Maize productivity analysis in response to climate change under different nitrogen management strategies

Abstract

The evaluation of climatic change impact on maize grain and biomass yield under different N management practices through a well-calibrated and validated APSIM model in Vertisol of central India has been made. Climate scenarios were derived from seven global climate models (GCM) for two representative concentration pathways (RCPs), i.e. RCP4.5 and RCP8.5, and two-time slices, i.e. 2050 and 2080. The five N scenarios, namely N0%, N50%, N100%, N150%, and 100% organic, were studied in different climatic scenarios. The probability of exceedance showed that N0%, N50%, N100%, N150%, and 100% organic treatments have a 50% chance of yield greater than 1.0, 3.40, 4.20, 4.45 and 3.84 t ha-1, respectively. The average reduction of maize yield was -44.4, -20, -19.7 - 17.9 and 22.5 per cent in N 0%, N 50%, N 100%, N 150%, 100% organic, respectively under RCP4.5 over the baseline period (1980-2010). For RCP8.5, the average reduction of maize yield in N 0%, N 50%, N 100%, N 150%, 100% organic was 41.2, 21.2, 20.8 20.6 and 23.1 per cent, respectively. Simulation results suggested that a higher decrease of maize yield in 100 per cent organic treatments than inorganic treatments is due to variability in N uptake.

Keywords

• Maize
• nitrogen management
• modelling
• climate change
• APSIM