Cropping System Conversion led to Organic Carbon Change in China’s Mollisols Regions

Abstract

Land use change driven by diet, globalization, and technology advancement have greatly influenced agricultural production and environment in the mollisols region of China, with a marked impact on the depletion of soil organic matter, a signature property of mollisols. Here we report findings on soil organic carbon (SOC) change in three different cropping systems (soybean, soybean/maize, corn) in Northeast China during a 10-year time span. The results indicated that the decline rate of SOC in recent ten years (0.27 g kg−1 yr−1) has slowed down considerably compared to previous decades (1.12 g kg−1 yr−1). Crop system conversion from soybean monocropping to corn monocropping or break system was the critical factor for SOC change, and the background SOC was the second influence factor. When approaching a SOC turning point, conversion from low carbon input crop system (soybeans monocropping) to high carbon input crop system helped slow down the SOC decline (break crop) or even improve SOC (corn monocropping) in mollisols regions. This result implied that imported soybean has brought benefit for Northeast China. But for sustainable goal in China’s mollisols region, straw returning, optimized nitrogen fertilization and no tillage are all necessary whatever in continues maize or rotation system.

Elevated CO2 alters the structure of the bacterial community assimilating plant‐derived carbon in the rhizosphere of soya bean

“…Mollisols are a major soil type used for growing soya beans in northeast China (Sui et al, ). However, soil organic C (SOC) in Mollisols has markedly decreased (up to 50%) with intensive farming practices during the past five decades (Tong et al, ). The increase of atmospheric CO 2 concentrations associated with global climate change poses great uncertainty over predicted SOC stocks.…”

Assessing the effects of ecological restoration approaches in the alpine rangelands of the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau

“…Brown et al 2013, Zhen et al 2014, Koenig et al 2015, Zhen and Du 2017, in order to better understand the coupled human-earth system (e.g. Folke et al 2002, Chen et al 2015, Lee et al 2015, Monier et al 2017, Tong et al 2017. However, they have not systematically examined the effects of the specific restoration approaches adopted in the environmental policies; thus, it is likely that science-based evidence that may support the process of proposing the effective approaches that can be introduced and adopted by the users has been lacking (Thiel 2009, Helming et al 2013.…”

Land-Use Planning in Agricultural Development for Food Security

“…Consequently, a decline rate of carbon depletion is observed. It ranges from 1.12 to 0.27 g kg À1 year À1 (Tong et al 2017). Nevertheless, several researchers have found crop rotation or break crop systems to be better than monocropping system (Hungria et al 2006).…”