Dossier
Water availability in agriculture
Nataliya Stupak, Jacob Jeff Bernhardt, Franziska Potts, Maximilian Zinnbauer | 17.06.2024
Progressive climate change is increasingly influencing water availability and water requirements in agriculture. Innovative water management concepts are needed to maintain crop production and minimise conflicts of interest with other water users.
In terms of annual precipitation, Germany will remain a water-rich country in the future. However, changes in precipitation patterns, higher evaporation as a result of rising temperatures and increased and more intense extreme weather events are leading to new challenges in agricultural water management.
How will regional and crop-specific irrigation requirements change in the future? How can water availability for crop production be improved in the context of climate change? How effective and feasible are different water management options? What adjustments to the legal framework are necessary to enable sustainable and targeted water management? The Thünen Institute is helping to answer these current research questions.
