Assessment of Agricultural Drought Vulnerability Based on Crop Growth Stages: A Case Study of Huaibei Plain, China

Abstract

Climate change can lead to and intensify drought disasters. Quantifying the vulnerability of disaster-affected elements is significant for understanding the mechanisms that transform drought intensity into eventual loss. This study proposed a growth-stage-based drought vulnerability index (GDVI) of soybean using meteorological, groundwater, land use, and field experiment data and crop growth model simulation. The CROPGRO-Soybean model was used to simulate crop growth and water deficit. Four growth stages were considered since the sensitivity of soybean to drought is strictly related to the growth stage. The GDVI was applied to the Huaibei Plain, Anhui Province, China, with the goal of quantifying the spatiotemporal characteristics of soybean drought vulnerability in typical years and growth stages. The results show that: (1) The sensitivity of leaf-related parameters exceeded that of other parameters during the vegetative growth stage, whereas the top weight and grain yield showed a higher sensitivity in the reproductive growth stage; (2) A semi-logarithmic law can describe the relationship between the drought sensitivity indicators and the GDVI during the four growth stages. The pod-filling phase is the most vulnerable stage for water deficit and with the highest loss upper limit (over 70%); (3) The 2001 and 2002 seasons were the driest time during 1997−2006. Fuyang and Huainan Cities were more vulnerable to drought than other regions on the Huaibei Plain in 2001, while Huaibei and Suzhou Cities were the most susceptible areas in 2002. The results could provide effective decision support for the categorization of areas vulnerable to droughts.

Drought Stress Under a Nano-Farming Approach: A Review

“…Investigation of these concerns have included drought resilience in a multilevel food supply chain in the UK (Vicario et al 2023), agricultural vulnerability to drought in China's agro-pastoral ecology , breeding plants to be tolerant to drought stress with a focus on rhizosphere properties (Cheraghi et al 2023), and evaluation of the impact of complex drought patterns on global yield loss for major crops (Santini et al 2022). Loss of crop productivity due to drought stress has been investigated using many approaches such as APSIM crop models in northeast China (Wang et al 2022), analyzing spatiotemporal crop yield loss in Nepal (Dahal et al 2023), crop simulation, risk curves, and risk maps in Huaibei Plain, China (Wei et al 2022), using crop growth stages in the Huaibei Plain, China (Wei et al 2023), and analysis of economic losses of crop production in Pakistan (Rahman et al 2023).…”