Navigating Transitions: Resisting, Accepting, and Directing Change on Saltwater Affected Agricultural Lands
Taryn Sudol
University of Maryland
Sea level rise is producing wetter and saltier soil conditions on agricultural lands in the coastal zone of Maryland and Virginia, causing farmers and land managers to consider how to respond to these new conditions in the near- and long-term. Maryland Sea Grant (MDSG) and partners convened a “Coastal Farming Challenges” series (i.e. surveys, interviews and workshops) from late 2020 through spring 2021 to learn from these farmers and woodlot managers (n=35) about their experiences, motivations and intended actions. Some participants indicated they would like to continue managing land as they have been in the short term but expect to have to change their land management in the long term. Participants also identified their top three research and policy gaps to help navigate current and future challenges. Post-workshop MDSG surveyed and interviewed a subset of participants on their preferred communication methods and ongoing concerns. This presentation will share these perspectives, how participants’ shaped their strategies, and ways partners may better deliver relevant resources and collaborate with this audience.
Session 3B: Socio-economics of SWI Response and Impacts
June 12
10:15 - 11:45 am
Chesapeake Salon EF
Assessing the Effectiveness of Climate-Smart Rice Varieties in Coastal Bangladesh
Naveen Abedin
Virginia Tech
Rice production in the southern coastal region of Bangladesh faces crop destruction and increased soil salinity due to extreme flood events. The region accounts for 30 percent of the nation’s rice production – the main cash and food crop of the country. Although several stress-tolerant and stress-avoidant climate-smart (CS) rice varieties have been introduced, there is a lack of clear understanding of their yield effects in the farmer’s actual production environments. This study combines plot-level agricultural production survey data from coastal Bangladesh with remotely sensed flood estimates from Sentinel 1 SAR to assess the yield effects of CS rice variety adoption under varying flood conditions using instrumental variable techniques. Additionally, the study accounts for heterogeneous effects on yield based on unobserved idiosyncratic gains from adoption using the marginal treatment effects (MTE) approach. The analyses reveal that CS varieties effectively improve yield only when the flooded area is greater than the average level observed in the study region. For every additional square kilometer of flooding above the mean, CS varieties significantly improve yield by 21.3-22.2 percent. Furthermore, the study finds negative selection in adoption, meaning that farmers with a lower propensity to adopt would experience relatively higher yield gains from adoption. This alludes to the possibility that information about CS varieties or access to them is not effectively reaching farmers who would benefit the most from adoption. To optimally implement CS technologies, it is necessary to mitigate structural barriers and apply precision agriculture.
Agricultural adaptation to sea level rise and saltwater intrusion
Becky Epanchin-Niell
University of Maryland
Agricultural lands in coastal regions face ever-growing risks from sea level rise, including inundation and saltwater intrusion. We use remotely sensed data to examine how farmers have responded to coastal influences on Maryland’s Eastern Shore in terms of crop choice, transition out of agriculture, and presence of berms/levies. We find that low elevation fields – areas prone to more frequent inundation and coastal influences – are more likely to transition out of agriculture and into woody or herbaceous wetlands and, if remaining in agriculture, are less likely to be planted in a corn (Zea mays) rotation. We find that many low-lying agricultural fields abut protective berms or levies, and these bermed fields are more likely to persist in agricultural use. Using local sea level rise projections, we predict future land use change across the focal region through 2050. These changes reflect agricultural adaptation to changing conditions and have implications for farm productivity, ecosystem services, water quality, and coastal biodiversity.
Targeting and tailoring engagement to accelerate wetland restoration: The Delmarva Wetland Partnership
Samantha Heyn
The Nature Conservancy
Non-tidal wetland restoration and enhancement are key practices to restore a healthy Chesapeake Bay, but critically off-track at only 5% progress to meet our 2025 restoration goal. Participation in restoration programs is ultimately voluntary and therefore achieving the benefits that restoring wetlands provides depends on effectively engaging largely agricultural private landowners. Restoration incentive programs for landowners in the watershed are widespread. Failure to achieve sufficient progress suggests that these programs—as they are currently designed and being implemented—are not effectively countering barriers to voluntary behavior change. Accelerating wetland restoration and enhancement depends on developing a better understanding of and ultimately overcoming the social, economic, and political barriers that are discouraging landowner participation in these programs (TNC 2021). In this presentation, we will share the Delmarva Wetland Partnership’s approach to understanding and overcoming barriers to voluntary wetland restoration. Through a combination of spatial analysis and a social science survey, the partnership is attempting to better target and tailor restoration engagement to increase project impact and accelerate widespread participation. Focusing on the Delmarva Peninsula, we will share our interdisciplinary findings, discuss our in-progress outreach efforts, and our in-development approach to partnership coordination toward more effective project delivery. We expect our methods may be useful in informing the design of future restoration engagement efforts, both in new geography and related to alternative practices, such as tidal wetlands.