Shifting Rice Cropping Systems Mitigates Ecological Footprints and Enhances Grain Yield in Central China

Abstract

Intensive cereal production has brought about increasingly serious environmental threats, including global warming, environmental acidification, and water shortage. As an important grain producer in the world, the rice cultivation system in central China has undergone excessive changes in the past few decades. However, few articles focused on the environmental impacts of these shifts from the perspective of ecological footprints. In this study, a 2-year field trial was carried out in Hubei province, China, to gain insight into carbon footprint (CF), nitrogen footprint (NF), and water footprint (WF) performance. The three treatments were, namely, double-rice system (DR), ratoon rice system (RR), and rice-wheat system (RW). Results demonstrated that RR significantly increased the grain yield by 10.22–15.09% compared with DR, while there was no significant difference in the grain yield between RW and DR in 2018–2019. All of the calculation results by three footprint approaches followed the order: RR < RW < DR; meanwhile, RR was always significantly lower than DR. Methane and NH3 field emissions were the hotspots of CF and NF, respectively. Blue WF accounts for 40.90–42.71% of DR, which was significantly higher than that of RR and RW, primarily because DR needs a lot of irrigation water in both seasons. The gray WF of RW was higher than those of DR and RR, mainly due to the higher application rate of N fertilizer. In conclusion, RR possesses the characteristics of low agricultural inputs and high grain yield and can reduce CF, NF, and WF, considering the future conditions of rural societal developments and rapid demographic changes; we highlighted that the RR could be a cleaner and sustainable approach to grain production.

Ratoon Rice Cropping Mitigates the Greenhouse Effect by Reducing CH4 Emissions through Reduction of Biomass during the Ratoon Season

“…For example, the garlic-rice system was found to have significantly higher GWP but significantly lower GHGI than the wheat-rice system [26]. The ratoon rice cropping system (RR) showed similar direct GWP to the rice-wheat cropping system, which was 33% lower than that of the double rice cropping system (DR) [27]. These studies suggest that the different rotated crops in a given rice-based cropping system may affect the GWP and GHGI of the system.…”

“…RR and DR require different management practices (such as tillage and water management) and agricultural inputs (such as seeds, fertilizers, pesticides, and labor), which may lead to differences in GHG emissions, as well as in yield performance and economic benefits [30]. Previous studies have demonstrated that RR generally has lower annual GWP, GHGI, and carbon footprint [27], and higher NEEB compared with DR [28,30]. In addition, Xu et al [25] have comprehensively studied the GHG emissions, carbon footprint, and NEEB of RR and DR, which has greatly improved our understanding of the GHG emissions and NEEB of the two cropping systems.…”

Effect of Zero Growth of Fertilizer Action on Ecological Efficiency of Grain Production in China under the Background of Carbon Emission Reduction

“…For example, Fu et al (2013) used the ecological footprint index method to predict grain security and ecological sustainable development in China in 2030 [4]. Zhou et al (2022) studied the impact of rice planting system on the environment from the perspective of ecological footprint [5]. Tian et al (2016) used stochastic frontier analysis to measure the environmental efficiency of farmers' production in China [6], and Zhang et al (2019) used stochastic frontier analysis to calculate the green total factor productivity (GTFP) of countries along the Belt and Road [7].…”

Can the Integration of Water and Fertilizer Promote the Sustainable Development of Rice Production in China?

“…Due to favorable climatic conditions, double-cropped rice is one of the main types of production in central China. Farmland is waterlogged during most of the year, leading to changes in soil structure, which in turn accelerates nutrient loss and encourages farmers to develop the habit of over-fertilizing [63,64]. For example, the 1215 kg CO 2 -eq ha −1 nitrogen fertilizer input reported by Li et al in rice production in central China is three times higher than the one in this study [36].…”