CERES model application for increasing preparedness to climate variability in agricultural planning - calibration and validation test

Detailed observations of the vulnerable “Chromic Luvisol-maize” agroecosystem in lysimeters, including water and nitrogen fluxes at the bottom boundary, enabled to validate integrally the prediction capacity of calibrated CERES-maize model. Simulation outputs after calibration about PESW, water uptake, drainage, soil nitrogen storage, nitrogen leaching and crop dry weights, proved to be accurate enough over a comparatively long period (1.05.1997-1.10.1999). Graphical and statistical test of CERES-maize output characterised the performance of the model as acceptable over the specific conditions of validation lysimeter trial.