BeeContour
Strip cropping systems to promote bees and other pollinating insects in the agricultural landscape
Challenge
In order to stop the loss of biodiversity in the agricultural landscape, here using the example of (pollinator) insects, innovative and sustainable cultivation systems are needed that lead to more landscape structures and crop diversity and reduce the use of pesticides.
Planned innovation & aims
Development of strip cropping systems in order to
- integrate structures into cultivation in a practical way;
- increase crop diversity,
- increase the number of individuals and species diversity of pollinator insects,
- to economically quantify the management costs and ecological services of strip cropping systems.
Implementation
- Testing of strip cropping on the two scientific experimental farms Gladbacher Hof and Rauischholzhausen
- Testing of strip cropping on 15 farms: 5 conventional and 5 organic farms as well as 5 conventional biogas farms
- Accompanying survey of the animal-ecological and production-economic effects of strip cropping.
Lead partner
Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen
Professorship of Organic Farming with focus on sustainable soil use
Prof. Dr. Andreas Gattinger
Nadja.Kasperczyk@agrar.uni-giessen.de
Project consortium
JLU Chair of Plant Breeding
JLU Institute for Animal Ecology
JLU Chair of Agricultural Production Economics
Project duration
01.07.2021 – 30.06.2024
Funding