Abstract
The escalating global demand for food, coupled with agriculture’s significant environmental burdens, presents a fundamental challenge: feeding a growing population without compromising planetary health. Quantifying the comparative environmental performance of various food production systems is essential to guiding this transition, particularly across staple crops. This article addresses this by presenting a comparative Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of maize and soybean cultivation under Conventional, Organic, and Regenerative Agriculture (respectively CA, OA and RA), based on a rigorously modelled crop rotation derived from literature-based data. The LCA utilized the ReCiPe 2016 (H) method at both the Midpoint (problem-oriented) and disaggregated Endpoint (damage-oriented) levels, as well as the IPCC 2013 GWP 100a methodology. RA consistently demonstrated the lowest average total environmental impact per hectare across all indicators, affirming its potential for reduced local burden. For example, RA’s total damage score per hectare (136.18 Pt) for maize was significantly lower than both CA (149.86 Pt) and OA (167.87 Pt). However, when impacts were normalized per metric tonne of product, this advantage narrowed or reversed due to yield differences. For instance, while RA’s Global-Warming Potential (GWP) per tonne for maize (285.66 kg CO₂eq) still outperformed CA (328.93 kg CO₂eq), CA achieved the minimum impact in other key efficiency-driven categories, such as Endpoint Total Damage (15.77 Pt) and Land Use (146.66 m2a crop eq). Ultimately, these findings demonstrate no singular ‘optimal’ system, but rather a critical trade-off between mitigating local environmental burden (per-hectare) and maximizing production efficiency (per-tonne).
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All data supporting the findings of this study are available within the article and its Supplementary Information file.
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Each author listed has made a substantial contribution to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data; or the creation of new software used in the work; or has drafted the work or substantively revised it. All authors have approved the submitted version (and any substantially modified version that involves the author’s contribution to the study) and have agreed both to be personally accountable for their own contributions and to ensure that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work, even ones in which they were not personally involved, are appropriately investigated, resolved, and the resolution documented in the literature. A. Cavallito: conducted the literature search and synthesis, contributed to the development of the methodology, and provided overall project coordination and supervision. I. Bianchi: contributed in developing and executing key methodological approaches, and was instrumental in data acquisition and initial analysis. T. Mancia: contributed in the interpretation of the results and authored sections of the results and discussion. D. Catania: contributed to the interpretation of the results and provided critical feedback on the manuscript. M. Rossi: contributed to data acquisition and analysis. B. Marchetti: contributed to the conceptualization and development of the methodology, provided essential oversight for the overall project coordination.
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Alberto, C., Iacopo, B., Tommaso, M. et al. Evaluating the sustainability and productivity of conventional, organic, and regenerative agriculture in maize-soybean rotations: a modelling LCA study. Sci Rep (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-38291-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-38291-3
