Abstract. There is global concern over our capacity to feed a rapidly growing world population against a background of climate change and a shortage of renewable resources for agriculture. To address this challenge, sustainable intensification of crop production will be required to deliver increased yields with decreased environmental side effects, while maintaining the land area under cultivation. We must exploit new understanding in the science of crop production, in order to achieve both an improvement of crops and more effective agro-ecological management. The focus of this short article and the following papers that make up a research front on drought effects and water use efficiency is on science for the development of crops and cropping systems for water scarce environments. Both increases in drought resistance and efficiency of water use will be required in the major cropping regions of the world where water is already a significant limiting factor.

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