Rice serves as a staple food for over half of the world’s population. Although the reduction of rice yields by droughts is well known, when flooding fully submerges rice plants for over 1 week, crops cannot survive. Considering rice growth stages, using a flood dynamics model and difference-in-differences, we assessed the causal impact of rice crop submergence on yield losses from 1980 to 2015. Globally, these floods reduce annual rice yield by 4.3%, with China’s East Coast experiencing 14% losses. Since 2000, yield losses have increased due to more frequent extreme floods, a trend anticipated to continue.
This study focuses on the devastation of rice-killing floods, quantifying their causal effects on rice yield. These events involving total crop submergence for 7 day or more are most prevalent in the Yangtze River Basin, Amazon Basin, and Mekong Basin, with strong seasonality aligned with rice growing stages. Globally, these devastating floods reduce annual rice yield by an average of 4.3%. In major rice-producing countries of China and India, yield losses are even more pronounced, at 5.3 and 6.4%, respectively, corresponding to production losses of 10 million and 5 million tonnes or 5 and 4% of national production. In specific regions, such as the China East Coast, yield losses can reach up to 14%. Over recent decades, yield losses per rice-killing flood have increased, likely driven by more frequent and intense extreme weather events. Cultivating flood-resistant rice varieties emerges as a promising mitigation and adaptation strategy to safeguard rice yields in the face of climate change.
Sources:
Science Advance s
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adx7799 .
Provided by the IKCEST Disaster Risk Reduction Knowledge Service System
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