Climate-smart Land Management Methods for Enhancing the Adaptive Capacity of Food Production Systems in the Tropical Regions

The island ecosystem is influenced by the maritime climate and endemic flora and fauna that predominate the food production system. The observed variations and projected changes in rainfall and temperature seve­rely affect the small islands and island states (SIS) more than large countries. In this study, we analyse the long-term changes in total rainfall, its seasonal variations, the number of rainy days and extreme events based on standardized global datasets and ground observations for SIS, including island regions of India, to identify suitable adaptation options in order to ensure sustainable food production. We link these climatic parameters with the observed waterlogging, moisture stress and salinity, compounded by the sea-water intrusion, which severely affects agricultural diversification and food production. In these areas, climate-smart alternative land management (ALM) methods, viz. raised beds, paddy–fish, farm ponds with broader dykes, etc. have been demonstrated and evaluated against these climate change-linked challenges at smallholder farms in the Andaman Islands and Sundarbans region of India. The results showed that the ALM methods created favourable conditions for crop growth and agricultural diversification by excluding sea-water intrusion, harvesting rainwater, reducing salinity and facilitating drainage amidst extreme events experienced during the observation period (2010–2020). ALM enhanced on-farm food production (2.7–34.6 tonne ha^–1 rice equivalent yield), sustainability (0.23–0.79, measured as sustainable yield index) and net mitigation benefit (2.2–5.7 Mg CO₂ eq. year^–1), providing greater scope for its upscaling in the island and coastal regions as adaptation measures.