Conservation Agriculture Research Updates - April 2026

This paper presents results from a long-term experiment from the University of California Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources since 1999. The study site is located in the San Joaquin Valley. 19 years of reduced tillage with cover crops (CTCC) was compared with conventional tillage without cover crops (STNC). Results showed CTCC increased surface soil carbon by 50%, nitrogen by 83%, and air filled porosity 2.5 fold at high water potentials compared to STNC. CCTC respiration rates also increased over 100% under wet conditions, that the authors suggest is due to formation of macropores that become microbial hot spots upon re-wetting that results in accelerated carbon cycling. The authors conclude that "their findings highlight that soil structure–moisture–microbe interactions represent a critical frontier for optimizing conservation agriculture for carbon sequestration, requiring a balanced approach to tillage, organic inputs, and irrigation management to minimize rapid carbon losses. 

This paper looks at the impact of CA on durum wheat in Tunisia as a possible way to mitigate climate change. They looked at yield and water use efficiency. They assessed this over 12 years looking at conventional (CT), minimal (MT) and no-till (NT). Note that their weather data shows a significant decrease in precipitation and increase rain-free days over these 12 years. Results showed that NT had the smallest decrease in yield and the smallest coefficient of variation and thus greater stability. They concluded that the benefits of CA are particularly pronounced in years with extreme drought events, highlighting the importance of adopting such agricultural innovations to mitigate the impacts of climate change.

This article from Ghana looks at the effect of CA adoption by smallholder maize farmers of their food security. 400 farmers were selected that had been introduced to CA. The findings of the study show that crop rotation, row planting, fertilizer application, improved seeds and cover cropping were the CA practices often implemented by the farmers. The main issue highlighted by these farmers was poor access to credit for applying CA but CA did improve their food security.

This paper s based on an on-farm field trial under a long=term no-till (NT) system to evaluate the residual effect of one-time occasional tillage (OT) on crop performance, soil water, and water-use efficiency (WUE) one and two years after OT implementation from a dryland area of Morocco. Shallow and Deep OT options were evaluated with and without residue retention. 3 crops all grown under NT were evaluated - Durum wheat, faba bean, and chickpea. Results showed that the grain yield of wheat and chickpea were negatively affected by OT for all years considered. Average soil water storage measured at 0–60 cm at sowing was also lower in deep OT (133 mm) compared to NT with crop residue retention (151 mm) for all years and rotations considered. The comparison of WUE between treatments showed that, under NT with crop residue retention, the crops produced more grain and aboveground biomass per mm of water. 

This paper looked at the determinants of adoption and implementation of CA practices by surveying households in Nigeria. They used a Multinomial endogenous switching regression (MESR) model to estimate the factors influencing the adoption of conservation agricultural practices and yields of adopters and non-adopters of different conservation agricultural practices. Variables such as age, gender, farming experience, farm size, formal education, access to extension services and membership in associations were factors influencing the adoption and implementation of alternative package of conservation agricultural practices among the farmers. The model did show that adoption of alternative packages of conservation agricultural practices to mitigate the negative impact of climate change improves the productivity of the farmers in the study area. They conclude that stakeholders and government need to take the lead in the promotion of conservation agricultural practices while creating an enabling environment for effective participation of the other stakeholders.

This paper looks at the problems of conventional tillage (CT) in semi-arid regions of Morocco that include exposing soil that is already fragile to degradation. The objective of this study is to assess the role of CA to address the soil physical properties compared to CT and reverse soil degradation. Results show that most of the physical properties were improved with CA in both locations. SOM also increased under CA. They recommend that CA be encouraged in this semi-arid area.

This paper from research in Morocco looks at the issues of intensive land use and irregular rainfall, serious threats to food security. It looks at the using a long-term NT system started in 2004 to compare NT vs CT under irregular rainfall. Yields (grain and biomass) of crops (wheat and lentil) under NT and CT were analyzed and compared over the years of study. Results showed that crop yields varied over the years but under NT were greater or equal to CT yields. CT yields were correlated with with rainfall, whereas NT yields were not and are more adaptable in these dryland areas..

Climate change is causing declining rainfall (more variability) and increasing temperature extremes and when added to declining soil fertility, food security in rainfed Morocco is threatened. The objective of this study was to systematically evaluate agronomic, economic, and soil fertility indicators under CA and conventional tillage (CT) using field experimentation (medium-term) and simulation modeling (long-term) for a clay soil in Morocco. They looked at the effect of CA on wheat, barley, lentil and chickpea to determine yield, stability, profits, WUE, and soil fertility. They also used Dynamic simulation modeling to assess the long-term effect of adopting CA and CT in these cereal rotations. Both their 5-year field experiment and the modeling showed that adoption of CA improves a range of agronomic, economic and soil fertility indicators compared to CT.

This paper reviewed and synthesized findings on CA; past trends, opportunities and challenges, potential benefits and future outlook to combat degradation of soil and water in Middle East and North Africa (MENA). They estimate that 25-40% of the 53 million ha's of arable land in this region are suitable for CA but adoption is low and the authors list some of the factors responsible for this. The wider acceptance of CA requires the development of affordable and versatile no-till seeder alongside the implementation of integrated crop management practices. CA-based bundled agronomic management practices must be tailored to the biophysical and socio-economic environment. The authors conclude by predicting a bright future for CA in the MENA region and list a number of reasons for this.

This article is about the impacts of climate change on Burkina Faso (BF)agriculture where CC is expected to be more severe. 1820 documents were found and 217 used in this review. Analyzed adaptation options include conservation agriculture and climate-smart agriculture, irrigation, crop diversification, intensification, livelihoods diversification and migration. The focus and discussion is mainly on agricultural and individual responses, while livelihoods strategies such as diversification and migration are less frequently addressed. They conclude that more research is needed with results crucial for informing policy makers.

The investigation was carried out on a farmer's field at two locations in Ethiopia.. The objective was to evaluate the impacts of conservation tillage on the productivity of durum wheat.Treatments were CT and reduced tillage (RT) with and without residue and one plowing at seeding plus roundup. Wheat yield increased by 44% at one site with RT+residue compared to RT-residue. CT yield was 23% higher compared to one plowing at seeding plus roundup. The highest net return was the RT+residue in the dryland area.

In this paper, a process-based model, Denitrification-Decomposition (DNDC), was validated on midterm (9 years) and employed depending on the local climate, soil and management conditions, to assess the impacts of alternative management practices on SOC stock under two tillage systems, in a semi-arid region of Morocco. Modeled results pointed out that, under no-tillage practice (NT), the SOC content increased by 30% compared to conventional tillage (CT). During the simulated period (9 years), the SOC sequestration potential (CSP) has been greatly improved with increased crop residue rate and application of farmyard manure (FY-manure). They conclude that an increase in crop residue rate returned at surface after harvest and application of organic fertilizer, especially under NT practice, can substantially improve SOC stock in a semi-arid region.

This paper used the applied principles of Transformative Learning and Communicative action for potential for innovation technologies like CA in Burkino Faso. In this country CA has not been successfully integrated beyond the trial scale. The stakeholder mapping showed that dominant players and traditional ways of communicating are essential for success. This learning process is recommended for other programs.

This review article looks at the relationship between agroecology and water management in order to identify strategies for sustainable agriculture in North African countries. The paper looks at agroecological approaches to water management, including agroforestry, conservation agriculture, water-efficient irrigation, and landscape design. It looks at integrating biodiversity for water regulation, leveraging ecosystem services for purification, and adopting advanced technologies, such as precision agriculture and remote sensing, and policies needed for efficient water management. They conclude that there is a need for interdisciplinary collaboration among agronomists, hydrologists, ecologists, policymakers, and local communities to develop holistic approaches that seamlessly integrate agroecology and modern water management, ensuring sustainable agricultural systems in the region. 

In this study, a 20-year experiment was used to investigate the long-term effects of no-tillage in CA on soil organic carbon (SOC) and nitrogen (N) mineralization, plant N uptake, grain yields, and the grain quality of durum wheat. NT was compared with CT in a wheat/legume crop rotation. After 20 years the CA plot  had 43% more absolute potentially mineralizable N (N0) in the topsoil than the CT plots, with no significant differences observed in deeper soil layers (15–30 cm and 30–45 cm). Other comparisons are made in this paper for different wheat parts. Their results highlight the benefits of long-term CA adoption to increase soil N mineralization, providing a substantial base for N uptake during the critical growth stages of durum wheat, thus leading to increased crop yield. 

This chapter describes the challenges facing this part of the World that includes Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt and Sudan mostly due to high population growth rates, youth unemployment, increasing food needs, variable income levels and threatened fragile natural resources. The chapter describes the introduction of conservation agriculture and its adoption in this area and how there was a need to dismantle barriers and promote this management system to improve replace traditional systems that result in degradation of the environment and lead to reduced productivity.

This paper evaluated the impact of tillage on agronomic, physiological, and biochemical traits in canola in Morocco. There were 4 tillage systems; deep (DP) and chisel (CP) plowing, minimum tillage (MT) and no-till (NT). Results showed that NT consistently exhibited superior performance with the highest seed yield and oil content. In contrast, DP faced challenges during a severe drought in that resulted in no production. They concluded that no-till can be recommended for canola cultivation in Morocco as well as in other North-African and Mediterranean countries with similar climate and soil conditions.

Morocco is experiencing threats to food security due to climate change  as temperatures rise and precipitation declines. CA is considered as a way to help. This research compared and evaluated the impact of four cultivation techniques (no-till: NT, minimum till: MT, chisel ploughing: CP and deep ploughing: DP) on certain physiological and agronomic parameters of bread wheat. NT showed the highest grain yield, and water use efficiency (WUE) compared with other cultivation practices.

This article looked at no-tillage (NT) and agroforestry techniques affect hydrology and sediment loss hilly areas in Morocco. Land cover and precipitation impact on hydrological processes were quantified with the calibrated Kinematic Runoff and Erosion (KINERO2) model. This model was validated with data from 7 rainstorms from 2014-2018. Soil erosion was then simulated using extreme storm event intervals of 5,10, 15, 30, 50, and 100 years. Then, land use scenarios were tested with the Automated Geospatial Watershed Assessment (AGWA) tool for conventional agriculture (baseline scenario), no-tillage agriculture, agroforestry and combined no-tillage and agroforestry (alternative scenarios). They conclude that adopting no-tillage plus agroforestry on vulnerable farmland has the potential to significantly reduce soil erosion and diminish the sediment yield

This study explores the combined impact of minimum or no tillage and fertilizer regimes on agronomic parameters of cotton–cereal rotations, as practiced by smallholder farmers in Benin in three different climate zones. There were 3 soil preparation treatments - CT, strip tillage (ST) and NT (direct seeding (DS)) and 4 fertilizer treatments. At the three sites NT or DS led to lower below ground biomass and cotton yields compared to CT in the first year of transition to CA where the soils were degraded. Fertilizer regimes affected seed cotton yields differently across sites and treatments, with marginal responses within soil preparation methods, but they contributed to increased yield differences between conventional and no tillage. The results from the first year of this experiment, which is meant to continue for another 5 years, suggest that strip tillage could be a sensible way to initialize a transition, without initial yield penalties, toward more sustainable soil management. Note the paper did not mention the use of residues, an important factor for successful no-till.

This review article looks at the challenges and research needs for adoption of CA and improvement of crop-soil water conditions in Southern Europe and Northern Africa. This multidisciplinary and participatory study was the basis for the project "Research-based participatory approaches for adopting conservation agriculture in the Mediterranean Area-CAMA". There is an emphasis on smallholder farms. It uses a socio-economic analysis of the reasons that restrict the CA diffusion and legume crop improvement as a component of improved CA cropping systems, and the need for a network of long-term experiments on CA and soil characteristic modification.

This is the second chapter highlighted from Rattan Lal's 2021 book on Soil Organic Matter. This chapter collates and synthetizes the information on research in relation to improvements in achieving sustainability and mitigating anthropogenic climate change—through adoption of no-till (NT) systems over existing conventional agriculture systems (e.g. crop productivity, soil quality, erosion control, and carbon emissions and sequestration). It concludes that conversion to NT systems for management and control of soil erosion can also reduce losses of SOC in water- or wind-transported sediments and contribute to reducing emissions and sequestration of carbon.

This article applies an endogenous switching regression model to a case study of 2296 wheat fields in Morocco, to provide evidence on the socio-economic impacts of residue retention. 30% and 60% plus of crop residues were retained respectively on 35% and 14% of wheat fields. These levels of residue retention led to 22% and 29% more yields, 25% and 32% higher gross margins and 22% and 25% more consumption of wheat, respectively. Residue retention is economically and biophysically beneficial even for owners of livestock as the monetary value of the additional grain yield more than offsets the cost of purchasing an equivalent amount of feed from the market—all providing good economic justification for residue retention. Development and/or import of alternative feed sources, introducing crop insurance, and raising the awareness of the economic, biophysical and environmental benefits of residue retention among farmers are needed.

This paper looked at the economic impacts in 1901 sampled wheat fields in Morocco with different tillage intensities. Results from an endogenous switching regression model showed that fields that were not tilled gave 298.6 kg/ha (23%) higher yields, US$89/ha (27%) more income and more stable yields than those tilled once or more. Fields that were not tilled also had 87% lower yield variance with 100% and 65.6% less risk of giving yield levels below 500 and 1000 kg/ha, respectively. Labor saving from avoiding tillage under ZT was undermined by higher labor needed for weeding. However, if this constraint can be removed reduced or zero-tillage can improve the economic and biophysical viability of dryland agriculture in this country.

This paper analyzes farmers’ perceptions about post-harvest free grazing on agricultural lands and identifies incentives that motivate forage production, to help inform forage development and policy to allow CA to be adopted that requires keeping the soil surface covered with crop residues. Results found that a majority of farmers would prefer post-harvest grazing restrictions to the existing reciprocal post-harvest grazing. Farmers also had strong preferences for forage production policy incentives, but the results reveal considerable preference heterogeneity. The paper provides policy makers with needed information for policy makers to formulate incentives for smallholder forage programs.