Title: North American agriculture: its contribution to the green house effect

Authors: A. Schmitz, H. Furtan, P. Kuch, A. Guzel

Addresses: Dept. of Agriculture and Resource Economics, University of California at Berkeley, 207 Giannini Hall, Berkeley California 94720, USA. ' University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan S7N OWO, Canada. ' Environmental Protection Agency, 401M St., S.W., Room 427 WT, Washington, DC 20460, USA. ' Middle East Technical University, Ankara, Turkey

Abstract: This paper assesses the effect of agricultural systems and changing input use in North American agriculture on CO₂ emissions. These emissions are linked to the greenhouse effect. In the early part of the 20th century, there was a significant increase in CO₂ emissions as a large amount of land was diverted from its grassland state into cultivated cropland. CO₂ emissions from North American agriculture peaked in the middle part of the 1970s and have declined appreciably since then. It is quite possible that no significant increases in CO₂ emissions will occur. This will especially be true if the US maintains its current conservation reserve programme in which a significant cropland base is not used for cropland production.

Keywords: agriculture; carbon dioxide emissions; conservation reserve; field consumption; greenhouse effect; United States; USA; greenhouse gases; GHG emissions.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEP.1994.028349

International Journal of Environment and Pollution, 1994 Vol.4 No.1/2, pp.75 - 96

Published online: 17 Sep 2009 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article