Water protection, food production and ecosystem health are worldwide issues. Changes in the global water cycle are affecting human wellbeing in many places, while widespread land and ecosystem degradation, driven by poor agricultural practices, is seriously limiting food production. Understanding the links between ecosystems, water, and food production is important to the health of all three, and sustainably managing these connections is becoming increasingly necessary. This book shows how sustainable ecosystems, especially agroecosystems, are essential for water management and food production.

Of all the confrontations man has engineered with nature, irrigation systems have had the most widespread and far-reaching impact on the natural environment. Over a quarter of a billion hectares of the planet are irrigated and entire countries depend on irrigation for their survival and existence. Considering the importance of irrigation schemes, it is unfortunate that until recently the technology and principles of design applied to their construction has hardly changed in 4,000 years. Modern thinking on irrigation engineering has benefited from a cross-fertilization of ideas from many other fields including social sciences, control theory, political economics and agriculture. However, these influences have been largely ignored by irrigation engineers. Drawing on almost 40 years of experience of irrigation in the developing world, Laycock introduces new ideas on the design of irrigation systems and combines important issues from the disciplines of social conflict, management, and political thinking.

The degradation of land and water resources resulting primarily from agricultural activities has had enormous impact on human society. In order to alleviate this problem, an advanced understanding of the state of our resources and the process of degradation is needed. "Conserving Land, Protecting Water" includes an overview of existing literature focusing on global patterns of land and water degradation and discussions of new insights drawn from successful case studies on reversing soil and water degradation and their impact on food and environmental security.

As global pressure on water resources intensifies, it is essential that scientists understand the role that water plays in the development of crops and how such knowledge can be applied to improve water productivity. Linking crop physiology, agronomy and irrigation practices, this book focuses on eleven key fruit crops upon which millions of people in the tropics and subtropics depend for their livelihoods (avocado, cashew, Citrus spp., date palm, lychee, macadamia, mango, olive, papaya, passion fruit and pineapple). Each chapter reviews international irrigation research on an individual fruit crop, identifying opportunities for improving the effectiveness of water allocation and encouraging readers to link scientific knowledge with practical applications. Clearly written and well illustrated, this is an ideal resource for engineers, agronomists and researchers concerned with how the productivity of irrigated agriculture can be improved, in the context of climate change, and the need for growers to demonstrate good irrigation practices.

Plant phenotyping is rapidly developing technology that involves the quantitative analysis of structural and functional plant traits. It is widely recognised that phenotyping needs to match similar advances in genetics if it is to not create a bottleneck in plant breeding. Advances in plant phenotyping for more sustainable crop production reviews the wealth of research on advances in plant phenotyping to meet this challenge, including new technologies such as optical and thermographic sensors, as well as alternative carrier systems such as field robots and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). The book details the use of plant phenotyping to analyse traits such as crop root functionality, yield performance and disease resistance. Edited by a world-renowned researcher in plant science, Advances in plant phenotyping for more sustainable crop production will be a standard reference for university and other researchers in plant science, as well as those in computing and engineering science with a research focus on computer vision, data mining and image-based plant phenotyping. The book will also be a key resource for plant breeders, government and private agencies involved in advocating for a more sustainable agriculture, agricultural engineers, as well as suppliers of agricultural technology.

This book is based on a workshop held in Zimbabwe, May 1999, organized by the Department of Research and Specialist Services (Zimbabwe) and the International Board for Soil Research and Management (IBSRAM). Reviewing the current state of knowledge on and the practical aspects of the management of Vertisols in Africa, this book also includes comparative chapters covering other parts of the world, such as India, Australia and Texas (USA).

"Quality Control for Foods and Agricultural Products" is a single, complete, and practical reference to the wide variety of techniques for quality control in the production of food products. The book may also serve as a guidebook to other industries that are initiating or reviewing their quality control procedures.

This title provides an overview of the tools available for quality control in the food industry. Among the quality control measures discused are practical methodology, sampling methods, measurement devices, sensors, computer analysis, data interpretation, reference materials, and standardization. "Quality Control for Foods and Agricultural Products" allows the reader to compare and contrast the advantages and disadvantages associated with a particular quality control method. Armed with this knowledge, the best possible quality control method may be chosen for a given product.

Keep your lawn and garden lush without wasting resources by capturing and recycling the greywater that drains from your sink, shower, and washing machine. This accessible and detailed guide walks you through each step of planning for and installing a variety of greywater systems, including laundry-to-landscape and branched drain gravity-fed. After identifying greywater sources in your home and estimating flow rate, you'll learn to pinpoint where to redirect the wastewater for the greatest benefit. No matter which system you decide to build, doing so is quick and inexpensive and uses only basic tools and materials readily available at home supply stores.

Innovation has moved through a range of revolutionary epochs, but there is no clear picture of how, or even if, innovation can be managed. This book explores the models, methods and metrics of innovation analysis in the context of a single center: the Global Oilseeds Complex centred in Saskatoon, Canada. It is a single, coherent volume that outlines the theory and practices related to innovation, offering a critical assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of the different approaches, backed up with empirical evidence.

In this book, Leslie Small and Ian Carruthers examine in detail the potentials and limitations of user fees for financing irrigation operation and maintenance. Both authors have extensive field experience in irrigation in developing countries and have combined this experience with simple concepts of economics to examine possible institutional and financial reforms which would not simply ask farmers to pay for an inadequate irrigation service, but would create the potential for significant improvements in the quality of the service provided. The proposed elements of any such reform are discussed in depth - a system of user fees covering the recurrent costs of irrigation; a financially autonomous irrigation agency that can retain and use the fees to operate and maintain the irrigation facilities; and a macro policy environment that is not unduly skewed against the agricultural sector. Written in a style intended to convey economic perspectives and insights to non-economists, this book will be essential reading for all those concerned with the financing and performance of irrigation in developing countries.

This textbook provides a comprehensive treatment of irrigation engineering for advanced undergraduates and graduate students. It does not require a background in calculus, hydrology, or hydraulics, offering a one-stop overview of the entire field of study. It includes everything a student of irrigation engineering needs to know: concepts of climate, soils, crops, water quality, hydrology, and hydraulics, as well as their application to design and environmental management. To demonstrate the practical applications of the theories discussed, there are over 300 worked examples and end-of chapter exercises. The exercises allow readers to solve real-world problems and apply the information they've learned to a diverse range of scenarios. To further prepare students for their future careers, each chapter includes many illustrative diagrams and tables containing data to help design irrigation systems. For instructors' use when planning and teaching, a solutions manual can be found online alongside a suite of PowerPoint lecture slides.

Micro Irrigation Management: Technological Advances and Their Applications, the fifth book in the Innovations and Challenges in Micro Irrigation book series, is a valuable reference volume on micro irrigation and water management for professional training institutes, technical agricultural centers, irrigation centers, agricultural extension service, and other agencies who work with micro irrigation programs. With an international focus, this new book focuses on applications of solar energy in micro irrigation and other important technological advances. It includes case studies and illustrative examples on drip irrigation design.

This new volume in the Innovations and Challenges in Micro Irrigation series covers an array of technologies to estimate evapotranspiration and to evaluate parameters that are needed in the management of micro irrigation, with worldwide applicability to irrigation management in agriculture. Topics include recent evapotranspiration research, performance evaluation of filters and emitters, evaluation of fertigation and ground water with treated wastewater effluent, performance of pulse drip irrigated potato under organic agriculture practices in sandy soils, impact of polyethylene mulch on micro irrigated cabbage, and tree injection irrigation.

This new book, the fourth volume in the Innovations and Challenges in Micro Irrigation book series, examines the potential of solar energy and other emerging energy technologies in micro irrigation to create sustainable energy sources. The authors discuss a variety of innovative micro irrigation system designs, with a special focus on solar energy and photovoltaic (PV) energy.

This report examines Viet Nam's tech-based startups in two sectors: agriculture and health. It assesses the challenges for creating a more enabling ecosystem to scale up startups in these sectors and makes recommendations to overcome them. Technology-based startup enterprises are an increasingly important part of the business landscape in Asia and the Pacific. By applying innovative technologies to create new products and services, they can make a significant contribution to economic development while generating social and environmental benefits. However, to survive and then thrive, tech startups require an enabling ecosystem that includes supportive government policy, adequate access to capital, skilled personnel, and quality digital infrastructure. This is the third country report in the series ""Ecosystems for Technology Startups in Asia and the Pacific.

Tea is big business. After water, tea is believed to be the most widely consumed beverage in the world. And yet, as productivity increases, the real price of tea declines while labour costs continue to rise. Tea remains a labour intensive industry. With a distinguished career spanning over 50 years and rich experience in diverse crops, Mike Carr is eminently qualified to indulge in an intelligent discourse on tea agronomy. In addition to a comprehensive review of the principal tea growing regions worldwide in terms of structure, productivity and principal constraints, he has attempted to question and seeks to find the associated experimental evidence needed to support current and future crop management practices. The book will assist all those involved in the tea industry to become creative thinkers and to question accepted practices. International in content, it will appeal to practitioners and students from tea growing countries worldwide.

This Atlas is composed of Hazards-Volume I and Exposures, Vulnerabilities, and Risks-Volume II containing spatial information and thematic maps for assessing development in the agriculture and water sectors. This two-volume atlas is intended to support the formulation of co-beneficial options for climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction and management in Bangladesh.

This Atlas is composed of Hazards-Volume I and Exposures, Vulnerabilities, and Risks-Volume II containing spatial information and thematic maps for assessing development in the agriculture and water sectors. This two-volume atlas is intended to support the formulation of co-beneficial options for climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction and management in Bangladesh.

The study examined women's roles and gender gaps in land operation and farming, labor arrangements in agriculture and water management, and feminization of agriculture in the Lower Vaksh River Basin in Tajikistan. The study was part of the Strengthening Gender-Inclusive Growth in Central and West Asia project supported by the Asian Development Bank (ADB). The study findings will improve understanding of the situation so as to inform the ADB grant-financed project in modernizing irrigation and drainage systems in the Lower Vaksh River Basin. It reinforces the need for gender inclusiveness in planning and designing irrigation and drainage projects, ensuring benefits for all.