title: Improving farming practices reduces the carbon footprint of spring wheat production.
abstract: Wheat is one of the world's most favoured food sources, reaching millions of people on a daily basis. However, its production has climatic consequences. Fuel, inorganic fertilizers and pesticides used in wheat production emit greenhouse gases that can contribute negatively to climate change. It is unknown whether adopting alternative farming practices will increase crop yield while reducing carbon emissions. Here we quantify the carbon footprint of alternative wheat production systems suited to semiarid environments. We find that integrating improved farming practices (that is, fertilizing crops based on soil tests, reducing summerfallow frequencies and rotating cereals with grain legumes) lowers wheat carbon footprint effectively, averaging -256 kg CO2 eq ha(-1) per year. For each kg of wheat grain produced, a net 0.027-0.377 kg CO2 eq is sequestered into the soil. With the suite of improved farming practices, wheat takes up more CO2 from the atmosphere than is actually emitted during its production.
authors.affiliation: 1] Gansu Provincial Key Laboratory for Aridland Crop Science, Gansu Agricultural University, Lanzhou 730070, China [2] Semiarid Prairie Agricultural Research Centre, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Swift Current, Saskatchewan, Canada S9H 3X2.
authors.forename: Yantai
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Gan
authors.affiliation: Pollutant Inventories and Reporting Division, Environment Canada, 9th floor, Fontaine Building, 200 Sacré-Coeur, Gatineau, Québec, Canada K1A 0H3.
authors.forename: Chang
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Liang
authors.affiliation: Gansu Provincial Key Laboratory for Aridland Crop Science, Gansu Agricultural University, Lanzhou 730070, China.
authors.forename: Qiang
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Chai
authors.affiliation: Saskatoon Research Centre, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada S7N 0X2.
authors.forename: Reynald L
authors.initials: RL
authors.lastname: Lemke
authors.affiliation: Eastern Cereal and Oilseed Research Centre, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, 960 Carling Avenue, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada K1A 0C6.
authors.forename: Con A
authors.initials: CA
authors.lastname: Campbell
authors.affiliation: Semiarid Prairie Agricultural Research Centre, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Swift Current, Saskatchewan, Canada S9H 3X2.
authors.forename: Robert P
authors.initials: RP
authors.lastname: Zentner
mesh_terms: D000383:Agriculture / Q000379:methods*; D001272:Atmosphere; D002244:Carbon / Q000032:analysis / Q000378:metabolism; D002245:Carbon Dioxide / Q000032:analysis / Q000378:metabolism; D058572:Carbon Footprint; D057231:Climate Change; D012621:Seasons; D014908:Triticum / Q000254:growth & development* / Q000378:metabolism
chemical_list: D002245:Carbon Dioxide; D002244:Carbon