The potential effects of future climate change were investigated, corresponding to a doubling of atmospheric CO2 from 350 to 700 ppm, on agricultural production of four different cropping systems at two Italian locations, Modena and Foggia. Climate change scenarios, derived from two general circulation models (GCMs), were used as weather input to a soil-plant growth simulator, CropSyst. This mo...

Suggested citation IARI (2012) Crop residues management with conservation agriculture: Potential, constraints and policy needs. Indian Foreword India being an agriculture-dominant country produces more than 500 million tons of crop residues annually. These residues are used as animal feed, for thatching of homes, and as a source of domestic and industrial fuel. A large portion of unused crop re...

Returning crop residue may result in nutrient reduction in soil in the first few years. A two-year field experiment was conducted to assess whether this negative effect is alleviated by improved crop residue management (CRM). Nine treatments (3 CRM and 3 N fertilizer rates) were used. The CRM treatments were (1) R0: 100 % of the N using mineral fertilizer with no crop residues return; (2) R: cr...

Year-to-year variations in crop yields can have major impacts on the livelihoods of subsistence farmers and may trigger significant global price fluctuations, with severe consequences for people in developing countries. Fluctuations can be induced by weather conditions, management decisions, weeds, diseases, and pests. Although an explicit quantification and deeper understanding of weather-indu...

31 Year-to-year variations in crop yields can have major impacts on the livelihoods of subsistence farmers 32 and may trigger significant global price fluctuations with severe consequences for people in developing 33 countries. Fluctuations can be induced by weather conditions, management decisions, weeds, diseases, 34 and pests. Although an explicit quantification and deeper understanding of w...

land is used for crop production and can increase potential profit. There are ecological as well as economic advantages to increasing the amount of time the land is used for production. A winter grain crop, traditionally wheat, can act as a cover crop to prevent erosion. A warm-season double crop, often soybean, may yield smaller returns than a full-season crop but often averages a positive net...

Various genetic engineering routes to enhance C3 leaf photosynthesis have been proposed to improve crop productivity. However, their potential contribution to crop productivity needs to be assessed under realistic field conditions. Using 31 year weather data, we ran the crop model GECROS for rice in tropical, subtropical, and temperate environments, to evaluate the following routes: (1) improvi...

The sensitivity of agricultural output to climate change has often been estimated by modelling crop yields under climate change scenarios or with statistical analysis of the impacts of year-to-year climatic variability on crop yields1,2. However, the areaof croplandandthenumberof cropsharvestedpergrowing season (cropping frequency) both also a ect agricultural output and both also show sensitiv...

Proper grazing management practices can generate corresponding compensatory effects on plant community production, which may reduce inter-annual variability of productivity in some grassland ecosystems. However, it remains unclear how grazing influences plant community attributes and the variability of standing crop. We examined the effects of sheep grazing at four stocking rate treatments [con...