Vinayak Shedekar
Soil, Water and Bioenergy Resources Program
The Second International Conference on Food and Agriculture was held at Dhanbad, Jharkhand (India) during March 29-31, 2018.
Dr. Vinayak Shedekar, Research Associate-II with the Soil, Water, and BioEnergy Resources (SWBR) Program was among the three Ohio State University delegates who organized a 2-day special session on “Climate-smart Agriculture” (CSA). Dr. Bryan Mark, State Climatologist of Ohio and Dr. Asmita Murumkar, Post-doctoral Researcher in the Department of Food, Agricultural and Biological Engineering joined Shedekar.
The session featured talks from experts, educators, and representatives from non-profit organizations relating to the development of climate-smart agricultural systems, tools, crops, and communities.
The speakers presented topics such as role of youth in climate change adaptation, climate change assessment, and climate-smart technologies, among others. The session kicked off with Dr. Bryan Mark’s presentation that highlighted the framework for climate change assessment, adaptation, and mitigation in USA and India. Dr. Asmita Murumkar delivered a talk on assessing climate change impacts. Vinayak presented use of decision tools for climate-smart agriculture. Two presentations on developing climate-smart crops were another highlight of the session.
Dr. Ismail Dweikat, Professor in the Department of Agronomy and Horticulture at University of Nebraska-Lincoln, presented his research on developing drought tolerant crops in response to changing climate. The presentation highlighted sorghum and pearl millet as alternative crops that can be grown in deficit-irrigated or water scarce regions.
The CSA session concluded with an expert panel question-answer session, which ranged from scientific queries to extension and outreach related questions.