Investigating the Carbon Footprint due to Tractor and Fertilizer Use during Organic and Conventional Vegetable Production in Palas, Kayseri

Temizyürek Arslan M., Karaçetin Bell E.

ICENS, Praha, Çek Cumhuriyeti, 12 - 16 Haziran 2019, ss.57

  • Yayın Türü: Bildiri / Özet Bildiri
  • Basıldığı Şehir: Praha
  • Basıldığı Ülke: Çek Cumhuriyeti
  • Sayfa Sayıları: ss.57
  • Erciyes Üniversitesi Adresli: Evet

Özet

Agriculture appears to be the second biggest economic sector releasing greenhouse gasses according to the 2014 IPCC report. Although there is a perception that organic farming is more environmentally friendly, many studies claim otherwise and individual farming techniques influence the emissions more.

In this study we concentrated on vegetable production in Palas Plain, Kayseri, Turkey. We made surveys with 14 organic and 18 conventional vegetable producers in 2016.

In this paper we evaluated the direct and indirect greenhouse emission differences on conventional and organic farming practices only due to tractor and fertilizer use.

The amount of energy per hectare of agricultural land was 468 GJ/ha (SE: 75.78) for organic farming and 365 GJ/ha (SE: 60.91) for conventional farming due to tractor using. There was no significant difference between the energy consumed by tractor use (p= 0.55, n= 32) and the amount of fertilizer used (p= 0.087, n= 32). CO2 equivalent values of emissions from organic and conventional areas were 97 tons CO2-eq/ha (SE:15.70) and 76 tons CO2-eq/ha (SE:12.66), respectively.

There was no difference between the organic and conventional farming on the carbon emissions levels (p=0.55, n=32) but the difference was on individual practices including fertilizer type and the amount of time tractor used.  

Keywords: carbon footprint, agriculture, organic farming, vegetable production