Matthew Harrison

Abstract Cultivar evolution through plant breeding is a cornerstone of contemporary food security, but the extent to which genetic adaptation to climatic variability and shocks contributes to yield gains is not well known. Here, we compile 48,797 cultivar-site-year observations from 2001 to 2020, covering the four prominent maize production regions in China with differing shifts in climatic conditions.

Abstract Regenerative agriculture can be deconstructed into several constituent practices, including adaptive multi-paddock (AMP) grazing, improved biodiversity, silvopasture, and minimizing cultivation and synthetic fertilizer inputs. Here, using farms across a rainfall gradient, we examined how three constituents—pasture species composition, antecedent soil organic carbon (SOC) and AMP grazing—influenced SOC accrual, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, production and profitability.

Abstract With the changing climate, soil waterlogging is a growing threat to food security. Yet, contemporary approaches employed in crop models to simulate waterlogging are in their infancy. By analysing 21 crop models, we show that critical deficiencies persist in accurately simulating capillary rise, crop resistance to transient periods of waterlogging, crop recovery mechanisms, and the effects on soil nitrogen processes, phenology and yield components.