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INRA Centre de Bordeaux Aquitaine 71 avenue E. Bourlaux CS 20032 33882 Villenave d'Ornon cedex  05 57 12 26 55

pietro.barbieri@inra.fr

Parcours

I graduated in Organic Agriculture and Food Systems at Hohenheim University (Stuttgart, DE) in November, 2014 with a thesis about Amaranth domestication and breeding. The work was developed in collaboration with the Institute of Plant Breeding at Hohenheim University (Crop biodiversity and Breeding Informatics). During my studies I also collaborated with the Italian Seed State authority (INRA-ENSE) and with the Institute for Animal Production in the Tropics and Subtropics (Hohenheim University). After graduation I collaborated with the Milan State University in the Bio-Regione project and with the Swiss Research Institute for Organic Agriculture (FiBL), working on a project dealing with long-term trials comparing organic and conventional agriculture in the Tropics (Sys-Com project). Currently I am a PhD student at INRA Bordeaux, working on modelling the development of organic agriculture at the global scale.

Recherches et compétences

Agronomist, I am experienced with the set-up of field trials and the collection of field data. I have a good background in statistic for qualitative and quantitative data (linear and mixed effects models, non-linear models, multivariate statistics, etc.). I have a good knowledge of the R software language, both for statistical analysis, and for programming.  I am acquainted with mathematical modeling, and spatially explicit analysis using QGIS and R. I have some experience in lecturing.

Projets en cours 

Today, the ability of Organic Agriculture to “feed the world” is a highly debated topic. In the last decades, several authors has attempted to compare the productivity of organic agriculture versus conventional agriculture. Such studies were carried out at crop level and mainly using the meta-analysis methodology. Nevertheless, those studies do not consider the consequences of a potential dramatic development (or up-scaling) of organic systems on crop productivity due to the possible risk of a limited availability of nutrients to sustain the production.

Indeed, nutrients source might be limited in some areas – e.g. in stockless regions. Additionally, organic systems might be dependent on conventional systems as a nutrient source. A second limitation of such studies lie in the lack of accounting for differences in crop rotations between organic and conventional systems. Therefore, nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus) availability may represent an obstacle for a huge scaling-up of organic farming.

The main objective to address those two limitation and to assess the food production capacity of organic agriculture if it was to develop dramatically at the global scale using a spatial-explicit modeling approach.

Enseignements 

Bordeaux Science-Agro (FR)

April - May 2017

Guest Lecturer - Agriculture and Global Change

Teaching Assistant -  Analyse des systèmes de production

Publications

Armengot L, Barbieri P., Andres C., Milz J., & Schneider M. (2016), Cacao Agroforestry systems have higher return on labor compared to full-sun monocultures. Agronomy for Sustainable Development, 36(4), 70

Barbieri P. ​ & Bocchi S. (2015). Analysis of the alternative agriculture's seed market sector - history and development. Journal of Agriculture and Environmental Ethics 28(4): 789-801