Crop-livestock systems in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) are mostly rainfall-dependent and based on fragmented marginal lands that are vulnerable to soil erosion, drought and variable weather conditions. The threat of water scarcity in these systems is real, due to expanding demand for food and feed, climate variability and inappropriate land use (Amede et al., 2009). According to recent estimates, f...

The dryland areas of Central Chile are associated to Mediterranean climate. Under these conditions, water availability during crop growth is a crucial factor for crop productivity. Conservation tillage systems play an important role in this area, increasing soil water availability; however, crop yield responses can be variable. Soil management should be aimed at reducing water loss and promotin...

Understanding the drivers and consequences of diversity and productivity in plant communities remains a central challenge in ecological research (Thompson et al. 2001, Mittelbach 2012). Interest in how the diversity and composition of plant communities regulate ecological processes and ecosystem services that different ecosystems provide has expanded over the past two decades (Loreau et al. 200...

277 Lathyrus (Lathyrus sativus L.) is mostly grown on the residual soil moisture in rice-fallows as utera (relay) crop (Gupta and Bhowmick, 2005; Mondal and Ghosh, 2005). But low productivity especially under utera system is the major problem associated with this crop (Bhowmick et al., 2005). Even there is a limited scope for agronomic manipulation under rice-utera system although it has potent...

introduction: water scarcity is one of the primary problems in arid and semi-arid regions such as iran. in these regions, increasing water productivity in agriculture sector is inevitable. water productivity can be increased using the drip irrigation method and application of irrigation strategies such as deficit irrigation. potato is the major crop in dehgolan plain. researches have shown that...

Vertisols occur extensively in centralIndiaand have high production potentials. Because of the high clay content (40-60% or more), high bulk density (1.5-1.8 Mg m-3) and related properties, these soils have high moisture storage capacity. Conversely, these soils become very hard when dry and very sticky when wet. Since last two decades, scientists, farmers and also the policy makers have be...

Phosphorus (P) is a critical nutrient used to maximize plant growth and yield. Current agriculture management practices commonly experience low plant P use efficiency due to natural chemical sorption and transformations when P fertilizer is applied to soils. A perplexing challenge facing agriculture production is finding sustainable solutions to deliver P more efficiently to plants. Using presc...

Meteorological elements directly influence crop potential productivity, regulating its transpiration, photosynthesis, and respiration processes in such a way as to control the growth and development of the plants throughout their physiological mechanisms at a given site. The interaction of the meteorological factors with crop responses is complex and has been the target of attention of many res...

1. Introduction Systems approach has been used by engineers since the 1950's for the study of complex and dynamic processes but their use by scientists working in biological fields is relatively recent. A system is defined as any well delineated part of reality which may contain a number of interrelated elements forming the systems structure. These functioning components interact in various way...