Fertilizer and pesticide reduction in cherry tomato production to achieve multiple environmental benefits in Guangxi, China.

ABSTRACT

Cherry tomatoes, as a highly profitable vegetable, consume a substantial amount of fertilizer and pesticide compared with other staple crops, which leads to remarkably negative environmental impacts. The optimization of these agricultural inputs to mitigate these environmental burdens and improve cherry tomato yield has drawn little attention. This study used life cycle assessment (LCA) combined with a field investigation to analyze the environmental benefits under optimized fertilizer and pesticide inputs (i.e., reduction of 24.7% nitrogen, 35.6% phosphorus pentoxide, 18.8% potassium oxide, 17.1% organic fertilizer, and 30.9% pesticides) compared to traditional farmer inputs. Results showed that (1) compared to traditional farmer management, optimized inputs reduced the energy depletion by 24.7%, water depletion by 6.4%, global warming by 28.8%, acidification by 23.7%, aquatic eutrophication by 34.2%, human toxicity by 34.8%, aquatic eco-toxicity by 34.8%, and soil eco-toxicity by 26.7%, respectively; (2) among them, aquatic eco-toxicity and aquatic eutrophication were the major environmental impacts in cherry tomato production and were mainly attributed to chlorothalonil and phosphate fertilizer use, respectively; and (3) optimized inputs decreased the total environmental index and environmental damage cost by 33.8% and 28.1%, respectively, without compromising the yield. These findings provide insight into optimizing fertilizer and pesticide usage to alleviate multiple environmental impacts while maintaining cherry tomato yield and improving economic benefits. Further studies should focus mainly on less harmful pesticide utilization and phosphate use efficiency improvement, which may achieve vegetable production system sustainability in China and also provide a reference value for vegetable production systems in the Global South.