Determination of carbón footprint of rice Oryza sativa on the irrigation district Juncal, Huila, Colombia

Abstract

The carbón footprint measures the emission of greenhouse gases (GHG ) expressed in kilograms of carbón dioxide equivalent (kg C0₂ eq) produced by many human activities induding the agri-cultural sector through the production, use of machinery, irrigation practíces and crop protection through chemical such as herbicides, insecticidas, pesticides and fertilizers.

This study consisted in evaluating the carbón footprint in the rice farms in 10 pieces of land at the irrigation district El juncal including the experimental farm of the University Surcolombiana, con-sidering only emissions until harvest, with the objective of analyze the agricultural practices used on each farm for the production of 1 ha of rice, to determine carbón emissions, and to propose parameters that will be the basis for the creation of programs to reduce the carbón footprint in the production of rice.

The process is carried out taking into account the conversión factors from the IPCC (Intergovern-mental Panel on Climate Change) and aspeets of the Protocol Greenhouse Gases (World Business Council for Sustainable Development and World Resource InsUtute); the initial stage consisted of data collection activities that produce carbón dioxide (C0₂) through surveys applied to voluntar)' farmers and identification of outeomes, which were dassified according to emission souices in seo-pe 1 and 2; then calcúlate the carbón footprint, obtaining 1.091,57 kg CO, eq/ha for fuel activity , 55,10 kg C02 -eq / ha for pesücide application, 3244,78 kg CO, eq I ha per applicaüon of fertilizers and 607,26 kg C0₂ eq/ha in electrical use; been the scope 1 the largest emitter with 8735 % of the total emissions.