Koerber G R, Edwards-Jones G, Hill P W, Milà i Canals L, Nyeko P, York E H, Jones D L. (2009). Geographical variation in carbon dioxide fluxes from soils in agro-ecosystems and its implications for life-cycle assessment, Journal of Applied Ecology, 46, 306–314.
Koerber G R, Edwards-Jones G, Hill P W, Milà i Canals L, Nyeko P, York E H, Jones D L. (2009). Geographical variation in carbon dioxide fluxes from soils in agro-ecosystems and its implications for life-cycle assessment, Journal of Applied Ecology, 46, 306–314.
This paper explores the importance of considering CO2 exchange from soil. It’s complicated (to me at least – I received help clarification from one of the authors) but in essence it measures Net Biome Production – a way of measuring the carbon emitted and returned to the soil. These calculations are for carbon and CO2 only - not all GHGs.
The data show that for some crops, eg wheat and grass the system tends to lock up carbon (NPB is positive). This is in line with other studies. The data show that all vegetable systems tend to lose carbon. Why this is so is a little unclear but it may be due to a combination of increased soil cultivation, which stimulates C release, and too little organic matter being returned to the soil. If you consider a single crop then there is great variation between different farms in the amount of carbon they are burning off / locking up. This is due to a combination of their local soils, local weather and the specifics of crop management.
There are no clear trends between countries - but it looks like from this paper that Uganda tends to have the most negative carbon balance of all the countries. This is probably due its warm climate and the moisture of the soil (its quite a wet place).
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