Short crop rotations provide an environment conducive for an increase in plant disease, weed pressure from herbicide resistance, and insect damage (these productivity decreasing factors will be referred to as “pests” in this document). While short rotations are currently profitable, the lack of diversification in a cropping system can be detrimental to maintaining crop yield and profitability.
The industry requires economic information on the trade-offs between current profits of short rotation systems with a limited number of crops, that also have a high potential for reduced future productivity and higher costs, against diversified cropping systems that maintain productivity and profitability. Systems that lessen the likelihood of productivity and profitability decline due to increased pest levels should have higher long-term profits.
This study will utilize budgeting methods and dynamic economic models to determine the long-term economic trade-offs across a range of diverse cropping systems. The models will contain agronomic relationships of rotation impacts on pests over time and of pests on crop yield. The economic models will be used to simulate expected returns and the variability of returns to assist producers in selecting cropping systems that sustain productivity and profitability. The analyses will be for three regions in the Prairies that have different cropping systems and production issues: (i) southern Manitoba, (ii) the Black and Gray soil zones, and (iii) the Brown and Dark Brown soil zones.