scholarly journals Crop Yields in European Agroforestry Systems: A Meta-Analysis

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vladimir Ivezić ◽  
Yang Yu ◽  
Wopke van der Werf
Keyword(s):  
Systematic Review ◽  
Crop Production ◽  
Crop Yields ◽  
Alley Cropping ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Quantitative Information ◽  
Negative Influence ◽  
Agroforestry Systems ◽  
Tree Planting ◽  
Agricultural System

Agroforestry is the practice of integrating woody vegetation with crops and/or livestock production in order to strengthen ecological services on farmland and achieve a more multi-functional agricultural system. Crop yields determine economic outcomes when trees are young, but information on yields is scattered in the literature and a quantitative overview of crop yields in European agroforestry systems is lacking. We therefore synthesized published information on crop yields in European agroforestry systems, using meta-analysis. A systematic review of the literature was conducted, highlighting quantitative information on yields is available only for traditional Dehesa systems in Spain and Portugal and for modern alley cropping experiments, mostly in northern Europe. Relative cereal crop yields in alley cropping systems (systems with tree rows with interspersed crop strips) were 96% of sole crop yield at tree planting. Crop yields in alley cropping decreased on average with 2.6% per year over the first 21 years of the tree stand, indicating increasing competitive effects of the trees with their age. On the other hand, studies in traditional Dehesa and Montado systems in Southern Europe showed no negative influence of the trees on crop production, indicating that competition between crops and trees plays a less important role in those systems than in alley cropping. Overall, the systematic review showed a need for more experimental data to further substantiate the benefits of agroforestry and elucidate optimal agroforestry practices under European conditions.

scholarly journals Rooting Forest Landscape Restoration in Consumer Markets—A Review of Existing Marketing-Based Funding Initiatives

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ennia Bosshard ◽  
Merel Jansen ◽  
Sara Löfqvist ◽  
Chris J. Kettle
Keyword(s):  
Negative Influence ◽  
Agroforestry Systems ◽  
Tree Planting ◽  
Forest Landscape ◽  
Landscape Restoration ◽  
Non Profit ◽  
For Profit ◽  
Landscape Degradation ◽  
Forest Landscape Restoration ◽  
Wide Range

Forest landscape restoration (FLR) is globally important to mitigate a wide range of social and environmental problems driven by landscape degradation and deforestation. Despite widespread recognition of the urgent need to restore biodiversity and ecological functioning across many forest landscapes, there is an apparent mismatch between political commitments and direct actions on the ground. Global markets and consumption patterns remain prominent drivers of land degradation. Alternatively, market forces could be transformed to have net positive rather than negative influence on land use change, offering innovative pathways to incentivise and finance FLR. Understanding current market mechanisms that finance FLR is essential for establishing best practices and effective policy. We reviewed 40 eco-marketing initiatives to provide an overview of the types of organizations involved in funding of FLR, and how they finance and enable FLR interventions. We identified three groups of initiatives: for-profit business, certified social enterprise, and non-profit organization. In total, 36 out of the reviewed initiatives collaborated with enabler-organizations to implement FLR activities. All initiatives promoted active tree planting, primarily in regenerative agroforestry systems. Only six analyzed initiatives included natural regeneration as a type of FLR intervention. This suggests that eco-marketing initiatives primarily focus on funding tree planting initiatives, possibly because tree planting is the easiest message to communicate to consumers. Strong safeguards and governance of FLR projects are necessary to ensure that tree planting projects do not overshadow other FLR interventions in areas where other approaches have more significant ecological, environmental, and social benefits.

scholarly journals Incidence rate and basic reproduction number of Coronavirus diseases (COVID-19): a systematic review and meta-analysis protocol

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hailay Abrha Gesesew ◽  
William Mude ◽  
Tafadzwa Nyanhanda ◽  
Lillian Mwanri
Keyword(s):  
Systematic Review ◽  
Data Extraction ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Quantitative Information ◽  
Incidence Rates ◽  
World Health ◽  
Bibliographic Databases ◽  
Search Term ◽  
Reproduction Numbers ◽  
Health Organization

Abstract Background : World Health Organization declared Coronavirus (COVID-19) as a newly emerging disease on 31 December 2019. In a space of two-months, there have been several studies reporting incidence rates, incubation periods, fatality rates, basic and effective reproduction numbers of the disease. However, the data have not been synthesized and pooled together to determine the global average. Objective : The present study aims to systematically review available global evidence on incidence rates, and basic and effective reproduction numbers of COVID-19. Methods : This is a protocol for a systematic review of available quantitative studies published in English. Studies which describe the incidence rates, and basic and effective reproduction numbers of COVID-19 will be included in the search. Initially, search term concepts will be constructed through a preliminary search on Google scholar. Then, we will perform a full systematic search using the identified concepts in the following electronic bibliographic databases: SCOPUS, PubMed, Web of Sciences and CINAHL. Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) will be used to schematically present the full search strategy. Standardised Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) quality appraisal and selection tools, and data extraction tools will be used to recruit studies and extract data from the included studies, respectively. Thematic analysis will be used to analyse the non-quantifiable data, and meta-analysis will be used to pool the quantitative information.

scholarly journals Virus Shedding of Avian Influenza in Poultry: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Viruses ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (9) ◽  
pp. 812 ◽  
Author(s):  
Germeraad ◽  
Sanders ◽  
Hagenaars ◽  
Jong ◽  
Beerens ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Systematic Review ◽  
Avian Influenza ◽  
Control Strategies ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Quantitative Information ◽  
Effective Control ◽  
Virus Shedding ◽  
Virus Origin ◽  
Inoculation Route ◽  
Meta Analyses

Understanding virus shedding patterns of avian influenza virus (AIV) in poultry is important for understanding host-pathogen interactions and developing effective control strategies. Many AIV strains were studied in challenge experiments in poultry, but no study has combined data from those studies to identify general AIV shedding patterns. These systematic review and meta-analysis were performed to summarize qualitative and quantitative information on virus shedding levels and duration for different AIV strains in experimentally infected poultry species. Methods were designed based on the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. Four electronic databases were used to collect literature. A total of 1155 abstract were screened, with 117 studies selected for the qualitative analysis and 71 studies for the meta-analysis. A large heterogeneity in experimental methods was observed and the quantitative analysis showed that experimental variables such as species, virus origin, age, inoculation route and dose, affect virus shedding (mean, peak and duration) for highly pathogenic AIV (HPAIV), low pathogenic AIV (LPAIV) or both. In conclusion, this study highlights the need to standardize experimental procedures, it provides a comprehensive summary of the shedding patterns of AIV strains by infected poultry and identifies the variables that influence the level and duration of AIV shedding.

scholarly journals A Review of Soil-Improving Cropping Systems for Soil Salinization

Agronomy ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (6) ◽  
pp. 295 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julián Cuevas ◽  
Ioannis N. Daliakopoulos ◽  
Fernando del Moral ◽  
Juan J. Hueso ◽  
Ioannis K. Tsanis
Keyword(s):  
Crop Production ◽  
Crop Yields ◽  
Cropping Systems ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Conservation Agriculture ◽  
Crop Productivity ◽  
Soil Salinization ◽  
Review Literature ◽  
Residue Management ◽  
Negative Effect

A major challenge of the Sustainable Development Goals linked to Agriculture, Food Security, and Nutrition, under the current global crop production paradigm, is that increasing crop yields often have negative environmental impacts. It is therefore urgent to develop and adopt optimal soil-improving cropping systems (SICS) that can allow us to decouple these system parameters. Soil salinization is a major environmental hazard that limits agricultural potential and is closely linked to agricultural mismanagement and water resources overexploitation, especially in arid climates. Here we review literature seeking to ameliorate the negative effect of soil salinization on crop productivity and conduct a global meta-analysis of 128 paired soil quality and yield observations from 30 studies. In this regard, we compared the effectivity of different SICS that aim to cope with soil salinization across 11 countries, in order to reveal those that are the most promising. The analysis shows that besides case-specific optimization of irrigation and drainage management, combinations of soil amendments, conditioners, and residue management can contribute to significant reductions of soil salinity while significantly increasing crop yields. These results highlight that conservation agriculture can also achieve the higher yields required for upscaling and sustaining crop production.

scholarly journals REVIEW ON KNOWLEDGE GAP IN Brachiaria GRASS RESEARCH AND UTILIZATION: ETHIOPIAN PERSPECTIVE

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 9-26
Author(s):  
Wubetie ADNEW ◽  
Bimrew ASMARE ◽  
Yeshambel MEKURIAW
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Crop Yield ◽  
Crop Production ◽  
Crop Yields ◽  
Livestock Production ◽  
Agricultural System ◽  
Research Knowledge ◽  
Feed Resources ◽  
Livestock Feed ◽  
The Tropics

Still food security has not been attained fully in many tropical African countries including Ethiopia. However, the issue of food security achievement has been able to realize due to various setbacks among which low productivity of crops and livestock take the lion share. Among the various constraints the parasitic weed Striga, and Stemborer pests are responsible for lower crop yields in the region. Regarding livestock feed, shortage in terms of quantity and quality are the major impediment to the livestock sector. To achieve food security, increasing crop yield and livestock production is vital in Ethiopia and other tropical countries. Crop yields can be enhanced through the control of weeds using biological systems to increase food crop yield apart from chemical inputs. In case of livestock, full production and reproduction potential of animals can be met through fulfilling nutritional requirements of livestock. The major livestock feed resources in Ethiopia are natural pasture and crop residues. Both feed resources; however, are poor in nutritional value and they are listed as low maintenance feed category. Therefore, it is vital to intensify integrated crop- livestock production systems for sustainable economy and environment. Introducing forage grasses in the crop production system has been practiced in the tropics as push pull technology. In Ethiopia, Brachiaria grass is an emerging forage for integrated agricultural production that has been getting considerable recognition as an option to overcome the pests in crop production in the tropics due to its high adaptive and yielding as well as climate smart forages. In the country, Brachiaria is recently introduced by different organization in different agro-ecology of the country mainly as push-pull integrated agricultural system and considering its fodder potential for the livestock feed. Therefore, this review paper aimed to looking for the available research knowledge in Ethiopia and somewhere else in the glob for better utilization of Brachiaria grass in the integrated agricultural system. All available information regarding the research and utilization of Brachiaria grass were reviewed in the published papers. The review reveal that Brachiaria has many advantages over other grass species in terms of adaptation to drought and low fertility soils, ability to sequester carbon; increase nitrogen use efficiency through biological nitrification inhibition (BNI) and arrest greenhouse gas emissions. The knowledge has been established in quantifying the multiple contributions of Brachiaria grass inclusion as push pull technology in different parts of the world (South America, Kenya, Rwanda). Limited report showed that cut-and-carry system is the utilization practice of brachiaria grass grown the push pull integration. The potential of improved Brachiaria grass in Ethiopia to address the challenge of livestock feed scarcity and other environmental managements; however, remain unexploited/limited which calls researchers to work on. The review concluded that B. cultivars could have a significant contribution on both animal and cereal production in the tropics but limited research and utilization in Ethiopia.

scholarly journals Farmers’ Perceptions of Tree Shelterbelts on Agricultural Land in Rural Kyrgyzstan

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 1093 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Ruppert ◽  
Martin Welp ◽  
Michael Spies ◽  
Niels Thevs
Keyword(s):  
Crop Production ◽  
Agricultural Land ◽  
Crop Yields ◽  
Farming Systems ◽  
Agroforestry Systems ◽  
Economic Benefits ◽  
Sustainable Land Use ◽  
Main Concern ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Trade Offs

The reestablishment of agroforestry systems in Central Asia, combining crop production with protective tree shelterbelts, provides significant potential to improve farming systems. This includes increasing crop yields, additional income from timber, as well as reducing soil degradation and wind erosion. Thus, adopting shelterbelts as a form of pro-environmental behavior provides a number of socio-economic benefits, although some trade-offs need to be considered as well. This paper investigates factors that shape the perception of—and attitude towards—the establishment of tree shelterbelts by farmers in two case study regions in Kyrgyzstan. Applying a conceptual framework distinguishing between extrinsic and intrinsic factors, research methods included semi-structured interviews with farmers and local policy makers. The results show spatial differences in the perception of shelterbelts, both on the regional and on the village scale. In general, shelterbelts were negatively perceived by more than half of the farmers. The main concern raised by farmers was the shading of crops by shelterbelts, resulting in a decrease of yield. In addition, small field sizes and potential conflicts with neighbors were key concerns. Furthermore, rules set by local self-government bodies were inconsistent with the legislative framework, posing significant restrictions to the adoption of sustainable land use practices.

Disentangling the environmental impacts in increasing global food production

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Cristina Rulli ◽  
Paolo D'Odorico
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Crop Production ◽  
Agricultural Intensification ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Crop Yields ◽  
Rural Livelihoods ◽  
Food Prices ◽  
Habitat Destruction ◽  
Agricultural System ◽  
Global Food

<p>The past few decades have seen unprecedented changes in the global agricultural system with a dramatic increase in the rates of crops production fueled by an escalating demand for food calories, as a result of demographic growth, dietary changes, and – more recently – new bioenergy policies. Food prices have become consistently higher and increasingly volatile with dramatic spikes in 2007-08 and 2010-11. The confluence of these factors has heightened demand for the natural resources needed for crop production, that is land and water so increasing the environmental burden. Solutions to feed the planet often point to agricultural intensification (i.e., increase in crop yields) as the approach that could meet the increasing human demand with the smaller environmental impacts. Indeed, intensification avoids the land use change (e.g., deforestation), habitat destruction, and increase in CO<sub>2</sub> emissions that would result from an expansion of cultivated land (or “extensification”). The impacts of intensification on freshwater resources, rural livelihoods, and equity, however, is often ignored. At the same time, agricultural expansion has important externalities that go beyond biodiversity losses or greenhouse gas emissions, with important ramifications to human and planetary health. We use a suite of model simulations and data analyses to evaluate the hydrological and nutritional impacts of agricultural intensification vs expansion and discuss their different suitability large scale farming vs smallholders.</p>

Cereal pre-harvest sprouting: a global agricultural disaster regulated by complex genetic and biochemical mechanisms

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Li Tai ◽  
Hong-Jin Wang ◽  
Xiao-Jing Xu ◽  
Wei-Hang Sun ◽  
Lan Ju ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Crop Production ◽  
Regulatory Networks ◽  
Crop Yields ◽  
Germination Rate ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Biological Significance ◽  
Economic Benefits ◽  
Economic Losses ◽  
High Germination ◽  
Custom Made

Abstract With the growth of the global population and uncontrollable natural disasters, crop yields must be steadily increased to enhance human adaptability to risks. Pre-harvest sprouting (PHS) is a global disaster for agricultural production, which is mainly used to describe the phenomenon in which grains germinate on the mother plant directly before harvest. After domestication, the dormancy level of cultivated crops was generally lower than that of wild ancestors. Although the shortened dormancy period likely improved the industrial performance of cereals such as wheat, barley, rice, and maize, the excessively high germination rate has caused frequent PHS in areas with higher rainfall, causing great economic losses. Here, we systematically reviewed the causes and harms of PHS, the major indicators and methods for PHS assessment, emphasising the biological significance of PHS in crop production. Wheat quantitative trait loci (QTLs) functioning in PHS controls were also comprehensively summarised for a meta-analysis. Finally, we used Arabidopsis as a model plant to develop more complete PHS regulatory networks for wheat. The integration of this information is conducive to cultivating custom-made cultivated lines suitable for different demands and different regions and is of great significance for improving crop yield and economic benefits.

The effects of low-ratio n-6/n-3 PUFA on biomarkers of inflammation: a systematic review and meta-analysis

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yali Wei ◽  
Yan Meng ◽  
Na Li ◽  
Qian Wang ◽  
Liyong Chen
Keyword(s):  
Systematic Review ◽  
Fatty Acid ◽  
Polyunsaturated Fatty Acid ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Chain Polyunsaturated Fatty Acid ◽  
Inflammation Markers ◽  
Pufa Supplementation ◽  
Long Chain

The purpose of the systematic review and meta-analysis was to determine if low-ratio n-6/n-3 long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acid (PUFA) supplementation affects serum inflammation markers based on current studies.

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