Introduction - Adapting Agricultural Practices to Extreme Weather Events.

Climate change affects ecosystems, human health, water availability, infrastructure, and agriculture. Climate-related impacts on agriculture result from the interaction of climate-related hazards with the vulnerability and exposure of human and natural systems.This symposium aims to describe extreme weather events (e.g. heat waves, drought, extreme precipitation, wind erosion, flood, etc.), and to present adaptive solutions (i.e. genetics, cropping practices, cover crops) or tools (models) for implementing effective mitigation strategies. Droughts affect water availability for farming and heat waves can affect seed yield directly. Exposure to heat waves could be mitigated by crop selection and cropping practices, but these strategies must be evaluated. Climate change can also affect phenology of biological systems with significant impacts in established ecological relationships. Such changes can alter the spatial distribution of suitable habitas for different species, as well as alter weed-crop competition. These events and their consequences must be understood by producers and adaptive strategies developed and tested to cope with the climate changes that cannot be avoided