Characterization of Farming Practices in Field Crops: Comparison between Organic and Conventional Farming

The crop management in organic and conventional farming have been studied in numerous studies but often based on a limited number of cases. We conducted a statistical analysis of the results of the “Cultural Practices” survey for field crops (SSP, 2021), which collected data from a sample of representative organic and non-organic fields, enabling us to produce data on intercropping practices, soil preparation, mechanical weeding, fertilization, and crop protection. Our analysis shows that farming practices depend on production methods and soil and climate conditions : while some practices are more common in organic farming (presence of grassland in crop rotations, mechanical weeding) or conventional farming (use of nitrogen and pesticide inputs), others depend more on the region than on the production method (soil cover between crops, deep tillage without ploughing), or even on an interaction between both (similar proportion of plowed organic/conventional plots in the south but different in the north).