Farm Equipment Books
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Ecological Basis of Agroforestry
Faced with the growing problems of climate change, ecosystem degradation, declining agricultural productivity, and uncertain food security, modern agricultural scientists look for potential relief in an ancient practice. Agroforestry, if properly designed, can mitigate greenhouse effects, maintain ecosystem health and biodiversity, provide food security, and reduce poverty. Poorly implemented ...
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Fingerponds: Seasonal Integrated Aquaculture in East African Freshwater Wetlands: Exploring their potential for wise use strategies: PhD: UNESCO-IHE Institute, Delft
Wetlands play an important role in the livelihoods of many rural households particularly in sub-Saharan Africa. However, due to decline in rainfed terrestrial agriculture, many wetlands are being encroached upon to grow crops. The question to any wetland scientist/policy maker in the region is: what efforts can be made to achieve a balance between human needs for food and income and maintenance ...
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HOME GARDENS and AGROBIODIVERSITY
Smithsonian Books has published Home Gardens and Agrobiodiversity, edited by Pablo Eyzaguirre and Olga Linares. What is a home garden? The editors write that 'home gardens are microenvironments within a larger farming system that contain high levels of species diversity and may contain crop species or varieties of species different from those found in surrounding agroecosystems.' They are thus ...
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Sustainable Agriculture and the International Rice-Wheat System
Addressing a topic of major importance to the maintenance of world food supplies, this reference identifies knowledge gaps, defines priorities, and formulates recommendations for the improvement of the rice-wheat farming system. The book reveals new systems of rice intensification and management and illustrates the application of no-till and conservation farming to the rice-wheat system. With ...
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Violence Through Environmental Discrimination
The degradation of renewables - land and freshwater - worldwide leads to conflict over access and/or distribution of these resources. However, not all conflicts become violent. Environmentally-caused violence is hardly found in relations between states. Today, mainly in developing countries, there is a correlation between environmental degradation and violent conflicts. As this synthesis of ...
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Modeling Ruminant Digestion and Metabolism
This book fills the gap in the available literature on modelling farm animal systems. This monograph has a broad and comprehensive coverage of ruminant systems and features the application of models in animal biology. It will be of great value to animal scientists, agricultural scientists, modellers and animal physiologists. ...
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An Introduction to Agroforestry
This college-level textbook summarizes the state of current knowledge in the rapidly expanding field of agroforestry. The book, organized into 25 chapters in six sections, reviews the developments in agroforestry during the past 15 years and describes the accomplishments in the application of biophysical (plant and soil related) and socioeconomic sciences to agroforestry. Although the major ...
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Agriculture as a Mimic of Natural Ecosystems
This book critically examines the idea that the sustainability of agriculture could be improved by mimicking the structure and processes occurring in natural ecosystems. Researchers from around the world present comparative studies of multi-species farming systems, natural ecosystems and conventional agriculture. Case studies from Europe, Africa, Asia, Australia, and North and South America ...
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Management of Biological Nitrogen Fixation for the Development of More Productive and Sustainable Agricultural Systems
The subsistence agriculture of the pre-chemical era efficiently sustained the nitrogen status of soils by maintaining a balance between N loss and N gain from biological nitrogen fixation (BNF): the microbial conversion of atmospheric N to a form usable by plants. This was possible with less intensive cropping, adaptation of rational crop rotations and intercropping schemes, and the use of ...
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Green Manure/Cover Crop Systems of Smallholder Farmers
In the 1980s and 1990s, green manure/cover crop (GMCC) systems became a popular agricultural technology in research and development efforts for smallholder tropical and subtropical farmers. However, few syntheses of these experiences have been conducted. This volume of case studies contributes to bridging this gap by reviewing field-level experiences with these systems. Twelve case studies are ...
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Applications of Seasonal Climate Forecasting in Agricultural and Natural Ecosystems
Climate variability has major impacts in many parts of the world, including Australia. Developments in understanding of the El Niño - Southern Oscillation Phenomenon have introduced some skill in seasonal to inter-annual climate forecasting. Can this skill be harnessed to advantage? Or do we just continue to observe these impacts? How does a decision-maker managing an agricultural or ...
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Agroforestry in Europe
While recent EU Rural Development policy clearly recognises the economic, ecological, and social advantages of agroforestry systems, to date the implementation of such systems remains poor throughout most of Europe. In light of this, this collection of peer-reviewed papers brings together some of the most important current research in European agroforestry, and evaluates the current scope and ...
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Environmental and Agricultural Modelling:
Agriculture increasingly faces the challenge of balancing its multiple functions in a sustainable way. Integrated assessment and modelling (IAM) can provide insight into the potential impacts of policy changes. However, concepts to address the wide range of issues and functions typical for agriculture are still scarce. Environmental and Agricultural Modelling reviews and presents our current ...
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Genetic Engineering, Biofertilisation, Soil Quality and Organic Farming
Sustainable agriculture is a rapidly growing field aiming at producing food and energy in a sustainable way for humans and their children. Sustainable agriculture is a discipline that addresses current issues such as climate change, increasing food and fuel prices, poor-nation starvation, rich-nation obesity, water pollution, soil erosion, fertility loss, pest control, and biodiversity depletion. ...
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The Sciences and Art of Adaptive Management
The Sciences and Art of Adaptive Management: Innovating for Sustainable Agriculture and Natural Resource Management. This book is one of the newest additions to the SWCS publications. The 25 authors represent a rich international knowledge base ...
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Gulf Agriculture
Agriculture in the Gulf region is fast developing and rapidly becoming more sophisticated with the latest farming technology. GULF AGRICULTURE, the only specialized magazine in English covers on a bimonthly basis all news relating to agriculture, horticulture, crop protection, irrigation, landscaping, and livestock farming in the Gulf ...
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Soil Engineering
The agricultural world has changed significantly during the last years. The excessive use of heavy machinery, waste disposal, the use of agrochemicals and new soil cultivation means led to severe problems, which agricultural engineers have to cope with in order to prevent soil from permanent irreversible damage. This Soil Biology volume will update readers on several cutting-edge aspects of ...
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Biotechnology of Food Crops in Developing Countries
Tropical crops such as cowpea, yam, plantain, and cassava are heavily underresearched but, in addition to rice, maize, wheat, and potato, are important as primary or secondary food staples in the developing countries. The modern tools of molecular and cellular technology offer the opportunity not only to make substantial gains in knowledge of these crops, but also they overcome some of the ...
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Peasants, Farmers and Scientists
This book is a critical account of tropical agricultural science and agricultural development in the twentieth century, in particular in Africa. It describes successes as well as fads and failures, from the perspective of a practitioner of more than 40 years. The emphasis is on the second half of the century, but the story frequently reaches deep into the first half of the century as well. The ...
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