A Climate Change Perspective on Grasslands

Grasslands are the result of interactions between climate, soil, interspecies competition and natural or humnn distucbance. They are vital to human sustenance but vulnerable to human mismanagement and climatic stress.• Thece is now a strong scientific consensus that climate will change during the next century at a rate unprecedented since the end of the last glaciation. Expected climatic changes include not only increasing temperatures, but also changes in total rainfall and its seasonality, and systematic increases in rainfall intensity. Along with the direct effects of increasing carbon dioxide concentrations on plants, and changes in fire frequency, these environmental influences will interact strongly with the stresses being placed on grasslands due to overgrazing and other forms of mismanagement. Recent research is leading to greater confidence in our ability lo foreshadow future climatic changes at a regional level, although the detail of these climate change scenarios is still rapidly evolving. Grassland scientists, in collaboration with climatologists, should therefore be actively exploring the sensitivity of grasslands to the types of climatic changes now envisaged.