Agricultural adaptation to the environmental and social consequences of climate change in mixed farming systems: Evidence from North Xinjiang, China

CONTEXT: Mixed farming systems are the mainstay of many developing countries ' agricultural sector while sensible to the environmental and social consequences of climate change. Besides, some developing countries have proposed and/or launched specific policies to incentivise actions to address climate change. OBJECTIVE: This study assesses the potential adaptations and systematic changes of mixed agriculture under varying climatic conditions and agricultural greenhouse gases (GHG) abatement schemes, represented by agricultural GHG tax, in North Xinjiang, the second largest mixed farming region in China and one of the key farming regions in Central Asia. METHODS: A whole -farm bioeconomic optimisation model that considers multiple adaptation options and enterprises interactions and farm -level data are used to depict the changes on land use, productivity, profitability and GHG emissions of mixed farms with different scenarios. RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS: Results suggest that farm profitability tends to be enhanced with rising precipitation. Agricultural GHG tax reduces the profitability of mixed farming production, but the losses are likely to be offset, to some extent, with rising precipitation. The favorable GHG reduction effect of rising precipitation could be boosted when agricultural GHG tax is launched. Adapting to the changing precipitation and the application of agricultural GHG tax, economically optimised land uses tend to be relatively cropping -dominated and size of livestock enterprise tends to decrease considerably. Additionally, adaptation options include more wheat -pasture and wheat -field -pea rotations with increasing agricultural GHG tax rate. SIGNIFICANCE: By exploring a mixed farming system under changing climate in North Xinjiang, our results contribute to a better understanding of possible systematic evolution in mixed farming systems under climate change in developing countries. Policymakers should place greater emphasis on mixed farming systems in North Xinjiang to promote China 's carbon neutrality. Policy priority also includes enabling farmers in mixed agriculture to be sufficiently informed about climate change impacts and effective adaptations and boosting carbonneutral research and innovation to facilitate efficient adaptations and lessen the adverse financial effects.