Agro-Ecological Indicators (AEIs) for Dairy and Mixed Farming Systems Classification: Identifying Alternatives for the Cuban Livestock Sector

Abstract

Attainment of acceptable levels of land and labor productivity and low external input use is not a mutually exclusive proposition. This study examines characteristics of a range of current specialized dairy farming systems (DFS) and mixed (crop-livestock) farming systems (MFS) in Cuba to determine their efficiency in the process of food and feed production. The central question was whether the favorable results of MFS realized in a small-scale experimental system were also attainable in larger, commercial farms. To this end, we collected data on 93 farms from around the country for a period of 1 year. The farms were classified according to four predictor variables: farm type, years since conversion from DFS to MFS, proportion of land allocated to crops in rotation and farm size. Farms were compared based on 12 pre-selected Agro-Ecological Indicators (AEIs) by using analysis of variance and Tukey's HSD tests. The 12 AEIs were also subjected to a principal components Downloaded by [University of Western Ontario] at 23:39 12 April 2015 436 F. R. Funes-Monzote et al.analysis and related to the four predictor variables by reducedrank regression, also known as redundancy analysis. Three farm types were distinguished: mixed farming experimental (MFe), mixed farming commercial (MFc) and specialized dairy farming (DFS). Total energy output per unit of farm area was on average four to six times higher on the mixed farms than on the specialized dairy farms, while protein output three to four times higher. Milk yield per unit of forage area was highest on MFe (2.4 Mg ha -1 yr -1 ), followed by MFc (1.7), while it was much lower (0.7) on DFS. The redundancy analysis revealed that MFe did only slightly better than MFc and was most opposite to DFS in terms of AEIs. In conclusion, the previous experimental findings were confirmed nationwide, thus demonstrating the benefits of MFS for agroecological performance in Cuba.

Dairy farming systems driven by the market and low-cost intensification in West Africa: the case of Burkina Faso

“…In further work, it would be interesting to look in greater depth at dairy producers’ ecological footprints and agroecological profiles, taking into account, as suggested by Funes-Monzote et al ( 2009 ), indicators that do not refer solely to the production unit (in this case the cow being milked), but also, for example, the yield per asset or per unit area, along with biodiversity indicators and energy balances.…”

Ecological Intensification for Crop Protection

“…In this context, one should be ready to face situations such as the ban of DDT in US agriculture in 1972, the phase-out of a set of "dirty dozen" pesticides on rice in Indonesia in the late 1970s, or the "special period" in Cuba following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s Funes-Monzote et al 2009 ). Although those were drastic measures, they largely contributed to the rise of IPM in the USA and Indonesia, and of agroecology -especially in its crop protection dimension -in Cuba.…”

Cuba’s agrifood system in transition, an introduction to the Elementa Special Feature

“…That collection was published by the California-based nonprofit organization Food First, which has played an essential role in raising awareness in the United States -and the English-speaking world more generally -about agroecology in Cuba. There have also been a handful of peer reviewed papers first-authored by Cubans (Febles-Gonzalez et al 2011;Funes-Monzote et al 2009a;Funes-Monzote et al 2009b) and a number of others resulting from collaborative efforts between non-Cuban and Cuban researchers (Deere et al 1994;Altieri et al 1999;Nelson et al 2009;Simon-Reardon and Perez, 2010;Rosset et al 2011;McCune et al 2011;Altieri and Funes-Monzote, 2012).…”