• Journal of The Korean Society of Agricultural Engineers
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• v.63 no.6
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• pp.1-16
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• 2021

Global warming due to climate change is expected to significantly affect the hydrological cycle of agriculture. Therefore, in order to predict the magnitude of climate impact on agricultural water resources in the future, it is necessary to estimate the water demand for irrigation as the climate change. This study aimed at evaluating the future changes in water demand for irrigation under two Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs) (SSP2-4.5 and SSP5-8.5) scenarios for paddy rice in Gimje, South Korea. The APEX-Paddy model developed for the simulation of paddy environment was used. The model was calibrated and validated using the H₂O flux observation data by the eddy covariance system installed at the field. Sixteen General Circulation Models (GCMs) collected from the Climate Model Intercomparison Project phase 6 (CMIP6) and downscaled using Simple Quantile Mapping (SQM) were used. The future climate data obtained were subjected to APEX-Paddy model simulation to evaluate the future water demand for irrigation at the paddy field. Changes in water demand for irrigation were evaluated for Near-future-NF (2011-2040), Mid-future-MF (2041-2070), and Far-future-FF (2071-2100) by comparing with historical data (1981-2010). The result revealed that, water demand for irrigation would increase by 2.3%, 4.8%, and 7.5% for NF, MF and FF respectively under SSP2-4.5 as compared to the historical demand. Under SSP5-8.5, the water demand for irrigation will worsen by 1.6%, 5.7%, 9.7%, for NF, MF and FF respectively. The increasing water demand for irrigating paddy field into the future is due to increasing evapotranspiration resulting from rising daily mean temperatures and solar radiation under the changing climate.

• Korean Journal of Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.108-125
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• 2015

The agro-climatic index is one of the ways to assess the climate resources of particular agricultural areas on the prospect of agricultural production; it can be a key indicator of agricultural productivity by providing the basic information required for the implementation of different and various farming techniques and practicalities to estimate the growth and yield of crops from the climate resources such as air temperature, solar radiation, and precipitation. However, the agro-climate index can always be changed since the index is not the absolute. Recently, many studies which consider uncertainty of future climate change have been actively conducted using multi-model ensemble (MME) approach by developing and improving dynamic and statistical downscaling of Global Climate Model (GCM) output. In this study, the agro-climatic index of Korean Peninsula, such as growing degree day based on $5^{\circ}C$, plant period based on $5^{\circ}C$, crop period based on $10^{\circ}C$, and frost free day were calculated for assessment of the spatio-temporal variations and uncertainties of the indices according to climate change; the downscaled historical (1976-2005) and near future (2011-2040) RCP climate sceneries of AR5 were applied to the calculation of the index. The result showed four agro-climatic indices calculated by nine individual GCMs as well as MME agreed with agro-climatic indices which were calculated by the observed data. It was confirmed that MME, as well as each individual GCM emulated well on past climate in the four major Rivers of South Korea (Han, Nakdong, Geum, and Seumjin and Yeoungsan). However, spatial downscaling still needs further improvement since the agro-climatic indices of some individual GCMs showed different variations with the observed indices at the change of spatial distribution of the four Rivers. The four agro-climatic indices of the Korean Peninsula were expected to increase in nine individual GCMs and MME in future climate scenarios. The differences and uncertainties of the agro-climatic indices have not been reduced on the unlimited coupling of multi-model ensembles. Further research is still required although the differences started to improve when combining of three or four individual GCMs in the study. The agro-climatic indices which were derived and evaluated in the study will be the baseline for the assessment of agro-climatic abnormal indices and agro-productivity indices of the next research work.

• Korean Journal of Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.133-144
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• 2022

This study was conducted to investigate the cultivation period, adaptive genetic resources, growth and development patterns, and water consumption for rice cultivation in the desert environment of United Arab Emirates (UAE). R esearch on rice cultivation in the desert environment is expected to contribute to resolving food shortages caused by climate change and water scarcity. It was found that the optimal cultivation period of rice was from late November to late April of the following year during which the low temperature occurred at the vegetative growth stage of rice in the UAE. Asemi and FL478 were selected to be candidate cultivars for temperature and day-length conditions in the desert areas as a result of pre-testing genetic resources under reclaimed soil and artificial meteorological conditions. In the desert environment in the UAE, FL478 died before harvest due to the etiolation and poor growth in the early stage of growth. In contrast, Asemi overcame the etiolation in the early stage of growth, which allowed for harvest. The vegetative growth phases of Asemi were from early December to early March of the following year whereas its reproductive growth and ripening phases were from early March to late March and from late March to late April, respectively. The yield of milled rice for Asemi was 763kg/10a in the UAE, which was about 41.8% higher than that in Korea. Such an outcome was likely due to the abundant solar radiation during the reproductive growth and grain filling periods. On the other hand, water consumption during the cultivation period in the UAE was 2,619 ton/10a, which was about three times higher than that in Korea. These results suggest that irrigation technology and development of cultivation methods would be needed to minimize water consumption, which would make it economically viable to grow rice in the UAE. In addition, select on of genetic resources for the UAE desert environments such as minimum etiolation in the early stages of growth would be merited further studies, which would promote stable rice cultivation in the arid conditions.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.109 no.3
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• pp.259-270
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• 2020

Extreme weather events, such as heat and drought, have occurred frequently over the past two decades. This has led to continuous reports of cases of forest damage due to physiological stress, not pest damage. In 2014, pine trees were collectively damaged in the forest genetic resources reserve of Sogwang-ri, Uljin, South Korea. An investigation was launched to determine the causes of the dieback, so that a forest management plan could be prepared to deal with the current dieback, and to prevent future damage. This study aimedto 1) understand the topographic and structural characteristics of the area which experienced pine tree dieback, 2) identify the main causes of the dieback, and 3) predict future risk areas through the use of machine-learning techniques. A model for identifying risk areas was developed using 14 explanatory variables, including location, elevation, slope, and age class. When three machine-learning techniques-Decision Tree, Random Forest (RF), and Support Vector Machine (SVM) were applied to the model, RF and SVM showed higher predictability scores, with accuracies over 93%. Our analysis of the variable set showed that the topographical areas most vulnerable to pine dieback were those with high altitudes, high daily solar radiation, and limited water availability. We also found that, when it came to forest stand characteristics, pine trees with high vertical stand densities (5-15 m high) and higher age classes experienced a higher risk of dieback. The RF and SVM models predicted that 9.5% or 115 ha of the Geumgang Pine Forest are at high risk for pine dieback. Our study suggests the need for further investigation into the vulnerable areas of the Geumgang Pine Forest, and also for climate change adaptive forest management steps to protect those areas which remain undamaged.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Agricultural Engineers
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• v.61 no.6
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• pp.111-121
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• 2019

Evapotranspiration (ET) of vegetation is one of the major components of the hydrologic cycle, and its accurate estimation is important for hydrologic water balance, irrigation management, crop yield simulation, and water resources planning and management. For agricultural crops, ET is often calculated in terms of a short or tall crop reference, such as well-watered, clipped grass (reference crop evapotranspiration, $ET_o$). The Penman-Monteith equation recommended by FAO (FAO 56-PM) has been accepted by researchers and practitioners, as the sole $ET_o$ method. However, its accuracy is contingent on high quality measurements of four meteorological variables, and its use has been limited by incomplete and/or inaccurate input data. Therefore, this study evaluated the applicability of Backpropagation Neural Network (BPNN) model for estimating $ET_o$ from less meteorological data than required by the FAO 56-PM. A total of six meteorological inputs, minimum temperature, average temperature, maximum temperature, relative humidity, wind speed and solar radiation, were divided into a series of input groups (a combination of one, two, three, four, five and six variables) and each combination of different meteorological dataset was evaluated for its level of accuracy in estimating $ET_o$. The overall findings of this study indicated that $ET_o$ could be reasonably estimated using less than all six meteorological data using BPNN. In addition, it was shown that the proper choice of neural network architecture could not only minimize the computational error, but also maximize the relationship between dependent and independent variables. The findings of this study would be of use in instances where data availability and/or accuracy are limited.