Climate Change and Agriculture: A Historical Analysis

This book discusses the history of environmental science and climate change, and the initiation and development of different parameters determining climate changes. The account of the history of such changes and turmoil in India and abroad starts in the prehistoric period, long before the emergence of “Rigveda”, the first human written work. The book describes the writings of Aristotle and Theophrastus on climatic disasters and their impact on the vegetation and society in Greek and Roman history, and addresses different studies related to climate change during the prehistoric period and their chronological development. The first book of its kind, it enhances our understanding the origin of research on climate change and climate related problems, and as such is a valuable resource for postgraduate students of agriculture and environment sciences, research scholars, scientists, environmentalists and policy planners.

Dr.Dinesh Chandra Uprety (Dr.D.C.Uprety) is an Emeritus Scientist at the Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi and has 43 years research and teaching experience. He has led the South Asian and Indian program on CO₂ enrichment research and technology. He has designed and developed Open Top Chamber (OTC), FACE and FATE climate change research technologies for the South Asian region, bringing India in to GCTE research network. He was a member of the  IPCC working group II in 2003. He has published about 150 research papers, 4 books and 5 chapters in edited books relating to climate change and agriculture. He is Fellow of the National Academy of Sciences (FNASc); Fellow, START International, USA; Indian Soc. Plant Physiology (FISPP); and received the Gold medal of Acad. Advanc. Agric.Sci.India (AAAS); Sukumar Basu Award in 2004; Eminent Citizen MNERGA 2010; B.N.Singh Memorial Award BHU Centenary Award 2016. He was honored at the 8^th International Photosynthesis Conference, Univ. Hyderabad, 2017. The South Asian CO₂ research network of Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and India was coordinated by Dr. Uprety at IARI. Dr. Uprety’s research and technologies have helped farmers, scientists, students and policy makers to address the challenges of rising atmospheric CO₂ and temperature.

V.R. Reddy is currently the Research Leader and Supervisory Plant Physiologist for the USDA-ARS, Crop Systems and Global Change Laboratory (CSGCL), Beltsville, MD, USA. Dr. Reddy has served on various professional, and administrative positions, most recently as Acting Associate Director for  ANRI (2011-2012), and as Beltsville Area representative on the RL Advisory Council (2010-2012).  Presently he is  member of Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Paris, France. He is a Fellow of the American Society of Agronomy, and Crop Science Society of America, and serves on several Editorial Boards of international scientific journals.

Dr. Reddy's research focuses on crop responses to climate change, especially processes like photosynthesis, respiration, transpiration, carbon and nitrogen metabolism and growth analysis of cotton, soybean, corn, and various other crops. In addition to his research, Dr. Reddy provides both technical and administrative leadership for the Crop Systems and Global Change Laboratory.

 Dr.Jyostana Devi Mura, completed her Ph.D.  in Genetics in 2008, and has been a visiting scientist at USDA-ARS, MD, USA since 2016. She is a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Agronomy & Crop Science. She has published more than 50 research articles. She has worked on the molecular, biochemical and physiological characterization of peanut and chickpea transgenic expressing transcription factor for cold, drought and salinity.