Why Ag is Different
Hazards, exposures, vulnerabilities and adaptation are uniquely challenging in agriculture
Weather threatens both agricultural production and the infrastructure behind it. Land cannot relocate, and biological resilience and soil function can take years to build. These differences matter when pricing risk and evaluating investments in resilience.
Physical Risk Challenges
Physical risk analysis is an established tool in the built environment for quantifying potential losses and evaluating investments in adaptation and resilience.
Inherently Local Adaptation
Agricultural adaptation combines industrial measures, such as flood protection, backup power and storage, with biological changes that improve soil function, establish windbreaks and restore ecological buffers.
Biological adaptation also has a lead time: improving soil function or establishing living buffers can take years to build resilience.