Quantifying nitrogen losses in oil palm plantations: models and challenges

Pardon, Lénaïc; Bessou, Cécile; Saint-Geours, Nathalie; Gabrielle, Benoît; Khasanah, Ni’matul; Caliman, Jean‐Pierre; Nelson, Paul N.

doi:10.5194/bg-13-5433-2016

Cited by 18 publications

(28 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…The amount of legume understory was also reported to be one of the most influential parameters on N losses before 7 yr of age in a sensitivity analysis of Agricultural Production Systems sIMulator (APSIM)‐Oil palm simulation model (Pardon et al., 2017). Moreover, in a range of models compared, N fixation was always modeled with constant fixation rates (Pardon et al., 2016), while in the field, legumes usually have the capacity to regulate their N provision by fostering N fixation or N uptake from soil, depending on soil mineral N content (Giller & Fairhurst, 2003).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Available models do not account for all the potential N inputs and losses or management practices, such as residue and cover crop management. This leads to high uncertainty in N loss estimations (Pardon et al., 2016). In this context, we decided to develop a model specific to oil palm that estimates all potential N losses to the environment, as influenced by management practices, throughout the whole crop cycle.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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IN‐Palm: An agri‐environmental indicator to assess nitrogen losses in oil palm plantations

et al. 2020

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Oil palm (Elaeis guineensis Jacq.) is currently cultivated on 19 million ha, and palm oil represents more than one-third of the global vegetable oil market. Addition of nitrogen (N) via legume cover crop and fertilizers is a common practice in industrial oil palm plantations, however, there is a tendency for N loss, thus contributing significantly to environmental effects. To improve the sustainability of palm oil production, it is crucial to determine which management practices minimize N losses.Continuous field measurements would be cost-prohibiting as a monitoring tool, and in the case of oil palm, available models do not account for all the potential nitrogen inputs and losses or management practices. In this context, we developed IN-Palm, a model to help managers and scientists estimate N losses to the environment and identify best management practices. The main challenge was to build the model in a context of knowledge scarcity. Given these objectives and constraints, we developed an agri-environmental indicator, using the INDIGO method and fuzzy decision trees. We validated the N leaching module of IN-Palm against field data from Sumatra, Indonesia. IN-Palm is implemented in an Excel file and uses 21 readily available input variables to compute 17 modules. It estimates annual emissions and scores for each N-loss pathway and provides recommendations to reduce N losses.IN-Palm predictions of N leaching were acceptable according to several statistics, with a tendency to underestimate nitrogen leaching. Thus, we highlighted necessary improvements to increase IN-Palm precision before use in plantations.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

IN‐Palm: An agri‐environmental indicator to assess nitrogen losses in oil palm plantations

et al. 2020

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“…However, the collection of such field data is still limited (e.g. Pardon et al 2016aPardon et al , 2016bPardon et al , 2017. Furthermore, a discrepancy between respective field data and world mean values is a source of uncertainty.…”

Section: Calculation Of the N Footprintmentioning

confidence: 99%

Concealed nitrogen footprint in protein-free foods: an empirical example using oil palm products

Hayashi

Oita

Nishina

2020

Environ. Res. Lett.

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The agro-food system satisfying human food demand releases heavy nitrogen (N) loads into the environment. The N footprint is an indicator of N loads from individual consumption of food as well as energy. A bottom-up approach called the 'N-calculator method' calculates the food N footprint using the N content in consumed foods, such that the N footprint of protein-free foods is treated as zero. This method underestimates the N footprint of protein-free foods, such as oil and sugar, when the source crops require N input in production. In this study, we propose a substitution factor, the virtual nitrogen factor for protein-free foods (VNFree), defined as the potential N load per unit weight of consumed food, to explicitly calculate the production N footprint. Oil palm and its products, palm oil (PO) and palm kernel oil (PKO), were chosen for this case study of protein-free foods. Global mean VNFree values of PO and PKO obtained by averaging national-scale data of the three countries with the largest production (Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand) were 0.0241 and 0.0037 kg N kg -1 oil, respectively. The 6.5-times difference in VNFree values was attributed to the difference in oil yield. The food N footprint of PO and PKO calculated here represented less than 2% of the previously reported total food N footprints of several countries. However, oil palm products are also used for industry, and the chemical fertilizer consumption for oil palm accounted for only 8%-12% of that of all oil and sugar crops. The protein-free N footprint of all these products will be much larger. We expect that the current N-calculator method as a bottom-up approach will be improved by expanding the VNFree concept, which enables the calculation of the concealed N footprint in protein-free products, including all uses of oil and sugar crops.

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“…Potential uptake will depend on the planting material and vary along the cycle. Soil and climate conditions will affect both production potential and environmental risks (Pardon et al 2016b). Improving practices towards this optimum match involves good agronomic knowledge and experience, and monitoring tool such as soil and leaf analyses.…”

Section: Improving Oil Palm Performancesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Deciphering agricultural practices and environmental impacts in palm oil plantations in Riau and Jambi provinces, Indonesia

Moulin¹,

Wohlfahrt²,

Caliman

et al. 2016

International Journal of Sustainable Development & World Ec

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Oil palm cultivation has drastically increased in the last decades and has become a key crop to meet the global vegetable oil demand, while raising environmental issues linked to deforestation, fertiliser or pesticide uses. Guidelines on best practices have been developed to limit these environmental impacts. However, there is little evidence on the field reality of concrete declination of these general guidelines and on the room for improvement of practices in light of the local diversity of oil palm systems. This study aimed to investigate in the field the actual practices in two contrasted areas in Indonesia, the first global palm oil producer. We carried out field surveys in Riau and Jambi provinces and collected data on annual applications of two synthetic mineral fertilisers, two herbicides and yields. We characterised the cropping systems of 88 smallholders' and 45 industrial plantation units including potential practice drivers. Both qualitative and quantitative analyses showed contrasted practices across growers. Fertiliser rates were variable across all grower types, while pesticide rates especially distinguished between industrial and smallholders' practices. Practices and performances were particularly variable amongst smallholders, and significantly different in Jambi compared to Riau. This study highlighted the great diversity of practices and potential environmental impacts. It stresses the need for a more systematic accounting of the local specificities of the cropping systems and their rationales in order to promote more adapted and efficient best practices recommendations. ARTICLE HISTORY

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Quantifying nitrogen losses in oil palm plantations: models and challenges

Cited by 18 publications

References 32 publications

IN‐Palm: An agri‐environmental indicator to assess nitrogen losses in oil palm plantations

IN‐Palm: An agri‐environmental indicator to assess nitrogen losses in oil palm plantations

Concealed nitrogen footprint in protein-free foods: an empirical example using oil palm products

Deciphering agricultural practices and environmental impacts in palm oil plantations in Riau and Jambi provinces, Indonesia

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