Ethiopian agriculture has greater potential for carbon sequestration than previously estimated

Abstract

More than half of the cultivation-induced carbon loss from agricultural soils could be restored through improved management. To incentivise carbon sequestration, the potential of improved practices needs to be verified. To date, there is sparse empirical evidence of carbon sequestration through improved practices in East-Africa. Here, we show that agroforestry and restrained grazing had a greater stock of soil carbon than their bordering pair-matched controls, but the difference was less obvious with terracing. The controls were treeless cultivated fields for agroforestry, on slopes not terraced for terracing, and permanent pasture for restrained grazing, representing traditionally managed agricultural practices dominant in the case regions. The gain by the improved management depended on the carbon stocks in the control plots. Agroforestry for 6-20 years led to 11.4 Mg ha(-1) and restrained grazing for 6-17 years to 9.6 Mg ha(-1) greater median soil carbon stock compared with the traditional management. The empirical estimates are higher than previous process-model-based estimates and indicate that Ethiopian agriculture has greater potential to sequester carbon in soil than previously estimated.