Maize‐based intercropping systems achieve higher productivity and profitability with lesser environmental footprint in a water‐scarce region of northwest China

Abstract

Global agriculture is facing multiple challenges to meet the food demands, optimize resource utilization, and mitigate the climate change. A field study, combined with the life cycle assessment (LCA), was conducted to select the effective and sustainable cropping systems in northwestern China. The study compared four maize‐based intercropping and corresponding monoculture systems on crop yield, evapotranspiration (ET), water use efficiency (WUE), profitability, and carbon footprint (CF). Maize/wheat intercropping had the highest energy yield (532.5 GJ/ha, on average) and maize equivalent energy yield (MEEY) (522.3 G/ha, on average), followed by those from the maize/rape intercropping system, and the lowest by the sole potato system. The WUE of maize equivalent energy yield (WUEMEEY) was the highest (1.06 GJ ha−1 mm−1) for sole rape system, followed by those for the maize/wheat and maize/rape intercropping systems. Maize/potato intercropping had the highest benefit: cost ratio at 3.30, followed by those for the maize/wheat intercropping (2.58), sole potato (2.57), and maize/rape intercropping (2.53). Lower CF and higher net ecosystem economic budget (NEEB) were observed in maize‐based intercropping systems. The maize/wheat intercropping system had the lowest CF per maize equivalent energy yield (CFm) (10.7 kg CO2‐eq GJ−1 year−1), and the maize/potato intercropping system had the lowest CF per unit economic output (CFe) (0.14 kg CO2‐eq US$−1 year−1), and the highest NEEB (7,352.8 US$/ha). The data presented indicate that maize‐based intercropping system may be a viable practice for the synthesized goals of higher productivity and profitability while lesser environmental footprint in a water‐scarce region of northwest China.

Turning biennial into biannual harvest: Long‐term assessment of Arabica coffee–macadamia intercropping and irrigation synergism by biological and economic indices

“…The little loss of coffee yield and gain of macadamia yield (positive AYL values) in the intercropping system provided better exploitation of available resources than under monocrops (Dhima et al, 2007;Gitari et al, 2020;Machiani et al, 2018). Intercropping has been considered a practical system to alleviate drought risk under global climate change, because it had a higher yield advantage in dry conditions than that in wet ones (Sun et al, 2021;Wang et al, 2020), as corroborated by this study.…”

Economic Evaluation of Tomato Sole and Tomato Onion Intercropping Systems of Smallholders in District Muzaffargarh, Pakistan

“…The result revealed that the financial benefits of the intercropping system are higher than the sole cropping system. These results were in accord with the research studies [20][21][22] Benefit-Cost Ratio (BCR) analyses were performed for farmers operating under the intercropping and sole tomato cropping system. The result revealed that tomato-onion intercropping gave a high BCR of 2.35 as compared to sole tomato with BCR 1.88 (table 3).…”

Maize/peanut intercropping improves nutrient uptake of side-row maize and system microbial community diversity

“…This method is also suitable for mechanized seeding, fertilization and field management [5]. Maize and peanut strip intercropping not only improves crop yield and water and fertilizer utilization efficiency but also reduces competition for major soil nutrients, increases beneficial soil microorganism numbers and diversity, and reduces pathogenic and poisonous microorganisms, effectively improving the ecological environment of farmland [6,7] while helping to reduce carbon emissions and to increase the economic value of the ecosystem [8].…”