Validated research in MS technique that cultivates pastures in soybean crops – Lado Rural

Embrapa researchers have just validated Antecipasto, a soy and forage intercropping system to be adopted in ILP (crop-livestock integration) systems. With support from Agrisus (Sustainable Agriculture Foundation) and JBAPec (Jarbas Barbosa Agriculture and Livestock), the technology was tested on rural properties in Mato Grosso do Sul with good results.

In Anticipasto, part of the forage planting period occurs in intercropped cultivation between the soybean rows, anticipating the formation of pasture, without causing a reduction in the oilseed grain productivity.

Researchers also see opportunities for validating Antecipasto in the states of Mato Grosso, Goiás, Tocantins, Roraima, São Paulo, Minas Gerais, Paraná and Bahia. For livestock farmers, the solution can alleviate the lack of pasture in the dry season, the delay in establishing pastures and the failure in their formation. For farmers, it is a real possibility to open new areas with integrated production systems, as well as acquiring land at affordable prices and with agricultural potential, in addition to improving soil conditions.

“It is a technology that does not compromise soybean grain yield, intensifies production and anticipates the formation of pasture and grazing”, defines researcher Luís Armando Zago, from Embrapa Agropecuária Oeste. The system is still recommended for rural producers who already use ILP, in the Cerrado and Atlantic Forest biomes, and need forage production at the most critical time of the year: the dry/winter season, for animal feed.

Zago explains that between the end of the 1990s and the beginning of the 2000s, research sought to establish forage crops in consortium with soybeans, but the difficulty imposed by the size of soybeans, similar to that of forage crops, made progress in studies difficult, given the loss of oilseed productivity of around 12% and the difficulty in controlling weeds.

Furthermore, he says that there were other obstacles such as the simultaneous sowing of soybeans and forage, the increase in the sowing depth of grass, the choice of Marandu and Xaraés grasses, and the over-seeding of forage at the end of the soybean cycle. “With Antecipasto, these difficulties were overcome with the delay in sowing grass in relation to soybeans, in addition to the use of smaller forage crops with slower initial growth”, declares the researcher.

With technology, annual crops are established faster than perennial forages; In this way, the grass’s ability to compete in relation to soybeans, the main crop, is minimized.

The experiments

Rural properties in Maracaju, Dourados, Nova Andradina, Anaurilândia, Rio Brilhante and Nova Alvorada do Sul, municipalities located in the south of Mato Grosso do Sul, were chosen to validate the Antecipasto system due to their diversity and agricultural suitability. One of the participating properties is Rosa Branca in Rio Brilhante, which produces soy in clayey soils.

In 2019, two hectares of soybeans were sown, following the research protocol; BRS Tamani grass came later, with a seeder for small grains, with a rate of 4 kg per hectare of pure viable seeds. Panicum was sown at two other times, one in super sowing, before the soybean leaves fell (January 2020) and the other, right after the soybean harvest.

Producer Carlos Eduardo Barbosa details that, for sowing grass, the spacing between the soybean rows was between 50 and 60 cm, and in areas where weeds were under control. Even at this spacing, a high volume of straw and good distribution were detected. He says that there were no operational problems, such as compromising the separation of impurities from soybeans.

* With information from Embrapa Gado de Beef and Agropecuária Oeste.