Conservation Agriculture Worldwide, an Alternative to Agricultural Burning Rolf Derpsch, ex No-till Consultant, Asuncion, Paraguay [email protected] Andean Regional Conference – Assessing Open Agric. Burning  Autoridad Nacional del Agua (ANA), Lima, Peru 1 12 ‐ 13 February, 2015 What is Conservation Agriculture? Permanent Cover - Cropping Systems for Sustainable Agriculture, based on three principles: Minimum soil disturbance = No-tilage Permanent soil cover Diversified crop rotations (FAO, 2001) What is No-tillage? No-tillage is defined as a system of seeding crops into untilled soil by opening a narrow slot, trench or band only of sufficient width and depth to obtain proper seed coverage. No other soil tillage is done. No‐tillage in Argentina  (AAPRESID) Peiretti, 2005) ( No-till soybeans into black oats in Brazil (Derpsch, 1996) No-till maize in Brazil (Calegari, 2008) About 80% of all crops are planted No-till in MERCOSUR - no burning! Harvesting (Derpsch, 2014) All crops can be seeded in No-till systems Onions in Colombia Cassava in Paraguay (Derpsch, 2001) Potatoes in No-tillage after wheat in Colombia (Birbaumer, 2000)