Research about Cropping Systems in Saline Coastal Areas

Dear Colleagues,

Coastal areas with high salinity levels often have fragile agro-ecosystems and are vulnerable to climatic disturbances, making it difficult for farmers to sustain their livelihoods. Limited access to natural resources—especially fresh irrigation water—and their inefficient utilization lead to poor farm productivity, profitability, and environmental outcomes. Many farmers in these areas are poverty-stricken and face the constant threat of food insecurity and outmigration.

Small farms’ sustainability in coastal areas must leverage cropping systems (farming systems) that adapt to dynamic soil and water salinity regimes, other climate-induced bio-physical stresses and perturbations, and market volatility. This asks for a holistic human-centric design of cropping systems (farming systems) that accounts for available land, water, and biological resources in the coastal agro-ecosystems. It is crucial to diversify the cropping systems (farming systems) at the varietal, crop and enterprise levels; make optimal use of scant usable water resources; produce yields that exceed household consumption needs; generate substantial income; minimize environmental harm with special reference to depleting groundwater; align with socio-cultural norms; and promote gender equality.

Despite extensive research on the agronomic and economic aspects of crops and livestock in the coastal areas, resilient cropping systems in the face of water-stress has only recently become an explicit focus of attention. Further, much of the problem-solving research in the coastal areas needs multidisciplinary and transdisciplinary undertakings. Simply put, a transition from ‘crop or livestock’ to ‘cropping and farming systems’ to ‘food systems’ is imminent in the research agenda that accounts for bio-physical, socio-economic, cultural, and gender realities and examines the system outcomes through the lenses of resource use efficiency, productivity, profitability, marketability, and environmental externalities.

The current Special Issue invites research in cropping systems (farming systems) that cut through diverse disciplinary and cross-disciplinary studies in coastal cropping systems addressing the abovementioned concerns with an explicit focus on water resources.

Dr. Mohammed Mainuddin
Dr. Rupak Goswami
Prof. Dr. Mohammad A. Mojid
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Water is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• coastal agroecosystem
• farming systems
• sustainable intensification
• water resource management
• climate-resilience
• water footprint
• whole-farm analysis
• multi-criteria assessment
• socio-economics of cropping systems
• gendered outcomes