Closing the yield gap: Why localised analysis matters
28 October 2019
Last update: 25/06/20 11:11
The population in Central America is rising rapidly, but staple crop production seems unable to keep up with increasing food demand. Maize yield is particularly low in Central America compared to other regions. Although potential yield has been estimated as high as 10 t/ha, average production remains low at around 2.3 t/ha.
Yield gap analysis, which measures the difference between potential and actual yield, is a useful starting point for identifying intensification prospects but has not been applied frequently in Central America. We established field trials in six maize- and bean-producing regions in Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, which represent about three-quarters of the maize-producing area.
We assessed factors such as drought stress, nutrient deficiency, pest and disease pressure, and inter-plant competition, and we hypothesized that fertilization and supplementary irrigation would have the greatest impact on yield. We found that while improved fertilization improved maize yield by 11% on average, it had no significant effect on bean production. Irrigation had no effect, although this was due mainly to good rainfall distribution throughout the growing season in the study year. On average, optimized planting arrangements increased maize yield by 18%, making it the most promising factor we evaluated. No single treatment increased yield effectively or consistently across all sites.
The trial results confirmed that production constraints are highly dependent on local management practices and environmental conditions. We recommend that development actors whose main aim is to increase crop production start with conducting multi-year, participatory experiments to understand the primary causes of yield gaps and identify the limitations specific to the areas in question, as this will allow for more efficient research
The article ‘Factors contributing to maize and bean yield gaps in Central America vary with site and agroecological conditions’ is available Open Access in The Journal of Agricultural Science
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