US farmers’ adaptations to climate change: a systematic review of adaptation-focused studies in the US agriculture context

Abstract

Farmers in the US are adopting a range of strategies to deal with climate change impacts, from changing planting dates to using advanced technologies. Studies on farmers’ adaptation in US agriculture focus on a variety of topics and provide an understanding of how farmers adapt to climate change impacts, which adaptation strategies offer better outcomes, and what challenges need to be addressed for effective adaptations. Nevertheless, we lack a comprehensive view of adaptation studies focusing on US farmers’ adaptations. A review of adaptation studies in US agriculture context will help us to understand current adaptation research trends and realize future research potential. To fulfill this gap, this study systematically reviewed peer-reviewed studies on adaptation to climate change in US agriculture. A systematic search on the Web of Science and Google Scholar platforms generated 95 articles for final review. These studies were categorized under five themes based on their topical relevance: (i) reporting on-farm adaptations, (ii) exploring potential adaptations, (iii) evaluating specific adaptations, (iv) challenges of adaptations, and (v) perceptions toward adaptations. A skewed distribution of studies under these themes has been observed; a majority of the studies focused on evaluating specific adaptations (47%) followed by exploring potential adaptations (22%), while reporting on-farm adaptations (17%), challenges of adaptations (6%), and perception towards adaptations (8%) received less attention. In this article, key findings under each theme are presented and some areas for future research focus are discussed. These findings indicate the need for more attention to documenting on-farm adaptation strategies and the associated challenges while emphasizing other themes.