6 months internship offer

Background:

Land-constrained sub-Saharan Africa is characterized by low yields due to disappearing fallows, low availability of organic inputs, and limited access to mineral fertilizers. Cereal-legume intercropping is one option for sustainable intensification to secure food and feed production. Intercrops can increase productivity and yield stability compared to sole crops thanks to greater resources use efficiency (water, light, nutrients). The use of soil-plant models help evaluate in silico the agronomic performance of cereal-legume intercropping for contrasting climates and crop management (e.g. sowing date, cultivars, fertilization). This internship will help to assess the performance of current soil-crop models to simulate cereal-legume intercropping under contrasting conditions. The final goal is to understand whether intercropping can help adapt to climate change and help stabilize yield in the face of the inter-annual variability of climate. Such output is so crucial for smallholder farmers of the global South who are already facing the consequences of climate change.

Objectives:

This internship aims at assessing the performance of the STICS-IC model in simulating cereal-legume for contrasting environments (climate, soil texture) and crop management (fertilizers, irrigation) in two sites in sub-Saharan Africa and one site in Brazil. In a first step, the intern will be in charge of calibrating, evaluating and possibly modifying the model. The intern will then use the calibrated model to address the following research question: Does cereal-legume intercropping provide greater productivity and yield stability than the sole crops, given the inter-annual climate variability at the three sites?

Materials and methods

The work will first aim at parameterizing the STICS crop model (Intercrop STICS-IC version) for millet, sorghum, cowpea and maize to evaluate its capacity to simulate the growth and productivity of cereals-legumes intercrops in contrasting sites (Senegal, Mali and Brazil). Once calibrated and validated STICS-IC will be used to assess the productivity and yield stability of intercrops versus corresponding sole crops for historical and future climate series (climate change scenarios).

Internship conditions

The internship will be based at Cirad headquarters in Montpellier. Cirad caries cutting-edge research on the sustainability of food systems across the tropics. The intern will benefit from direct supervision of Antoine Couëdel based in Montpellier, and benefit from interactions with researchers of the AIDA team posted in the African countries were the data for modelling is being produced. This internship will contribute to the scientific outputs of the European project IntercropValuES (Developing Intercropping for agrifood Value chains and Ecosystem Services delivery in Europe and Southern Countries). There will be possibility for a PhD position following this internship.

Desired skills

Agronomic background, interests with handling large datasets and statistical analyses of experimental and modelling data. Interests in modelling. Good oral and writing english proficiency. Affinity with issues related to smallholder farming.

Duration

6 months starting in February, March or April 2023 (flexible date). Stipend is ~550 euros per month.

Supervision

Antoine Couëdel (Cirad / UR AÏDA, Montpellier), Gatien Falconnier (Cirad / UR AÏDA, Zimbabwe), Mathias Christina (Cirad / UR AÏDA, La Réunion) and Eric Justes (Cirad / Persyst, Montpellier)
Please apply no later than December 5th, 2022 by email only to antoine.couedel@cirad.fr