EVALUATING MAIZE-LEGUME-CUCURBIT INTERCROPPING FOR ENHANCING DROUGHT RESILIENT SMALLHOLDER AGRICULTURAL SYATEMS OF CENTRAL CHILE

Résumé fourni par la source

Drought stress is one of the most limiting factors, mainly in Mediterranean and arid or semi-arid environments worldwide. This situation is not an exception in central Chile, where a decline in rainfall of approximately 25% to 45% has been recorded over the past few decades, affecting mostly family farm agriculture. The main objective of the present study was to assess the intercropping of legume and cucurbits with maize, as a starting point to determine the best combinations. The experiment was conducted under greenhouse conditions in a bifactorial arrangement based on a completely randomized design with three replications. The treatments included 13 cropping systems: (T1-maize, T2-common bean, T3-chickpea, T4-pumpkin and T5-cucumber, as sole crops; T6-maize and common bean, T7-maize and chickpea, T8-maize and pumpkin, T9-maize and cucumber, T10-maize, common bean and pumpkin, T11-maize, common bean and cucumber, T12-maize, chickpea and pumpkin, and T13-maize, chickpea and cucumber); and two irrigation levels (40% and 100% of water holding capacity (WHC) of substrate, named as R100 and R40, respectively). The results showed that intercropping system and irrigation level altered morphological and physiological parameters. The water deprivation decreased significantly root and shoot biomass, height and relative growth rate of all the crops. Moreover, the results showed that intercropping enhanced land use productivity, with a land equivalent ratio (LER) with a median of 1.30. Overall, the results of the current study indicated that intercropping of maize, common beans and pumpkin could aid smallholder farmers to cope with water shortage, particularly in Mediterranean and other arid and semi-arid environments. Keywords: drought, intercropping, Mediterranean environments.

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