Throughout peach orchards in Greece, plant protection, fertilization and irrigation are often conducted empirically, negatively affecting energy use efficiency and greenhouse gas emissions (GHG emissions). The aim of this study was to apply alternative fertilization and irrigation practices in canning peach orchards to improve nutrient and irrigation water management and to assess yield, energy input–output and the carbon footprint of the alternative cultivation practices for three important clingstone cultivars of different ripening periods. Energy use analysis revealed that the cultivation practice with the highest energy use was almost always irrigation, followed by fertilization, plant protection, weed control and pruning. Electricity, fuels, fertilizers and machinery presented the highest energy requirements. Alternative fertilization, in combination with deficit irrigation (DI), was more energy efficient compared to farmers’ practices in all cultivars based on energy use efficiency, energy productivity and specific energy. Irrigation was the cultivation practice with the highest impact on GHG emissions due to electricity and, secondly, to fuel consumption. Alternative fertilization and DI decreased the intensity (kg CO₂eq kg⁻¹) of the emitted GHG compared to farmers’ practices. In conclusion, alternative fertilization and irrigation practices improved energy use efficiency and decreased the carbon footprint of the canning peach orchards by improving yield and decreasing fertilizer and irrigation water input.

Improving environmental sustainability while maintaining economic viability is a major challenge for Mediterranean cereal production, where conventional systems are associated with high input use, elevated greenhouse gas emissions, and strong cost pressures. Although Conservation Agriculture (CA) and Precision Agriculture (PA) are widely promoted as promising solutions, evidence on their combined environmental and economic performance under real farming conditions remains limited. This study evaluated CA, PA, and their combined application (CPA) in winter cereal systems in Greece, using three years of farmer-managed field data from four representative sites. Agronomic and environmental performance and economic outcomes were assessed under actual farm sizes and a scaled 300 ha scenario. Across sites and years, no systematic yield differences were observed among CA, PA, and CPA, indicating that alternative systems can maintain yield stability under real farmer-managed conditions. Environmental performance was driven primarily by tillage intensity: CA reduced CO₂eq emissions by 212–238 kg ha⁻¹ relative to conventional tillage, while CPA achieved the largest reductions (262–332 kg ha⁻¹), accompanied by surface-layer SOM increases of 0.30–0.56% over three years. PA applied within conventional tillage resulted in only modest emission reductions (41–82 kg ha⁻¹), but consistently improved NUE, with variable-rate fertilization increasing NUE by approximately 5–7% relative to uniform application. Despite these environmental benefits, economic performance remained constrained due to high fixed machinery costs, high input prices, and low grain values resulting in negative net profits across all systems. CA reduced total costs by 3.8–11.8%, PA delivered only marginal improvements, while CPA achieved the largest cost reductions (5.0–12.6%) delivering also the most stable net profit mitigation. Carbon credit revenues increased profitability by only 2–3%. Scaling to 300 ha improved competitiveness through fixed-cost dilution, but profitability remained unattainable. Overall, integrated CA–PA systems offer substantial environmental benefits but require targeted policy support, cooperative machinery use, and service-based solutions to enable economically viable adoption in Mediterranean cereal systems.

This study evaluated the effect of an integrated irrigation practice (IP), including reg-ulated deficit irrigation (RDI), managed through an IoT-based platform, on a pear or-chard (Pyrus communis L., cv. ‘Krystali’) compared to the farmer’s standard practice (FP). Tree response was evaluated through the measurement of tree water relations, leaf physiological functions, biochemical parameters, fruit growth and quality, pro-duction, and aerial multispectral NDVI imaging. IP achieved 15.8% water savings, sig-nificantly enhancing water-use efficiency and increasing yield per tree. However, IP trees exhibited higher crop water stress index - CWSI values and lower midday stem water potential -Ψstem than FP, particularly by late July, indicating progressive water stress. Leaf-level responses revealed morphological and biochemical alterations to drought, including increased leaf mass per area (LMA), dry matter content (DM), and accumulation of proline, alongside declines in chlorophyll pigments. Despite these stress indicators, gas exchange parameters were maintained in IP, possibly due to fruit load modulating source–sink relationships and surpassing stomatal limitations. IP re-duced vegetative growth, as evidenced by lower winter pruning material mass, but this did not result in improved fruit quality. IP produced smaller fruit with lower an-tioxidant activity, polyphenolic content and soluble solids content/acidity ratio, alt-hough fruit firmness was improved. NDVI did not detect differences between the treatments on vegetative growth, or on canopy greenness, suggesting that IP trees maintained adequate photosynthetic capacity or that water stress was moderate for NDVI detection. The study highlights the need for integrating irrigation management with fruit thinning and careful scheduling to optimize both water productivity and marketable fruit quality in water-scarce pear production systems.

Sequential extreme hydrological events driven by climate change pose severe risks to both crop survival and groundwater quality in flood-prone agricultural regions. The current study investigated the long-term soil hydrodynamics and potential perfluoralkyl and polyfluoralkyl substance (PFAS) leaching in a mountain tea (Sideritis raeseri) plantation in Thessaly plain, Greece, before, during and after the consecutive extreme storms Daniel and Elias (in September 2023). An 8-year simulation was performed, covering the years 2018–2025, including an initial calibration/validation phase (2018) followed by the 2019–2025 simulation of hydrodynamics and potential short-chain PFAS leaching, under two hypothetical solute transport scenarios. Model HYDRUS-1D was calibrated and validated using field data (precipitation, irrigation, evaporation, transpiration and biomass) from the 2018 growing season under four irrigation treatments (100%, 75%, 50% and 0% of ET_c, where ET_c is crop evapotranspiration) to secure reliable soil hydraulic properties and was subsequently extended to simulate soil water dynamics until 2025, when crop failure was observed. To quantify environmental risks, two hypothetical solute transport scenarios with different initial depths of contamination (0–20cm and 0–100 cm) and an initial short-chain PFAS soil pore water concentration of 0.1 ppb (equal to upper EU limit) were executed exclusively for the 2019–2025 period to simulate the potential leaching of the contaminants through the soil. The simulation successfully captured the agronomic reality, showing that prolonged waterlogging conditions persisted, suggesting a severe risk of root anoxia, potentially leading to the subsequent crop failure in 2025. Furthermore, solute transport modeling captured the leaching process and predicted that under typical Mediterranean hydrological conditions, short-chain PFAS had already potentially leached beyond the root zone prior to the extreme events. However, the sequential floods acted as an acute hydraulic flush, evacuating the residual chemicals towards deeper soil layers. Moreover, the 0–100 cm contaminated profile represents the most critical hazard to the underlying aquifer, delivering a higher load and elevated risks for the groundwater table than the shallow (0–20 cm) contamination profile.

The aim of this research was to study the effects of full and limited irrigation on the growing and productive characteristics of organically cultivated “Mountain Tea” (Sideritis raeseri). The research took place at the University of Thessaly farm in Velestino, Magnesia-Central Greece, during the year 2016, which was the second growing season. The experiment consisted of three treatments in three replications. Two of the treatments were irrigated: one treatment was irrigated with a supplied amount of water equal to the 75% of the daily water needs, while the other one was fully irrigated (100% of the daily water needs). Irrigation water was provided with a surface drip irrigation system. The third treatment was rainfed (no irrigation–0%). The results showed that limited irrigation compared to the full one, can save a significant amount of irrigation water while having the same results regarding the crop’s characteristics.