Abstract: Within the context of nitrogen (N) management, since 1950, with the rapid intensification of agriculture, farmers have often applied much larger fertiliser quantities than what was required to reach the yield potential. However, to prevent pollution of surface and groundwater induced by nitrates, The European Community launched The European Nitrates Directive 91/6/76/EEC. In 2002, in Wallonia (Belgium), the Nitrates Directive has been transposed under the Sustainable Nitrogen Management in Agriculture Program (PGDA), with the aim of maintaining productivity and revenue for the country’s farmers, while reducing the environmental impact of excessive N application. A feasible approach for addressing climatic uncertainty lies in the use of crop models such as the one commonly known as STICS (simulateur multidisciplinaire pour les cultures standard). These models allow the impact on crops of the interaction between cropping systems and climatic records to be assessed. Comprehensive historical climatic records are rare, however, and therefore the yield distribution values obtained using such an approach can be discontinuous. In order to obtain better and more detailed yield distribution information, the use of a high number of stochastically generated climate time series was proposed, relying on the LARS-Weather Generator. The study focused on the interactions between varying N practices and climatic conditions. Historically and currently, Belgian farmers apply 180 kg N ha(-1), split into three equal fractions applied at the tillering, stem elongation and flag-leaf stages. This study analysed the effectiveness of this treatment in detail, comparing it to similar practices where only the N rates applied at the flag-leaf stage were modified. Three types of farmer decision-making were analysed. The first related to the choice of N strategy for maximising yield, the second to obtaining the highest net revenue, and the third to reduce the environmental impact of potential N leaching, which carries the likelihood of taxation if inappropriate N rates are applied. The results showed reduced discontinuity in the yield distribution values thus obtained. In general, the modulation of N levels to accord with current farmer practices showed considerable asymmetry. In other words, these practices maximised the probability of achieving yields that were at least superior to the mean of the distribution values, thus reducing risk for the farmers. The practice based on applying the highest amounts (60-60-100 kg N ha(-1)) produced the best yield distribution results. When simple economical criteria were computed, the 60-60-80 kg N ha(-1) protocol was found to be optimal for 80-90% of the time. There were no statistical differences, however, between this practice and Belgian farmers’ current practice. When the taxation linked to a high level of potentially leachable N remaining in the soil after harvest was considered, this methodology clearly showed that, in 3 years out of 4,30 kg N ha(-1) could systematically be saved in comparison with the usual practice.

Abstract: The numerical crop growth model Italian Vineyard Integrated Numerical model for Estimating physiological values (IVINE) was developed in order to evaluate environmental forcing effects on vine growth. The IVINE model simulates vine growth processes with parameterizations, allowing the understanding of plant conditions at a vineyard scale. It requires a set of meteorology data and soil water status as boundary conditions. The primary model outputs are main phenological stages, leaf development, yield, and sugar concentration. The model requires setting some variety information depending on the cultivar: At present, IVINE is optimized for Vitis vinifera L. Nebbiolo, a variety grown mostly in the Piedmont region (northwestern Italy). In order to evaluate the model accuracy, IVINE was validated using experimental observations gathered in Piedmontese vineyards, showing performances similar or slightly better than those of other widely used crop models. The results of a sensitivity analysis performed to highlight the effects of the variations of air temperature and soil water potential input variables on IVINE outputs showed that most phenological stages anticipated with increasing temperatures, while berry sugar content saturated at about 25.5 °Bx. Long-term (60 years, in the period 1950–2009) simulations performed over a Piedmontese subregion showed statistically significant variations of most IVINE output variables, with larger time trend slopes referring to the most recent 30-year period (1980–2009), thus confirming that ongoing climate change started influencing Piedmontese vineyards in 1980.

Abstract: Crop growth simulation models are increasingly used for regionally assessing the effects of climate change and variability on crop yields. These models require spatially and temporally detailed, location-specific, environmental (weather and soil) and management data as inputs, which are often difficult to obtain consistently for larger regions. Aggregating the resolution of input data for crop model applications may increase the uncertainty of simulations to an extent that is not well understood. The present study aims to systematically analyse the effect of changes in the spatial resolution of weather input data on yields simulated by four crop models (LINTUL-SLIM, DSSAT-CSM, EPIC and WOFOST) which were utilized to test possible interactions between weather input data resolution and specific modelling approaches representing different degrees of complexity. The models were applied to simulate grain yield of spring barley in Finland for 12 years between 1994 and 2005 considering five spatial resolutions of daily weather data: weather station (point) and grid-based interpolated data at resolutions of 10 km x 10 km; 20 km x 20 km; 50 km x 50 km and 100 km x 100 km. Our results show that the differences between models were larger than the effect of the chosen spatial resolution of weather data for the considered years and region. When displaying model results graphically, each model exhibits a characteristic ‘fingerprint’ of simulated yield frequency distributions. These characteristic distributions in response to the inter-annual weather variability were independent of the spatial resolution of weather input data. Using one model (LINTUL-SLIM), we analysed how the aggregation strategy, i.e. aggregating model input versus model output data, influences the simulated yield frequency distribution. Results show that aggregating weather data has a smaller effect on the yield distribution than aggregating simulated yields which causes a deformation of the model fingerprint. We conclude that changes in the spatial resolution of weather input data introduce less uncertainty to the simulations than the use of different crop models but that more evaluation is required for other regions with a higher spatial heterogeneity in weather conditions, and for other input data related to soil and crop management to substantiate our findings. Our results provide further evidence to support other studies stressing the importance of using not just one, but different crop models in climate assessment studies. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.