Improvements in on-farm resource stewardship with profitable information technologies in rice production

The assessment of animal welfare on-farm is important to ensure that current welfare standards are followed. The current manual assessment proposed by Welfare Quality® (WQ), although being an essential tool, is only a point-estimate in time, is very time consuming to perform, only evaluates a subset of the animals, and is performed by the subjective human. Automation of the assessment through information technologies (ITs) could provide a continuous objective assessment in real-time on all animals. The aim of the current systematic review was to identify ITs developed for welfare monitoring within the pig production chain, evaluate the ITs developmental stage and evaluate how these ITs can be related to the WQ assessment protocol. The systematic literature search identified 101 publications investigating the development of ITs for welfare monitoring within the pig production chain. The systematic literature analysis revealed that the research field is still young with 97% being published within the last 20 years, and still growing with 63% being published between 2016 and mid-2020. In addition, most focus is still on the development of ITs (sensors) for the extraction and analysis of variables related to pig welfare; this being the first step in the development of a precision livestock farming system for welfare monitoring. The majority of the studies have used sensor technologies detached from the animals such as cameras and microphones, and most investigated animal biomarkers over environmental biomarkers with a clear focus on behavioural biomarkers over physiological biomarkers. ITs intended for many different welfare issues have been studied, although a high number of publications did not specify a welfare issue and instead studied a general biomarker such as activity, feeding behaviour and drinking behaviour. The ‘good feeding’ principle of the WQ assessment protocol was the best represented with ITs for real-time on-farm welfare assessment, while for the other principles only few of the included WQ measures are so far covered. No ITs have yet been developed for the ‘Comfort around resting’ and the ‘Good human-animal relationship’ criteria. Thus, the potential to develop ITs for welfare assessment within the pig production is high and much work is still needed to end up with a remote solution for welfare assessment on-farm and in real-time.

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APPLYING SIMULATION TO IMPROVE RICE VARIETIES IN REDUCING THE ON-FARM YIELD GAP IN CAMBODIAN LOWLAND RICE ECOSYSTEMS

Experimental Agriculture ◽

10.1017/s0014479714000271 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 51 (2) ◽

pp. 264-284 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

P. L. POULTON ◽

T. VESNA ◽

N. P. DALGLIESH ◽

V. SENG

Keyword(s):

Climate Variability ◽

Smallholder Farmers ◽

Cropping System ◽

Rice Production ◽

Lowland Rice ◽

Yield Gap ◽

Rice Varieties ◽

Seasonal Climate ◽

Rice Ecosystems ◽

On Farm

SUMMARYAchieving export growth in rice production from variable rainfed lowland rice ecosystems is at risk if depending on conventional breeding or genetic development alone. Sustained, long-term production requires building adaption capacity of smallholder farmers to better manage the challenges of seasonal climate variability and future climate change. Better understanding of the risks and constraints that farmers face in managing their current cropping system helps develop strategies for improving rice production in Cambodia. System models are now considered valuable assessment tools for evaluating cropping systems performance worldwide but require validation at the local level. This paper presents an evaluation of the APSIM-Oryza model for 15 Cambodian rice varieties under recommended practice. Data from a field experiment in 2011, conducted in a non-limiting water and nutrient environment, are used to calibrate varietal-specific coefficients and model input parameters. An independent dataset is then used to validate the model performance for a ‘real-world’ situation using on-farm data for six rice varieties planted in 54 farmer fields on 32 farms in two villages of Southeastern Cambodia. From this analysis, the APSIM-Oryza model is shown to be an acceptable tool for exploring the mismatch between current on-farm yields and potential production through yield gap analysis and the exploration of cropping system options for smallholder farmers to increase production, adapt to seasonal climate variability and be prepared for potential climate changes.

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Access to Credit and Constraint Analysis: The Case of Smallholder Rice Farmers in Ghana

Journal of Agricultural Studies ◽

10.5296/jas.v4i2.9167 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 4 (2) ◽

pp. 53 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Elisha Kwaku Denkyirah ◽

Ahmed Abdul Aziz ◽

Elijah Kofi Denkyirah ◽

Ofori Obeng Nketiah ◽

Elvis Dartey Okoffo

Keyword(s):

Sampling Technique ◽

Probit Model ◽

Rice Production ◽

Farm Income ◽

Record Keeping ◽

Access To Credit ◽

Rice Farmers ◽

Multi Stage ◽

Coefficient Of Concordance ◽

On Farm

The study assessed rice farmers’ access to credit and constraints in rice production in the Tolon District of Ghana. A total of 140 rice farmers were sampled for the study using multi-stage sampling technique. The probit model was used to estimate the factors that affected rice farmers’ access to credit. The Kendall’s coefficient of concordance was used to assess the constraints in rice production. The results of the study revealed that majority of the rice farmers accessed credit from family and friends and invested the credit into non-agricultural activities. The probit result revealed that age, marital status, member of farmer based organization, extension visit, record keeping and farm income were the significant variables that influenced rice farmers’ access to credit. The results also revealed that high cost of inputs and pest were the most pressing institutional and technical constraints in rice production, respectively. The study recommends that credit should be converted to physical inputs and other services and delivered to farmers to help minimize credit diversion from the farm sector. Rice farmers should be encouraged to form farmer groups and keep records of farming activities considering the fact that it positively influenced farmers’ access to credit. Subsidies should be provided on farm inputs. Effective ways of eliminating pest on rice fields should be developed since it was a major challenge facing the rice farmers in their production.

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