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100 Years of Indian Forestry. Volume 1: Souvenir
(Manager Government of India Press, 1961) Forest Research Institute
"This Souvenir is a brief survey of the growth ol Indian Forest Administration from a small beginning and gives a general picture of its outstanding achievements in various fields during the last 100 years. The period between 1856 and 1864 was one of intense activity in the organisation of Forest Department, and the year 1961 has therefore been selected as a representative year for celebrating the Centenary of Forest Administration."
100 Years of Indian Forestry. Volume 2: Forests
(Manager Government of India Press, 1961) Forest Research Institute
"This volume, 'The Forests', which is a companion volume to the Souvenir issued on 18th November, 1961 to commemorate the Centenary of Forest Administration in India, is intended to give a bird's-eye view of forestry in India at the present time. The forest types of India, the protective, productive and industrial aspects of forestry, forest management and working plans, forest education and research, wild like, etc., have all been briefly reviewed, neccessarily in a restricted compass. It will be seen that the achievements of forestry in India have been remarkable indeed, more so in the context of the handicaps, particularly the apathy of the general public, that impedes progress. It is the hope that these achievements will help to inspire added confidence in the workers in the field and spur them on to fresh efforts in tackling the vast problems before us."
3 Pillars of a Food Revolution
(2010) Lappé, Anna
"As marketers learn to fake climate-friendly food, how do we spot the real thing? Anna Lappé says it's a question of values."
Accessing Nature: Agrarian Change, Forest Laws and their Impact on an Adivasi Economy in Colonial India
(2009) Das Gupta, Sanjukta
"This article discusses how changing access to nature impacted an adivasi people, the Hos of Singhbhum. Without romanticizing the pre-British past, it may be argued that for the Hos of the time there had been dependence both on the forest and on cultivation, which had ensured them a minimum livelihood. This paper explores how their access to nature gradually diminished under colonial rule through the twin governmental policies of expansion of the agrarian frontier and restriction of the forests to the indigenous population. This led to the sedentarisation of the adivasis, further contributing towards agrarian expansion in India. However, this article argues that the extension of cultivation did not, however, benefit the Hos. Instead, the nature of the increase in acreage in Singhbhum, led to new agricultural practices, which, together with the restrictive forest laws and lack of new irrigation facilities, led to an agrarian crisis in the region, forcing the Hos to leave their lands and seek their fortunes elsewhere."
Accounting of Agricultural and Nonagricultural Impacts of Irrigation and Drainage Systems
(2003) International Water Management Institute
"This paper is a collaborative research between the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) and the Agricultural Engineering Research Centre of Taiwan. This study contributes to IWMI's program on the Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management in Agriculture. The research in 2003 consists of two components. First, research in Taiwan continues on estimating the positive and negative externalities of paddy-rice production. Second, research is being conducted in Sri Lanka to assess more broadly the impact of water resource development. In addition, two extensive literature reviews have been completed."
Accounting of Agricultural and Nonagricultural Impacts of Irrigation and Drainage Systems: A Study of Multifunctionality in Rice
(2002) Matsuno, Yutaka; Ko, H. S.; Tan, C. H.; Baker, R.; Levine, Gilbert
"The 'non-commodity' functions associated with agriculture, especially those with non-market outputs, may have significant impacts, positive or negative, on the sustainability of agricultural activity. For example, irrigation facilities that deliver water to rice fields serve a multitude of other beneficial purposes, including provision of water for domestic use, bathing, livestock, trees and other natural vegetation, groundwater recharge and flood control. This study examines the non-commodity functions of rice irrigation in Taiwan, particularly as they relate to society, human health and the environment, and, to the extent possible, quantifies them for some situations in Taiwan. It concludes that the monetary value of the multiple functions of rice irrigation is very substantial-on the order of its commodity value -and decisions about the future of rice agriculture should factor in both types of outputs."
Adaptive, Participatory and Integrated Assessment (APIA) of the Impacts of Irrigation on Fisheries, Evaluation of the Approach in Sri Lanka
(2004) Nguyen-Khoa, Sophie; Smith, Laurence; Lorenzen, Kai
"Irrigated agriculture is the largest user of water globally and its development can have significant impacts on inland fisheries. These impacts can be varied and complex, and range from biodiversity concerns to economic impacts and changes in the livelihood opportunities of rural households. There is a need to improve the knowledge of these impacts and integrate their assessment into project planning and implementation. This paper describes an approach designed to meet this challenge and the results of its pilot-testing in Sri Lanka. The approach derives from a literature review of planning and appraisal methodologies, interaction by a multidisciplinary team of researchers and evaluation of the test case."
Adoption and Impacts of Zero Tillage as a Resource Conserving Technology in the Irrigated Plains of South Asia
(2007) Erenstein, Olaf; Farooq, Umar; Malik, R. K.; Sharif, Muhammad
"The recent stagnation of productivity growth in the irrigated areas of the Indo-Gangetic Plains of South Asia has led to a quest for resource-conserving technologies that can save water, reduce production costs and improve production. The present synthesis of two detailed country studies confirmed widespread adoption of zero tillage (ZT) wheat in the rice-wheat systems of India’s Haryana State (34.5% of surveyed households) and Pakistan’s Punjab province (19%). The combination of a significant 'yield effect' and 'cost-saving effect' makes adoption worthwhile and is the main driver behind the rapid spread and widespread acceptance of ZT in Haryana, India. In Punjab, Pakistan, adoption is driven by the significant ZT-induced cost savings for wheat cultivation. Thus, the prime driver for ZT adoption is not water savings or natural resource conservation but monetary gain in both sites. Water savings are only a potential added benefit."
Agri-Silviculture in Uganda: A Case for Kachung Forest
(1980) Chaudhry, Mohammed Azfal; Silim, Salim
"Agri-silviculture is a production technique which combines the growing of agricultural crops with simultaneously raised and protected forest crops. This practice, called agri-forestry, has been in existence in various primitive forms since man learned to clear forests and cultivate land, and has different names in different parts of the world. In western and central Africa, the age-old habit of swidden agriculture, or 'shifting cultivation,' involving continued destruction of forest areas by cutting and burning and then raising the agricultural crops on the ashes of the destroyed forest, seems to be the beginning, however crude, of this practice."
Agri-Tourism Spatial Development Initiatives in Southern Africa: Are They Enhancing Rural Livelihoods?
(2001) Kepe, Thembela; Ntsebeza, Lungisile
"This paper examines an attempt to kick-start economic growth through the promotion of agriculture and tourism in an impoverished rural region of South Africa."
Agricultura en Amazonia: Crecimiento con Abundancia de Recursos Naturales en una Region Perifirica
(1990) Cunha, Aercio S.; Kyle, Steve C.
"This paper shows how lack of competitiveness for commercial agriculture in Amazonia makes difficult the attraction or retention of mobile factors (capital and labor) generating a state of continuous scarcity for these factors. It is also shown that policies attempting to regain equilibrium in factor proportions like capital subsidies or colonization programs are ineffective. Finally, it is shown that attempts to maximize the return on scarce factors lead to overutilization of natural resource and environmental degradation. Although global price incentives policies can help, technical progress is the important variable for the long run sustainability of agriculture in Amazonia."
Agricultural Abandonment, Suburban Growth, and Forest Expansion in Puerto Rico between 1991 and 2000
(2008) Pares-Ramos, Isabel K.; Gould, William A.; Aide, Mitchell
"The response of local economies to the globalization process can have a large effect on population and land-use dynamics. In countries with a high population density and relatively high levels of education, the globalization process has resulted in a shift in the local economy from agriculture to manufacturing, technology, and service sectors. This shift in the economy has impacted land-use dynamics by decreasing agricultural lands, increasing urban growth, and in some cases, increasing forest cover. This process of economic and forest transition has been well documented in Puerto Rico for the period 1950 to 1990, but some authors predicted that poor planning and continued urban growth would eliminate the gains in forest cover. To investigate the impacts of recent economic changes, we evaluated demographic and land-use changes for 880 barrios (i.e., neighborhoods), the smallest administrative unit, in Puerto Rico using government census data from 1990 and 2000 and land-cover classifications from 1991 and 2000. During this period, the population increased by 284 127 people (8.2%). Most of the growth was in the suburban barrios, whereas urban barrios lost population. This shift was reflected by the construction of more than 100 000 housing units in suburban barrios. Although urban sprawl is perceived as the major land-cover change, urban cover only increased from 10% to 11% between 1990 and 2000, whereas the increase in forest cover was much greater (28% to 40%). Grasslands and shrublands were the major sources of new urban and forest areas in 2000. Although these results are encouraging in terms of increasing forest cover, most of the new development has been concentrated in the coastal plains, which are the location of most of the remaining agricultural areas, a few protected areas, and threatened ecosystems (e.g., mangroves)."
Agricultural Groundwater Exploitation: An Experimental Study
(2006) Giordana, Gastón; Montginoul, Marielle; Willinger, Mark
"This paper is the initial part of a larger study motivated by challenges that the current practice in groundwater exploitation poses to sustainable development of coastal zones. The growing pressure on costal groundwater resources, due to the accelerated urban and tourism industry development combined to an irrigation water demand more and more demanding on high water quality, has arisen a commons problem that could have local catastrophic consequences. Notably, the overexploitation of groundwater in coastal zones may lead to water resource degradation as consequence of salt water intrusion into the aquifer. We present the case of the Roussillon coastal plane, a zone located in the Pyrénées-Orientales department (South of France), which is a good representative case of water problems faced in southern Europe. In this region, water demand is satisfied by surface water and a two-layer local aquifer. The superficial layer has sea connections, meaning that overexploitation can generate sea water intrusion. The layers are naturally separated by an impermeable substratum. This independency can be broken by an overexploitation of the deep layer; the impermeable substratum could become locally permeable letting polluted water from the superficial layer percolate. "We concentrate our effort on the agricultural water demand that remains the second one, in quantitative terms, after the urban water demand. Farmers can generally satisfy their needs by extracting water from substitute resources, namely, surface water (from irrigation channels) and groundwater. Due to end-users demand (of crop products) and due to irrigation techniques, farmers prefer groundwater than surface, especially the deep layer. But farmers' water exploitation behavior is not well known: tube wells are not registered even if it is compulsory and there is no water meter. In order to better analyze their behavior under this configuration, we implement laboratory experiments, by studying an N-person discrete-time deterministic dynamic game of T periods fixed duration. The objective function is stage-additive and depends on a state variable, whose dynamic evolution is linked to past decisions of all players. Players have to decide whether to use a private good or, by paying a lump-sum fee, to extract on one of two imperfectly substitute Common-Pool Resources (CPRs). Two type of experiments were done: firstly, we considered only the quantitative problem; in a second step, we introduced the qualitative problem and then the possible connection between the two layers leading non only to an overexploitation of the deep layer but also to its pollution, which impact farmers' income. For each case, two treatments were done. In the affect each CPR separately. In a second treatment, the CPRs are not independent, both types of externalities are considered. The observations are confronted to three benchmark outcomes corresponding to distinct behavioural assumptions: (a) sub-game perfection, (b) joint payoff maximization, and (c) myopic behaviour."
Agricultural Indigenous and Farmers Traditional Knowledge: Rescue, Sistematization and Incorporation to the IEAS
(2006) Gomez Espinoza, Jose Antonio; González, Gerardo Gómez
"Under environmental breakdown context, and the low consideration that in indigenous and farmers communities, the Traditional Agricultural Knowledge (SAT) with low environmental impact are preserved under 'milpa' system and this production is almost the half of national production of this cereal, in this work is suggested to carry the SAT into of Agricultural Superior Institution (IEAS) curricula like a social and ecological pertinent answer of Agricultural Superior Education, this thesis is, a proposed conceptual framework for SAT study, the recovery, systematization, interpretation, identification of Sciences-SAT correspondences and instrumentation under context of apprenticeship education models; to carry them to the academic space under a study program."
Agriculture and Protection of Landscape Area of the White Carpathians
(2003) Krumalova, Veronika; Backman, Stefan
"The protected landscape area of the White Carpathians in Czech Republic is confronted with several threats. The protection of the landscape involves instituted policies and restrictions on production. Due to the approaching EU accession and the possible subsequent institutional changes, there is an increased demand for knowledge on production opportunities and threats. In addition there are immediate concerns on the relation between agricultural production and the environment. One major concern is the abandonment of agricultural land. In this article the combination of production elements and protection is described. Factor analyses are used to identify groups of farms with similarities in production structure and organisation. The results of the factor analysis are compared to typology achieved by interviews. Some important elements with policy and research implications are derived."
Agriculture Wrapped with Social Networks, Data Mining and Mobile Computing to Boost up Crop Productivity
(2010) Akkanini, Haritha; Junapudi, Vasavi
"'The backbone of Indian economy' –agriculture which is known for its multifunctional success in generating employment, livelihood, food, nutritional and ecological security is facing several problems in improving the crop productivity. As we had good expertise in the field of agriculture the crucial information is not reaching the farmer community in a timely manner. In this paper we made an effort to find a way out to bridge the gap in the broadcast of information so that timely decisions can be taken for a better farming. We are trying to propose a system which provides advisory services as a decision support to farmers on crop related issues using the mobile services. In addition to these, the effort is being made to familiarize this information through a social network where a human being is a resource to influence others instead of mass media. Initially the proposed system is designed to collect the climatic data and it will be passed to the mobiles of all farmers through messages. There is a coordinator for each region to provide suggestions periodically. At the end of cropping, the coordinator will collect the information like• Had the farmer utilized the climatic information• Type of soils• Type of seeds• Pesticides used• Yield information, etcwill be maintained in a database. Applying data mining techniques the results are analyzed. In each location identifying a person, who utilized the services and achieved the higher productivity. He will act as a motivator/educator to other farmers. Through him we will educate/motivate other farmers about to consider and follow the climate alert message information as valuable as mass media."
Agronomie, Agriculture, Forêts
(Publisud, 2008) Richard-Mollard, Daniel; Gillard, Jacques; Le Tacon, Francois; Perfect, Trevor John
"Six experts ont participéà l'Évaluation des sciences agricoles, dans des sous domaines divers. Unrapporteur général a étéchargé derecouper les observations, et desituer/'importance du domaine pourleMaroc (ci après). Nous donnons aussi des extraits derapports spécifiques, concernant l'agronomie et les forêts. Les rapports surles Sols et surl'Eau figurentà la suite."
Alleviating Poverty by Linking Smallholders with Agribusiness: Roles of Social Capital and Common Property
(2006) Marshall, Graham R.; Patrick, I.W.; Muktasam, A.; Ambarawati, I.G.A.A.
"Recent decades have witnessed a marked acceleration of agro- industrialisation processes in much of the developing world. This is opening up new opportunities for smallholders, even in isolated areas, to escape poverty by trading in the resulting new markets. There is, however, increasing recognition of the constraints faced by poor smallholders in becoming competitive within such markets. There has also been deepening awareness of the knowledge gaps impeding the design of institutional arrangements capable of surmounting these constraints. The concept of 'social capital' has found itself at the centre of efforts to address these knowledge gaps. "The focus in this paper is on examining what is known about: the challenges of ensuring that the poor share equitably in the benefits of market liberalisation; the extent to which these challenges involve social capital issues; and how such social capital issues might be addressed most effectively. Included in the review is a summary of findings relevant to these issues from recent research in Indonesia - concerned with contract farming and micro-finance delivery, respectively - involving two of the present authors. A proposal for further research involving all four authors is also presented. The research aim is to evaluate the role that social capital plays in Bali and Lombok (eastern Indonesia) in reducing rural poverty by helping smallholders access market opportunities arising from trade liberalisation. A particular focus would be on understanding of the conditions under which social capital in the form of common property institutions helps smallholders to access such opportunities."
Alley Farming in Thailand
(2010) Ogunlana, Elizabeth Adebola; Noomhorm, Athapol; Silakul, Teerapol
"Poverty alleviation and environmental preservation are very important issues to many governments. Alley farming is beneficial to the environment because it conserves soil and sustains yields over time. Specifically, alley farming reduces soil erosion, which is a major problem in Thailand. Alley farming was conducted on a farmer’s field at Khaokwan Thong, a village in Uthaithani Province, Northern Thailand. We did a two-by-two factorial with and without alley farming, and with and without fertilizer. From this study, we observed that the two species used, Leucaena leucocephala and Acacia auriculiformis, grow well in Thailand, and that alley farming is suitable for Thailand. Few Thai farmers have heard about alley farming. However, it is nevertheless useful to know that there is potential for alley farming in Thailand using the two species. These plants, based upon the diameter and height measurements provided, grew well."
Analysing Institutions, Policies, and Farming Systems for Sustainable Agriculture in Central and Eastern European Countries in Transition
(2001) Gatzweiler, Franz W.; Backman, Stefan; Sipilainen, Timo; Zellei, Anett
"The aim of this paper is to develop a comprehensive conceptual framework for the analysis of institutions, policies and farming systems for agri-environmental sustainability in Central and Eastern European countries in transition. The basic unit of analysis is the 'agri-environmental action scenario'. The action scenario consists of a set of components which together shape the outcomes of an agri-environnmental action situation. The framework consists of 1) the environmental effects of transition, 2) policies, institutions, and 4) farming systems. We aim at characterising these key elements of the framework, their relationship and interactions, and their role in achieving sustainability at the interface between agriculture and the environment. Environmental areas of concern are: water, soil and biodiversity. The paper intends to create a common understanding of basic concepts and a shared conceptual model among the members of the Central and Eastern European Sustainable Agriculture (CEESA) Network. The framework will be adapted according to new insights and findings during the course of research activities of the CEESA research project."
Analysis of Profitability and Risk in New Agriculture Using Dynamic Non-Linear Programming Model
(2010) Sharma, Rakesh Kumar; Sankhayan, Prem Lall; Singh, Ranveer
"Cropping pattern in the Himalayan region of India has undergone a significant change in the recent past. Introduction of horticultural crops such as vegetables, fruits and flowers has led to more intensive agriculture. Such a change, resulting in higher incomes and improvements of the overall living conditions has, however, been accompanied with increased income risk. This emphasizes the need for proper analysis of the cropping pattern, at an appropriate scale, such as a micro watershed. This was achieved by constructing a dynamic non-linear programming model incorporating appropriate objective function, constraints and crop and livestock activity budgets along with risk component present in the gross returns. The model was then solved under alternate policy scenarios by using General Algebraic Modeling Systems (GAMS) for the next 20 years. The optimum cropping plans were then compared with each other and with the existing plan. Tomato and carnation are the preferred crops, if the sole objective is profit maximization. Optimum plan with risk consideration was also assessed by fixing the variance in gross returns at the current level. It reduced the area under tomato in rainy season by growing capsicum and beans. Similarly, peas replaced tomato in winter season and chrysanthemum replaced carnation. By comparing it with the existing plan, it can be inferred that the people are more concerned to risk than the profits. The profits and risks from floriculture are relatively very high as compared to other crops. By removing constraints in credit availability, irrigation facilities, transportation and market yards, large scale production of vegetables and flowers can help in raising the income level."
An Analysis of Property Rights, Land Value, and Agriculture Investment on Two Frontiers in Brazil
(1993) Alston, Lee J.; Libecap, Gary D.
"In this paper, we examine the determinants of property rights and their interplay with agricultural investment and land value in two Brazilian states, Parana and Para."
Analysis of Surface Soil Moisture Patterns in Agricultural Landscapes Using Empirical Orthogonal Functions
(2009) Korres, W.; Koyama, C. N.; Fiener, P.; Schneider, K.
"Soil moisture is one of the fundamental variables in hydrology, meteorology and agriculture. Nevertheless, its spatio-temporal patterns in agriculturally used landscapes affected by multiple natural (rainfall, soil, topography etc.) and agronomic (fertilisation, soil management etc.) factors are often not well known. The aim of this study is to determine the dominant factors governing the spatio-temporal patterns of surface soil moisture in a grassland and an arable land test site within the Rur catchment in Western Germany. Surface soil moisture (0–6 cm) has been measured in an approx. 50×50 m grid at 14 and 17 dates (May 2007 to November 2008) in both test sites. To analyse spatio-temporal patterns of surface soil moisture, an Empirical Orthogonal Function (EOF) analysis was applied and the results were correlated with parameters derived from topography, soil, vegetation and land management to connect the pattern to related factors and processes. For the grassland test site, the analysis results in one significant spatial structure (first EOF), which explains about 57.5% of the spatial variability connected to soil properties and topography. The weight of the first spatial EOF is stronger on wet days. The highest temporal variability can be found in locations with a high percentage of soil organic carbon (SOC). For the arable land test site, the analysis yields two significant spatial structures, the first EOF, explaining 38.4% of the spatial variability, shows a highly significant correlation to soil properties, namely soil texture. The second EOF, explaining 28.3% of the spatial variability, is connected to differences in land management. The soil moisture in the arable land test site varies more during dry and wet periods on locations with low porosity."
Analysis of Virtual Water Flows Associated With the Trade of Maize in the SADC Region: Importance of Scale
(2009) Dabrowski, J. M.; Masekoameng, E.; Ashton, P. J.
"The concept of virtual water encourages a country to view agricultural crops in terms of the amount of water required to produce those crops, with a view to implementing trading policies that promote the saving of scarce water resources. Recently, increased attention has focussed on partitioning the virtual water content of crops into green and blue water (derived from rainfall and irrigation, respectively) as the latter has higher opportunity costs associated with its use and therefore impacts directly on scarcity. Maize is the most important crop traded within the SADC region. South Africa is the largest producer and exporter of maize, with the majority of its exports destined for other SADC countries. In comparison to other SADC countries, South Africa produces maize relatively efficiently, with a low virtual water content and a high green (868 m3 t−1 ) to blue (117 m3 t−1 ) water ratio. The blue water content is however higher than for maize produced in all other SADC countries, with the exception of Namibia (211 m3 t−1 ). Current trade patterns therefore result in a net expenditure of blue water (66×106 m3 ), almost all of which is exported by South Africa (65×106 m3 ). South Africa is one of the most water scarce countries in the region and analysis of virtual water flows indicates that current SADC maize trading patterns are influenced by national productivity as opposed to water scarcity. The virtual water content of maize was estimated for each of South Africa’s nineteen Water Management Area’s (WMA) and used as a proxy to represent water use efficiency for maize production. The virtual water content varied widely across all of the WMAs, ranging from 360 m3 t−1 in the Ustutu Mhlatuze to 1000 m3 t−1 in the Limpopo. A comparison of the virtual water content and production of maize (expressed as a percentage of the total national production) identified those WMAs where maize production is highly water inefficient(e.g. Lower Orange and Limpopo WMAs). Results suggest that, while a national estimate of the virtual water content of a crop may indicate a relatively efficient use of water, an analysis of the virtual water content at smaller scales can reveal inefficient use of water for the same crop. Therefore, analysis of the virtual water content of crops and trading of agricultural products at different spatial scales (i.e. regional, national and WMA) could be an important consideration within the context of water allocation, water use efficiency and alleviation of water scarcity."
Analyzing Institutional Successes and Failures: A Millennium of Common Mountain Pastures in Iceland
(1991) Eggertsson, Thráinn
"Throughout their history, the island economies of the North Atlantic have relied to a large extent on common property resources both in agriculture and in the fisheries. It is well established that the sharing of resources need not always lead to a full-scale dissipation of wealth, the tragedy of the commons, when certain conditions are met. However, it is also well known that communities often fail to establish institutions for restricting entry to the commons, and, even when they exist, these institutions are often fragile structures, vulnerable to pressures from population growth, technological change, and shifts in political power and processes. Therefore, it is of considerable interest to examine the evolution of property rights to natural resources in the North Atlantic communities, such as Iceland, Greenland, and the Faroes, and investigate whether institutions did emerge in these societies that effectively regulated entry and prevented the dissipation of their natural resources. The present study is concerned with the law and economics of Icelandic agriculture, specifically with the institutions that for more than a thousand years have regulated the use of the country's extensive common mountain pastures."
Application of Vegetation Indices for Agricultural Crop Yield Prediction Using Neural Network Techniques
(2010) Panda, Sudhanshu Sekhar; Ames, Daniel P.; Panigrahi, Suranjan
"Spatial variability in a crop field creates a need for precision agriculture. Economical and rapid means of identifying spatial variability is obtained through the use of geotechnology (remotely sensed images of the crop field, image processing, GIS modeling approach, and GPS usage) and data mining techniques for model development. Higher-end image processing techniques are followed to establish more precision. The goal of this paper was to investigate the strength of key spectral vegetation indices for agricultural crop yield prediction using neural network techniques. Four widely used spectral indices were investigated in a study of irrigated corn crop yields in the Oakes Irrigation Test Area research site of North Dakota, USA. These indices were: (a) red and near-infrared (NIR) based normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), (b) green and NIR based green vegetation index (GVI), (c) red and NIR based soil adjusted vegetation index (SAVI), and (d) red and NIR based perpendicular vegetation index (PVI). These four indices were investigated for corn yield during 3 years (1998, 1999, and 2001) and for the pooled data of these 3 years. Initially, Back-propagation Neural Network (BPNN) models were developed, including 16 models (4 indices * 4 years including the data from the pooled years) to test for the efficiency determination of those four vegetation indices in corn crop yield prediction. The corn yield was best predicted using BPNN models that used the means and standard deviations of PVI grid images. In all three years, it provided higher prediction accuracies, coefficient of determination (r2), and lower standard error of prediction than the models involving GVI, NDVI, and SAVI image information. The GVI, NDVI, and SAVI models for all three years provided average testing prediction accuracies of 24.26% to 94.85%, 19.36% to 95.04%, and 19.24% to 95.04%, respectively while the PVI models for all three years provided average testing prediction accuracies of 83.50% to 96.04%. The PVI pool model provided better average testing prediction accuracy of 94% with respect to other vegetation models, for which it ranged from 89–93%. Similarly, the PVI pool model provided coefficient of determination (r2) value of 0.45 as compared to 0.31–0.37 for other index models. Log10 data transformation technique was used to enhance the prediction ability of the PVI models of years 1998, 1999, and 2001 as it was chosen as the preferred index. Another model (Transformed PVI (Pool)) was developed using the log10 transformed PVI image information to show its global application. The transformed PVI models provided average corn yield prediction accuracies of 90%, 97%, and 98% for years 1998, 1999, and 2001, respectively. The pool PVI transformed model provided as average testing accuracy of 93% along with r2 value of 0.72 and standard error of prediction of 0.05 t/ha."
Approach Towards an Operational Tool to Apply Institutional Analysis for the Assessment of Policy Feasibility within SEAMLESS-IF
(SEAMLESS Integrated Project, 2007) Schleyer, Christian; Theesfeld, Insa; Hagedorn, Konrad; Aznar, O.; Callois, J.M.
"This Deliverable D2.4.2 comprises the work done by Task 2.4 (Activities 2.4.1-3) on the development of indicators characterising policy delivery systems and institutional environments. Task 2.4 addresses, in particular, the issue of the institutional conditions required to implement policies that acknowledge and promote sustainability and multifunctional aspects of agriculture. The final goal of Task 2.4 is to produce ex-ante an institutional assessment of agri-environmental policy options through their impact on the contribution of agriculture to sustainable development. For this purpose, the 'Procedure for Institutional Compatibility Assessment' (PICA) has been developed as a formalised methodology to assess the compatibility between policy options and various institutional contexts."
Aquaculture vis-a-vis Agriculture
(2000) Khan, S. A.; Lyla, P.; Veerappan, N.; Rajagopal, S.
"The effect of aquaculture, especially shrimp farming, on agriculture has caused heated debate among aquaculturists, agriculturists, and non-governmental organizations. As data on the negative impact of shrimp farming on adjacent rice fields are not available, a study was undertaken in rice fields skirting three shrimp farms: a semi-intensive farm; an extensive farm; and a semi-intensive farm with a buffer zone. The buffer zone was found to be helpful in preventing salinization of the adjacent agricultural fields and the Electrical Conductivity (EC) values (less than 1) reported were found to be harmless to the rice crop. Thus, aquaculture and agriculture can coexist in coastal areas if there are buffer zones in between."
Are Local People Conservationists? Analysis of Transition Dynamics from Agroforests to Monoculture Plantations in Indonesia
(2010) Feintrenie, Laurène; Schwarze, Stefan; Levang, Patrice
"Cash crops are developing in the once forested areas of Indonesia in parallel with market and economic improvements. Perennial crops such as coffee, cocoa, and rubber were first planted in estates by private or public companies. Local people then integrated these crops into their farming systems, often through the planting of agroforests, that is, intercropping the new cash crop with upland rice and food crops. The crop was generally mixed with fruit trees, timber, and other useful plants. A geographic specialization occurred, driven by biophysical constraints and market opportunities, with expansion of cocoa in Sulawesi, coffee in Lampung, and natural rubber in eastern Sumatra. However, during the past three decades, these agroforests have increasingly been converted into more productive monoculture plantations. A common trajectory can be observed in agricultural landscapes dominated by a perennial cash crop: from ladang to agroforests, and then to monoculture plantations. This process combines agricultural expansion at the expense of natural forests and specialization of the land cover at the expense of biodiversity and wildlife habitats. We determined the main drivers of agricultural expansion and intensification in three regions of Indonesia based on perception surveys and land use profitability analysis. When the national and international contexts clearly influence farmers’ decisions, local people appear very responsive to economic opportunities. They do not hesitate to change their livelihood system if it can increase their income. Their cultural or sentimental attachment to the forest is not sufficient to prevent forest conversion."
Asian Summer Monsoon and its Associated Rainfall Variability in Thailand
(2010) Limsakul, Atsamon; Limjirakan, Sangchan; Suttamanuswong, Boonchob
"The Asian monsoon is an important component of the Earth’s climate. Its associated rainfall variability is a crucial factor for Thailand’s socio-economic development, water resources and agricultural management. An analysis shows that the Thailand rainfall annual cycle is in phase with the Indian summer monsoon (ISM) and the western North Pacific summer monsoon (WNPSM). On the basis of the Empirical Orthogonal Function (EOF) analysis, the dominant spatial-temporal interannual variability in summer monsoon rainfall (Jun.–Sep.) during 1975-2006 could be explained by the first two EOF modes, accounting for 34% of the total variance. The EOF1 was spatially dominated by strong positive signals in the central and east, whereas the EOF2 exhibited dipole variability. The coefficient time series of EOF1 significantly correlated positively with ISM index, but negatively with WNPSM index. The results suggest that summer monsoon rainfall in Thailand is higher (lower) than normal during the strengthening (weakening) of ISM. In contrast, rainfall in the north-east (central) is surplus (deficit) during the strengthening (weakening) of WNPSM. These findings imply that, on an interannual time scale, ISM and WNPSM exert their influence to a different extent on summer monsoon rainfall in Thailand. A clear picture of linking mechanisms and interactions with another climate mode in the Indo-Pacific sector needs to be understood. This knowledge is essential for effectively adapting to climate-related hazards and rainfall extremes and for better management of water resource and agriculture in Thailand, especially under current/future warming conditions."
Assessing Current and Potential Rainfed Maize Suitability Under Climate Change Scenarios in México
(2010) Monterroso Rivas, A. I.; Alvarez, C. Conde; Dorantes, G. Rosales; Gomez Diaz, J. D.; Garcia, C. Gay
"We conducted an assessment on the capacity to grow maize under rainfed conditions as well as under simulations of climate change scenarios in México. The selected method took into account the most limiting factor from different variables that maize requires to grow. These factors were compared, resulting in potential areas for maize distribution, classified in four different suitability levels: suitable, moderately suitable, limited suitability and not suitable. The emissions scenarios of climate change selected were A2 and B2 by 2050, including the GFDL-CM2.0, UKHADGEM1 and ECHAM5/MPI models. The results indicated that in base scenario, 63.1% of the national surface presents some degree of maize growing suitability. Specifically, 6.2% of the national surface indicated suitable conditions, while 25.1 and 31.6% had moderated and limited conditions, respectively. According to the climate change models, we were able to determine the full suitability level is also the most vulnerable one and as a consequence, this will also be the most aggravated one by decreasing its surface 3% according with UKHadley B2 and up to 4.3% in accordance with ECHAM5/MPI A2. This will make the limited suitability classification the one with the largest national territory, as much as 33.4%, according to ECHAM5/MPI A2 and up to 43.8% reflected by the GFDL-CM2.0 A2 model. The ECHAM5/MPI model indicates the most adverse conditions for maize growth, while GFDL model represents the less aggravating. All this clearly reflects that the natural conditions given for maize growing will become more restrictive, making it critical to implement environmental adapting measures."
Assessing the Impact of Integrated Natural Resource Management: Challenges and Experiences
(2002) Gottret, Maria Veronica; White, Douglas C.
"Assessing the impact of integrated natural resource management (INRM) research poses a challenge to scientists. The complexity of INRM interventions requires a more holistic approach to impact assessment, beyond the plot and farm levels and beyond traditional analysis of economic returns. Impact assessment for INRM combines the traditional 'what' and 'where' factors of economic and environmental priorities with newer 'who' and 'how' aspects of social actors and institutions. This paper presents an analytical framework and methodology for assessing the impact of INRM. A key feature of the proposed methodology is that it starts with a detailed planning process that develops a well-defined, shared, and holistic strategy to achieve development impact. This methodology, which is known as the 'paths of development impact' methodology, includes the mapping of research outputs, intermediate outcomes, and development impacts. A central challenge is to find a balance between the use of generalizable measures that facilitate cross-site comparison and slower participatory process methods that empower local stakeholders. Sufficient funding for impact assessment and distinct stakeholder interests are also challenges. Two hillside sites in Central America and one forest margin site in Peru serve as case studies."
An Assessment of Small-scale Users' Inclusion in Large-scale Water Users Associations of South Africa
(2004) Faysse, Nicolas
"The management of water resources is being transformed in South Africa. All water users, especially the small-scale ones, are now invited to participate in this management. At the local level, the former whites-only Irrigation Boards (IBs) are to become more inclusive Water User Associations (WUAs), incorporating all water users. The actual outcomes of small-scale user involvement in the already accepted WUAs are not obvious. This report reviews the process of inclusion of small scale users in the new large-scale WUAs. The analysis presented here uses information from previously published case studies. In order to assess the potential benefits of having small-scale users on board, the research investigated the possible overlap between water-related problems of small-scale users and the functions of the WUAs. The presence of small-scale users in the WUA is always beneficial, even though they are faced with the problem of lack of funds for operation and maintenance. The possible benefit of the presence of drinking water users (rural communities and farm workers) stumbles on a lack of clarity when it comes to the responsibility of the WUA with regard to water quality and drinking water supply. It appears that the lack of internal organization of small-scale users such as farm workers and rural communities is a major stumbling block. While the presence of small-scale users at the management committee helps them in terms of capacity building and enables them to voice their problems, such a practice has still proved to be insufficient. This report recommends external monitoring of small-scale user inclusion after the transformation of an IB into a WUA. The problem oriented approach of this research may also facilitate assessment of the inclusion of small scale users in the catchment management agencies of South Africa, as well as in water resource management organizations in other developing countries where large- and small scale users share water from the same source."
An Assessment of the Small-Scale Irrigation Management Turnover Program in Indonesia
(2000) Vermillion, Douglas L.; Samad, Madar; Pusposutardjo, Suprodjo; Arif, Sigit S.; Rochdyanto, Saiful
"The purpose of this study is to assess the results of the Small-Scale Irrigation Turnover Program in Indonesia. In 1987, the Government of Indonesia adopted a policy to turn over to water user associations (WUAs) the management of all public irrigation systemsfrom the intake to drainage facilitiesin the country, which are 500 hectares or less in service area. The primary interest of the government in the turnover policy is to lighten its cost burden for the irrigation subsector while enabling farmers to sustain and even improve the productivity of irrigated agriculture through the mobilization of their own local resources. Generally speaking, the primary concern of farmers (in a context where there is no volumetric water charge) is to maintain or increase the returns per unit of land and labor."
An Assessment of the Village Tank Rehabilitation Program of the Freedom From Hunger Campaign Board in Anuradhapura District
(1991) Dayaratne, M. H. S.; Moragoda, Ranjanie
"The Village Tank Rehabilitation Program of the National Freedom From Hunger Campaign (FFHC) Board is assessed in this paper as a parallel study to the Anuradhapura Dry-Zone Agriculture Project (ADZAP) which was carried out by the International Irrigation Management Institute (IIMI) in 1988. Following a nongovernmental approach, the FFHC Board has implemented tank rehabilitation programs in several districts in the island. The Thanthirimale cluster in Anuradhapura District is the largest tank rehabilitation project implemented by the Board. In this study, the Board's program in Thanthirimale was assessed through a sample survey, following a similar survey methodology used to assess the Tank Rehabilitation Program of ADZAP."
An Assessment of Tree Plantation Activity Among Smallholders in the District of Ranau, Sabah
(2010) Lintangah, Walter; Russel Mojiol, Andy; Kodoh, Julius; Solimun, Majhinus
"The study was conducted to assess the tree plantation activity among smallholders in the District of Ranau,Sabah. There were six range areas involved, namely Kundasang, Randagong, Nalapak, Lohan-Bongkud, Timbua and Perancangan. The objectives of the study have been to identify the type of tree species planted, the distribution of tree plantation areas, the planting practiced, and the perception of small holders towards tree plantation activity. Data were gathered by direct observation, interviews, questionnaire, as well as secondary data, which were collected from related agencies such as the Agricultural Department and the Rubber Industrial Board in Ranau. There were 47 observations of plantation areas recorded, and the farmers involved were interviewed. The study has identified that Hevea brasiliensis and Durio zibethinus of the agriculture crops' tree were the most types planted by the small holders. Species planted under the category of other selected plantation trees were Acacia sp. (40 %), Tectona grandis (29 %), Pinus sp. (18 %), Azadirachta excels, Neolamarckia cadamba, Octomeles sumatrana and Eucalyptus sp.(13 %). The species of Acacia sp., Tectona grandis, Octomeles sumatrana and Eucalyptus sp. were found at Randagong, Lohan-Bongkud, Timbua and Perancangan while Pinus sp. was mainly found at Kundasang. Azadirachta excelsa, Neolamarckia cadamba and Octomeles sumatrana were only found at Timbua, Lohan and Nalapak. The study has also revealed that the tree plantations among the small holders in Ranau were influenced by land areas owned by the farmer, and the willingness to wait for the long term outcome of the investment. Integrated planting among trees and various crops was applied in order to maximize the usage of the available land. The tree plantation under the category of agriculture crops was mainly for the purpose of economic income, while other selected plantation trees were cultivated for landscaping, long term investment and also for soil protection."
Attitudes to Privatization of Land among Ukrainian Peasantry
(1995) Pribytkova, Irina
"Reforming of land ownership system in Ukraine infringes upon different social groups' interests in the village. The principal of them are peasantry and authorities of all levels. Their interests, expectations, resources, notion about property rights and its firmness have the great influence on running of land ownership reformation. For understanding all collisions of current moment and forecast the most probable way of land ownership system changing it is necessary to find out answers for the next questions: What is the attitudes towards land privatization and different forms of rural economics among diverse social groups of Ukrainian villagers today?; What is understanding of property rights and its protection among peasantry?; Does privatization of land, conducting in the Ukraine 'from the top', correspond to peasantry's interests?; Does design of land privatization answer to its realization?; and What is the level of peasantry trust in authorities' intention to change the property rights? "Author of the paper makes an attempt to answer these questions using the results of sociological inquests and analysis of statistical data. Author comes to a conclusion about the very low level of rights-consciousness among villagers, their distrust to authorities and as a result of this temporizing position towards radical reforming of property rights, the peasants' adherence to habitual collective forms of agrarian economics. But the vital interests of the Ukrainian peasant are bound up with their private plots, which demonstrate stability and efficiency during the whole of its history."
Balancing Ecosystem Services and Disservices: Smallholder Farmers’ Use and Management of Forest and Trees in an Agricultural Landscape in Southwestern Ethiopia
(2014) Ango, Tola Gemechu; Börjeson, Lowe; Senbeta, Feyera; Hylander, Kristoffer
"Farmers’ practices in the management of agricultural landscapes influence biodiversity with implications for livelihoods, ecosystem service provision, and biodiversity conservation. In this study, we examined how smallholding farmers in an agriculture-forest mosaic landscape in southwestern Ethiopia manage trees and forests with regard to a few selected ecosystem services and disservices that they highlighted as 'beneficial' or 'problematic.' Qualitative and quantitative data were collected from six villages, located both near and far from forest, using participatory field mapping and semistructured interviews, tree species inventory, focus group discussions, and observation. The study showed that farmers’ management practices, i.e., the planting of trees on field boundaries amid their removal from inside arable fields, preservation of trees in semimanaged forest coffee, maintenance of patches of shade coffee fields in the agricultural landscape, and establishment of woodlots with exotic trees result in a restructuring of the forest-agriculture mosaic. In addition, the strategies farmers employed to mitigate crop damage by wild mammals such as baboons and bush pigs, e.g., migration and allocation of migrants on lands along forests, have contributed to a reduction in forest and tree cover in the agricultural landscape. Because farmers’ management practices were overall geared toward mitigating the negative impact of disservices and to augment positive services, we conclude that it is important to operationalize ecosystem processes as both services and disservices in studies related to agricultural landscapes."
Barriers and Opportunities for Sustainable Food Systems in Northeastern Kansas
(2010) Peterson, Hikaru Hanawa; Selfa, Theresa; Jank, Rhonda
"Survey responses of producers and institutional buyers in northeastern Kansas (United States) were analyzed to understand barriers and opportunities for sustainable food systems in the region where their emergence has been limited. Producers and buyers identified barriers previously noted regarding mismatches of available quantities and prices. Producers’ enthusiasm to supply locally exceeded buyers’ interest to source locally. Transportation was identified as one of the major concerns by producers, and their responses to choice tasks revealed producers’ preferences to sell locally while pricing their products to secure sales revenue and to cover their logistics expenses at least partially."
Between Arguments, Interests and Expertise: The Institutional Development of the Dutch Water Boards, 1953-Present
(2016) Mostert, Erik
"The Dutch water boards perform essential tasks for the Netherlands and generally effectively, yet they have often been called old-fashioned, ineffective and expensive. This paper describes and analyses the discussions on the water boards since 1953 in order to increase insight in the factors that influence institutional change in water management. In this period the water boards have changed a lot: their number has been reduced from 2670 to 24, they got new tasks, and more groups are now represented and contribute financially. But they have also successfully resisted proposals to abolish them or cancel the reserved seats for specific groups. Change occurred when groups with a vested interest in the water boards, such as agriculture, saw the change as strengthening the boards, and when these groups were relatively weak and could be overruled. In other cases there was continuity. One of the factors influencing the strength of these groups was their influence on public discourse via, for instance, the many advisory bodies with water board experts on them."
Between Conservationism, Eco-Populism and Developmentalism -- Discourses in Biodiversity Policy in Thailand and Indonesia
(2005) Wittmer, Heidi; Birner, Regina
"The present paper analyzes the role of discourse in conflicts concerning nature conservation in tropical countries. We focus on the contested question as to whether and to which extent local communities should be allowed to live and use resources inside protected areas. Applying the concepts of belief-systems, story-lines and discourse coalitions, we analyze two empirical case studies dealing with this conflict: The first case study is concerned with a policy process at the national level that aimed at passing a community forestry law in Thailand to make the establishment of community forests in protected areas possible. The second case study deals with the proposed resettlement of a village from the Lore Lindu National Park in Sulawesi, Indonesia. In both cases, three discourses could be observed: a conservationist discourse, an eco-populist discourse, and a developmentalist discourse. The case studies show that the conservationists and the developmentalists were able to form a discourse coalition, which was challenged by the proponents of the eco-populist discourse. The analysis also demonstrates that establishing story-lines in the discourse can lead to the neglect of facts and problems that do not fit in either discourse. The paper draws attention to the role of science in the different discourses and concludes that scientists should become more aware of the role they play in the different discourses."
Between Market Failure, Policy Failure and 'Community Failure': Property Rights, Crop-Livestock Conflicts and the Adoption of Sustainable Land Use Practices in the Dry Zone of Sri Lanka
(2002) Birner, Regina; Gunaweera, Hasantha
"Using the case of the semi-arid zone of Southern Sri Lanka as an example, the paper shows that crop damages caused by grazing livestock can constitute an important obstacle to the adoption of available technologies for more sustainable land use. The paper considers crop damages as an externality problem and shows that the classical solutions to externalities-the neo-liberal, the interventionist solution and the communitarian solution-cannot be applied in the Sri Lankan case due to market failure, government failure and 'community failure.' The paper discusses collective action and bargaining between organized interest groups as an alternative solution and analyses the conditions which make such a solution work. The paper concludes that - in the Sri Lankan case - a decentralized system of government, a preferential voting system creating incentives for politicians, an institutionalized negotiation platform, and the facilitating role of intermediaries favored this solution."
Beyond the City: The Rural Contribution to Development
(The World Bank, 2006) de Ferranti, David; Perry, Guillermo E.; Foster, William; Lederman, Daniel; Valdés, Alberto
From p. 1-2: "Most LAC countries are preoccupied about the state of their rural economy, particularly the competitiveness of rural economic activities, poverty, and environmental degradation. While the majority of LAC countries have in place trade policies, sector-specific government support policies, social intervention policies, infrastructure development strategies, and various regulatory regimes designed to respond to demands of various subsectors in the rural economy, most of these have focused on problems affecting the rural economy per se, without paying enough attention to how the rural economies (and policies) contribute to overall national welfare. This report aims to fill this gap by systematically evaluating the contribution of rural development and policies to growth, poverty alleviation, and environmental degradation both in rural areas and in the rest of the economy. Specifically, it uses this broad framework to shed light on five critical policy issues for Latin American economic authorities. For the convenience of readers interested in policy issues, this chapter presents first a summary of the policy implications of our findings. We then turn to the findings themselves, summarizing our methodological approach and main results."
Biodiversidad de Semillas Comunes e Inseparables de su Comunalidad
(2022) Castro-Colina, Libertad
"La diversidad de semillas, su comunalidad (campesinos) y sus prácticas locales (milpa y ejido) son comunes que pueden ser influidos por contextos no locales (ciencia y regulación). A través de un análisis basado en los ocho principios de diseño de instituciones comunes de Elinor Ostrom, este estudio concluyó que la ciencia con perspectivas agroecológicas apoya a la sabiduría milenaria de la milpa, mientras que la ciencia con un enfoque alineado a la Revolución Verde no. Además, la mayor parte de la legislación analizada es considerada como un obstáculo para la estabilidad del común."
Biodiversity Associated with the Rice Field Agro-ecosystem in Asian Countries: A Brief Review
(2003) Bambaradeniya, Channa N. B.; Amarasinghe, Felix P.
"This review is intended to bring together the published information available on the biodiversity associated with the rice field agrosystem, in countries extending across Asia from Sri Lanka to Japan."
Biodiversity Management: Intellectual Property Rights and Farmers' Rights
(1998) Trommeter, Michel
From the Author's Paper: "Traditional plant varieties and wild species are disappearing irreversibly, and this process has resulted in the disappearance of farming know-how and the genetic information it entailed. These varieties have been replaced by modern ones, which are economically more efficient but which have only a low degree of genetic diversity. What will happen if, for example, these modern varieties turn out to be ill-adapted, or if a pathogen appears? Given the reduction of biodiversity and the risks involved, it is necessary to preserve: preservation for the present generations, in private banks where the preserved material is, or will be, used in plant breeding programming (the economic aspect of preservation); preservation for future generations, by developing an analysis in social terms of the intergenerational models and of sustainable development. "...In this paper there are two goals: to evaluate the benefits or advantages of a project integrating sustainable management of biodiversity at each level of intervention in the decision (local, national, global) and to define property rights on the genetic resources."
Biodiversity, Urban Areas, and Agriculture: Locating Priority Ecoregions for Conservation
(2003) Ricketts, Taylor; Imhoff, Marc
"Urbanization and agriculture are two of the most important threats to biodiversity worldwide. The intensities of these land-use phenomena, however, as well as levels of biodiversity itself, differ widely among regions. Thus, there is a need to develop a quick but rigorous method of identifying where high levels of human threats and biodiversity coincide. These areas are clear priorities for biodiversity conservation. In this study, we combine distribution data for eight major plant and animal taxa (comprising over 20,000 species) with remotely sensed measures of urban and agricultural land use to assess conservation priorities among 76 terrestrial ecoregions in North America. We combine the species data into overall indices of richness and endemism. We then plot each of these indices against the percent cover of urban and agricultural land in each ecoregion, resulting in four separate comparisons. For each comparison, ecoregions that fall above the 66th quantile on both axes are identified as priorities for conservation. These analyses yield four 'priority sets' of 6-16 ecoregions (8-21% of the total number) where high levels of biodiversity and human land use coincide. These ecoregions tend to be concentrated in the southeastern United States, California, and, to a lesser extent, the Atlantic coast, southern Texas, and the U.S. Midwest. Importantly, several ecoregions are members of more than one priority set and two ecoregions are members of all four sets. Across all 76 ecoregions, urban cover is positively correlated with both species richness and endemism. Conservation efforts in densely populated areas therefore may be equally important (if not more so) as preserving remote parks in relatively pristine regions."
Biofuels, Agriculture and Poverty Reduction
(2007) Peskett, Leo; Slater, Rachel; Stevens, Chris; Dufey, Annie
"The development of biofuels has generated vigorous debate on economic and environmental grounds. Our attention here is on its potential impacts on poverty reduction. The potential is large, whether through employment, wider growth multipliers and energy price effects. But it is also fragile: it will be reduced where feedstock production tends to be large scale, or causes pressure on land access, and its success can be undermined by many of the same policy, regulatory or investment shortcomings as impede agriculture. Whilst some of the factors facilitating, and impacts of, biofuels can be tracked at global level, its distributional impacts are complex, and point to the need for country-by-country analysis of potential poverty impacts."
Biophysical and Socioeconomic Factors Associated with Forest Transitions at Multiple Spatial and Temporal Scales
(2011) Yackulic, Charles B.; Fagan, Matthew; Jain, Meha; Jina, Amir; Lim, Yili; Marlier, Miriam; Muscarella, Robert; Adame, Patricia; DeFries, Ruth; Uriarte, Maria
"Forest transitions (FT) occur when socioeconomic development leads to a shift from net deforestation to reforestation; these dynamics have been observed in multiple countries across the globe, including the island of Puerto Rico in the Caribbean. Starting in the 1950s, Puerto Rico transitioned from an agrarian to a manufacturing and service economy reliant on food imports, leading to extensive reforestation. In recent years, however, net reforestation has leveled off. Here we examine the drivers of forest transition in Puerto Rico from 1977 to 2000 at two subnational, nested spatial scales (municipality and barrio) and over two time periods (1977-1991 and 1991-2000). This study builds on previous work by considering the social and biophysical factors that influence both reforestation and deforestation at multiple spatial and temporal scales. By doing so within one analysis, this study offers a comprehensive understanding of the relative importance of various social and biophysical factors for forest transitions and the scales at which they are manifest. Biophysical factors considered in these analyses included slope, soil quality, and land-cover in the surrounding landscape. We also considered per capita income, population density, and the extent of protected areas as potential factors associated with forest change. Our results show that, in the 1977-1991 period, biophysical factors that exhibit variation at municipality scales (~100 km²) were more important predictors of forest change than socioeconomic factors. In this period, forest dynamics were driven primarily by abandonment of less productive, steep agricultural land in the western, central part of the island. These factors had less predictive power at the smaller barrio scale (~10 km²) relative to the larger municipality scale during this time period. The relative importance of socioeconomic variables for deforestation, however, increased over time as development pressures on available land increased. From 1991-2000, changes in forest cover reflected influences from multiple factors, including increasing population densities, land development pressure from suburbanization, and the presence of protected areas. In contrast to the 1977-1991 period, drivers of deforestation and reforestation over this second interval were similar for the two spatial scales of analyses. Generally, our results suggest that although broader socioeconomic changes in a given region may drive the demand for land, biophysical factors ultimately mediate where development occurs. Although economic development may initially result in reforestation due to rural to urban migration and the abandonment of agricultural lands, increased economic development may lead to deforestation through increased suburbanization pressures."
Breaking the Cycles of Land Degradation: A Case Study from Ban Lak Sip, Laos
(2005) Williams, Sandy; Weale, Jim
"Around the world, intensive farming in fragile environments is taking its toll on natural resources. This has led to greater awareness of the need to use agricultural land sustainably to maximize yields without compromising the health and productivity of the soil. Laos' current rural-development and land-use policies were influenced in part by exactly such an environmental agenda. However, a recent study has shown that land degradation has actually increased in the village of Ban Lak Sip since these policies were put in place."
Bright Spots Demonstrate Community Successes in African Agriculture
(2006) Penning de Vries, F.W.T.
"This paper integrates the ideas and findings of four presentations in the section 'Community Successes' at the Nairobi NEPAD Regional Conference and those of the facilitated discussion sessions during the conference. The four presentations are also documented in the following chapters. We will focus here particularly on 'lessons learned' with respect to outscaling (more of the same) and upscaling (expansion to larger regions and higher levels of governance) of such successes."
Buscando la Autodestion en las Cajas de Agua del Valle de Coeneo-Huaniqueo, Michoacan
(2001) Lopez Pacheco, Elvia; Palerm Viqueira, Jacinta
"La permanencia del entarquinamiento como tecnica de riego que permitio la utilizacion de aguas torrenciales y el incremento de la frontera agricola en diferentes regiones del pais, durante los siglos XVIII, XIX y principios del XX, se vinculo a las haciendas y particularmente en el Bajio mexicano a las haciendas productoras de trigo. El desuso de esta tecnica de riego se ha atribuido a la discontinuidad generada, en la tenencia de la tierra con el reparto agrario y la irrupcion de los ejidatarios en el campo mexicano. "Sin embargo en la actualidad (siglo XXI) el entarquinamiento continua siendo empleado como tecnica de riego, en la cienega de Zacapu en el estado de Michoacan, la zona productora de lenteja mas importante a nivel nacional. En una zona donde predomina como tenencia de la tierra el ejido. Los ejidatarios en contraste con la teoria han permitido la persistencia del entarquinamiento en cajas de agua mediante la creacion de acuerdos comunitarios y multicomunitarios para el uso, mantenimiento y manejo de un sistema de regadio heredado de las haciendas a traves de una organizacion social autogestiva basada en la estructura ejidal."
Can TRIPs Deter Innovation? The Anticommons and Public Goods in Agricultural Research
(2004) Rangnekar, Dwijen
"The paper begins by outlining the concept of an anticommons property regime and then presents the notion that knowledge is a local (quasi) public good. It with this conceptual foundation that the policy issue of an anticommons property regime in agricultural research is discussed. While the latter discussion in quite speculative, it focuses on three policy problems: access and consolidation within the industry, transaction costs and uncertainty, and orphan crops/regions and research capacity."
Capacity Building for Participatory Irrigation Management in Sindh Province of Pakistan
(2001) Memon, Yameen; Talpur, Mustafa; Rust, Hammond Murray
"Based on a project in which IWMI assessed the training needs of the farmers under the Farmer Managed Irrigated Agriculture (FMIA), the study highlights the importance of training in areas such as; effective communication strategies and conflict resolution, equitable water distribution, optimum use of water, financial management and developing a business plan."
The Carr Lake Project: Potential Biophysical Benefits of Conversion to a Multiple-Use Park
(2007) Casagrande, Joel M.; Watson, Fred
"The Carr Lake Project aims to convert Carr Lakes 450 acres of agriculture fields into a regional multi-use park that will benefit flood protection, water quality, and wildlife habitat, while also providing additional recreational areas for the local community. The Project is represented by an informal consortium of interested parties including the Watershed Institute of California State University Monterey Bay, The City of Salinas, 1000 Friends of Carr Lake, and the Big Sur Land Trust."
Cash Income Diversification in Rural Small Holder Cassava Producing Households of Nigeria
(2008) Enete, A.A.; Achike, Anthonia I.
"The issue of poverty alleviation for the people of less developed nations of the world has currently assumed the status of a recurring decimal. This is particularly critical for sub-Saharan Africa, because, the region contains a growing share of the world’s absolute poor, with most of these found among rural farm households. High variability in crop yield and thus income variability arising from the vagaries of weather makes income diversification important for these households in order to improve their economic status. This paper, based on primary data collected as part of the Collaborative Study of Cassava in Africa, identified factors that drive cash income diversification decisions among rural farm households of Nigeria. Using Heckman’s two-stage model, it separates the first discrete decision of whether or not to engage in non-crop income activities from the continuous decision of how much non-crop income is needed by the household. While the level of formal education of the household head, good market access conditions and availability of initial liquidity stimulate the first decision to start non-crop income activities, only household characteristics (also including the level of formal education of the household head) drive the extent of non-crop cash income earned by the household. These observations further underscore the need for investing in people – education, and in infrastructure – improving market access, as potent tools for economic empowerment."
Cash Transfers: Mere 'Gadaffi Syndrome', or Serious Potential for Rural Rehabilitation and Development?
(2005) Harvey, Paul; Slater, Rachel; Farrington, John
"There has been a stark dichotomy between development approaches concerned with the productive sectors, usually focusing on enhancing the supply side, and those concerned with social protection, which have been widely regarded as a drain on public resources. This paper argues that the two are complementary and that social protection is less of a drain than previously thought. Transfers to the poor under social protection have generally been in kind, often taking the form of free or subsidised food. Nevertheless, recent experience in both development and rehabilitation contexts suggests a larger niche for cash transfers than many suppose, sometimes instead of in-kind transfers, at other times, in parallel with them. This paper reviews the evidence, drawing out implications for agriculture and natural resource development."
A Catalyst toward Sustainability? Exploring Social Learning and Social Differentiation Approaches with the Agricultural Poor
(2014) Shaw, Alison; Kristjanson, Patti
"Emerging sustainability challenges, such as food security, livelihood development and climate change, require innovative and experimental ways of linking science, policy and practice at all scales. This requires the development of processes that integrate diverse knowledge to generate adaptive development strategies into the future. Social learning is emerging as a promising way to make these linkages. If and how social learning approaches are being applied in practice among smallholder farming families--the bulk of the worlds food producers, requires specific attention. In this paper we use a case study approach to explore social learning among the agricultural poor. Five key evaluative factors: context assessment, inclusive design and management, facilitating learning, mobilizing knowledge and assessing outcomes, are used to analyze nine projects and programs in (or affiliated with) the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR). We explore three main questions: (1) in what contexts and in what ways are socially differentiated and marginalized groups enrolled in the learning process? (2) what, if any, are the additional benefits to social learning when explicitly using strategies to include socially differentiated groups? and (3) what are the benefits and trade-offs of applying these approaches for development outcomes? The findings suggest that, in the agricultural development context, social learning projects that include socially differentiated groups and create conditions for substantive two-way learning enhance the relevance and legitimacy of knowledge and governance outcomes, increasing the potential for accelerating sustainable development outcomes."
Center Commissioned External Review of IWMI Research Theme 1 : Agricultural Water Management
(2005) Langford, John; Ben-Mechlia, Netij
"This Working Paper presents the final report from the Center Commissioned External Review of IWMI Research Theme 1: Agricultural Water Management, and IWMI's Management Response. These documents, together with the overall program direction, were reviewed and approved by IWMI's Board of Governors during its Program Committee Meeting, held on May 17, 2005 in Tehran, Iran."
Challenges for Agri-Environmental Policies in CEE Countries
(2001) Zellei, Anett
"All Central and Eastern European Countries (CEECs) have been going through a severe agricultural depression since their centrally planned economies collapsed in the early 1990s. It has now become clear that the transition process is far more complex and is likely to be much more protracted than was first expected. The agricultural policies of the Communist era resulted in considerable environmental problems, which are still present to varying degrees even after a considerable decrease in agricultural inputs during the past ten years. On the other hand, CEECs still retain a significant proportion of Europe' s biodiversity. The existing low input and low intensity agriculture practised in these countries can be perceived in certain respects as an opportunity for environmental sustainability in the agricultural sector. However, in view of future EU membership and accompanying policies, the question is to what extent the requirements of environmental protection and nature conservation will be taken into account in the CEECs' policy formation. The paper presents a preliminary survey of agri-environmental problems and relevant regulations in the Central and Eastern European Countries and identifies future challenges for their agri-environmental policy formation."

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Browsing DLC by Subject "agriculture"