1. Introduction

Corn (Zea mays L.) is grown throughout the world and as such is subject to a wide variety of climates and potential scenarios of climate change. Production area continues to increase in response to the increased demand for corn grain and the production per unit area (yield) has continued to increase due to enhanced technology (Figure 1). What is imperative to stability

© 2016 The Author(s). Licensee InTech. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and eproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. © 2018 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Figure 1. World corn yield and area harvested since 1960 (data obtained from FAO stat, http://www.fao.org/faostat/en, downloaded March 8, 2018).

(Figure 2). Throughout this chapter, we will focus on the impacts of climate on corn phenology and production to provide an understanding of the potential for adaptation strategies. In this chapter we will focus on three components critical to corn production: the changing climate, impact of climate on corn phenology and phenological models, and impact of climate on corn

Climate Change Impacts on Corn Phenology and Productivity

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Figure 3. World corn production by region. (data from FAOSTAT, downloaded March 15, 2018).

The production regions for corn show the dominant areas in the Americas followed by Asia accounted for 81% of the world's corn production (Figure 3). Climate impacts in the Americas

Projections of climate change are a result of a combined set of simulation models using various scenarios of changes in carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations and the associated forcing functions [1]. The current CO2 concentrations are at nearly 400 ppm in 2018 and are projected to increase to a range of 794–1142 ppm by 2100 without any abatement scenarios [1]. The result of

1. Global mean temperatures will continue to increase throughout the twenty-first century if CO2 concentrations continue to increase and under the highest emission scenario would

and China will dominate the effects on future corn production.

2. Projections of climate change

these efforts can be summarized as [1, 2]:

range from 2.6 to 4.8C.

productivity.

Figure 2. Deviations from the yield trend line for corn production in the United States from 1950 to 2017. (data obtained from the National Agricultural Statistics Service, www.nass.usda.gov, accessed March 8, 2018).

and increases in future production is understanding how climate change will impact this trend in corn production and the areas of the world where corn is produced. Corn is a grain crop with both food and feed uses and variation in production at the local scale can have major impact on local economies and local food supplies as well as world food security.

The trend line for corn yield has shown a steady increase and a small amount of variation among the years; however, at the local scale is where the impacts of seasonal weather and trends in climate become more noticeable. Across the United States, there have been large deviations from the trend line in years in which weather events have caused yield reductions

Figure 3. World corn production by region. (data from FAOSTAT, downloaded March 15, 2018).

(Figure 2). Throughout this chapter, we will focus on the impacts of climate on corn phenology and production to provide an understanding of the potential for adaptation strategies. In this chapter we will focus on three components critical to corn production: the changing climate, impact of climate on corn phenology and phenological models, and impact of climate on corn productivity.

The production regions for corn show the dominant areas in the Americas followed by Asia accounted for 81% of the world's corn production (Figure 3). Climate impacts in the Americas and China will dominate the effects on future corn production.
