PowerPointPrsentation

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Weed Management in Organic Farming in the New EU
Member States and the Candidate Countries -
Results from the Weed Management Questionnaire -
M.Glemnitz, M. 1 L. Radics 2 K. Mackensen1 1
Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape
Research (ZALF), Müncheberg (Germany) 2 Corvinus
University of Economy and Public Administration
(BUEPA), Budapest (Hungary)
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Topics covered by the questionnaire

• Targets
• the most frequent and main target species for
  weed management
• on arable land, on grassland, in vegetables, in
  orchards and vineyards
• alien weed species known in organic farming
• weed species included in the red lists or are
  targeted by nature protection activities

• Preventive weed management
• common tools for preventive weed management
• base of decision making for weed management
• parameters used for determining the needs for
  weed management

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Topics covered by the questionnaire (2)

• Direct weed management
• use of different practices for direct weed
  management
• availability of different machinery for direct
  weed management

• Expert assessments
• importance of weed management
• good experiences in weed management
• unsolved problems in managing specific weed
  species
• most important limitations for improving weed
  management success

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Topics covered by the questionnaire (3)

• Administrative background
• national laws or regulations regulating or
  concerning weed management
• specialized governmental bodies dealing with weed
  management issues
• monitoring activities related to weed occurrence
  and weed management

• Scientific background
• institutions providing education
• institutions/groups working in research
• ongoing or recently finished projects related to
  weed species occurrence and weed management
• databases on weed species occurrence and weed
  management

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Importance of weed management
Expert assessment high yield limitations are
caused by weeds
yes, thats totally right yes, thats partly
true no data
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Efficiency of weed management
Current weed management is rather effective
no, thats not true yes, thats partly true no
data
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Role of weed management
How important is weed management in organic
farming in your country?
Preventing weed infestation is a main objective
in planning most of the plant production measures
Important, but only single measures will be
modified No data
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Target species for weed management on arable land
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Regional target species on arable land (1)
Avena fatua
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Regional target species on arable land (2)
Sorghum halepense
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Regional target species on grassland
Heracleum sp.
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Alien weed species, important in organic farming
Datura stramonium (AT, HU)
Asclepias syriaca (HU)
Abutilon theophrasti (HU, SK, SI)
Ambrosia artemisiifolia (HU, SK)
Commelina benghalensis (CY)
Oxalis pes-caprae (CY, IT)
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Status quo of weed management in practice

• Preventive measures
• The usage of different practices
• Machinery in use

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Measures in use to prevent weed infestation
Concerning to prevent weed infestation, the use
of the following tools is common practice in
organic farming of my country (multiple choice
allowed)
Number of countries
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Usage of different practices for direct weed
management on arable land
stated in share () of all organic farms in the
country, based on expert assessments.

gt50 50 30 10
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Machinery in use for direct weed control
Legend C-Cultivator, H-Hoe, RTH-Rigid tine harrow
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Machinery in use for direct weed control
Legend FTH-Flex-tine harrow, FinW-Finger weeder,
RH-Rotary Hoe, FlaW-Flame weeder
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Regional experiences
Self-constructed machinery for managing weeds at
the potatoe hills, Latvia
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Limiting factors for improving weed management
success (subjective expert assessments)
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Limiting factors
3 - thats totally right 2 - thats partly true
1- thats not the point 0 - I dont know
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Conclusions (1)

• Weed management is regarded in most of the
  countries as Very important, preventing weed
  infestation is a main objective in planning most
  of plant production measures
• The control of some noxious species is not solved
  and need additional research, development and
  advise
• a.) on arable land Cirsium arvense, Elymus
  repens, Avena fatua, Convolvulus arvense
• b.) on grassland Rumex sp., Heracleum sp.
• Main target weeds can be named for different
  crops, most of them are common in whole Europe,
  partly with increasing tendency new solutions
  are needed
• Alien weed species are regarded as a new upcoming
  problem for weed management in most of the
  countries.

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Conclusions (2)

• Modern machinery is lacking in most of the
  countries, due to their economic costs, for small
  farms expensive machinery is not achievable
• In organic farming problems can only be solved by
  using multiple tools together (f.i. Heracleum),
  knowledge is the key to use the tools
  appropriate, improvement in research and advisory
  services is essential
• There are many unsolved problems in weed
  management practice named, for whom the support
  from other experts, or with other words, an
  enlarged international co-operation is requested.
  Exchange of experts needs to supported especially
  because of the very limited number of experts in
  the single countries.

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Machinery in farms of different sizes
Legend C-Cultivator, H-Hoe, RTH-Rigid tine
harrow, FTH-Flex-tine harrow, FinW-Finger weeder,
RH-Rotary hoe, FlaW-Flame weeder
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Unsolved weed problems on arable land
weed crop current measure CY CONAR CYNDA
potatoes crop rotation CZ CIRAR not spec.
- EE AVEFA s.cereals crop rotation, mech.
removal ARTVU cereals crop rotation, mech.
removal HU perennials not spec. - LT CIRAR,
ELYRE cereals - PL AVEFA, APESV cereals - RO CI
RAR, CONAR all crop rotation, stubble
tillage ELYRE, SORHA all manual removal SI
CIRAR cereals crop rotation SK ELYRE all -
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Unsolved weed problems on grassland
weeds current measure EE Heracleum
sosnyovski - LT Ranunculus repens
- Taraxacum officinale - LV Heracleum
sosnyovski - SI Rumex sp. manual weeding
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Number of current projects
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Material and Methods

• 15 Countries (AT, BG, CY, CZ, DE, EE, HU, IT, LT,
  LV, MT, PL, RO, SI, SK)
• Main instrument Standardized questionnaires,
  dispersed through the country representatives
• Target groups
• administrative bodies
• experts (advisory bodies, farmers associations )
• scientists

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Predominant kind of land use in organic farms
Grassland dominated Grassland
arable Arable Arable vegetables
orchards Orchards dominated No data
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Regional target weeds
Amaranthus sp. (arable land)
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Material and Methods

• 15 countries instrumentquestionnaires 3 target
  groups
• Return quota 84 single contributions (24
  adminstrative bodies, 38 experts, 22 scientific
  sector)
• Quality check
• completeness test,
• test for clarity / wording,
• contradictions between multiple answers,
• professional focus of the author,
• spatial representation of the experts,
• cross checking with existing literature
• Country profile verbal summary, used for
  feedback loops, agreements on interpretations and
  summaries