viterbo, Italy. Three different pluriannual databases were built to perform retrospective studies aimed at establishing the relationships between temperature humidity index (THI) and parameters of interest for dairy cow farms. The THI combines temperature and humidity in a single value and has been widely used to quantify heat stress in farm animals. The first database was built to assess the relationships between THI and mortality over a 6 yr period (2002-2007); the second one was a 7 yr database (2001-2007) which was built to establish the relationships between THI and milk yield; the last database included THI, milk somatic cell counts, total bacterial counts, fat and protein percentages data collected over a 7 yr period (2003-2009). The analysis of the three databases provided several equations which demonstrated and quantified an increase of mortality, reduction of milk yield and a worsening of milk quality in hot environment. Results of these analyzes authorized speculations about risks for dairy cows and their productivity in a warming planet. Furthermore, the same results are being utilized by economists also working within MACSUR at the University of Tuscia for an integrated study aimed at establishing the economic impact of climate change in the dairy sector. Combining this information with climate change regional scenarios might permit prediction of the impact of global warming and identification of adaptation measures that are appropriate for specific contexts.
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