Andrew Apostoli has successfully defended his PhD Final Defence on August 31, 2021.
Congratulations, Andrew!
Here is the abstract for his dissertation:
The Impacts of Climate Change on the Potential for a Northward Expansion of Agriculture in Ontario’s Great Clay Belt Region
Climate change has widespread impacts on the agriculture sector, especially in northern latitudes where warming is amplified, and where ecosystems and traditional lifestyles are notably sensitive to the effects of warming. This may enable the northward expansion of agriculture in northern areas of Ontario, such as the Great Clay Belt (GCB) region. While the GCB region contains an abundance of productive and less expensive land, the historical trends and future agroclimatic conditions are underexplored. The first study of this thesis examined the historical trends of agroclimatic indices at seven locations within the GCB region during 1961-1990. First, how to best account for missing data in the historical record was found by imputing a daily gridded meteorological dataset. Using complete and reliable historical climate data, the trends implied a potentially more favourable climate for agriculture in the region as warming, with longer growing seasons and increases in heat accumulation, may result in the northward expansion of some crops. The second study explored the new growing conditions up to the year 2100 using climate models. Future projections indicated a warming trend using raw and bias-corrected/downscaled data for two emissions scenarios during the growing season. Bias-corrected/downscaled data was found to be more useful for impact analyses because it corrected for errors and showed better agreement with station observations compared to the raw output. The third study explored the challenges, opportunities and needs and priorities for expanding agriculture in the GCB region using climatological and socio-economic data. The results showed that the most significant barriers currently facing agricultural expansion is derived from socio-economic factors rather than from environmental factors. This thesis demonstrated that climate change presents significant opportunities for agricultural expansion in the GCB region. This suggests opportunities for economic development that may help ameliorate the disadvantages associated with rural and remote communities in northern Ontario. The challenge presented for the GCB region will be to ensure sustainable growth in the agriculture sector without compromising environmental quality, natural resources and Indigenous sovereignty. There is a need to develop adaptation strategies in response to the impacts of climate change on agriculture in the GCB region.