Shifting cultivation is the main land-use system transforming landscapes in riverine Amazonia. Increased concentration of the human population around villages and increasing market integration during the last decades may be causing agricultural intensification. Studies have shown that agricultural intensification, i.e. higher number of swidden-fallow cycles and shorter fallow periods, reduces c...

The widespread acquisition of land for large-scale/commercial production of biofuel crops in Ghana has raised concerns from civil society organizations, local communities and other parties, regarding the impact of these investments on local livelihoods. This paper assessed the effect of large-scale acquisition of land for production of Jatropha curcas on farmers’ livelihoods in Ghana. The study...

Due to China's rapidly increasing population, the total arable land area has dramatically decreased; as a consequence, the competition for farming land allocated for grain and cotton production has become fierce. Therefore, to overcome the existing contradiction between cotton grain and fiber production and the limited farming land, development of early-maturing cultivars is necessary. In this ...

Ethiopia is a largely agrarian country with nearly 85% of its employment coming from agriculture. Nevertheless, it is not known how much land is under cultivation. Mapping land cover at finer resolution and global scales has been particularly difficult in Ethiopia. The study area falls in a region of high mapping complexity with environmental challenges which require higher quality maps. Here, ...

Land-use and agricultural practices affect the soil microbial carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) turnover and hence the biosphere-atmosphere exchange of greenhouse gasses (GHG), namely N2O, CH4 and CO2. In view of the global importance of irrigated agriculture, it is crucial to understand how and to which extent this land-use system interferes with the terrestrial N and C cycles and contributes to the...

Despite conflicting claims about the performance of Bt cotton, in 2002 the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee approved its commercial cultivation in several states of north India. Judging from the lackadaisical manner in which the genetically modified cotton was handled in the southern and western states, serious doubts about the efficiency of the regulatory agencies persist. More democrati...

In recent years leaf curl disease of cotton has become a major limiting factor in the production of cotton, which is an important fiber cash crop. In the last two decades or more, leaf curl disease in cotton took on epidemic proportions in Pakistan. In the early 1990’s cotton leaf curl disease (CLCuD) appeared in the bordering parts of India in the states of Rajasthan and Punjab and spread to e...

Salinity stress is a major abiotic factor that affects crop output, and as a pioneer crop in saline and alkaline land, salt tolerance study of cotton is particularly important. In our experiment, four salt-tolerance varieties with different salt tolerance indexes including CRI35 (65.04%), Kanghuanwei164 (56.19%), Zhong9807 (55.20%) and CRI44 (50.50%), as well as four salt-sensitive cotton varie...

A field experiment was carried out to study the changes of soil bacteria, fungi and actinomycetes in saline-sodic soils for different numbers of cultivated years under drip irrigation. The drip irrigation had substantial effects on levels of bacteria, fungi and actinomycetes. With increased number of cultivated years under drip irrigation, the soil biological properties were greatly improved. A...