Book Description
From Reclamation to Sustainability tells the story of four places in the West--the Arkansas Valley and the Grand Valley of Colorado, the Truckee-Carson basins of California and Nevada, and the Yakima Basin in Washington--where development and use of water, primarily for irrigated agriculture, have been central to economic and social development.In these places (and many others), the reclamation vision that helped settle the West now competes with a vision of a sustainable West.

All four regions tell of the essential role water has played in western agriculture and the importance of this agriculture for settlement of much of the West.They also exemplify the many difficulties of turning prairie and desert into productive croplands, and MacDonnell describes the sometimes extraordinary human committment and effort that made this possible.

Now, however, western water resources have been developed beyond their sustainable capacity in an attempt to irrigate as much land as possible, and MacDonnell illustrates the consequences of this overdevelopment, including declining rural communities, dewatered streams incapable of supporting native species, and degraded water quality.He also provides examples of efforts torepair some of the damages and of the challenges involved in such restoration.

MacDonnell argues that sustainable use of the West's water resources depends on reducing the gap between diverted water and used water,restoring the functional ecological integrity of water sources, allowing uses of developed water to change, and effective collaborative public/private processes that help reconcile competing interests in water.He concludes that the manner in which the West moves toward sustainable use of its limited water resources--particularly as it affects irrigated agriculture--matters at least as much as achieving sustainable use.It matters because the choices we make will have important consequences for the future West. ... Read more

Book Description
This digital document is a journal article from Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment, published by Elsevier in . The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Media Library immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Description:
Nitrate (NO"3^-) leaching from intensively grazed pasture systems, e.g. dairy farming, is of increasing environmental concern worldwide. The major source of the NO"3^- leached in grazed pastures is the nitrogen (N) returned in the urine from the grazing animal. The objective of this study was to use undisturbed soil monolith lysimeters to quantify the effectiveness of treating a grazed pasture soil with a fine particle suspension (FPS) nitrification inhibitor, dicyandiamide (DCD), in decreasing NO"3^- leaching losses from a deep sandy soil with a mixture of perennial ryegrass (Lolium perenne L.) and white clover (Trifolium repens L.) pasture. The application of DCD as a FPS at 10kgha^-^1 in autumn (May) and late winter (August) decreased NO"3^--N leaching from 134kg Nha^-^1 year^-^1 to 43kg Nha^-^1 year^-^1 (equivalent to a 68% reduction) from the dairy cow urine N applied in the autumn (May) at the rate of 1000kg Nha^-^1. This reduced the annual average NO"3^--N concentration under the urine patch from 43mg NO"3^--NL^-^1 to 18mg NO"3^--NL^-^1. The DCD FPS also reduced Ca^2^+ leaching by 51% and Mg^2^+ leaching by 31%. In addition, herbage dry matter yield in the urine patch areas was increased by 33%, from 15.3tha^-^1 year^-^1 without DCD to 20.3tha^-^1 year^-^1 when DCD was applied at 10kgha^-^1. However, DCD applied at 5kgha^-^1 (May and August) did not provide significant environmental and agronomic benefits under the experimental conditions. Results from this study when compared with those reported previously show that DCD, when applied as a FPS at 10kg active ingredient ha^-^1, is just as effective in reducing NO"3^- leaching in grazed pasture soils, as when it is applied as a solution. ... Read more

Book Description
This publication examines the many facets of organic agriculture including its contribution to ecological health, international markets and local food security. It builds on empirical experiences throughout the world and analyzes the prospects for a wider adoption of organic agriculture. Numerous scenarios depicted in this publication represent the millions of people from all social and economic backgrounds who have adopted this new agrarian ethic on the integrity of food. The publication also discusses the lack of institutional support for nurturing existing knowledge and exchange in organic agriculture. ... Read more

Book Description
This digital document is a journal article from Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment, published by Elsevier in . The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Media Library immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Description:
The objectives of this study, dealing with the relationships of insects between the natural forest and the open agricultural land, were to: (a) record insects at sites of the forest interior, the forest margin and agricultural land, using modified Malaise traps, in order to identify species that occur in the forest as well as in the open country, (b) determine the movement patterns of selected species based on their abundances at the different habitats, (c) find out whether major pest species of the cultivated crops show any relationship to the adjacent natural forest and (d) find out whether species originating from the forest (non-pest species) are able to colonize open country. The results indicate that the habitat of the pest species considered is limited to cultivated land and does not include the forest. None of the non-pest species recorded in this study would be able to exist permanently in the agricultural area. They all depend on a closed forest habitat and therefore will become extinct as the forest disappears with proceeding slash and burn agriculture. However, some but not all of the pest and non-pest species were regularly recorded from the forest margin. ... Read more

Book Description
This digital document is a journal article from Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment, published by Elsevier in 2006. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Media Library immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Description:
Between 1990 and 2000, farmland birds showed a significant decline across Europe, a trend not shared by bird assemblages of other habitats over the same period. Mean trends for each farmland species in the period 1990-2000 were positively correlated with trends over the period 1970-1990, and there was little change in population trajectory for most species over the 30-year period. Of the 58 species classed by an independent assessment as being primarily birds of farmland, 41 showed negative overall mean trends across Europe in 1990-2000, 19 of them significant. There was a significant negative correlation between mean national trends of all farmland species and indices of national agricultural intensity. This relationship strengthened when the 19 declining species were considered alone, and was not apparent when only non-declining species were considered. Population trends of terrestrial non-farmland bird species over the same period were unrelated to agricultural intensity. Trends in farmland bird populations were independent of the proportion of farmland under agri-environment prescriptions. The results support earlier evidence that population trends of farmland birds across Europe can be predicted from gross national agricultural statistics. Substantial changes in agricultural policy, particularly the removal of economic incentives that lead to agricultural intensification, are required if 2010 targets for halting loss of biodiversity are to be met in an enlarged European Union. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Good title, poor delivery
This review reproduced here with the permission of the authorand the Executive Editor of the Journal of Environment &Development

It was not until the beginning of this decade thatenvironmentalists truly began to discover the environmental relevance of trade issues.The singular event of the GATT decision on the Tuna/Dolphin case ensured the battle between trade proponents and environmentalists would be joined.Since then, it has been an "Us" versus "Them" attitude, from both trade liberalization proponents and environmentalists.The free trade advocates, having been around for many years, did not welcome the environmentalist's intervention.The debate is still framed by two questions "How does trade liberalization harm the environment?" and "How do environmental protection measures interfere with trade liberalization?" It is within this context that Agriculture, Trade, & The Environment must be reviewed.

OVERVIEW Agriculture, Trade, & The Environment has a promising title.Trade versus environment debates have more often than not neglected agricultural issues.A book that "discovers linkages" between trade and the environment, without neglecting agriculture, has the potential to advance long-standing traditional view-points.Unfortunately, the reader will be disappointed.While the book does a good job of presenting the traditional free market argument that increasing public wealth will increase the public's desire for environmental protection, it does not seriously address agricultural aspects of the trade versus environment debate.

Part of the book consists of papers presented at a symposium titled "Agriculture, Trade and the Environment: Understanding and Measuring the Critical Linkages" sponsored by the International Agricultural Trade Research Consortium, an organization made up of 160 economists from 16 countries.The other chapters were invited contributions.Almost all of the authors are economists.

The book includes a few good chapters and an excellent introduction to the pro-trade liberalization perspective.It does not deal well with agricultural issues and is mostly a rehash of economic models and arguments in favor of trade liberalization.In particular, the book emphasizes the theory that free trade, like a rising tide, lifts all boats, thus protecting also the environment.In the final chapter, it is admitted that "though the conference was intended to be agriculturally oriented, the larger issues related to the general environment quickly emerged as the focus" (p. 301).Agriculture, Trade and the Environment provides further proof that purist economics is an inadequate tool kit for environmental policy-making.Yet another glaring over-sight, the editors did not include any chapters on environmental economics theory such as those from University College London, the London School of Economics, or even the World Bank.

The editors have organized the papers and the invited contributions into four parts.The first few chapters deal with the linkages of trade and the environment to international institutions. Second, the linkages between trade, renewable resources, and international environmental goods are explored.The third part discusses ways to measure these linkages.The fourth section deals with the identification of future research needed.

DISCOVERING THE CRITICAL LINKAGES: TRADE, INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTIONS AND THE ENVIRONMENT The ever-present Jagdish Bhagwati repeats the assertion that there is a positive correlation between income growth and the demand for environmental protection.Howard Gruenspecht looks at whether the suggested trade/environment linkages are valid, and whether there are other more cynical motivations for the environmentalists to interfere in trade talks.Ambassador Michael Smith, who identifies himself as a major player in trade and environment negotiations, reveals that he conducts his work on two principles "(1) that traders are, at heart, environmentalists ...; and (2) that carried to an extreme, the international crusade of environmentalists can end up hurting everyone" (p. 42).This clearly is a biased view that does not suggest one who is seeking balance.

Steve Charnovitz once again proposes his Global Environmental Organization that should operate along side of the World Trade Organization just like the International Labor Organization.In so doing, he fails to acknowledge the need for reform of the international trade regime which has been at the forefront of the trade and environment debate since Our Common Future was published in 1987.A chapter by Ballenger and Krissoff provides an adequate summary of one of the NAFTA environmental side agreements but devolves into a shallow and unconvincing account of interviews of environmental groups' and farm groups' positions on NAFTA related environmental provisions.

DISCOVERING THE CRITICAL LINKAGES: TRADE, RENEWABLE RESOURCES AND INTERNATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL GOODS G.M. Heal leads off with a chapter on the management of international environmental goods. This is followed by Graciela Chichilnisky's discussion of property rights and the search for an equilibrium model for North-South trade. She concludes with the simplistic notion that the "South overproduces, but primarily because the North overconsumes" (p.107) and that "all in all, property rights improvements in the South could check the main economic source of overuse: prices which are below social costs" (p.106).Therefore, Chichilnisky ignores the fact that natural resource prices in the North are also well below social costs.

Diao and Roe also try to tackle the North-South general equilibrium model.This section of the book ends with a chapter by John Walley on how to quantify trade and environment linkages.He points out that standard environmental regulation that supposedly interferes with trade actually has little effect.However, if instead a carbon tax were adopted, global production and trade patterns would be strongly impacted.

MEASURING THE CRITICAL LINKAGES This part of the book, which includes six competent chapters, finally begins to deal with the issues related to agriculture.The authors discuss the economic effects of environmental policies on the agriculture sectors in the United States and Europe.Unfortunately, the chapters perpetuate the one-sided perspective of the book by continuing to suggest that environmental issues have no place in trade liberalization talks (remember the rising tide).

KEY QUESTIONS AND RESEARCH NEEDS The lead sentence in this section says almost all that needs to be said: "Most of the research that has already been done on the relationship between expanded agricultural trade and environmental protection is theoretical, incomplete, and lacks sufficient empirical content" (p. 281).

JED V5N4 ... Read more

Book Description
This digital document is a journal article from Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment, published by Elsevier in 2006. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Media Library immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Description:
This paper presents a framework for nutrient management that takes sustainable soil fertility, environmental protection and balanced plant nutrition as starting points, and integrates concepts from plant physiology, soil chemistry and agronomy. The framework is meant as a tool that can be applied even if no local experimental results are known. Saturated soil fertility and ideal soil fertility constitute the bench marks of the framework. Saturated soil fertility is the fertility at which the soil by itself does exactly satisfy the nutrient demand of a crop producing the target yield, provided no nutrients get lost. Ideal soil fertility is the fertility at which the soil in combination with 'replacement input' exactly satisfies that nutrient demand. Replacement input is an input equal to the quantity of nutrients removed in harvested crop. Saturated soil fertility is calculated as a function of target nutrient uptake, and ideal soil fertility as a function of target nutrient uptake and recovery fractions of input nutrients. Because the recovery fractions are high for N, low for P and medium for K, the soil is relatively low in N, high in P, and medium in K at ideal soil fertility. The supplies of N, P and K to the crop by soil and replacement input together are well-balanced. The ratio of ideal soil fertility to saturated soil fertility proves to be 0.2, 0.6 and 0.4 for N, P and K, respectively. In case of nutrient losses, the steady-state soil fertility where nutrient input equals nutrient output by crop and losses is exactly the same as the ideal soil fertility for nutrients that do not accumulate in the soil, and somewhat higher than ideal soil fertility for nutrients that do accumulate. Equations are presented to calculate that steady-state soil fertility and the nutrient input and output. ... Read more

Book Description
Close and complex links exist between agriculture and theenvironment and there is increasing public concern to provide greaterenvironmental quality in agriculture.Reducing the harmful and enhancing thebeneficial environmental effects to ensure the sustainable use of resources inagriculture while maintaining an economically efficient agricultural sectorhave become important policy objectives in OECD countries. Over the lastdecade there has been some progress in environmental performance, as a resultof agricultural policy reforms, environmental measures, and changes intechnology and farm practices. There is, however, still room for improvementand more needs to be done. Which principles should policies be based on?Andwhich strategy framework should be adopted?This report sheds light on thekey policy questions and issues, and draws some conclusions for the betterdesign and implementation of government policies.This report was prepared asinput into the 1997 OECD Agriculture Ministerial Meeting of March 1998. ... Read more