What do vegetable farmers expect from climate services to adapt to climate change by 2060? A case study from the Parisian region

Climate services are an important tool providing information for many sectors to adapt to climate change. For agriculture, the impacts of climate change vary between regions and between crops, and farmers' needs for climate information are also determined by local context. The purpose of this paper is to identify the climate information needs of vegetable farmers, and to discuss these needs within the specific context of the Parisian region. Based on participatory workshops in three areas of the Parisian region, and using regional downscaled data from the French climate services, this study addresses the following question: what do vegetable farmers of a peri-urban area expect from climate services to adapt to climate change by 2060? Participatory workshops with agricultural expert allowed us to build a preliminary set of climate variables based on crops' vulnerability to high temperatures, mild temperature in winter, late frost, low relative air humidity, low precipitation, and climate extremes such as drought, heat waves and floods. Based on this set of variables climate projection on monthly, seasonal, and annual scales were provided to farmers for the near (2021–2040) and distant (2041–2060) future, as well as for past period (1990–2020) and discussed during 3 participatory workshops. Based on farmer’s feedbacks, we made a synthesis of climate information required by farmers which was validated and further discussed in a last round of workshops involving farmers and agricultural advisers. Three main findings emerge from this participatory study. Our first finding shows the need for both climate and non-climate information for vegetable farming adaptation. Specific needs include information on wind speed peaks and directions, soil moisture, climate analogous spaces (or sites), and urban planning regulations (constraining the possibility to build greenhouses or tunnels to adapt to climate change). Our second finding is that farmers expect from climate services to visualise a comprehensive climatic situation, that is, a whole conjunction of several inter-related variables, rather than precise and detailed variations of a single one. Seasonal and annual time scales seem to be the most relevant for farmers’ adaptation strategies (except for frost requiring more precise information). Our third finding is that these needs remain context-specific and depend on water access, the market demand (here Parisian), and the peri-urban location.