GO MAXI-CoberLEG: Maximizing the benefits of cover crops through winter legume species selection and crop management

This project arises as a public-private collaboration between members who have recognized technical capacity and extensive experience in the different sectors of the agri-food chain, allowing for the creation of links between knowledge and cutting-edge technologies between farmers, researchers, companies and communication services, implementing a methodology based on which the potential results obtained can be analyzed by all partners and immediately transferred to the industrial field for optimization for end users, thus generating a transversal vision of them. Lupin (Lupinus spp), as a winter legume, is promising due to its good adaptation to Mediterranean areas, its high capacity to fix atmospheric N and its self-reseeding capacity, thus the fixed N can persist for years in the cover without mechanical reseeding, reducing the costs of external inputs.

Conservation agriculture is based on agronomic practices that manage agricultural soil by altering its composition, structure and biodiversity as little as possible, and by reducing its erosion and degradation. It seeks to conserve soil and appears as an alternative to conventional agriculture, which is aggressive in its work on the soil.

The evolution towards these techniques presents numerous environmental advantages, such as direct sowing (no tillage), conservation tillage (reduced, without turning, without incorporating or only part of the crop residues), and the establishment of plant covers between rows. FAO considers cover crops as one of the three solutions for agricultural conservation, together with the reduction of tillage and the strengthening of the presence of biodiversity. The primary sector must adapt to new policies, especially to the new European Regulation on fertilizers and pesticides.

Spain, with a production of 5.9 x 106 T, is the leading citrus producer in the EU (60%) and sixth in the world (5%). However, production is around 1.1 x 106 T less (-13%) compared to the last 5 years, due to low utilization due to pests, old trees with lower yields, increased production costs and the growing abandonment of crops due to low profitability. On the other hand, organic citrus production has increased in recent years, thanks to increased demand.

In this context of Mediterranean agriculture, and particularly in semi-arid systems, where citrus crops play a key role at the economic, social and environmental levels, there is a need to optimise agricultural practices that increase the capacity for adaptation and mitigation to climate change, an aspect that MAXI-CoberLEG emphasises. Cover crops can include any plant species grown for purposes beyond the primary production of grains or fodder.