Fecha/hora: 01/06/2024 04:04:57

Biblioteca(s): | INIA Las Brujas.
Fecha corriente: | 27/01/2021
Fecha de la última actualización: | 27/01/2021
Autoria: | BERRUETA, C.; GIMÉNEZ, G.; DOGLIOTTI, S.
Afiliación: | MARIA CECILIA BERRUETA MOREIRA, INIA (Instituto Nacional de Investigación Agropecuaria), Uruguay; GUSTAVO GIMÉNEZ FRANQUEZ, INIA (Instituto Nacional de Investigación Agropecuaria), Uruguay; SANTIAGO DOGLIOTTI, Facultad de Agronomía, Universidad de la República, Montevideo, Uruguay.
Título: | Scaling up from crop to farm level: Co-innovation framework to improve vegetable farm systems sustainability.
Año de publicación: | 2021
Fuente/Imprenta: | Agricultural Systems, April 2021, Volume 189, Article number 103055. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agsy.2021.103055
ISSN: | 0308-521X
DOI: | 10.1016/j.agsy.2021.103055
Idioma: | Inglés

Notas:

Article history: Received 6 July 2020; Received in revised form 7 January 2021; Accepted 8 January 2021; Available online 15 January 2021.
Corresponding author: Cecilia Berrueta. E-mail address: cberrueta@inia.org.uy

Contenido:

Abstract-
CONTEXT: Successful scaling up from crop level research to adoption by farmers depends on its practitioners being aware of the constraints that arise as scaling up proceeds. Promising ideas from crop level research are not adopted by farmers in many cases. OBJECTIVE: Scaling up is explored here in a study conducted in five vegetable farms in south Uruguay, where tomato production was one of the main sources of income. We aimed to evaluate the redesign process at both levels (crop and farm) focusing on: synergies and trade-offs between crop yield and farm system improvement and how critical crop constraints could be solved at farm level. METHODS: Improved crop management practices were proposed following yield gap analysis recommendations developed in previous studies, aiming to maximise crop yield and inputs use efficiency. At the farm level, a multi-year plan defining crops choice, crops area and allocation of fields to crops was designed to match resource demands to supply, especially for labour. Redesign plans were implemented for one year, with 66% of redesigned activities adopted at farm level and 86% at crop level. RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS: We found several examples where farm system adjustment conflicted with crop yield maximization. We also found constraints prioritised as bottlenecks for crop yield improvement, which require solutions at the farm level. For instance, fertigation problems (quantity and timing) explained part of the yield gap in tomato. Overcoming these constraints requires farm system settings, e.g. adjustment of cropping area to water availability, development of suitable water reservoirs and infrastructure for water distribution and fertilisers injection, besides adjustment of a fertigation plan according to crop demand, soil fertility and greenhouse environment at crop level. Crop yield limiting factors identified through yield gap analysis, considered inside a farm system redesign process, could be a powerful tool to better targeting crop management recommendations to overall farm performance improvement. SIGNIFICANCE: The consideration of farm systems as a whole showed greater economic and environmental impacts than focusing only on the main crop due to synergies and trade-offs among farm system components. Multi-scale analysis showed that recommendations from crop research need to be tailored to farm context and objectives considering synergies and trade-offs. 
© 2021 Elsevier Ltd

Palabras-Clave: | Crop management; Family farms; Farm system; Redesign at farm level; Yield gap analysis.
Categoría del tema: | F01 Cultivo
Registro original: | INIA Las Brujas (LB)
Ejemplares: | LB - (102463-1) - PXI - AP - DD - PP/AGRICULTURAL SYSTEMS/2021 -  -  - DIS