EGU21-12627, updated on 04 Mar 2021
https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu21-12627
EGU General Assembly 2021
© Author(s) 2021. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Monitoring agroecological transformation processes induced by climate and agricultural innovations over time and space

Heide Spiegel1, Julia Miloczki1, Bernhard Freyer2, Andreas Surböck2, Jürgen K. Friedel2, Hans-Peter Kaul3, Helmut Wagentristl3, Andreas Schaumberger4, Renate Mayer4, Andreas Bohner4, Veronika Gaube5, and Taru Sandén1
Heide Spiegel et al.
  • 1Austrian Agency for Health and Food Safety, Department for Soil Health and Plant Nutrition, Vienna, Austria
  • 2University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Department of Sustainable Agricultural Systems, Division of Organic Farming, Vienna, Austria
  • 3University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Institute of Agronomy, Department of of Crop Sciences, Vienna, Austria
  • 4HBLFA Raumberg-Gumpenstein, Institut für Pflanzenbau und Kulturlandschaft, Grünlandmanagement und Kulturlandschaft, Austria
  • 5University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Institute of Social Ecology, Department of Economics and Social Sciences, Vienna, Austria

Sustainable agricultural production of food, feed, fibre and fuel with limited agricultural land to cover human demands and at the same time to secure natural resources is currently one of the biggest global challenges. Changes in agricultural management to ensure fertile soils, stable yields and product qualities and to avoid adverse environmental impacts, affect various soil and plant characteristics, agrobiodiversity and the micro-climate of agroecosystems.

Long-term field experiments (LTEs) are indispensable to detect and understand impacts of climate (drought, heat, floods, frost) and agricultural innovations on soils and plants. Amongst agricultural innovations are adaptions of crop rotations to climate change, efficient fertilisation systems with and without livestock, reduced soil tillage intensity, the conversion of a whole landscape section from conventional to organic farming and introducing landscape elements like flowering strips or hegdes that serve, e.g., as habitats for pollinators and beneficials.

For the evaluation of impacts of climate change and agricultural innovations, researchers of agricultural long-term ecological research (LTER) sites in Austria have developed indicators to enable the systematic comparison of long-term trials impact on soil-plant systems in different agroecological zones of Austria and Europe, respectively, including different agro-ecosystems, e.g., arable land and grassland. Examples for soil indicators include soil characteristics like organic carbon, nutrients and contaminants, biological and physical (e.g., porosity, structure) indicators that have already been measured since many years in various field experiments. Embedded in long-term socio-ecological regions (LTSER), which allow analyzing long-term socio-economic and biophysical drivers of change in agricultural management, these agricultural LTER sites contribute crucial insights into the interaction between nature and society.

How to cite: Spiegel, H., Miloczki, J., Freyer, B., Surböck, A., Friedel, J. K., Kaul, H.-P., Wagentristl, H., Schaumberger, A., Mayer, R., Bohner, A., Gaube, V., and Sandén, T.: Monitoring agroecological transformation processes induced by climate and agricultural innovations over time and space, EGU General Assembly 2021, online, 19–30 Apr 2021, EGU21-12627, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu21-12627, 2021.

Displays

Display file