Soil organic carbon storage impacts on crop yields in rice-based cropping systems under different long-term fertilisation

Rice production in the Yangtze River Basin accounts for 44.4 % of China’s total rice production. Exploring the response of crop yields to soil organic carbon (SOC) storage under various fertilisation treatments for maintaining high and sustainable crop yields is an urgent issue. A database containing information on crop yields, SOC content, environmental factors (climate and soil properties), and nutrient input from fertilisation was established from seven long-term experimental sites located in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River Basin (operational since the 1980s/1990s) in two lowland rice-based cropping systems (i.e., rice–wheat rotation and rice–rice rotation systems). The study considered four treatments: no fertiliser application (CK); application of chemical nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium fertilisers (NPK); application of manure (M); and a combination of NPK and M (NPKM). Results showed that the NPKM treatment produced the highest crop yields, followed by the NPK/M and CK treatments. The NPK and NPKM treatments generally had higher sustainable yield indices (SYI, 0.34–0.74) and lower coefficients of variation (CV, 11–32 %) than the M and CK treatments (SYI: 0.29–0.62 and CV: 15–44 %) in both cropping systems across all sites. Crop grain yields were significantly increased with increasing SOC storage (0–20 cm) and followed a logarithmic regression in both systems, suggesting that a further increase in SOC content could lead to higher yields. Structural equation modelling indicated that fertilisation, soil properties, and climate together explained 75–77 % of the variance in crop yield in the two systems. The primary contributing factors were fertilisation and its associated changes in soil nutrients. Chemical fertilisers mainly had direct effects on crop yields, while manure had both direct and indirect (through improvements in soil properties) effects on crop yields. In the rice–rice system, SOC alone had both direct and indirect (through the improved availability of soil nutrients) positive effects on crop yields. Our findings emphasise the potential benefits of sequestering SOC not only for enhancing crop production but also for improving the stability and sustainability of crop yield from paddy fields.