
This two-part handbook focuses on the work that the Agricultural Model Intercomparison and Improvement Project (AgMIP) accomplished using a new method — the AgMIP Regional Integrated Assessment Protocol — in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) and South Asia (SA), with funding from the UK Department for International Development. Through this research, AgMIP substantially improves the characterization and understanding of food security in SSA and SA and how its affected by climate variability and change.
The chapters in this handbook demonstrate how AgMIP has enhanced the capacity of developing country researchers and stakeholders to work together, exploring and prioritizing adaptation to current and future climate stresses. Part 1 describes regional integrated assessment methods and analyses, while Part 2 presents the outcomes of farming system studies. The entire volume shows how AgMIP has established, as a public good, protocols for Regional Integrated Assessments that improve the capability of developing countries to address climate change challenges.
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Contents:
- Part 1: Regional Integrated Assessment Methods and Analyses:
- Overview of AgMIP Regional Integrated Assessment (Cynthia Rosenzweig, Alex C Ruane, Carolyn Z Mutter, Erik Mencos Contreras, and Alessandro Moscuzza)
- Understanding Differences in Climate Sensitivity Simulations of APSIM and DSSAT Crop Models (Kenneth J Boote, Myriam Adam, Ishfaq Ahmad, Shakeel Ahmad, Davide Cammarano, Ashfaq Ahmad Chattha, Lieven Claessens, John Dimes, Wiltrud Durand, Bright S Freduah, Sridhar Gummadi, John Hargreaves, Gerrit Hoogenboom, Sabine Homann-Kee Tui, James W Jones, Tasneem Khaliq, Dilys S MacCarthy, Patricia Masikati, Sonali McDermid, Kadiyala Dakshina Murthy, Andree Nenkam, Cheryl Porter, Alex C Ruane, Nataraja Subash, Peter Thorburn, Pierre S Traore, Geethalakshmi Vellingiri, and Syed Aftab Wajid)
- Representative Agricultural Pathways: A Multi-Scale Foresight Process to Support Transformation and Resilience of Farming Systems (Roberto O Valdivia, Sabine Homann-Kee Tui, John M Antle, Nataraja Subash, Harbir Singh, Swamikannu Nedumaran, Ibrahima Hathie, Muhammad Ashfaq, Javaria Nasir, Geethalakshmi Vellingiri, Lakshmanan Arunachalam, Lieven Claessens, Dilys S MacCarthy, Samuel Adiku, Wiltrud Durand, Caleb Dickson, Hermine Mitter, and Martin Schönhart)
- Design, Development, and Evaluation of the AgMIP Impacts Explorer: Applying a User-Centered Approach in an Interactive Visualization Tool (Joske Houtkamp, Sander Janssen, Shari Lynn Lifson, Alex Ruane, Inge La Rivière, Hugo de Groot, Amanda Evengaard, Roberto O Valdivia, and Carolyn Z Mutter)
- AgMIP Regional Integrated Assessments: High-level Findings, Methods, Tools, and Studies (2012–2017) (Cynthia Rosenzweig, Carolyn Z Mutter, Alex C Ruane, Erik Mencos Contreras, Kenneth J Boote, Roberto O Valdivia, Joske Houtkamp, Dilys S MacCarthy, Lieven Claessens, Roshan Adhikari, Wiltrud Durand, Sabine Homann-Kee Tui, Ashfaq Ahmad, Nataraja Subash, Geethalakshmi Vellingiri, and Swamikannu Nedumaran)
- Appendices:
- Protocols for AgMIP Regional Integrated Assessments, Version 7.0
- AgMIP Guidelines for Engaging Stakeholders in Integrated Model Efforts, Version 2.1
- AgMIP7 Workshop Report
- Part 2: Farming System Studies:
- Potential Impacts of Agricultural Intensification and Climate Change on the Livelihoods of Farmers in Nioro, Senegal, West Africa (Dilys S MacCarthy, Ibrahima Hathie, Bright S Freduah, Mouhamed Ly, Myriam Adam, Amoudou Ly, Andree Nenkam, Pierre S Traore, and Roberto O Valdivia)
- An Integrated Assessment of Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation in Maize-Based Smallholder Crop–Livestock Systems in Kenya (Lieven Claessens, Roberto O Valdivia, Sridhar Gummadi, Mary Kilavi, John Recha, Caleb Dickson, and John M Antle)
- Adoption and Impacts of Small-Scale Irrigation in Kenya's Maize-Based Farm Households (Roshan Adhikari, John M Antle, and Keith Wiebe)
- Assessing the Impact of Climate Change on the Staple Baskets of Botswana and South Africa (Wiltrud Durand, Davide Cammarano, Olivier Crespo, Thembeka Mpusaing, Hlamalani Ngwenya, Andries Fourie, and Weldemichael A Tesfuhuney)
- Transforming Smallholder Crop–Livestock Systems in the Face of Climate Change: Stakeholder-Driven Multi-Model Research in Semi-Arid Zimbabwe (Sabine Homann-Kee Tui, Patricia Masikati, Katrien Descheemaeker, Gevious Sisito, Buhle Francis, Trinity Senda, Olivier Crespo, Elisha N Moyo, and Roberto O Valdivia)
- Development of Climate Change Adaptation Strategies for Cotton–Wheat Cropping System of Punjab Pakistan (Ashfaq Ahmad, Muhammad Ashfaq, Ghulam Rasul, Syed Aftab Wajid, Ishfaq Ahmad, Tasneem Khaliq, Javaria Nasir, Fahd Rasul, Farah Riaz, Burhan Ahmad, Shakeel Ahmad, Irfan Ahmad Baig, Roberto O Valdivia, and Gerrit Hoogenboom)
- Integrated Assessment of Climate Change Impacts on Rice–Wheat Farms of IGP-India through Multi-Climate-Crop Model Approach: A Case Study of Meerut District, Uttar Pradesh, India (Nataraja Subash, Harbir Singh, Sohan Vir Singh, Mohar Singh Meena, Balwinder Singh, Gokul Prasad Paudel, Guillermo Baigorria, Suryanarayana Bhaskar, Azad Singh Panwar, Sonali P McDermid, and Roberto O Valdivia)
- Assessment of Impacts of Climate Change on the Maize–Rice Farming System in Trichy District, Tamil Nadu, India (Geethalakshmi Vellingiri, Lakshmanan Arunachalam, Gowtham Ramasamy, Bhuvaneswari Kul anthaivel,Ramaraj Ammapet Palanisamy, Manikandan Narayanaswamy, Sonali McDermid, Swamikannu Nedumaran, Kadiyala Dakshina Murthy, and Roberto O Valdivia)
- Regional Integrated Assessment of Climate Change Impacts on the Rainfed Farming System in Kurnool District, Andhra Pradesh, India (Swamikannu Nedumaran, Kadiyala Dakshina Murthy, P Jyosthnaa, Roberto O Valdivia, Sonali McDermid, Srinivasa Reddy Srigiri, Geethalakshmi Vellingiri, and Anthony Whitbread)
- Integrated Modeling under a Changing Climate in Latin America and the Caribbean: Bridging the Gaps between Supply and Demand of Information for Decision-Making (Kelly Witkowski, Roberto O Valdivia, Daniela Medina, and Francisco Meza)
- Moving to National Scale (Cynthia Rosenzweig, John M Antle, Alex C Ruane, Carolyn Z Mutter, Malgosia Madajewicz, Roberto O Valdivia, Gerrit Hoogenboom, Cheryl Porter, Keith Wiebe, Sander Janssen, and Erik Mencos Contreras)
Readership: Professionals (agriculture, resource economics, climate science, environmental engineering) and Students (undergraduate and graduate) in research, Development experts, National and regional agricultural planners, and Climate change negotiators.

Cynthia Rosenzweig is a leader in the field of climate change impacts. She is an adjunct senior research scientist at Columbia University’s Center for Climate Systems Research and a Professor in the Department of Environmental Science at Barnard College. She is also a senior research scientist at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, where she heads the Climate Impacts Group. She is the co-founder of the Agricultural Model Intercomparison and Improvement Project (AgMIP), a major international collaboration to improve global agricultural modeling, understand climate impacts on the agricultural sector, and enhance adaptation capacity in developing and developed countries. She is now spearheading the AgMIP coordinated global and regional assessments of effects of climate change on the food system, including effects on nutrition. She was a coordinating lead author of the food security chapter for the IPCC Special Report on Climate Change and Land. She was named as one of Nature’s ‘Ten People Who Mattered in 2012’. A recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, she joins impact models with climate models to project future outcomes under altered climate conditions.

Carolyn Mutter is a senior staff officer of research at Columbia University's Center for Climate Systems Research. She regularly serves as Principal Investigator for Columbia grants and awards in support of AgMIP research and network building activities. This includes partner visits to facilitate collaborative planning and proposals for work packages involving AgMIP teams nationally and internationally, as well as contributions to research publications, including through role of co-editor for AgMIP Research volumes. She also heads the AgMIP Coordination Unit team, facilitating activities of the AgMIP Steering Council, Executive Committee, and Leaders Forum in support of a diverse membership of over 1000 scientists worldwide; providing oversight of budget and staff, web development, updates, and blogs to increase visibility and awareness of, as well as access to results; and, the convening of regular high level global and regional workshops that enable AgMIP members to advance research collaborations including protocols for comparing and improving models.

Erik Mencos Contreras is a staff officer of research at Columbia University's Center for Climate Systems Research. He serves as member of the AgMIP Coordination Unit. He assists AgMIP research output by supporting the writing and editing of multi-author, peer-reviewed papers, as well as white papers, concept notes, and reports. He was a contributing author and chapter scientist of the food security chapter in the IPCC Special Report on Climate Change and Land. He supports AgMIP by working collaboratively with program managers, researchers, Columbia University finance officers, and sponsor agency officials on the overall research coordination and financial management of the program. He also supports the organization and execution of multi-disciplinary international workshops and meetings, which bring together the community of AgMIP researchers from all around the world to share cutting edge methods and findings, identify key science messages, and plan future initiatives.