Multiple Cropping System Expansion: Increasing Agricultural Greenhouse Gas Emissions in the North China Plain and Neighboring Regions

Xueyan Zhang
Additional contact information
Xueyan Zhang: Institute of Geographical Science and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China

Sustainability, 2019, vol. 11, issue 14, 1-14

Abstract: The increase of agricultural greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions has become a significant issue for China, affecting the achievement of its Nationally Determined Contributions under the Paris Agreement. Expansion of the large-scale multiple cropping system as a consequence of climate warming could be a major driving force of this increase. In this study, life cycle assessment was employed to identify agricultural GHG emissions due to the expansion of the multiple cropping system in the North China Plain and neighboring regions. We found that agricultural greenhouse gas emissions have increased from 41.34 to 120.87 Tg CO 2 -eq/yr over the past 30 years, and the expansion of the multiple cropping system has contributed to 13.89% of this increment. Furthermore, the increases in straw handling and agricultural inputs which are related to multiple cropping systems have also played an important role. Results of our study demonstrate that the expansion of the multiple cropping system contributes considerably to increases in agricultural GHG emissions in the North China Plain and neighboring regions. Therefore, it can be concluded that the sustained northward expansion of the multiple cropping system will further elevate agricultural GHG emissions in China, and this should be considered while formulating policies to reduce GHG emissions from agriculture.

Keywords: greenhouse gas emissions; multiple cropping system; life cycle assessment; China (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/14/3941/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/14/3941/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:14:p:3941-:d:249918

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().