Simon Rich Ant Farm Epub Pdf 19
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Olive farming has vastly intensified across the Mediterranean basin recently. This ongoing process has detrimental social and environmental outcomes, but it also represents a unique opportunity to study the impacts of intensification and identify solutions for sustainable management of this iconic and culturally important crop. This interdisciplinary study jointly explores the ecological, social, and economic consequences of olive farming intensification, to identify solutions for sustainable agriculture. During 2017-2019 we conducted ecological, social and economic surveys in 50 olive groves plots, each representing different intensification levels (super-intensive, intensive, organic, extensive, and traditional olive groves) and plots with natural vegetation as ecological control. Birds and plants were sampled to assess biodiversity under each intensity level. Landscape preference was assessed using an online survey (n = 299) targeting the general public, featuring representative images for the different intensity levels. Data on yield, revenue, profit, and costs in the olive groves was collected from farmers for two seasons (n = 44). Our results demonstrated a trade-off between economic and socio-ecological benefits. Intensive and super-intensive groves maximize the economic values at the expense of the socio-ecological values, whereas the opposite is true for traditional groves. However, within this gradient we found few opportunities to promote sustainable olive farming. Organic groves demonstrated an optimal solution, with an economic value similar to intensive plots, rich biodiversity and high appreciation by people. On the other hand, extensive olive farming represented a non-sustainable situation, in which socio-ecological values were similar or lower than organic groves, while yield and profit were the lowest found in this study. Traditional groves were the most appreciated landscape, hosting bird and plant communities similar to nearby plots with natural vegetation. Building on these results we highlight several policy directions that can help reconcile olive production, biodiversity conservation and social values to conserve this important cultural landscape sustainably.
I began by visiting all the restored plantation sites that were within driving distance of our home. Colonial Williamsburg was also a site that I found invaluable, especially since some of my characters lived in that town for a number of years.
Small local libraries were invaluable as their genealogy sections were rich with details of that time period.
I also interviewed local historians, among them an esteemed African American woman, Mrs. Bessie Lowe. Her grandparents had been slaves, and her stories were invaluable.
You've owned and operated a tearoom, an artisan gift shop and an herb farm, you've raised cashmere goats and horses and dabbled in a photography, ceramics, weaving and painting. What made you finally take the plunge and write your first novel?
In Saskatchewan, at Fort Walsh, they speak of a Crow Native woman, Crow Mary, who was married to a well-known fur trader, Abe Farwell. Hers is a fascinating story and is becoming even more so as I do my research.
Kathleen Grissom was raised in the tiny village of Annaheim, Saskatchewan, lived and worked in Montreal and New York City, and finally settled on a large farm in rural Virginia. The Kitchen House is her first novel. Her website is www.kathleengrissom.com.
The number of undernourished people and the risk of micro-nutrient deficiency remain high in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Decades of policy designed to reverse the trends of food insecurity have illustrated that the causal pathways of intervention to end-point outcomes, such as nutrition, are not necessarily straightforward. Utilising proxies for dimensions of food security, this study investigates the relative importance of different pathways to food security in two subtly contrasting communities in the Sahelian and Sudanian Savanna zones of Burkina Faso.
The methods for evaluating food access and micro-nutrient deficiencies have traditionally been time-consuming and invasive. More recently, however, proxies have been introduced to enable wide-scale monitoring and evaluation. Food insecurity of access metrics and diet diversity scores (to a greater extent) have been assessed against diet quality and adequacy ratios, and have emerged as reliable proxies (evident in [21,22,23,24,25,26,27]. In the one case where Household Diet Diversity Score (HDDS) was not associated with diet quality or adequacy ratios, an association was instead identified with Household Food Insecurity of Access Score/Prevalence (HFIAS/HFIAP; [28]. As HFIAS/HFIAP and HDDS represent different aspects of food security, both metrics are adopted in the present study.
Utilising these proxies for food insecurity, a growing body of literature has taken shape around the question of what differentiates those that are food insecure from those that are more food secure in high-risk communities around the world. Jones [29] present a conceptual framework, hypothesising that on-farm crop species richness is associated with diet quality and diversity through own-farm consumption and market-orientated production, generating income for food expenditures (Fig. 1). It is hypothesised that these two channels are mediated by agricultural productivity, markets, infrastructure, wealth, gender dynamics and food purchasing behaviour. Species richness is also hypothesised to have a positive influence on agricultural productivity and resilience to shocks.
This present study seeks to improve our understanding of the associations between improved food security and household-farm attributes in vulnerable rural communities. We do so by characterising farm systems, household demographics and food security status in subtly contrasting communities in drought prone regions of Burkina Faso. Food security indicators were enumerated for two periods to account for the temporal variability throughout the year. Diet diversity was disaggregated by channel of access to better understand food sourcing behaviour. With this approach we address the questions of: (a) what are the differentiating attributes of more food secure households, and more specifically (b) what are the roles of subsistence (own-farm sourced) and food purchases in improving access to sufficient and diverse nutrition? This study, therefore, contributes to the discussion of the drivers of food security of access, using a methodology that accounts for the temporal variability throughout the year.
There were significant differences in the livelihoods of households between the two provinces. Table 1 compares provinces across a range of variables directly and indirectly related to human nutrition (full distributions shown in Additional file 1: Fig. S1). These variables are presented in the table as follows: resources (adult equivalents, land and livestock ownership), income (including gendered control), wealth (PPI), crop production (diversity, yields, market participation), human energy adequacy (from consumption of own-produced crop and livestock products), and livestock production (diversity, market participation and protein adequacy). There were notable differences between provinces in household demographics, land area, land use, market participation, energy/protein adequacy, and income (significant differences indicated in column 4 of Table 1). This section describes the variability and differences in livelihoods.
Yields per hectare of staple crops were lower than the rain-water limited yield potential. Maize was the highest yielding staple crop, followed by the more commonly cultivated staples of sorghum and then millet. Crop yields for these three staple crops were marginally lower in Yatenga when compared to Seno (difference in millet yield was not statistically significant; Table 1). Households differed in their levels of practice adoption. Improved seeds, fertiliser and irrigation were more readily adopted in Yatenga province; and, value addition was common in both provinces (Additional file 1: Tables S2 and S3). As a proxy for the diversity of cash crop yield differences, Fig. 2 presents crop income by adopted practices and province. Crop income was significantly higher for households in Yatenga province that adopted irrigation, fertilisers and/or improved seeds (CI does not cross zero; t test alternative). In terms of livestock, there was a low level of adoption of improved livestock breeds in both Yatenga and Seno provinces.
Off-farm income was common across provinces (67% of households in Yatenga, 57% of households in Seno), with the majority earning under US$ 500 per household per annum. For those that did earn off-farm income, the central tendency of earnings was similar across provinces (median of US$ 296 in Yatenga and US$ 375 in Seno). Households in Yatenga generally had higher gross incomes, yet significantly less income from live animals (Table 1). Control of income did not differ significantly by province, where the majority (85%) of households had less than 10% of income controlled by females. Households in Yatenga province tended to have a higher Progress out of Poverty Indicator score (PPI).
We also assessed whether: (a) the influence of farm income on diet diversity is mediated by female control; (b) food self-sufficiency is positively associated with diet diversity (variable removed from regression) and (c) wealth (PPI) is positively associated with diet diversity (variable removed from regression). However, female control of income, food self-sufficiency and wealth were not found to be associated with diet diversity in this study.
The potential pathways from food and income availability to food security analysed in this study are represented diagrammatically in Fig. 4. The diagram includes practice adoption and farm activities from Fig. 2 and Table 1 on the left-hand-side, representing the basis for food production. Both market and subsistence (own-farm) channels to food security are represented in a flow (indicated by arrows) from the left-hand side towards the right-hand side. Market participation and off-farm income both contribute to gross income. Mediated through expenditure, market participation and storage decisions, these two channels of food access (purchased and own-farm) then have a bearing on energy access, diversity of food access and food security more generally (right-hand-side of Fig. 4). The pathways from food and income availability to food security may also influence the pattern of food utilisation and food safety within a household. These dimensions of food security, however, are beyond the scope of this study (top right bullet points of Fig. 4).
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