Browsing by Subject "Crop rotation"
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(2022)Grain legumes are grown on less than 2% of the arable area of Europe, while large quantities of soybean and soymeal are imported for feed for pigs and poultry. Crop rotations need diversifying by adding grain legumes for soil health and for the break-crop effect, lowering pest, disease and weed pressures in the subsequent crop. The economic effects are of interest from adding legumes to crop rotations and can be evaluated by modelling crop rotations and comparing the means of the gross margins (GM) from the rotations. In Finland, cereal-based crop rotations dominate the important crop growing areas of Southwestern Finland. The most common rotation during a five-year-period can consist of a cereal monoculture with two or more cereal species. The largest potential for diversification in crop rotations can be found on pig, poultry, and cereal farms. Modelling of grain legumes in crop rotations has previously been done for Västra Götaland in Sweden, Brandenburg in Germany, Calabria Italy, eastern Scotland in the United Kingdom, and Sud-Muntenia i Romania. The aim of this work was to create modelled crop rotations for Southwestern Finland to evaluate the gross margin, NO3-N-leaching, and N2O-emissions of the crop rotations. Yields were modelled for a ten-year period following actual yield fluctuations. They were analysed and there were no significant differences in gross margin detected in the crop rotations, whether they were a legume or an all-cereal rotation. Significant differences were found in N2O-emissions between the crop rotations
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(2015)Crop rotation is an important farming practice in organic agriculture. In the research it has been shown that diverse crop rotations enhance productivity as well as agrobiodiversity, and thus the organic regulations of EU obliges the farmers to have diverse rotations on their farms. However, it is unclear what kinds of crop rotations have been implemented on Finnish farms. In this master’s thesis the aim was to find out what kinds of crop rotations plans there were used on 21 organic arable farms on Uusimaa and Satakunta regions in the Southern Finland and how the plans were put into practice during 2008–2012. The aim was also to study, if there were differences between the regions. The study material consisted of the crop rotation plans which are required from the farmers in the beginning of 5-year organic subsidy period and of the information from EU’s IACS-database about the crops grown on farms. The typical crop rotation on the organic farms was the alternation between cereals and ley, in different pace on different field plots. Also the winter rye – oat – two- or three-year ley was a typical crop rotation. Crop rotation plans and realized crop rotations were compared with each other by “realization index”, which was developed by this study. The realization index showed that the plans were followed every year less and less on the average, but on the same time it was also typical to come back to the plans. However, as a consequence of the changes made into the plans, the field area of the farm was usually not an entity, bound together by crop rotation, but the crop rotation was planned for the each field plot separately. There were statistically significant differences in crop rotations plans between regions. In Uusimaa region the crop rotations were based on crop types whereas in Satakunta region the crops to be grown were identified more precisely. Several future research topics emerged, such as the significance of crop rotations in organic agriculture, farmer’s strategies in crop rotation design and the sustainability as well as productivity of those strategies.
Now showing items 1-2 of 2