scholarly journals Estimating farmers’ internal value of crop residues in smallholder crop-livestock systems: A South Asia case study

2021 ◽  
pp. 003072702110395
Author(s):  
Kent Olson ◽  
Victor Gauto ◽  
Nils Teufel ◽  
Braja Swain ◽  
Sabine Homann-Kee Tui ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
South Asia ◽  
Null Hypothesis ◽  
Crop Residues ◽  
Construction Material ◽  
Shadow Price ◽  
Livestock Feed ◽  
Mixed Crop ◽  
Shadow Value ◽  
Using Data

Crop residues (CR) are an important, internally produced resource with several uses on smallholder, mixed crop-livestock farms, including livestock feed, mulch, fuel and construction material. This study sets out to develop a method to estimate the internal shadow value of CR as feed and as mulch for smallholder households. The study uses a South Asia case study as illustration using data from a set of village and household surveys in three different sites. The estimated shadow prices were higher for CR as mulch than for CR as feed at all three sites. These results reject the null hypothesis that the estimated shadow price for CR as feed is greater than the shadow price for CR as mulch. Since the null hypothesis was formed based on observing household behavior, the rejection of the null hypothesis implies that there are other reasons to explain why more households use CR as feed versus as mulch.

scholarly journals Can Retention of Crop Residues on the Field Be Justified on Socioeconomic Grounds? A Case Study from the Mixed Crop-Livestock Production Systems of the Moroccan Drylands

Agronomy ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (8) ◽  
pp. 1465
Author(s):  
Tamer El-Shater ◽  
Yigezu A. Yigezu
Keyword(s):  
Crop Residues ◽  
Production Systems ◽  
Animal Feed ◽  
Livestock Production ◽  
Economic Benefits ◽  
Zero Tillage ◽  
Alternative Feed ◽  
Mixed Crop ◽  
Residue Retention

Conservation agriculture (CA) involving zero tillage, crop diversification, and residue retention is considered a panacea for several interrelated problems in agricultural production. However, in the mixed crop-livestock production systems of the drylands, crop residues have great significance as sources of animal feed, posing a major challenge in the promotion of CA. While the economic benefits and the drivers of adoption of zero tillage and rotation have been well documented, the literature on the economics of residue retention (RR), especially in the drylands, is scanty. By applying the endogenous switching regression model to a case study of 2296 wheat fields in Morocco, this paper provides evidence on the socio-economic impacts of residue retention. Between 30% and 60% and above 60% of crop residues were retained respectively on 35% and 14% of wheat fields. These levels of residue retention led to 22% and 29% more yields, 25% and 32% higher gross margins and 22% and 25% more consumption of wheat, respectively. Retention of above 60% residue reduces both downside risk and variability of yield while lower levels of residue retention have mixed effects. Residue retention is economically and biophysically beneficial even for owners of livestock as the monetary value of the additional grain yield more than offsets the cost of purchasing an equivalent amount of feed from the market—all providing good economic justification for residue retention. Our findings show that economic reasons are not barriers for adoption of residue retention, but risk factors and absence of alternative feed sources might. The policy implication of our results is that there are high incentives for Morocco and other similar countries in North Africa and West Asia to invest in the development and/or import of alternative feed sources, introducing crop insurance, and raising the awareness of the economic, biophysical and environmental benefits of residue retention among farmers.

scholarly journals Superregular grammars do not provide additional explanatory power but allow for a compact analysis of animal song

2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (7) ◽  
pp. 190139 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. Morita ◽  
H. Koda
Keyword(s):  
Computational Complexity ◽  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Null Hypothesis ◽  
Computational Analysis ◽  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Regular Languages ◽  
Human Language ◽  
Human Data ◽  
Using Data

A pervasive belief with regard to the differences between human language and animal vocal sequences ( song ) is that they belong to different classes of computational complexity, with animal song belonging to regular languages, whereas human language is superregular. This argument, however, lacks empirical evidence since superregular analyses of animal song are understudied. The goal of this paper is to perform a superregular analysis of animal song, using data from gibbons as a case study, and demonstrate that a superregular analysis can be effectively used with non-human data. A key finding is that a superregular analysis does not increase explanatory power but rather provides for compact analysis: fewer grammatical rules are necessary once superregularity is allowed. This pattern is analogous to a previous computational analysis of human language, and accordingly, the null hypothesis, that human language and animal song are governed by the same type of grammatical systems, cannot be rejected.

scholarly journals Assessment of Livestock Feed Resources and Coping Strategies with Dry Season Feed Scarcity in Mixed Crop–Livestock Farming Systems around the Gilgel Gibe Catchment, Southwest Ethiopia

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (19) ◽  
pp. 10713
Author(s):  
Belay Duguma ◽  
Geert P. J. Janssens
Keyword(s):  
Coping Strategies ◽  
Crop Residues ◽  
Farming System ◽  
Livestock Production ◽  
Dry Season ◽  
Southwest Ethiopia ◽  
Feed Resources ◽  
Mixed Farming ◽  
Livestock Feed ◽  
Mixed Crop

In the current study area, livestock are an integral part of the mixed farming system, and play very important roles as sources of draught power, nutrition, cash income, employment and poverty alleviation. However, feed shortage, especially during the dry season, is the most important constraint to optimal productivity. This study aimed to investigate livestock feed resources and feeding practices, coping strategies with seasonal scarcity, and to identify major constraints to livestock production in a mixed farming system around the Gilgel Gibe catchment, southwest Ethiopia. Data were collected from 342 households using a structured questionnaire. The results showed natural pasture, crop residues, stubble grazing, and roadside grasses were the main feed resources, in that order. None of the respondents practiced improved forage cultivation due to insufficient land and lack of knowledge on forage production and utilization. Free grazing was the most predominant feeding system. Almost all respondents experienced dry season feed scarcity. Conserving crop residues and hay, purchasing roughages, reducing herd size and renting grazing land were the major coping strategies to feed scarcity. The farmers’ perceived major constraints to livestock production were feed shortage, animal diseases, and low productivity of local breeds. Institutional, technical and technological interventions are suggested to alleviate the constraints to livestock production in mixed crop-livestock systems in the study area and outside with similar settings.

A case study of global ULF pulsations using data from space-borne and ground-based magnetometers and a SuperDARN radar

2011 ◽  
Vol 17 (6) ◽  
pp. 54-67
Author(s):  
A.S. Potapov ◽  
◽  
E. Amata ◽  
T.N. Polyushkina ◽  
I. Coco ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Using Data

Professional Stress among Junior Commissioned Officers and Non Commissioned Officers of Indian Military Intelligence – A Case Study

GIS Business ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (6) ◽  
pp. 133-145
Author(s):  
Dr. S. S. Nirmala ◽  
Dr. N. Kogila ◽  
T. Porkodi
Keyword(s):  
Factor Analysis ◽  
Correlation Matrix ◽  
Null Hypothesis ◽  
Primary Data ◽  
Questionnaire Data ◽  
Military Intelligence ◽  
Sphericity Test ◽  
Professional Stress ◽  
Structured Questionnaire

The present study is focusing on the professional stress on organisation among the Junior Commissioned Officers (JCOs) and Non-Commissioned Officers (NCOs) of Indian Military Intelligence. 384 samples of Military Intelligence personnel will be taken for this study. Sources of data is Primary data include a structured questionnaire. Data was collected through structured questionnaire and measure through Likert’s scale, using KMO measure of sampling adequacy, Cronbach’s alpha for checking internal consistency, Bartlett sphericity test for testing the null hypothesis and various factor analysis including Eigenvalues, Extract square Sum loading, variance percent and Accumulation percent values relative comparison and Correlation matrix will be used as tools to arrive at desired results and statistical interpretations. The hypotheses put for test and the resultant values at 0.01 and 0.05 (for different factors) clearly indicated that there is an existence of association between different level of cadres and professional stress among personnel of Indian Military Intelligence. The authority who can formulate the rules and regulations and binding them on the lower cadres and professions to accept and adopt.

The Interactional Foundations of Economic Forecasting

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Werner Reichmann
Keyword(s):  
Economic Forecasting ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Social Legitimacy ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Economic Future ◽  
Economic Forecasts ◽  
Epistemic Process

How do economic forecasters produce legitimate and credible predictions of the economic future, despite most of the economy being transmutable and indeterminate? Using data from a case study of economic forecasting institutes in Germany, this chapter argues that the production of credible economic futures depends on an epistemic process embedded in various forms of interaction. This interactional foundation—through ‘foretalk’ and ‘epistemic participation’ in networks of internal and external interlocutors—sharpens economic forecasts in three ways. First, it brings to light new imaginaries of the economic future, allowing forecasters to spot emerging developments they would otherwise have missed. Second, it ensures the forecasts’ social legitimacy. And finally, it increases the forecasts’ epistemic quality by providing decentralized information about the intentions and assumptions of key economic and political actors.

scholarly journals Extending Geodemographics Using Data Primitives: A Review and a Methodological Proposal

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (6) ◽  
pp. 386
Author(s):  
Jennie Gray ◽  
Lisa Buckner ◽  
Alexis Comber
Keyword(s):  
Social Dynamics ◽  
Feature Space ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
Multiple Time ◽  
Current State ◽  
Cluster Label ◽  
Static Data ◽  
The Social ◽  
Using Data

This paper reviews geodemographic classifications and developments in contemporary classifications. It develops a critique of current approaches and identifiea a number of key limitations. These include the problems associated with the geodemographic cluster label (few cluster members are typical or have the same properties as the cluster centre) and the failure of the static label to describe anything about the underlying neighbourhood processes and dynamics. To address these limitations, this paper proposed a data primitives approach. Data primitives are the fundamental dimensions or measurements that capture the processes of interest. They can be used to describe the current state of an area in a multivariate feature space, and states can be compared over multiple time periods for which data are available, through for example a change vector approach. In this way, emergent social processes, which may be too weak to result in a change in a cluster label, but are nonetheless important signals, can be captured. As states are updated (for example, as new data become available), inferences about different social processes can be made, as well as classification updates if required. State changes can also be used to determine neighbourhood trajectories and to predict or infer future states. A list of data primitives was suggested from a review of the mechanisms driving a number of neighbourhood-level social processes, with the aim of improving the wider understanding of the interaction of complex neighbourhood processes and their effects. A small case study was provided to illustrate the approach. In this way, the methods outlined in this paper suggest a more nuanced approach to geodemographic research, away from a focus on classifications and static data, towards approaches that capture the social dynamics experienced by neighbourhoods.

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