Improving vineyard resilience: innovative practices for water stress management

The Mediterranean region is known for its warm climate and limited water resources, making vineyards vulnerable to water stress and the impacts of climate change. Various innovative practices have been developed and implemented in the region to address these challenges for water stress management. Regulated deficit and drip irrigation, combined with advanced technologies such as soil moisture sensors, and real-time monitoring systems improve precision in water application and optimise water use by targeting critical growth stages or alternating root zone hydration. Additional innovations, such as remote sensing and water harvesting, further bolster vineyard resilience. These methods reduce water use, improve grape quality, maintain economic viability and promote long-term sustainability in vineyard management.Farmers are adjusting their practices to cope, but many of these solutions remain confined to specific regions or agricultural sectors. The EU-funded CLIMED-FRUIT project is working to bridge this gap by collecting and sharing innovative, climate-adaptive practices from various European agricultural groups to enhance resilience and promote effective climate change adaptation and mitigation. This article presents a non-exhaustive list of experimental results from projects carried out across Europe and identified in the framework of CLIMED-FRUIT project.