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Western EuropeCrop and environmental conditions in major production zones

Authors: 超级管理员 | Edit: xingqiang

Wheat is cultivated almost everywhere in the Western Europe MPZ (figure 2.6), while maize is more frequent in the warmer areas of the south, especially in southwest France (Poitou-Charentes, Aquitaine, and Midi-Pyrénées), south-east France (Rhone-Alpes) and the adjacent areas in Italy, starting with Liguria and proceeding along the Po valley through Lombardy and eventually Veneto. In the east, main maize growers include Oberösterreich and Steyermark in Austria and all of Hungary. Rice is grown in the Po valley in Italy and soybean is virtually absent.

As already mentioned in section 1.1, several areas experienced abnormal environmental conditions, including high rainfall in the United Kingdom (43 percent above the recent 13 year) and Hungary (a drop of 33percent). But the most spectacular and spatially coherent departures concern temperature, mostly in the northern center and east of the MPZ: a 2.1°C increase in Denmark and close to a 2.0°C increase in Germany, Hungary, Czechia,Slovakia, and Austria (+1.5°C). Abnormal PAR was recorded only in Denmark (-4.5percent).

Based on VHI clusters, crop conditions in Europe can be described for the three corners and middle area of a triangular area across the continent. In the first (i) point of the triangle—in the United Kingdom and Denmark—the area is characterized by a sharp deterioration in VHI in Decemberand January, associated with floods and possibly low radiation in Denmark. At this stage of the season, the season’s final outcome will still very much depend on the conditions that will prevail during February and the following months. The second point (ii) of the triangle covers Spain and the east of south-western France, where VHI was well above expectations for most of 2013,but rapidly deteriorated in December, compared with the reference period, reaching values close to average at the end of January. In a third corner (iii), covering the Po Valley and the eastern part of the MPZ (Hungary), VHI values are about average and then close to average in December and January.

Next, between the three listed "corners," the continent is characterized by a patchwork of the three described behaviors,mostly in areas with high maximum VCI values (above 0.8). Lower values are seenfor the peripheral areas, especially south and east Spain (Aragon and Castilla), south-west and north-west France (Central Midi-Pyrénées and east Brittany), the United Kingdom (Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire), the north of Lower Saxony in Germany, and eastern Hungary. As with VHI, the remaining areas are best described as random patches of high and low VCI, with different mixes of both, approximately 30 low-70 high in France and Hungary, 10-90 in Germany,Denmark, Czechia, and north Italy, and 70-30 in Spain and southern Italy. The average VCI in the MPZ is nevertheless rather high, 0.88, up 8 percent over the latest season.

 

Figure 2.6. Western Europe MPZ:Farming intensity and stress