3 pages, Horticulture crops play significant role in improving the productivity of land, generating employment, enhancing exports, improving economic conditions of the farmers and entrepreneurs and providing food and nutritional security to the people. For better management of the existing crops and to bring more area under horticulture crops, updated and accurate database is necessary for systematic planning and decision making. Remote sensing (RS) is an advanced tool that aids in gathering and updating information to develop scientific management plans. Many types of sensors namely microwave radiometers, laser meters, magnetic sensors and cameras collect electromagnetic information to derive accurate, large-scale information about the Earth's surface and atmosphere. Because these data and images are digital, they can easily be quantified and manipulated using computers. RS can be used in efforts to reduce the risk and minimize damage. The same data can be analyzed in different ways for different applications. A number of studies were aiming at identification of crop, area estimation, disease and pest identification, etc. using satellite data in horticulture. The potential use of RS techniques in Horticulture is briefly reviewed in order to exploit the available techniques for efficient crop management.
7 pages, In Ethiopia, economic development policy has historically been dominated by subsistence agriculture, leading to unrealized agricultural potential characterized by low productivity and a focus on subsistence farming practices. This would necessitate giving agricultural policies top priority and launching an improved initiative to speed up the transition from traditional farming. To this end, this review was to summarize the strengths and drawbacks of Ethiopia's agricultural policies and strategies, as well as make recommendations for improved interventions and the potential for scaling them up. This may be very helpful in directing policymakers to introduce the valuable interventions and handle related issues. Since 1991, the government of Ethiopia has implemented various agricultural policies in order to boost agricultural productivity and production, which in turn reduces poverty and food insecurity. However, the results have been found to be unsatisfactory. This is mainly due to the poor performance of the agricultural extension system in terms of its coverage and quality of implementation. Thus, the review argues, addressing such challenges and commercializing the sector could lead Ethiopia to further exploit its agricultural potential. In this regard, the recently implemented cluster farming is the right way to overcome these problems and support subsistence farming by increasing smallholder farmers bargaining power, increasing the faster diffusion of research recommendations and extension packages, knowledge transfer, and market linkage. Therefore, the review recommends that policymakers and development organizations should consider cluster farming as a main farming strategy to increase smallholder farmer’s productivity and support initiatives to attain the intended goals.
7 pages, The application of balanced fertilizers is essential to produce highquality broccoli. A field experiment was conducted to find an appropriate fertilizer management practice for broccoli (Brassica oleracea L. var. ‘Italica’) that can generate higher yield and quality. The experiment comprised 24 treatment combinations with six fertilizer management practices, i.e., T1: control. T2: cow dung at 10 t ha-1. T3: chicken manure at 10 t ha-1. T4: recommended NPK dose. T5: cow dung at 5 t ha-1 + 50% of the recommended NPK dose. T6: chicken manure at 5 t ha-1 + 50% of the recommended NPK dose. The highest plant height (60.00 cm) occurred in response to T6, the highest stem length (22.25 cm) in T4, and the maximum number of leaves per plant (22.00) in T4 and T6 treatments. Maximum fresh leaf weight per plant (609 g), stem diameter (3.98 cm), curd diameter (16.63 cm), and individual curd weight (494.50 g) occurred in response to the T5 treatment. The optimum yield (25.78 t ha-1) of broccoli can be obtained by application of cow dung (5 t ha-1) with a recommended dose of 50% inorganic fertilizer NPK (T5). Maximum TSS value (10.54%) occurred in response to T3, which was statistically similar to the effect of T6 (10.52%). Vitamin C content (80.77 mg 100 g-1) became significantly high in response to the T4 treatment (100% recommended dose of NPK). Minimum vitamin C content (53.84 mg 100 g-1) occurred in the control treatment (T1). Applying cow dung at 5 t ha-1 in addition to the 50% recommended dose of NPK fertilizers (T5) led to superior yield values in broccoli.
8 pages, This study examined the impact of replacing soybean meal (SBM) for treated and untreated sesame meal (SM) with varying amounts of crude protein (CP) on nutrient intake and digestibility, milk composition, and ruminal parameters in lactating goats. Forty mid-lactation Murciano-Granadina goats were randomly allocated to four diets including (1) SBM (16.5% CP; CON); (2) untreated SM (USM; 16.5% CP). (3) formaldehyde-treated SM (FTSM; 16.5% CP), and (4) FTSM containing 14.5% CP (LPFT). FTSM goats had higher dry matter (DM) and nutrient intake than CON and LPFT, as observed for milk fat (P<0.001) and total solids (TS; P=0.001) yield. Milk fat content was higher with USM than LPFT (P<0.05). In general, the sum of milk saturated fatty acids (SFA) decreased, and milk unsaturated FA (UFA), monounsaturated FA (MUFA), polyunsaturated FA (PUFA), and long-chain FA (LCFA) increased by the inclusion of USM, and FTSM in the diet. Incorporation of FTSM in the diet decreased ruminal pH, ammonia nitrogen, and acetate molar proportion compared to CON and USM as observed with LPFT. Also, this inclusion increased total volatile FAs production and propionate proportion compared to CON and USM (P<0.001). In conclusion, substitution of SBM for FTSM in the diet of dairy goats can improve milk and milk component yield as well as health-promoting alterations in milk FAs profile. Furthermore, reducing dietary CP level along with FTSM inclusion in the diet may be considered as a proper tool in compensating the adverse effects of dietary CP deficiency and optimizing the productive performance of dairy goats utilizing lower amounts of nitrogen sources.
16 pages, The importance of smallholder farming is increasingly recognized in rural areas where increased crop productivity and market participation can effectively improve their dietary diversity and nutrition quality. However, rural households are still faced with severe food insecurity and malnutrition. The study sought to assess the role of smallholder farming in crop productivity and market access on rural household dietary diversity. The secondary data were collected using a quantitative research method, and 1520 participants were selected using a stratified random sampling technique. The descriptive results showed that cereals were the most (98%) consumed food group, while vegetables and fruits were the least consumed food groups, at 37% and 23%, respectively. The results from the Household Dietary Diversity Score (HDDS) showed that 57% of smallholder farmers consumed highly diverse diets (more or equal to six food groups), whereas 25% and 18% of smallholder farmers consumed medium dietary diversity (four to five food groups) and low diverse diets (less or equal to three food groups), respectively. The findings from the Conditional Mixed Process (CMP) and Poisson endogenous treatment effect models showed that household size, ownership of livestock, wealth index, and involvement in crop production positively influenced household dietary diversity. On the other hand, output and access to market information showed a negative effect. Social grants had contradicting effects: they had a negative impact on the HDDS received from crop productivity while they had a positive effect on the HDDS from market participation. Providing different ways smallholder farmers can use their funds effectively can help improve household dietary diversity and nutrition quality. The study recommended that more workshops and training be conducted that cover all the sustainable production systems that smallholder farmers can undertake to produce different food groups. These will raise awareness among smallholder farmers about the requirements for balanced diets for food and nutrition security.
10pgs, Conservation agriculture-based sustainable intensification (CASI) is gaining prominence as an agricultural pathway to poverty reduction and enhancement of sustainable food systems among government and development actors in the Eastern Gangetic Plains (EGP) of South Asia. Despite substantial investment in research and extension programs and a growing understanding of the agronomic, economic and labor-saving benefits of CASI, uptake remains limited. This study explores farmer experiences and perspectives to establish why farmers choose not to implement CASI systems despite a strong body of recent scientific evidence establishing the benefits of them doing so. Through thematic coding of semi-structured interviews, key constraints are identified, which establishes a narrative that current households' resources are insufficient to enable practice change, alongside limited supporting structures for resource supplementation. Such issues create a dependency on subsidies and outside support, a situation that is likely to impact any farming system change given the low-risk profiles of farmers and their limited resource base. This paper hence sets out broad implications for creating change in smallholder farming systems in order to promote the adoption of sustainable agricultural technologies in resource-poor smallholder contexts, especially with regard to breaking the profound poverty cycles that smallholder farmers find themselves in and which are unlikely to be broken by the current set of technologies promoted to them.
19 pages, The global climate change and rapid population increase are raising challenges for food security, and it demands efficient crop improvement methods that ensure superior quality and quantity of the crops. The advancements in nanotechnology can be explored to enhance sustainable crop improvement. Recently, nanotechnology has made massive revolutions in solving various problems faced by the human population, including the agriculture, environment and food sectors. In agriculture, nanotechnology has implications on every stage of farming, including seed germination, growth, harvest, processing, storage and transport of agricultural products. Nano fertilisers, nano herbicides, nano-fungicides, nano biosensors, nanoscale genetic carriers, nano-bioremediating agents and nanocomposites for packing are the novel applications of nanotechnology in the crop improvement area. Nanotechnology ensures the site-specific delivery of the nutrients in the plant's target region, which minimises the loss and increases efficiency. The reduced size of the nanomaterials offers a broader surface area for pesticides and fertilisers, drastically escalating disease and pest control in crops as they promise to overcome the shortcomings caused by traditional pesticide application. The advancement in nanotechnology is rapidly contributing to the digitalization of agriculture also. For example, nanotechnology widens the horizons of high-tech agricultural farms with the aid of biosensors.
The synthesis of nano enzymes also revolutionized the stress-tolerant mechanism of the plants by acting as an efficient antioxidant enzyme, and it has been widely used against salinity tolerance recently. The contribution of nanotechnology in effective transfer of genetic material in gene editing and genetic engineering techniques has also significantly contributed towards crop improvement. Nanobioremediation and nanophotocatalysis methods can also remove toxic substances from the environment. It is clear that, nanotechnology driven agri-food sector is expected to bloom in the near future. This review article summarizes the potential benefits of nanotechnology in agriculture and related fields, including the environment and food industry. Although nanotechnology has contributed a lot to the betterment of the world in various ways, they also face several limitations. Despite being a frontier of scientific advancement in the modern era, the negative impacts caused by nanotechnology cannot be sidelined. Therefore, this review also discusses the limitations of nanotechnology in the last section.
9 pages, This study examines the labour of small-scale farmers during ploughing and develops a power tiller with the view of reducing the hardness of work and increasing the field operation capacity. The machine is designed and fabricated based on standard engineering principles for part-sizing and selection of materials. It is tested and the performance results obtained are compared to manual ploughing. Performance parameters were determined from fieldwork and laboratory experiments. The average depth, width of cut and operation speed were 14.84 cm, 24.56 cm and 3.48 km/h, respectively for power tiller compared with 10.62 cm, 18.97 cm and 0.49 km/h, respectively for manual ploughing. Average field efficiency and theoretical field capacity were 88.23%, and 0.096 ha/h, respectively for the power tiller compared with 96%, and 0.0136 ha/h for manual ploughing. Fuel consumption revealed for power tiller is 1.99 l/h. The field capacity of the machine was 0.075 ha/h which was higher than 0.013 ha/h for manual ploughing. The results show that the machine is suitable for small-scale farmers. Economic assessment of the power tiller is work to be done.
10 pages, Agricultural environment in many developing economies has become increasingly unpredictable in recent decades as a result of climate change, increasing the risk of crop failure. Access to meaningful information is required to mitigate the negative effects of the changing environment. This study examined the impact of agricultural extension services on the adoption of soil and water conservation (SWC) practices using data obtained from farming households in Northern Ghana. A multivariate probit model was used to assess the simultaneous or/and substitution adoption of SWC practices, while endogenous switching probit (ESP) was used to estimate the impact of extension services on adoption of SWC practices to account for observed and unobserved heterogeneities. The results showed that most of the SWC practices were adopted jointly, and factors such as non-farm economic activites and farm size influence the adoption of SWC practices. Moreover, farmers who accessed agricultural extension services had a higher probability of adopting most of the SWC practices (crop rotation, contour ploughing and manure application), and those who did not benefit from extension services would have had an equally higher likelihood of adopting the SWC practices had they accessed the services. The findings of the study imply that enhancing agricultural extension services will reduce adoption gaps in SWC practices, and consequently reduce farmers’ exposure to climate-related agricultural production risks. With growing information and communication technologies, pluralistic extension service delivery that mixes governmental and private-sector-led approaches to extension operations to foster demand-driven extension delivery services are highly recommended.
