As the dominant source of the human food supply, the global land system underlies the foundation of the livelihood and wellbeing of humanity on Earth. On the one hand, the growth rate in the land system’s productive capacity of food has played a key role in global food provision. Technological breakthroughs in wheat and rice production during the past few decades, for instance, have greatly contributed to the maintenance of this growth rate in many parts of the world. On the other hand, however, the terrestrial food production system is facing increasing challenges from environmental stressors ranging from climate change, air pollution to land degradation. Whether and how the global land system will support the food security of more than 10 billion people in the 21st century while minimizing its environmental footprint remains an open question to debate. It is inevitable that the global food production system has to be shifted from focusing on production expansion to land system resilience so that the dual goals of sustainable production and environmental friendliness can be simultaneously achieved.

This 32-chapter volume represents the core of several oral and poster presentations made at the conference. In addition to Introduction and Conclusion sections, the book is thematically divided into 7 sections, namely, 1) Land Use and Farming Systems, 2) Effects of Climate Change on Crop Yield, 3) Soil Nutrient and Water Management for Carbon Sequestration, 4) Rehabilitation of Degraded Lands through Forestry and Agroforestry, 5) Management of Animal Production for Greenhouse Gas Emissions, 6) Smallholder Adaptation to Climate Change, and 7) Economic, Social and Policy Issues. It addresses these themes in the context of sustainable intensification (SI). It implies increasing agronomic production from the existing land while improving/restoring its quality and decreasing the C or environmental footprint. Simply put, SI means producing more from less.

Biodiversity can provide a series of important ecosystem functions and ecosystem services, which meet the needs of human beings. Plants are the biological group with the highest carbon content on earth, their diversity has attracted increased attention. The interpretation of plant diversity patterns and drivers is crucial for the conservation and utilization of plant resources and is also one of the hot topics in plant science and ecology. There are already many studies on the patterns and drivers of plant diversity, including different diversity dimensions (e.g., taxonomic, phylogenetic, and functional diversity) and spatial scales (different plots/sites, watershed, country, continent, and globe). The mechanisms underlying plant diversity patterns are also quite complex. For example, many hypotheses are related to contemporary climate and soil conditions, with temperature, precipitation, and soil nutrient being the most discussed drivers. In addition, paleoclimate and geological events may also have a strong legacy on current plant diversity patterns. Except for these natural factors, many anthropogenic activities, including agriculture, deforestation, grazing, urbanization, and coal mining, are also important drivers of plant diversity. These anthropogenic activities can affect plant diversity patterns not only directly, but also indirectly through their effects on habitat loss and habitat fragmentation. Therefore, the current plant diversity patterns are the result of many interacting factors and need to be interpreted from a more comprehensive perspective. This Research Topic will therefore provide a platform for sufficient communication, aiming to integrate the research from different fields and deepen the understanding of the patterns and drivers of plant diversity. We encourage the submission of theoretical and experimental studies on different plant groups, such as seed plants, ferns, mosses, and algae. Studies based on new methods and technology (such as genomics and drones) are also welcomed. We welcome the following specific topics: • Effects of historical factors (such as paleoclimate, geological events) on plant diversity; • Plant diversity that driven by contemporary climate and anthropogenic activities; • The effect of habitat loss and fragmentation on plant diversity; • New methods of research on the patterns and drivers of plant diversity.

This volume provides a comprehensive overview of the interactions and feedbacks between urbanization and global environmental change. A key focus is the examination of how urbanization influences global environmental change, and how global environmental change in turn influences urbanization processes. It has four thematic foci: Theme 1 addresses the pathways through which urbanization drives global environmental change. Theme 2 addresses the pathways through which global environmental change affects the urban system. Theme 3 addresses the interactions and responses within the urban system in response to global environmental change. Theme 4 centers on critical emerging research.

This book, as a part of a series of CERES publications, provides a multi-regional and cross-sectoral analysis of food and water security, especially in the era of climate risks, biodiversity loss, pressure on scarce resources, especially land and water, increasing global population, and changing dietary preferences. It includes both conceptual research and empirically-based studies, which provides context-specific analyses and recommendations based on a variety of case studies from Africa, Middle East, and Asia regarding the fostering of long-term resilience of food and water security. The core approach of the volume consists of: assessing the structural drivers affecting the vulnerability of food and water security, under the persistence of current trends; identifying the best solutions and practices to enhance the climate resilience for food and water security; and fostering climate adaptation and biodiversity protection for food and water security.

This book includes information, experiences, practical initiatives and projects around the subject matter and makes it available to a wide audience. It addresses the scientific, social, political and cultural aspects of climate change impacts and respective solutions in an integrated and coherent way. Climate change as a global phenomenon imposes new challenges for survival. Extreme weather events including heat waves, storms, droughts as well as rising sea levels, warming oceans and melting glaciers threaten people's livelihoods and communities, ecosystems and habitats. Furthermore, it affects the entire food chain and increases competition for natural resources fuelling socioeconomic tensions. The results of the latest IPCC report highlight the urgent need for combating climate change. The adaptation measures to be undertaken range across sectors, thematic fields and geographical locations. Based on this need, the book focuses on the high-quality, interdisciplinary contributions on the scientific, social, economic, political and cultural aspects of climate change challenges and solutions

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is the leading international body for assessing the science related to climate change. It provides policymakers with regular assessments of the scientific basis of human-induced climate change, its impacts and future risks, and options for adaptation and mitigation. This IPCC Special Report on Climate Change and Land (SRCCL) is the most comprehensive and up-to-date scientific assessment of the multiple interactions between climate change and land, assessing climate change, desertification, land degradation, sustainable land management, food security, and greenhouse gas fluxes in terrestrial ecosystems. It assesses the options for governance and decision-making across multiple scales. It serves policymakers, decision makers, stakeholders, and all interested parties with unbiased, up-to-date, policy-relevant information. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.

Global environmental change (GEC) represents an immediate and unprecedented threat to the food security of hundreds of millions of people, especially those who depend on small-scale agriculture for their livelihoods. As this book shows, at the same time, agriculture and related activities also contribute to GEC by, for example, intensifying greenhouse gas emissions and altering the land surface. Responses aimed at adapting to GEC may have negative consequences for food security, just as measures taken to increase food security may exacerbate GEC. The authors show that this complex and dynamic relationship between GEC and food security is also influenced by additional factors; food systems are heavily influenced by socioeconomic conditions, which in turn are affected by multiple processes such as macro-level economic policies, political conflicts and other important drivers. The book provides a major, accessible synthesis of the current state of knowledge and thinking on the relationships between GEC and food security. Most other books addressing the subject concentrate on the links between climate change and agricultural production, and do not extend to an analysis of the wider food system which underpins food security; this book addresses the broader issues, based on a novel food system concept and stressing the need for actions at a regional, rather than just an international or local, level. It reviews new thinking which has emerged over the last decade, analyses research methods for stakeholder engagement and for undertaking studies at the regional level, and looks forward by reviewing a number of emerging 'hot topics' in the food security-GEC debate which help set new agendas for the research community at large. Published with Earth System Science Partnership, GECAFS and SCOPE

This volume is the outcome of an international cooperation between 73 scientists, experts, and practitioners from many countries, disciplines, and professional areas. As a part of a series of CERES publications, the volume attempts to contribute to the scientific debate about the food–biodiversity–climate nexus by developing a comprehensive region-specific and broader global understanding of the linkages between these areas, especially in the context of Global South. Instead of providing only modern science-based solutions for the nexus related challenges, the volume covers case studies that present mixed solutions, offering the use of traditional ecological knowledge in combination with modern science for both resilience and sustainability. This is increasingly instrumental in shaping the needed response options regarding the economic, social, and environmental future of the world. Based on a multi-regional and cross-sectoral analysis, the approach consists of: assessing the different natural and anthropogenic factors currently affecting ecosystems and their services, especially the impacts of climate change; highlighting the different linkages between the state of biodiversity and food systems in many contexts and scales; and exploring the various response mechanisms to effectively manage the implications of such linkages. Most chapters provide inputs for future relevant research and policy agendas.