Challenges for arable crop production under climate change conditions

The greatest challenges of climate change for crop production are the increasing lack of water during the growing season and the more frequent extreme weather events, such as heavy rain or drought periods. The most important adaptation measure is to enable soils to infiltrate as much precipitation as possible in order to increase water use efficiency and protect soils from the loss of fertile topsoil through erosion. With an increasingly negative climatic water balance during the growing season more and more arable crops will require irrigation. A continuous development of efficient irrigation, the expansion of storage capacities, up to concepts for the use of service water, are needed. Furthermore, there is a need for discourse in society about the importance of irrigation of agricultural crops and for a transparent preparation of a prioritization of water use necessary in the future.