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Enabling smallholder farmers to sustainably improve their food, energy and water nexus while achieving environmental and economic benefits

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Title Enabling smallholder farmers to sustainably improve their food, energy and water nexus while achieving environmental and economic benefits
 
Creator Gathala, Mahesh K
Laing, Alison M
Tiwari, Thakur P
Timsina, Jagadish
Islam, Saiful
Chowdhury, Apurba K
Chattopadhyay, Chirantan
Singh, Adityakumar
Bhatt, Bhagwati P
Shrestha, Renuka
Barma, Naresh CD
Rana, Dharamvir S
Jackson, Tamara M
Gerard, Bruno
 
Subject Climate Change
Agriculture
Food Security
smallholders
sustainability
 
Description Traditional cropping practices in the Eastern Gangetic Plains, South Asia, are resource intensive, requiring large inputs of water, energy and human labor. They are also inefficient, with relatively low productivity for the inputs used although the climate, soil and water resources of the region indicate that greater productivity is achievable. In on-farm experiments conducted across three countries (Bangladesh, India, Nepal) we compared the performance of traditional and improved management practices to understand which better facilitated the production of food-grain crops while reducing energy and water demands, thus improving the sustainability of cropping system energy requirements. Benefits of improved over traditional management practices included increases of up to 10% in crop grain yields; up to 19% in water productivity; up to 26% in energy productivity; and reductions of up to 50% in labor. These metrics combined to reduce the cost of production under improved management by up to 22% and to increase gross margins by up to 100% (although in most instances gross margins increased by 12–32%). CO2-equivalent emissions reduced by 10%–17% compared to traditional practices.

The principles behind the improved management practices, which we demonstrate improve the food-energy-water nexus while concurrently promoting more sustainable use of energy resources, are applicable across smallholder farming systems throughout South Asia and in many emerging-economy countries. These improvements to traditional management practices combined with our approach of supporting farmers through the implementation of new methods has widespread applications and the potential to assist many countries transitioning to low-energy, sustainable food production.
 
Date 2020-03
2021-02-04T14:59:08Z
2021-02-04T14:59:08Z
 
Type Journal Article
 
Identifier Gathala MK, Laing AM, TTiwari TP, Timsina J, Islam MS, Chowdhury AK, Chattopadhyay C, Singh AK, Bhatt BP, Shrestha R, Barma NCD, Rana DS, Jackson TM, Gerard B. 2020. Enabling smallholder farmers to sustainably improve their food, energy and water nexus while achieving environmental and economic benefits. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 120:109645.
1364-0321
https://hdl.handle.net/10568/111152
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2019.109645
 
Language en
 
Rights Copyrighted; all rights reserved
Limited Access
 
Format 109645
 
Source Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews