The Symposium on high salinity tolerant plants, held at the University of Al Ain in December 1990, dealt primarily with plants tolerating salinity levels exceeding that of ocean water and which at the same time are promising for utilization in agriculture or forestry. These plants could be very useful for a country like the UAE where fresh water resources are very scarce and the groundwater available at some places is already very salty. More than 60 million woody trees/shrubs have been planted so far and more are planned for the inland plains underlain with brackish groundwater. These species were no solution for the widely barren shoreline of the UAE. Here mangrove species were of potential use, and one species, Avicennia Marina, occurs widely and has been successfully planted for about a decade. Converting the tree plantations into economically useful cropping systems is still a problem requiring much research and development. The book deals in several sections with conventional irrigation systems using marginal water. The species used in these systems are mostly hybrids of conventional crops. The irrigation systems, however, have similar problems as may be expected for irrigation with seawater. Papers show the participants' experiments in this area. The volume serves as a link between scientists working for the improvement of classical irrigation systems and those interested in the application of a new dimension of salinity levels for irrigation water.

Jeremy takes us back to another year of life as a gentleman farmer at Diddly Squat - what could possibly go wrong this time?

Welcome back to Clarkson's farm. At the end of Jeremy's first year, Diddly Squat farm rewarded him with profits of £144. And while he's mastered the art of moaning, challenges still abound.

Who knew loading a trailer was more demanding than flying a gunship? That cows were more dangerous than motor-racing? Or that it's easier to get planning permission for a nuclear power station than turning an old barn into a restaurant?

Life on Clarkson's farm may not always go according to plan. But not a day goes by when Jeremy can't say 'I've done a thing' and mean it...

Post-agricultural studies have been central to the development of both the science of plant ecology and ecology in general. The study of old field succession in particular allows us to observe the development of the structure and function of communities, as well as understand the roles of history and initial conditions in that process. Understanding old field succession can help the public address important scientific and social issues, such as deforestation and forest regeneration, forest restoration, sustainability of agriculture, maintenance of biodiversity, and impacts of global climate change on forest dynamics. Post-Agricultural Succession in the Neotropics focuses on published scientific work and its implications for wise management of old field ecosystems in the neotropics, where conversion of land to cropping systems is the most common kind of disturbance and many landscapes are defined by areas recovering from agriculture. Written for researchers, professionals, and students of ecology, the book provides a background in old field ecosystems and proposes restoration strategies and a trajectory for future research. methodologies and management strategies proposed.

Concern about the environmental impacts of transgenic crops is one of the major reasons for the EU 's quasi-moratorium on GMOs. This book shows that the economic implications of these concerns are far-reaching and complex, ranging from the farm to research and technology development to consumer reactions, and that they influence government response, international trade and public and private incentives for R & D.

What is now called JCPenney, a fixture of suburban shopping malls, started out as a small-town Main Street store that fused its founder's interests in agriculture, retail business, religion, and philanthropy. This book - at once a biography of Missouri farm boy-turned-business icon James Cash Penney and the story of the company he started in 1902 - brings to light the little-known agrarian roots of an American department store chain. David Delbert Kruger explores how the company, its stores, and their famous founder shaped rural America throughout the twentieth century. ""Most of our stores,"" Penney explained in 1931, ""are located in agricultural regions where the tide of merchandising rises and falls with the prosperity of the farmers."" Despite the growth of cities in the early twentieth century, Penney maintained his stores' commitment to serving the needs of farmers and small-town folk. Tracing this dedication to Penney's rural upbringing, Kruger describes how, from one store in the sheep-ranching and mining town of Kemmerer, Wyoming, J. C. Penney Co. became a familiar chain on Main Street, USA, purveying value, providing good jobs, and marking rites of passage in many an American childhood. Kruger paints a biographical and historical picture of an American business mogul distinctly different from comparable capitalists such as Andrew Carnegie, Henry Ford, or Sam Walton. Despite his chain's corporate structure, Penney imbued each store with a Golden Rule philosophy that demanded mutual respect between customers, employees, competitors, suppliers, and communities. By tracing that spirit to its agrarian source, and following it through the twentieth century, J. C. Penney: The Man, the Store, and American Agriculture provides a new perspective on this American cultural institution - and on its founder's unique brand of American capitalism.

Earthworms, which belong to the order Oligochaeta, comprise roughly 3,000 species grouped into five families. Earthworms have been called 'ecosystem engineers'; much like human engineers, they change the structure of their environments. Earthworms are very versatile and are found in nearly all terrestrial ecosystems. They play an important role in forest and agricultural ecosystems. This Soil Biology volume describes the various facets of earthworms, such as their role in soil improvement, soil structure, and the biocontrol of soil-borne plant fungal diseases. Reviews discuss earthworms' innate immune system, molecular markers to address various issues of earthworm ecology, earthworm population dynamics, and the influences of organic farming systems and tillage. Further topics include the characteristics of vermicompost, relationships between soil earthworms and enzymes, the role of spermathecae, copulatory behavior, and adjustment of the donated sperm volume.

Plant biotechnology offers important opportunities for agriculture, horticulture, and the pharmaceutical and food industry by generating transgenic varieties with altered properties. This is likely to change farming practice and reduce the potential negative impact of plant production on the environment. This volume shows the worldwide advances and potential benefits of plant genetic engineering focusing on the third millennium.
The authors discuss the production of transgenic plants resistant to biotic and abiotic stress, the improvement of plant qualities, the use of transgenic plants as bioreactors, and the use of plant genomics for genetic improvement and gene cloning. Unique to this book is the integrative point of view taken between plant genetic engineering and socioeconomic and environmental issues. Considerations of regulatory processes to release genetically modified plants, as well as the public acceptance of the transgenic plants are also discussed.
This book will be welcomed by biotechnologists, researchers and students alike working in the biological sciences. It should also prove useful to everyone dedicated to the study of the socioeconomic and environmental impact of the new technologies, while providing recent scientific information on the progress and perspectives of the production of genetically modified plants.

The work is dedicated to Professor Marc van Montagu.

These Proceedings evolved from the OECD Co-operative Research Programme workshop on "Potential ecological impact of transgenic plants expressing viral sequencies," held at the Agricultural Biotechnology Center in Godollo, Hungary on 24-26 April 1997. The OECD Co-operative Research Programme At the Directorate for Agrieulture of the Organisation for Economie Co-operation and Development (OECD) a co-operative research programme for "Biological Resource Management" has existed since 1990. It foeuses on work in four specific topie areas, one of whieh is "Ecology and utilisation of new organisms" (Theme 3). The activities promoted by this programme are post-doctoral fellowships (announced annually), and the organisation of expert workshops (1-2 workshops per Theme per year). The 26 OECD member countries participating in this programme are: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, ltaly, Korea, Japan, the NetherIands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, SwitzerIand, Turkey, the UK, and the USA."

Today the goal of designing highly productive, sustainable agricultural produc tion systems is at the forefront of the agricultural research agenda around the world. The key to designing sustainable agricultural production technologies is in understanding their economic, environmental, and human health impacts. This volume presents a methodology designed to quantify such impacts and to represent them as tradeoff's. We propose this tradeoff' methodology as an approach to accomplish two essential elements in achieving agricultural sustainability. First, the tradeoff's method is a key to the design of successful interdisciplinary research projects to assess sustainability of production systems. Second, the tradeoff's method provides a successful means to communicate research findings to policy makers and the public. To put this effort into perspective, we would like to explain its origins and reflect on its implications for conducting future research. In 1987, the Rockefeller Foundation commissioned a report that set out to ascertain why, in view ofthe extensive literatures on certain classes of agricul tural pollution, there had been few if any attempts to incorporate pollution externalities into the rather voluminous literature on the assessment of agricultural research impacts (Antle and Capalbo, 1988; see also Antle, 1994)."

For courses in Greenhouse Management. Based on the author's life-long practical experiences both in the industry and in research, Greenhouse Operation and Management, Seventh Edition, offers students a state-of-the-art guide to the operation of commercial flower and vegetable greenhouses. The text presents coverage in the order in which decision-making concerns occur for a person entering the greenhouse business. Exceptionally comprehensive, yet accessible, it provides detailed, step-by-step instructions in layman's terms for ALL aspects of the business-from the physical facilities, to the day-to-day operations, to business management and marketing.

The Mekong Delta of Vietnam is one of the most productive agricultural areas in the world. The Mekong River fans out over an area of about 40,000 sq kilometers and over the course of many millennia has produced a region of fertile alluvial soils and constant flows of energy. Today about a fourth of the Delta is under rice cultivation, making this area one of the premier rice granaries in the world. The Delta has always proven a difficult environment to manipulate, however, and because of population pressures, increasing acidification of soils, and changes in the Mekong's flow, environmental problems have intensified. The changing way in which the region has been linked to larger flows of commodities and capital over time has also had an impact on the region: For example, its re-emergence in recent decades as a major rice-exporting area has linked it inextricably to global markets and their vicissitudes. And most recently, the potential for sea level increases because of global warming has added a new threat. Because most of the region is on average only a few meters above sea level and because any increase of sea level will change the complex relationship between tides and down-river water flow, the Mekong Delta is one of the areas in the world most vulnerable to the effects of climate change. How governmental policy and resident populations have in the past and will in coming decades adapt to climate change as well as several other emerging or ongoing environmental and economic problems is the focus of this collection.

This book reviews developments in the molecular biology of plant-nematode interactions that have been driven by the application of genomics tools. The book will be of interest to postgraduate students and to researchers with an interest in plant nematology and/or plant pathology more generally. A series of introductory chapters provide a biological context for the detailed reviews of all areas of plant-nematode interactions that follow and ensure that the bulk of the book is accessible to the non-specialist. A final section aims to show how these fundamental studies have provided outputs of practical relevance.

Knowledge generation and transfer mechanisms are being transformed in important and controversial ways. Investment in research and development has increased in response to recognition that scientific productivity is tightly connected to economic dynamism. Patent protection has been expanded in order to stimulate higher levels of private investment. Intellectual property rights held by public organizations and researchers are now increasingly transferred to private organizations to accelerate the diffusion and enhance the value of knowledge produced by public agencies and universities. Additionally, new institutions such as university offices of technology transfer, venture capital markets, and a variety of consortia in knowledge-intensive industries are being established throughout the United States and in other parts of the world. These changes have led to a repositioning of the state in systems of innovation and an increase in the proprietary character of technical information. The purpose of this book is to review and analyze i) contemporary transitions in agricultural knowledge generation and extension arrangements from an empirical perspective, and ii) emerging and contradictory perspectives as to how knowledge systems can be assessed effectively. The authors aim to provide the reader with a better understanding of the implications of new biotechnologies and new intellectual property rights regimes on public-private relations in science, the extent to which benefits from scientific knowledge are being appropriated by private sector actors, the diversity and possible outcomes of privatization initiatives in extension, and prospects for public goods production and ecological sustainability given contemporary trends. The book presents contrasting views on the degree of complementarity and substitution between private and public sector investments in research and extension. Recognizing that the labels `public' and `private' are incomplete and at times misleading descriptions of the structure and function of coordinating bodies in social systems, the analyses highlight ways in which public and private spaces and modes of functioning combine. In addition to illustrating a broad range of analytic methodologies useful for studying organizational questions in knowledge systems, the authors identify the implications of a range of past and potential institutional innovations.

In continuation from the previous three volumes 17, 18, and 19 on High-Tech and Micropropagation this volume presents 29 chapters on the propagation of ornamental plants through modern biotechnological methods. The species covered include "Alstromeria," "Antirrhinum," "Begonia," "Chrysanthemum," "Cornus," "Euphorbia," "Gardenia," "Gladiolus," "Hyacinthus," "Impatiens," "Iris," "Lycoris," "Nematanthus," "Paeonia," "Pelargonium," "Phalaenopsis," "Rhododendron," "Ruscus," "Saintpaulia," "Senecio," "Syringa," orchids, cacti, roses, and Boston ferns. In addition, one chapter is devoted to micropropagation of virus-free ornamentals in the CIS. Throughout the book, detailed protocols as well as a comprehensive review of the literature are provided. Advanced students, teachers, and researchers in the fields of floriculture, horticulture, and plant biotechnology in general, and also those interested in industrial or commercial micropropagation will find a wealth of useful information in the book.

Modeling Environmental Policy demonstrates the link between physical models of the environment and policy analysis in support of policy making. Each chapter addresses an environmental policy issue using a quantitative modeling approach. The volume addresses three general areas of environmental policy - non-point source pollution in the agricultural sector, pollution generated in the extractive industries, and transboundary pollutants from burning fossil fuels. The book concludes by discussing the modeling efforts and the use of mathematical models in general.

The Economics of European Agriculture explains the Demand and Supply characteristics of agricultural markets, as well as government intervention in agriculture, with an emphasis on the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). Bernadette Andreosso-O'Callaghan also analyses the fifth enlargement and its implications for agriculture in Europe, technology and innovation, and agricultural trade liberalization.

The future of agriculture strongly depends on our ability to enhance productivity without sacrificing long-term production potential. An ecologically and economically sustainable strategy is the application of microorganisms, such as the diverse bacterial species of plant growth promoting bacteria (PGPB). The use of these bio-resources for the enhancement of crop productivity is gaining worldwide importance.

" Bacteria in Agrobiology: Plant Growth Responses " describes the application of various bacteria in plant growth promotion and protection, including symbiotic, free living, rhizospheric, endophytic, methylotrophic, diazotrophic and filamentous species.