Open AccessSatellites reveal a small positive yield effect from conservation tillage across the US Corn Belt
Author(s) -
Jillian M. Deines,
Sherrie Wang,
David B. Lobell
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
environmental research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.37
H-Index - 124
ISSN - 1748-9326
DOI - 10.1088/1748-9326/ab503b
Subject(s) - tillage , yield (engineering) , conservation agriculture , crop yield , environmental science , conventional tillage , agriculture , agronomy , productivity , agricultural engineering , agroforestry , economics , biology , ecology , physics , engineering , macroeconomics , thermodynamics
Conservation tillage is a primary tenet of conservation agriculture aimed at restoring and maintaining soil health for long-term crop productivity. Because soil degradation typically operates on century timescales, farmer adoption is influenced by near-term yield impacts and profitability. Although numerous localized field trials have examined the yield impacts of conservation tillage, their results are mixed and often unrepresentative of real-world conditions. Here, we applied a machine-learning causal inference approach to satellite-derived datasets of tillage practices and crop yields spanning the US Corn Belt from 2005 to 2017 to assess on-the-ground yield impacts at field-level resolution across thousands of fields. We found an average 3.3% and 0.74% yield increase for maize and soybeans, respectively, for fields with long-term conservation tillage. This effect was diminished in fields that only recently converted to conservation tillage. We also found significant variability in these effects, and we identified soil and weather characteristics that mediate the direction and magnitude of yield responses. This work supports soil conservation practices by demonstrating they can be used with minimal and typically positive yield impacts.