Climate change is expected to greatly alter and modify all life forms on Earth. Therefore, maintaining natural and agroecosystems sustainability is one of the major scientific concerns in the current era. Reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions represents an urgent need to mitigate the effects and consequences of climate change. The present chapter analyzes carbon footprint and sequestration in different olive plantations, from extensively managed to super-intensively managed plantations, in three geographic districts of Marrakech-Safi region in Morocco. Olive tree plantations showed an important capacity to store CO2, especially in high-density plantations, however, the carbon footprint is still high compared with extensively managed plantations. The chapter contributes to an innovative solution to reduce GHG and, consequently, to maintain the sustainability of the agricultural sector in Morocco under the current context of global changes.
TopIntroduction
Climate change has undergone significant acceleration in recent decades mainly as a result of human activities. Therefore, the ongoing global changes, due to global warming and anthropogenic pressures, are likely to affect all life forms on Earth (Pörtner et al., 2022). This is the case for the Mediterranean region, which is likely to experience drastic effects from climate change impacts (Schilling et al., 2012). Current predictions suggest a significant decrease in precipitations with increases in temperatures and extreme climatic events (Driouech et al., 2010; Lionello and Scarascia, 2018). Therefore, these changes will impose challenging conditions for natural ecosystems (Matesanz and Valladares 2014; Lloret et al. 2016). In addition, the increasing drought is likely to affect Mediterranean agricultural activities and productivity which greatly depend on precipitation as the main water source (Schilling et al., 2012). However, to ensure the sustainability of natural and agricultural ecosystems in light of the growing human global population, several international conventions and protocols, such as Kyoto Protocol, were proposed to limit climate warming by reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions resulting from human activities. Accordingly, reducing CO2 emissions and increasing carbon sequestration are highly recommended to reduce greenhouse gas emissions at the global scale (Lal, 2004; Paustian et al., 2016). Indeed, the natural processes that maintain the global carbon cycle (Figure 1) are now insufficient to keep up with the accelerating pace of anthropogenic emissions.
Agriculture and livestock, besides fossil fuels, are considered to be the major sources of GHG emissions and contribute to deforestation and land degradation for at least 15% of GHG emissions (Van der Werf et al., 2009; World Bank, 2012). However, adequate agricultural management practices can balance CO2 emissions and store it as carbon (C) in the biomass and soil. In fact, land use and agricultural management can either increase or decrease soil C stocks (Lal, 2008). Consequently, increasing C storage in soil and biomass is proposed as a sustainable solution to mitigate the consequences of increased atmospheric CO2 concentration (Lal, 2004). However, it is worth mentioning that C sequestration is used to describe the processes by which CO2 is removed from the atmosphere and stored in the ocean, terrestrial environments, and geological formations. Accordingly, at the terrestrial level and through their life cycle, plants absorb CO2 from the atmosphere and release the oxygen gas (O2), in which a proportion of CO2 is returned to the atmosphere while another part is stored in various organic compounds. This latter is referred to as carbon sequestration. However, the C footprint is a measurement indicator for anthropogenic CO2 emissions (Peters, 2010).