Effect of crop rotation on nitrogen use efficiency – case study of Latvia
2022
Piliksere, Dace | Auzins, Alberts | Aboltins, Aivars
Nitrogen losses from crop production have several negative effects on environment and human health: nitrogen emissions in form of nitrous oxide, which is one of the greenhouse gases (GHG), contribute to climate warming that affects biodiversity in different ecosystems; nitrogen leaching contaminates above- and belowground waters causing environmental pollution/eutrophication and affecting drinking water quality. The Platform on Sustainable Finance has proposed nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) as an important criterion to assess the environmental sustainability of crop production in the framework of the EU Taxonomy. Moreover, the Platform has proposed a minimum NUE 70% for crop production. As there is still a lack of knowledge about NUE in crop production in Latvia, especially in conventional and integrated crop production, the aim of the study was to examine NUE for most frequent crop rotations in conventional and integrated crop production in Latvia. The most frequent (typical) crop rotations were identified according to the crop fields’ survey (period 2018–2021) as well as the spatial analysis of arable land in Latvia. The empirical data derived from the crop fields’ survey have been used to assess NUE. The crop fields’ survey implies that the majority of the fields were managed as two-crop and three-crop rotations; however, some farmers practised the wheat monoculture. The results of this study suggest that NUE is quite low for practised crop rotations in conventional and integrated farming in Latvia and that ensuring minimum NUE at least 70% could be challenging.
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