An interdisciplinary approach to increase wheat within-field diversity and promote agro-ecosystem services - INRAE - Institut national de recherche pour l’agriculture, l’alimentation et l’environnement
Communication Dans Un Congrès Année : 2019

An interdisciplinary approach to increase wheat within-field diversity and promote agro-ecosystem services

1 GQE-Le Moulon - Génétique Quantitative et Evolution - Le Moulon (Génétique Végétale)
2 GDEC - Génétique Diversité et Ecophysiologie des Céréales
3 LaMME - Laboratoire de Mathématiques et Modélisation d'Evry
4 EGC - Environnement et Grandes Cultures
5 iEES Paris - Institut d'écologie et des sciences de l'environnement de Paris
6 ECOSYS - Ecologie fonctionnelle et écotoxicologie des agroécosystèmes
7 MNHN - Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle
8 LEM - Laboratoire d'Ecologie Microbienne - UMR 5557
9 SADAPT - Sciences pour l'Action et le Développement : Activités, Produits, Territoires
10 BIOGER - BIOlogie et GEstion des Risques en agriculture
11 Université Paris Saclay (COmUE)
12 CA 41, Chambre d'Agriculture du Loir et Cher, France.
13 UMR Eco&Sols - Ecologie fonctionnelle et biogéochimie des sols et des agro-écosystèmes
14 BIOSOL - Biodiversité et fonctionnement du sol
15 CA 36 - Chambre d'Agriculture de l'Indre
16 GAEL - Laboratoire d'Economie Appliquée de Grenoble
17 GQE-Le Moulon - Génétique Quantitative et Evolution - Le Moulon (Génétique Végétale)
18 Agronomie
19 FDGEDA Cher
20 CA 41 - Chambre d'Agriculture du Loir et Cher
21 SADAPT - Sciences pour l'Action et le Développement : Activités, Produits, Territoires
22 UMR Eco&Sols - Ecologie fonctionnelle et biogéochimie des sols et des agro-écosystèmes
23 LEM - Laboratoire d'Ecologie Microbienne - UMR 5557
24 IUF - Institut universitaire de France
25 CESCO - Centre d'Ecologie et des Sciences de la COnservation
26 AGIR - AGroécologie, Innovations, teRritoires
27 Chambre d'Agriculture du Loiret
28 CA 27 - Chambre d'Agriculture de l'Eure
29 EGC - Environnement et Grandes Cultures
30 Grandes Cultures du Centre de Versailles-Grignon
31 iEES - Institut d'écologie et des sciences de l'environnement de Paris
32 CA 77 - Chambre d’Agriculture de Seine-et-Marne
33 Chambre Régionale d'Agriculture du Centre
34 Chambre d'Agriculture de la Seine et Marne
35 MONTP DOM VASSAL - Domaine expérimental de Vassal
Bruno Andrieu
Florence Dubs
Arnaud Gauffreteau
J.D. Gilet
  • Fonction : Auteur
G Houivet
  • Fonction : Auteur
Marie-Hélène Jeuffroy
Pierre Labarthe
Laurent Lejars
  • Fonction : Auteur
  • PersonId : 1098295
B. Lemain
  • Fonction : Auteur
Pauline Lusley
  • Fonction : Auteur
  • PersonId : 990233
S. Jouanne
  • Fonction : Auteur
Thomas Pommier
  • Fonction : Auteur
  • PersonId : 1136612
T. Vidal

Résumé

One major challenge for increasing agriculture sustainability is to better mobilize crop genetic diversity, as prone by agroecology. A simple way to increase within-field diversity is to use cultivar mixtures, and this has been successfully applied to a few crops in the past. Despite numerous scientific papers documeting the value of cultivar mixtures in wheat and other cereals, especially to control diseases, their cultivation has remained marginal throughout the world. To understand the origin of this gap between scientific knowledge and agricultural practices, the French project Wheatamix explored the synergies mobilized by cultivar mixtures, their impact on various ecosystem services, and their potential to reinforce the sustainability, resilience, and multi-functionality of agriculture. It focused on the agro-ecological and socio-economic impacts of variety associations at different scales, from the plant level up to the wheat supply chain. The project aims at developing new blending and breeding methods to design performing mixtures. To understand how plant-to-plant interactions shape wheat mixtures performances, Wheatamix has set five objectives: 1) describe the variability of morphological and ecological traits in a panel of 57 varieties; 2) explore variability by blending 16 contrasted varieties from the panel into 72 mixtures, composed of 2, 4, and 8 components; 3) study the ecosystem services provided; 4) assess the technical and economic performances in farmer conditions; 5) evaluate the impact of cultivar mixtures on the wheat supply chain. To achieve these goals, this project has developed an interdisciplinary approach, mobilizing agronomy, ecology, economics, ecophysiology, epidemiology, genetics, and management sciences. The project brought together scientists from 10 labs, as well as agricultural advisers and farmers from 6 French counties. The project first described the functional diversity of 57 varieties, highlighting the effects of modern breeding on trait variability, that lowered variability of traits subject to direct selection, and impacted both plant architecture, physiological traits as nutrient absorption, but also trade-off between traits. Wheatamix then surveyed how variation in mixture diversity impacted wild communities. A first result highlighted the low abundance of macro-organisms in this experiment: no relationship was found between the number of varieties in a mixture and the diversity/abundance of earthworms, weeds, mycorrhizae, springtails, beetles, nematodes. However, a significant effect of mixture diversity on the abundance of some spiders, and on nitrifying bacteria, was observed. Coming to ecosystem services, disease regulation (rust and septoria) has been confirmed as the most strongly and positively affected by varietal associations, raising also the strong effects of architectural variability of the canopy (septoria). Diversity also contributed to higher predation rates on aphids. Lastly, soil nitrification and denitrification activities were significantly affected by mixture diversity on 4 surveyed sites, contributing to a shift in plant nutrition and positive effect of greenhouse gas emission. Co-design of variety mixtures was carried out with farmers, technical advisers, and scientists. For three years, 30 farmers in the Paris basin proposed varietal blends and measured their performance on their farms. This exchange first highlighted that the first goals for farmers was to i) secure their production ii) simplify plot management. Then co-design workshops allowed to propose assembly rules and design mixtures, resulting in a wide diversity of sown mixtures. Field trials revealed that in more than 70% of the cases, the mixture had a higher yield than the mean of its components. This work highlighted farmers needs and resulted in a Multicriteria Evaluation Tool, helping farmers and advisers to design mixtures. The survey of the wheat supply chain finally highlighted the need for a concerted innovation among the various actors. Finally, Wheatamix also developed new statistical method to infer mixing ability, allowing both to blend the best mixers, and also to propose new breeding methods. Coupling various disciplines and approaches, such as ecophysiological modeling of plant competition (FSPM WALTer), field and controlled experiments, theoretical framework in ecology (sampling vs complementarity effects, functional traits and tradeoff), and mixture co-design and surveys with stakeholders, Wheatamix has allowed to understand the interest of cultivar mixtures for farmers. Wheat cultivar mixtures are experiencing an exponential growth: they only represented 2% of bread wheat sown in 2010, and are presently at 8%, raking at the first position on the cultivar list. Wheatamix emphasizes the need for an interdisciplinary approach when addressing agroecological subjects, and illustrates the strong mutual benefices between agronomic and ecological sciences.
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Dates et versions

hal-04481348 , version 1 (28-02-2024)

Identifiants

  • HAL Id : hal-04481348 , version 1

Citer

Jérôme Enjalbert, Vincent Allard, Christophe Ambroise, Bruno Andrieu, S. Barot, et al.. An interdisciplinary approach to increase wheat within-field diversity and promote agro-ecosystem services. European Conference on Crop Diversification, Sep 2019, Budapest, Hungary. ⟨hal-04481348⟩
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