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. 2022 Jul 1;283:108541. doi: 10.1016/j.fcr.2022.108541

Table 5.

Examples of major legume-cereal rotations and their estimated land area expressed in millions of hectares (Mha) for different geographic regions and countries.

Region/Country Rotation Area (Mha) Reference Comments
North America
USA soybean-maize 42.24a www.yieldgap.org/united-states
soybean-rice 0.40 Carroll et al. (2020)
Canada pulses-wheat or canola 2.16 Statistics Canada (2011)
South America common bean/maize 4.2 Lithourgidis et al. (2011) Intercropped with maize
Brazil soybean-maize
soybean-wheat
13.42
2.37
IBGE (2021); Embrapa personal communication 2021 > 90% of 2nd harvest maize follows soybean
Argentina soybean-wheat 4.65 Calviño and Monzon (2009) Also relay wheat-soybean-soybean double cropping
South Asia legumeb-rice-wheat 4.13 CGIAR (2018) Intercropped with wheat or relay crop
Bangladesh legumec-rice 0.78 Nasim et al. (2017)
green or black gram-wheatd 0.04
legumee-maize 0.02
India green gram-rice-wheat chickpea-rice-wheat 0.81
0.30
Atlas of cropping systems in India (2001)
groundnut-rice
grasspea-rice
black gram-rice
chickpea-rice
horse gram-rice
pulsesf-rice
1.03
0.95
0.60
0.30
0.25
0.12
chickpea-maize
green gram-maize
0.40
0.16
soybean-wheat
groundnut-wheat
pulsesf-wheat
2.23
0.16
0.10
South-East Asia
Philippines green gram - cereals 0.04 Sanchez (2021)
East Asia
China soybean-maize 1.1 Hu and Zimmer (2013)
soybean-rice 0.16 Frolking et al. (2002)
soybean-wheat 1.6
groundnut-wheat 0.9
Africa legumeg/maize or other cereals 8.56 CGIAR (2018) Intercopped with cereals
Sub-Saharan Africa soybean-maize 1.5 Acevedo-Siaca and Goldsmith (2020)
Europe
Lithuania faba bean-wheat-wheat
canola-wheat-pea-wheat
pea-wheat-oats
0.11 LegValue EU-project, personal communication 2021
Oceania
Australia pulsesh-wheat or canola-wheat-barley 2.26 FAOSTAT (2021): 2016–17 non-drought years average Wheat grown on 60%, grain legumes on 10–15% of rainfed arable cropping land.
1–4 years legume-based pasture-wheat or canola-wheat-barley 50.0 Angus and Peoples (2012); Angus and Grace (2017) Pasture phases tend to be longer in eastern cereal belt than the west.
a

Data for the USA corn-belt States (Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, Wisconsin).

b

Legumes include are chickpea, lentil, pigeon pea, soybean and groundnut.

c

Legumes include grasspea, lentil, cowpea, groundnut, soybean, green and black gram, pea and chickpea in rotation with either single rice crop (legume with single rice crop may also have another non-leguminous or non-cereal crop) or double rice crop.

d

Green or black gram in rotation with either single wheat or with rice and non-rice crops.

e

Legumes include green and black gram, lentil, Sesbania and groundnut in rotation with either single maize or rice and non-rice crops.

f

Pulse species not identified.

g

Legumes include cowpea, groundnut, soybean, pigeonpea, chickpea and lentil.

h

Pules include chickpea (1.08 Mha), lupin (0.57 Mha), lentil (0.35 Mha), and pea (0.26 Mha).