RESEARCH WORK

 

 

 

Sustainable land management plan for milk production at the UBPC Aguadita, Cienfuegos, Cuba

 

 

 

Eligia de la C. Cuellar1, C. Fresneda1, Caridad J. Rivero1, Martha Thompson2, Graciela Sánchez3andYudisney González 3

1Universidad de Cienfuegos Carlos Rafael Rodríguez, Cuatro Caminos, Carretera a Rodas km 3½, CP 59 430, Cienfuegos, Cuba
2Empresa Nacional de Proyectos Agropecuarios del MINAG, La Habana, Cuba
3Empresa Agropecuaria Rodas, Cienfuegos, Cuba
E-mail: ecuellar@ucf.edu.cu

 

 

 


ABSTRACT

A work was conducted at the UBPC Aguadita, of the Rodas municipality Cienfuegos province, Cuba, in order to elaborate a sustainable soil management plan to increase milk production. The guide contained in the manual of procedures for the implementation of sustainable land use, was used. The steps of the guide allowed to conceive a non-experimental study, of correlational/multiple type, in which theoretical and practical methods were used with their corresponding techniques (interviews, surveys, document review, direct observation); and measurements were made on site, with the application of ten methodological tools. It was proven that the low milk production in the UBPC is mainly caused by the soil degradation, the low quality of the pastures and the deficient knowledge management, which coincides with the main barrier for the application of sustainable land management. From these results the sustainable management plan was elaborated, as a tool that contributes to develop actions that mitigate the negative impact of soil degradation on the milk yield of the farm.

Keywords: Soil deterioration, grassland management, sustainability.


 

 

INTRODUCTION

The management of the resource soil is, in fact, the practice of its use by the human population, which should be sustainable (FAO/Netherlands, 1991), and constitutes an imperative need due to the affectations caused by the climate change and its immediate consequence: desertification. According to Alemán (2011), in the world this process affects 70 % of the dry lands (3 600 million hectares).

In Cuba, at present there is an agricultural surface that represents 62,7 % of the total mainland of the archipelago, and from it 55,4 % is cultivated. In the National Program of Soil Amelioration and Conservation proposed by the Soil Institute (Instituto de Suelos, 2001), it was indicated that a high percentage of the soils of the Republic of Cuba, is affected by natural or anthropic processes accumulated over the years, with a marked preponderance of the latter. This caused that: the erosion processes affect more than 2,5 million ha; salinity and sodicity, around one million ha; compaction, 2,5 ha and drainage problems, 2,7 million ha; besides, the high degree of acidity reaches 2,3 million ha and 60 % of the agricultural surface of the country is affected by these and other factors (even by more than one factor at the time), that can induce desertification processes, which reached 14 % of the national territory (Anon, 2012).

Potential erosion characteristics (sloping degree, soil type and climate) are shown by 54 % of the areas and near 40 % of them are already eroded with higher or lower intensity (Anon, 2000).

Another problem associated to degradation is shown in the areas dedicated to pasturelands, and is caused by the inadequate use of technology, the deforestation and the dependence on external inputs which accelerate the loss of productivity (Fernández et al., 2006).

To increase the productive results and protect the natural resources involved in agriculture, such as the soil, measures like the diversification of soil use and the change of agrarian structures are suggested (Sánchez et al., 2007); as well as the use of agrocological paradigms, which integrate processes and in which the agricultural practices are adapted to the specific conditions of each rural area (Vázquez et al., 2005).

Sustainable land management (SLM) emerges as a new way to do and think (FAO/PNUMA, 1999). Its application to the different uses of agricultural soils depends on the knowledge of the men and women that implement it, so that in each productive farm the multidisciplinary and trans-sectorial actions are conjugated depending on the integrated resource management (Mc Garry, 2005). It also depends on the changes occurred as a consequence of the current ecological, climate and socioeconomic conditions of the planet (Marzin et al., 2013), and on the feedback of the exchange of ancestral wisdom and knowledge (Alejandro and Romero, 2003).

The Basic Unit of Cooperative Production (UBPC, for its initials in Spanish) Aguadita, of the Rodas municipality Cienfuegos province, Cuba, is affected by soil degradation processes, and, although new technologies have been introduced, it shows a significant decrease in the productive yields. Likewise, in this unit there is no evidence of resource management with systemic approach, contributing to mitigate the negative impact of the degradation processes and of the climate change; which, together with the anthropic action, influence such results. For such reasons, a study was conducted in order to elaborate a sustainable land management plan which contributes to the increase of milk production in this entity.

 

MATERIALS AND METHODS

The study was conducted, during 2010-2012, at the UBPC Aguadita belonging to the Livestock Production Enterprise Rodas, in the municipality of the same name, whose main activity is milk production. The research methodology was non-experimental, of correlational/multiple type, and theoretical and practical methods with their corresponding techniques (surveys, interviews, direct observation, document review and measurements on site) were used; the methodological tools of the Manual de procedimientos para manejo sostenible de tierras (Handbook of procedures for sustainable land management) (Urquiza et al., 2011) were also applied. From the organizational and formal point of view, as work procedure the actions, methods and results were taken into consideration, according to table 1.

For the identification and selection of the productive site, the following selection criteria were taken into consideration: the disposition and political will of the top management of the UBPC to implement the soil sustainable management, as agroecological paradigm; the existence of reliable information in a period of five years; the existence of qualified labor with capacity to assimilate, reconvert or adapt the technologies under use, for the implementation of the SLM; and the possibility to make participatory decisions.

The key informers who served as experts were determined within a population of workers, and a test was applied to know the competence of these informers about the LSM, which was processed through Kendall's coefficient (w) to make the validations. In the causality analysis Vester matrix was used, which allowed to rank the problems that became evident from the above-mentioned techniques; and to locate the problems per typology, the problem and objective tree technique was used. The compiled information allowed a better characterization of the productive farm.

Through the document review (records of the productive and reproductive indicators of the UBPC, records paybills of the sales made), surveys applied to the key informers, direct observations and measurements on site, the main limiting factors related to the soil quality, the livestock production and the socioeconomic aspects of the UBPC, were identified. Emphasis was made on the performance of milk production, the floristic composition of the pastures, the prevailing soil type and the physical and biological characteristics of the soil.

Ten methodological tools were applied from the 39 existing in the above-mentioned handbook (table 2), and from these results the baseline was elaborated and the main problems were identified to elaborate the sustainable management plan.

 

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Figure 1 shows the milk production during 2008-2012.

Since 2010 a decrease of milk production was observed in the UBPC. According to the result of the document review and the direct observation carried out in the productive areas, this was provoked by the following causes: inadequate management of grazing and stocking rate higher than 1 LAU/ha, which favored the elimination of the plant cover and the appearance of uncovered spots in a soil of regular agroproductive category; the deterioration of the genetic potential of the dairy herd, whose base was the Siboney de Cuba genotype; and the unwise management of the herds, in which unproductive animals or animals that reached the slaughter age with more than 10 years and an incorporation to reproduction of 36-45 months, were observed. This is in addition to the fact that there was a 100-mm decrease of the annual mean rainfall values in the locality in the period 2008-2012, caused by the effect of the recurring meteorological drought that affected the country, as a consequence of the climate change.

This corroborates the statement by García et al. (1997), Vázquez (2011) and Milera (2013) regarding the fact that the livestock production activity should be seen as an integrated whole, and the interrelations and interactions of the system should never be neglected, to utilize the biophysical and biochemical processes, as well as the climate conditions and the animal management. Nevertheless, if measures aimed at mitigating these problems are applied, the dairy results could be increased in future stages, for which the statement by Rojas et al. (2011) about the development of diverse systems, which confer higher resilience and environmental response to the area, and have incidence on productive improvements, should be taken as basis.

Another important aspect which limited milk production was the low quality of the feedstuffs, because in the floristic composition of the pasturelands only 0,47 % of cultivated pastures and 0,09 % of protein bank were observed (fig. 2).

From the document review it was deduced that these pastures and forages that were offered (sugarcane and king grass) had less than 8 % of crude protein and moderate to low energy contents (Anon, 2000b); which, together with their bad management and utilization, did not allow higher productions. In this sense, the reports by different authors such as Benítez et al. (1994) and Milera (2010) about the need to plant and produce quality pastures, as well as to take into consideration the soil-plant-animal-climate relation, so that all the system constituents are favored in full synergy, are corroborated.

This is reaffirmed with the results of the interviews with the farmers, because more than 85 % expressed that the yields (2 L/cow) were very low, and that this was related to the existence of 86,6 % of natural pastures in the area. In this sense, it is known that in similar production systems, but with good-quality cultivated pastures, between 8 and 10 L/cow are obtained (Martínez et al., 2009).

Regarding the soil, Hernández, et al. (2015) genetically classified it as a Brown soil without carbonates, and according to the data of the enterprise it is compacted (100 % of the total agricultural surface) and shows 80 % of the surface with moderate erosion.

The inhabitants and farmers of that zone also consider that these areas have undergone a degradation process in the last five years, and identify compaction and erosion as the main degradation processes of the soil, which directly affect the productive yield, for which they should be solved at medium term through the implementation of the SLM. In this sense, Alemán (2011) stated that in the erosion process the topsoil, which is where the highest quantity of earthworms and other microorganisms is concentrated, is lost, thus producing the decrease of agricultural yields.

Among the most important causes of these degradation processes the excessive use of mechanization and the practice of overgrazing (due to the deficit of pasture enclosure) were identified; which, according to González et al. (2004), brings about that in the affected area the development of pastures is scarce, due to the loss of nutrients, the decrease of the soil aeration, and the low penetration capacity of its roots searching for nutrients and water.

The results of the measurements performed on site (table 3 ), from the methodology and the indicators contained in the field guide of visual soil assessment (VSA) which appears in the handbook (Urquiza et al., 2011) showed a soil quality index of «moderate» qualification, because the value was found in the range 15-30.

The value obtained in the earthworm content (4, moderate condition) was important, indicating that in a 20-cm bucket of soil there are more than 10 earthworms, which is an adequate sign of the potentialities of these areas to reduce the compacted surface. This is in correspondence with the report by Pimentel et al. (1992) regarding the fact that when the number of earthworm increases, the soil fertility, pasture root growth and, consequently, milk production of the system, increase, as long as the necessary measures are taken to stop the existing degradation process.

With regards to the other indicators, with the exception of the one referred to the abundance and color of the soil mottling, which obtained a qualification of 6 (good condition), all of them showed values between 0 and 3, placing them in the rank of poor and moderate; with emphasis on the indicator soil structure, indicating a predominance of large, dense blocks, with very few fine aggregates, for which there was little resistance to the structural degradation caused by erosion.

In general, the soils of the entity showed compaction and loss of the topsoil because of erosion, as well as affectations due to the average rainfall occurred, which indicates that the pastures in these soils have low capacity to hold nutrients and water.

The analysis of the problem tree (fig. 3) allowed to identify as main issue the low milk yield, which was given by the situation of the pastures, the bad management of the herd and the deficient management of knowledge. This corroborates the report by Anon (2001) regarding the fact that to reach a good milk production from tropical pastures, it is necessary to make a correct management of the soil-plant-animal system, and to create capacities in the farmers for their development.

In addition to the above-described facts, from the group work it was identified that in the UBPC Aguadita the following barriers exist which prevent the sustainable land management:

- The advisory by the Pasture Station and of the technical services related to artificial insemination, irrigation and drainage, etc., is scarce.

- A deficient use and management of land is made, due to the lack of knowledge management aimed at the increase of milk production.

- There is not a monitoring and control system of the land use that allows to make milk production more efficient.

- There is not a program, or development plans based on a sustainable management policy, to obtain increases in the milk yields.

- The regulation framework on land use is not taken into consideration

Nevertheless, the existence of the Cuban Association of Animal Production, through which the UBPC can have and has had access to financing sources for the purchase of inputs and materials in benefit of milk production, was identified as opportune.

To counteract the degradation processes of milk production, it is necessary to design work strategies that include the development of interconnected projects which allow to enhance the institutional structures in material terms and terms of their legal and technical tools, in the application of scientific results, in the sensitization and education, as well as in their capacities for monitoring and evaluation; besides providing technological alternatives and an adaptive program for fulfilling their objectives.

Table 4 shows the sustainable management plan for the UBPC Aguadita, in order to attenuate the degradation processes that prevent the application of the SLM for milk production.

 

CONCLUSIONS

The UBPC Aguadita shows a decrease in the milk production mainly caused by the soil degradation, the low quality of the pastures and of its herd, the deficient knowledge management and the performance of the climate variables produced by the climate change.

The visual evaluation showed a soil quality index of «moderate» qualification, with values in the range 15-30, which indicates that the pastures on these soils have low nutrient and water holding capacity.

The technical-administrative barriers which prevent the sustainable land management were identified, and the sustainable management plan for the UBPC Aguadita was elaborated, in order to attenuate the degradation processes that prevent its application to enhance milk production.

 

 

 

Received: Juna 17, 2015
Accepted: October 13, 2015