Global Patterns of Cropland Use Intensity

Abstract

This study presents a global scale analysis of cropping intensity, crop duration and fallow land extent computed by using the global dataset on monthly irrigated and rainfed crop areas MIRCA2000. MIRCA2000 was mainly derived from census data and crop calendars from literature. Global cropland extent was 16 million km 2 around the year 2000 of which 4.4 million km 2 (28%) was fallow, resulting in an average cropping intensity of 0.82 for total cropland extent and of 1.13 when excluding fallow land. The lowest cropping intensities related to total cropland extent were found for Southern Africa (0.45), Central America (0.49) and Middle Africa (0.54), while highest cropping intensities were computed for Eastern Asia (1.04) and Southern Asia (1.0). In remote or arid regions where shifting cultivation is practiced, fallow periods last 3-10 years or even longer. In contrast, crops are harvested two or more times per year in highly populated, often irrigated tropical or subtropical lowlands where multi-cropping systems are common. This indicates that intensification of agricultural land use is a strategy that may be able to significantly improve global food security. There exist large uncertainties regarding extent of cropland, harvested crop area and therefore cropping intensity at larger scales. Satellite imagery and remote sensing techniques provide opportunities for decreasing these uncertainties and to improve the MIRCA2000 inventory.

Mapping Crop Cycles in China Using MODIS-EVI Time Series

“…Cropping intensity, which we define here as the number of cropping cycles per year, is an important dimension of land use that is strongly influences water demand and agricultural production [18][19][20][21], but has received relatively little attention. In areas, such as Asia, which have limited lands available for arable expansion, crop production is commonly increased by planting crops more than once a year in the same field [22][23][24][25]. As such, the gross sown area (the total area sown with crops in a year, accounting for multiple crop cycles) in many parts of Asia is frequently larger than the corresponding amount of arable land.…”

Mapping Land Management Regimes in Western Ukraine Using Optical and SAR Data

“…Nowadays, up to 38% of the land surface is used for agriculture and every year about 13 million hectares covered by natural vegetation are transformed into agricultural land [1,4]. Next to agricultural expansion, agricultural intensification has recently become an important mode of reaching higher agricultural outputs [5][6][7]. Especially since the advent of industrial fertilizer and the green revolution, intensification has been responsible for the majority of yield increases in recent decades [6][7][8][9].…”

Potential of NPP-VIIRS Nighttime Light Imagery for Modeling the Regional Economy of China

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