One of the earliest scientific works on all aspects of compost and manure. Still of value today, especially to those interested in organic agriculture. Howard is the author of the very ground breaking "An Agricultural Testament."

World population is growing at an alarming rate and may exceed 9.7 billion by 2050, whereas agricultural productivity has been negatively affected due to yield limiting factors such as biotic and abiotic stresses as a result of global climate change. Wheat is a staple crop for ~20% of the world population and its yield needs be augmented correspondingly in order to satisfy the demands of our increasing world population. "Green revolution", the introduction of semi-dwarf, high yielding wheat varieties along with improved agronomic management practices, gave rise to a substantial increase in wheat production and self-sufficiency in developing countries that include Mexico, India and other south Asian countries. Since the late 1980's, however, wheat yield is at a standoff with little fluctuation. The current trend is thus insufficient to meet the demands of an increasing world population. Therefore, while conventional breeding has had a great impact on wheat yield, with climate change becoming a reality, newer molecular breeding and management tools are needed to meet the goal of improving wheat yield for the future. With the advance in our understanding of the wheat genome and more importantly, the role of environmental interactions on productivity, the idea of genomic selection has been proposed to select for multi-genic quantitative traits early in the breeding cycle. Accordingly genomic selection may remodel wheat breeding with gain that is predicted to be 3 to 5 times that of crossbreeding. Phenomics (high-throughput phenotyping) is another fairly recent advancement using contemporary sensors for wheat germplasm screening and as a selection tool. Lastly, CRISPR/Cas9 ribonucleoprotein mediated genome editing technology has been successfully utilized for efficient and specific genome editing of hexaploid bread wheat. In summary, there has been exciting progresses in the development of non-GM wheat plants resistant to biotic and abiotic stress and/or wheat with improved nutritional quality. We believe it is important to highlight these novel research accomplishments for a broader audience, with the hope that our readers will ultimately adopt these powerful technologies for crops improvement in order to meet the demands of an expanding world population.

In light of the novel corona virus outbreak in December 2019 and its subsequent impact on entire world as a global pandemic, the book attempts to provide integrated risk assessment on Covid -19 like pandemics, as well as to understand the societal, environment and economic impact of the outbreak in various sectors of development. It covers fundamental factors of global disease outbreaks and its coverage as major disaster through the complexity and severity of consequences, illustrating the dimensions of low frequency high intensity disasters. It brings together broad range of topics including basic concepts, isolation measure, role of governance and key technical advancements for containing the diseases. In addition, it also covers resilience analysis towards the impacts such outbreaks have on bio-diversity, ecosystem services and agricultural food production. It defines key exit strategies from the lessons learned and success stories of historical disease outbreaks. The book is presented in four parts, where part 1 familiarizes with fundamentals; part 2 focuses on integrated risk assessments; part 3 focuses on various measures and strategies of resilience; and part 4 suggests key lessons and recommendations. The book is a useful reading reference for scientific community, policy makers and professionals across the domains of health, environment, disasters and sustainable development. Book is specifically beneficial for postgraduate students, researchers, planners and field professionals.

This series, originally published between 1990 and 1994 arose out of the increasing need for the international debate and dissemination of on-going empirical and theoretical research associated with rural areas in advanced societies. Rural areas, then, as now, their residents and agencies, are facing rapid social, economic and political change. Local, national and international political forces have direct influence upon rural areas, not only for those concerned with agriculture but also regarding rural development initiatives, overall economic and social policy and regional and fiscal arrangements. The volumes are designed to appeal to a wide audience associated with international comparative research. They provide reviews of research available at the original time of publication, taking as their focus one major theme per volume.

This is a concise book with comprehensive information on coal and biomass ash generated from their combustion in thermal power plants. It presents detailed studies on ash generated from contrasting coal and biomass feedstocks, and provides a comparative evaluation of these different ashes in terms of their origin, properties, environmental hazards. Potential utilizations with specific advantages and disadvantages of the respective ashes are elaborated in detail, including some innovative means of ash utilization for value addition purposes. By addressing both the theory and commercial exploitation of these products, this book will be helpful for industrialists, academicians and researchers alike.

This book tells the story of the hopeful science and trusting art of forestry. It is a story about the hopes of foresters and other scientists to understand the forests more deeply, and about their unspoken trust that their knowledge could ensure an enduring sylvan future. Much has been written on the origins and development of modern forestry in various countries, and on the people and institutions involved, but there is little in the forest history literature that explains what the science actually is. Forest knowledge has an ancient history documented since classical times and applied within the intricate social and legal systems of medieval Europe. This volume is concerned with the modern form of forest science, founded in Europe early in the nineteenth century, when regimes for managing the forests, that could be traced to the ancient world and had flourished in the Middle Ages, were disrupted. New ways had to be found. Foresters have tried to know their forests scientifically for over three centuries and have hoped to apply their knowledge to good effect, even though they could not live to see the futures they envisioned. How far did their scientific understanding enable a sylvan future? What, over the three centuries discussed in this book, were their successes and failures? And now what might the future hold for forest science and its application? This is no tale of triumph: the outlook for the world's forests is too bleak for that. While many forests are flourishing, the climate is changing, tropical forests are disappearing, others are degrading, species are being lost, governments dither, international conferences fail. This is another, longer story - one of inquiry, of science and persistent endeavour to find a better future for the forests.

This book highlights the impact of climate change on the soil microbiome and its subsequent effects on plant health, soil-plant dynamics, and the ecosphere. It also discusses emerging ideas to counteract these effects, e.g., through agricultural applications of functional microbes, to ensure a sustainable ecosystem. Climate change is altering the soil microbiome distributions and thus the interactions in microbiome and plant-soil microorganism. Improvement of our understanding of microbe-microbe and plant-microbe interaction under changing climatic conditions is essential, because the overall impact of these interactions under varying adverse environmental conditions is lacking. This book has been designed to understand the impact of climate change, i.e., mainly salt and drought stress, on the soil microbiome and its impact on plant, yield, and the ecosphere. The book is organized into four parts: The first part reviews the impact of climate change on the diversity and richness of the soil microbiome. The second part addresses effects of climate change on plant health. The third part discusses effects on soil-plant dynamics and functionality, e.g., soil productivity. The final part deals with the effects of climate change on ecosystem functioning and also discusses potential solutions. The book will appeal to students and researchers working in the area of soil science, agriculture, molecular biology, plant physiology, and biotechnology.