ALBERT

All Library Books, journals and Electronic Records Telegrafenberg

feed icon rss

Your email was sent successfully. Check your inbox.

An error occurred while sending the email. Please try again.

Proceed reservation?

Export
  • 1
    Publication Date: 2023-08-01
    Description: Cereal crop production in sub-Saharan Africa has not achieved the much-needed increase in yields to foster economic development and food security. Maize yields in the region’s semi-arid agroecosystems are constrained by highly variable rainfall, which may be worsened by climate change. Thus, the Tanzanian government has prioritized agriculture as an adaptation sector in its intended nationally determined contribution, and crop management adjustments as a key investment area in its Agricultural Sector Development Programme. In this study, we investigated how future changes in maize yields under different climate scenarios can be countered by regional adjusted crop management and cultivar adaptation strategies. A crop model was used to simulate maize yields in the Singida region of Tanzania for the baseline period 1980–2012 and under three future climate projections for 2020–2060 and 2061–2099. Adaptation strategies to improve yields were full irrigation, deficit irrigation, mulch and nitrogen addition and another cultivar. According to our model results, increase in temperature is the main driver of future maize yield decline. Increased respiration and phenological development were associated with lower maize yields of 16% in 2020–2060 and 20% in 2061–2099 compared to the 1980–2012 baseline. Surprisingly, none of the management strategies significantly improved yields; however, a different maize variety that was tested as an alternative coping strategy performed better. This study suggests that investment in accessibility of improved varieties and investigation of maize traits that have the potential to perform well in a warmer future are better suited for sustaining maize production in the semi-arid region than adjustments in crop management.
    Description: Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape Research (ZALF)
    Description: Universität Hohenheim (3153)
    Keywords: ddc:631 ; Maize ; Climate change ; Adaptation ; Model ; Tanzania ; NDC
    Language: English
    Type: doc-type:article
    Location Call Number Expected Availability
    BibTip Others were also interested in ...
  • 2
    Publication Date: 2019-07-19
    Description: Rainfed agriculture constitutes around 80% of the world’s agricultural land, achieving the lowest on-farm crop yields and greatest on-farm water losses. Much of this land is in developing countries, including sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), where hunger is chronic. The primary constraint of rainfed agriculture—frequently experienced in SSA—is water scarcity, heightened by the unpredictability of season onset, erratic rainfall, as well as the inability of farmers to provide adequate soil and crop management. Farmers react differently to constraints, making a variety of choices—including the timing of planting, type of land cultivation, fertilization, and scattered fields, among many others. Limited information is available on the combined effects of these strategies for improving crop yield and water use efficiency (WUE). An experiment was co-conducted with farmers over four consecutive rainy seasons (2014–2018) in Tanzania, to evaluate these strategies for single and joint effects in improving yield and WUE on rainfed pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum (L.) R.Br.). The treatments used were flat cultivation both without and with microdosing, as well as tied ridging without and with microdose interaction, with different planting dates depending on farmers’ decisions. Results show that farmers react differently to the early, normal, or late onset of the rainy season, and cumulative rainfall during its onset, which affects their decisions regarding planting dates, yield, and WUE. Microdose fertilization increases both the yield and WUE of pearl millet significantly, with greater effects obtained using tied ridging compared to flat cultivation. For low-income smallholder farmers in a semi-arid agroclimate, using tied ridging with microdosing during early planting is an effective response to spatiotemporal rainfall variability and poor soils.
    Electronic ISSN: 2073-4395
    Topics: Agriculture, Forestry, Horticulture, Fishery, Domestic Science, Nutrition , Economics
    Location Call Number Expected Availability
    BibTip Others were also interested in ...
  • 3
    Publication Date: 2019-08-10
    Description: Drought and heat-tolerant crops, such as Pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum), are priority crops for fighting hunger in semi-arid regions. Assessing its performance under future climate scenarios is critical for determining its resilience and sustainability. Field experiments were conducted over two consecutive seasons (2015/2016 and 2016/2017) to determine the yield responses of the crop (pearl millet variety “Okoa”) to microdose fertilizer application in a semi-arid region of Tanzania. Data from the experiment were used to calibrate and validate the DSSAT model (CERES Millet). Subsequently, the model evaluated synthetic climate change scenarios for temperature increments and precipitation changes based on historic observations (2010–2018). Temperature increases of +0.5 to +3.0 °C (from baseline), under non-fertilized (NF) and fertilizer microdose (MD) conditions were used to evaluate nine planting dates of pearl millet from early (5 December) to late planting (25 February), based on increments of 10 days. The planting date with the highest yields was subjected to 49 synthetic scenarios of climate change for temperature increments and precipitation changes (of −30% up to +30% from baseline) to simulate yield responses. Results show that the model reproduced the phenology and yield, indicating a very good performance. Model simulations indicate that temperature increases negatively affected yields for all planting dates under NF and MD. Early and late planting windows were more negatively affected than the normal planting window, implying that temperature increases reduced the length of effective planting window for achieving high yields in both NF and MD. Farmers must adjust their planting timing, while the timely availability of seeds and fertilizer is critical. Precipitation increases had a positive effect on yields under all tested temperature increments, but Okoa cultivar only has steady yield increases up to a maximum of 1.5 °C, beyond which yields decline. This informs the need for further breeding or testing of other cultivars that are more heat tolerant. However, under MD, the temperature increments and precipitation change scenarios are higher than under NF, indicating a high potential of yield improvement under MD, especially with precipitation increases. Further investigation should focus on other cropping strategies such as the use of in-field rainwater harvesting and heat-tolerant cultivars to mitigate the effects of temperature increase and change in precipitation on pearl millet yield.
    Electronic ISSN: 2071-1050
    Topics: Energy, Environment Protection, Nuclear Power Engineering
    Location Call Number Expected Availability
    BibTip Others were also interested in ...
  • 4
    Publication Date: 2020-03-13
    Description: A series of factors affect the social perception of hazards in a rural context. This article analyzes how weather conditions influence farmers’ perceptions of natural hazards. In order to understand the relationship between time of year/season and farmers’ concerns about hazards, this study was undertaken. The methodology was based on surveys done to obtain a base-collection of primary data, as well as a meteorological and production analysis using secondary data. A case study of small coffee farms was carried out in a Brazilian municipality with questionnaires applied during the dry season in 2016 and the rainy season in 2017. The results indicate that drought is the main hazard identified by farmers in both weather seasons. Although there were some changes in perceptions observed, the ranking order of the main hazards did not change over the dry and rainy weather seasons.
    Electronic ISSN: 2071-1050
    Topics: Energy, Environment Protection, Nuclear Power Engineering
    Location Call Number Expected Availability
    BibTip Others were also interested in ...
  • 5
    Publication Date: 2021-09-27
    Description: Cereal crop production in sub-Saharan Africa has not achieved the much-needed increase in yields to foster economic development and food security. Maize yields in the region’s semi-arid agroecosystems are constrained by highly variable rainfall, which may be worsened by climate change. Thus, the Tanzanian government has prioritized agriculture as an adaptation sector in its intended nationally determined contribution, and crop management adjustments as a key investment area in its Agricultural Sector Development Programme. In this study, we investigated how future changes in maize yields under different climate scenarios can be countered by regional adjusted crop management and cultivar adaptation strategies. A crop model was used to simulate maize yields in the Singida region of Tanzania for the baseline period 1980–2012 and under three future climate projections for 2020–2060 and 2061–2099. Adaptation strategies to improve yields were full irrigation, deficit irrigation, mulch and nitrogen addition and another cultivar. According to our model results, increase in temperature is the main driver of future maize yield decline. Increased respiration and phenological development were associated with lower maize yields of 16% in 2020–2060 and 20% in 2061–2099 compared to the 1980–2012 baseline. Surprisingly, none of the management strategies significantly improved yields; however, a different maize variety that was tested as an alternative coping strategy performed better. This study suggests that investment in accessibility of improved varieties and investigation of maize traits that have the potential to perform well in a warmer future are better suited for sustaining maize production in the semi-arid region than adjustments in crop management.
    Print ISSN: 1436-3798
    Electronic ISSN: 1436-378X
    Topics: Biology , Energy, Environment Protection, Nuclear Power Engineering
    Published by Springer
    Location Call Number Expected Availability
    BibTip Others were also interested in ...
  • 6
    Publication Date: 2021-04-01
    Description: Among integrated crop–livestock systems, forage succession is an advantageous strategy for the use of pasture to feed cattle in periods of low rainfall, as well as for the generation of biomass for the no-till system for the next crop. Different species have different abilities to accumulate nutrients in their biomass, which are then released into the soil through the decomposition of crop residues. This study aimed to evaluate soybean yield in an integrated crop–livestock system in comparison to soybean–maize succession system through the production, decomposition and nutrient accumulation in the biomass. The experiment had a randomized block design with four replicates. The treatments were three cropping systems: integrated crop–livestock with Paiaguas palisadegrass (Brachiaria brizantha cv. BRS Paiaguas), integrated crop–livestock with Tamani guinea grass (Panicum maximum cv. BRS Tamani) and maize grown in succession to soybean. The results showed that the use of the integrated crop–livestock system in the form of forage succession provided greater soil cover and nutrient cycling as a result of the better utilization of the animal's excreta, than the cropping of maize in succession and resulted in higher soybean productivity, thus contributing to agricultural sustainability. Paiaguas palisadegrass and Tamani guinea grass showed a C:N ratio greater than 30:1, indicating slow decomposition of plant residues. The forages accumulated amounts of nutrients in their biomass that met the soybean demand, resulting in higher grain yield.
    Print ISSN: 0021-8596
    Electronic ISSN: 1469-5146
    Topics: Agriculture, Forestry, Horticulture, Fishery, Domestic Science, Nutrition
    Location Call Number Expected Availability
    BibTip Others were also interested in ...
Close ⊗
This website uses cookies and the analysis tool Matomo. More information can be found here...