Assessing extreme sea level rise impacts on coastal agriculture in Europe and North Africa

TL;DR

This study assesses how extreme sea level rise could impact coastal agriculture in Europe and North Africa by 2100, highlighting potential economic and food security risks.

Contribution

The paper introduces a spatially explicit method to estimate agricultural losses from extreme sea level rise under different climate scenarios.

Findings

Extreme sea level rise could cause annual agricultural losses of $800 million to $1.5 billion by 2100.

Coastal agriculture in Europe and North Africa is at high risk from flooding under RCP 4.5 and 8.5 scenarios.

Adaptive strategies like salt-tolerant crops and sea barriers are recommended to mitigate impacts.

Abstract

Sea Level Rise refers to the long-term increase of sea level. This phenomenon is primarily driven by the melting of ice caps and the thermal expansion of the oceans. Extreme Sea Level Rise (ESLR) events occur when SLR combines with temporary phenomena such as storm surges, tides, and waves, creating potentially damaging coastal flooding. The accelerating impact of climate change has raised the attention on ESLR and its effects on coastal regions. This study focuses on ESLR and its potential impacts on Europe and North Africa up to 2100, with particular attention to agriculture. Utilising Joint Research Centre (JRC) Global Extreme Sea Level projections and fine-scale DTM, we mapped areas vulnerable to ESLR under Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) scenarios 4.5 and 8.5. Through a topological approach, we generated spatially explicit maps of at-risk regions. Then, the magnitude of ESLR’s impact on local agricultural systems was estimated by overlaying crop production data from FAO (GAEZ 2015+) with different flood scenarios. Findings reveal that ESLR can severely affect coastal agriculture, suggesting significant potential agricultural losses (from $800 million up to $1.5 billion per year in the next 100 years), impacting food security and economic stability. This research underscores the urgent need for adaptive strategies, including the construction of dykes and sea barriers and the shift of agriculture to salt tolerant crops to mitigate ESLR impacts.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1038/s41598-025-31630-w.

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