Seed vs. vegetatively propagated globe artichoke in Mediterranean environments: a life cycle assessment (LCA) study.

Globe artichoke is an important vegetable crop native to the Mediterranean region where is widely grown; the European immigrants introduced this crop in the Americas especially in California, Argentina, Peru, and Chile. The crop is commonly propagated vegetatively utilizing offshoots, 'ovoli' (underground dormant shoots), or rhizome parts, often self-produced by the farmers. However, in recent years, new seed-propagated cultivars, hybrids, or open-pollinated, have grown in popularity due to higher uniformity, high crop productivity, resistance to diseases, and profitability. On other hand, seed-propagated needs a nursery procedure for producing artichoke plantlets, which environmental impact is usually underestimated or not acknowledged. With increasing attention to sustainability issues, there has come a rising interest in metrics for measuring and comparing environmental impacts farm-level practices. Using a classical environmental life cycle assessment (LCA) and exergetic life cycle assessment (ELCA) this study evaluated the efficiency of resource use and environmental impacts of 1 kg vegetatively propagated versus seed-propagated globe artichoke production in Southern Italy. The assessment considered all phases from the preparation of the seeds at the nursery to the harvesting of artichoke at the farm gate. It included resources for farming (fertilizers, agrochemicals, fuel, electricity, water, irrigation materials and infrastructure, machinery) and farming settings and productivity indicators (planting density, cycle length, and yield). The LCA results are characterized by employing a wide portfolio of environmental indicators (Climate change, acidification, toxicities, eutrophication, water consumption, etc) using the Recipe 2016 model. Thermodynamics-based resource indicator--cumulative energy demand (CED), cumulative exergy demand (CExD), and cumulative exergy extraction from the natural environment (CEENE) were further calculated. This is the first study of its kind to provide a thorough understanding of how propagation techniques of globe artichoke cultivation affect natural-resource consumption and the environment and which propagation technique has the better overall performance