Mudanças climáticas e a expectativa de seus impactos na cultura da cana-de-açúcar na região de Piracicaba, SP / Climate changes and their expected impacts on the sugarcane crop in the Piracicaba region, state of São Paulo, Brazil

AUTOR(ES)
DATA DE PUBLICAÇÃO

2008

RESUMO

Recent studies show increasingly higher concentrations of greenhouse effect gases in the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution. The major responsibility for the global warming is attributed to such increase, caused by gases resulting mainly from anthropic activities like burning fossil combustibles and deforestation. Other than temperature, precipitation has also suffered variations due to these practices; furthermore, the climatic projections for this century indicate the possibility of severe consequences for human beings. Agricultural activity depends largely on climatic factors, hence changes in these factors will affect the yield rate of crops, thus adversely affecting the agribusiness as a whole. In this work, an agricultural meteorological model was used to estimate the yield rate of sugarcane activity in the Piracicaba region, SP. Based on future scenarios presented in the fourth report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Changes (IPCC) and taking into consideration technological advances, it was proceeded an evaluation on the yielding rate of that crop, of the possible impacts caused by changes in temperature, precipitation, insolation and CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Through the climate change scenarios adopted in this study, it can be observed an increase of the potential evapotranspiration (ETP). Actual evapotranspiration itself also tends to increase, although in a lesser degree than the ETP, since the influence of an increase in temperature is minimized by the variation of the hydrological regimen. The results show a reduction in the availability of water resources, with an increase in deficiencies and a reduction in excesses. Increasingly higher temperatures will cause an increase of the potential productivity (PP), since that variable affects positively the efficiency of the photosynthetic processes of C4 plants. Regarding the actual productivities (PR), in which the effect of the water deficit on PP is considered, it can be observed that the variation is similar to the one obtained for PP. This increase is due to an increase in temperature, in CO2 and to technological advance. The variation of response among different cuts of sugarcane arises from their staying in the field in different periods of the year. The variation of the PRs in different scenarios follows the same pattern as the PPs of each kind of sugarcane, provided that the water deficit is the same. If an increase or decrease of the water deficit occurs, the PR will integrate the effects of the variables that condition PP, as well as the water deficit. The observed increase in sugarcane productivity resulting from global climate changes may have important impacts on the sugarcane sector, such as the possibility that the crop will expand to regions now unfeasible for production. However, with the increase in temperature and the consequent increase in the evapotranspiration rates there will be higher hydric deficiencies, which will require the use of irrigation, especially for early and medium sugarcane ratoon crops hit by longer periods of low availability of water in the soil.

ASSUNTO(S)

modelos matemáticos water balance balanço hídrico cana-de-açúcar climate changes mudança climática. agrometeorologia sugarcane. agrometeorological models

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