The market-leading textbook on this topic, the first edition was groundbreaking in the field and subsequent updates have maintained this as the definite work on Agroecology. A Companion Website offers the entire contents of the updated practical manual, Field and Laboratory Investigations in Agroecology, to book buyers, split into student and lecturer resources. These 24 sample investigations facilitate hands-on learning that involves close observation, creative interpretation, and constant questioning of findings. There is newly streamlined treatment of agroecology's foundations in ecological science, making the text more compatible with typical course curricula. A wealth of new content has been added while maintaining the book's concise, affordable format. The book uses a unique framework that presents agroecology as a science, movement, and practice. Updated case studies and updated chapter content incorporates the most recent knowledge, issues, progress, and research. New chapters offer brand new content: (Alternatives to Industrial Agriculture, Ecological Pest, Weed, and Disease Management, Urban and Peri-urban Agriculture, Agriculture and the Climate Crisis) while a revised analysis and critique of the food system's embeddedness in the extractive capitalist world economy reflects ideas in the emerging field of political agroecology. There is more explicit content on co-creation of knowledge, participatory and transdisciplinary research in this edition than any other.

This book examines the changing roles and functions of the soybean throughout world history and discusses how this reflects the complex processes of agrofood globalization. The book uses a historical lens to analyse the processes and features that brought us to the current global configuration of soy. From its origins as a peasant food in ancient China, today the protein-rich soybean is by far the most cultivated biotech crop on Earth, used to make a huge variety of food and industrial products, including animal feed, tofu, cooking oil, soy sauce, biodiesel and soap. While there is a burgeoning amount of literature on how the contemporary global soy web affects large tracts of our planet’s social and ecological systems, little attention has been given to the questions of how we got here and what alternative roles the soybean has played in the past. This book fills this gap and demonstrates that it is impossible to properly comprehend the contemporary global soybean chain, or the wider agrofood system of which it is a part, without looking at both their long and short historical development. However, a history of the soybean and its changing roles within equally changing agrofood systems is inexorably a history about globalization. Not only does this book map out where soybeans are produced, but also who governs, wields power and accumulates capital in the entire commodity chain from production to consumption, as well as identifying the institutional context the global commodity chain operates within. The book concludes by considering the soybean’s future role in a desirable agrofood system which improves human health, culture and livelihoods, and the provision of ecosystem services. This book is essential reading for students and scholars interested in agriculture and food systems, global commodity chains, globalization, environmental history, economic history and social-ecological systems.

This book provides a detailed coverage of how the circular economy aims to change the paradigm in relation to the linear economy, by limiting the environmental impact and waste of resources, as well as increasing efficiency at all stages of the product economy. It serves as the sole comprehensive overview of the role of biofuels in the circular economy. It contains updated information on the latest trends of techno-economic analysis of biofuels, economic transitions, low-carbon economies, green circular societies, and life cycle assessment of biofuels. This book delves deep into the economic security of the poor as well as the nexus between biofuel industry and global trade bodies, making it one of the few introductory books without bias toward the contribution of biofuels in circular economy. With its diverse contributions on themes such as biofuels as potential alternatives to fossil fuels, biofuel economics and policies; biofuel standards, blending, and future insecurities; economic transitions from biomass to biofuels; and biofuel economy, development, and food security, the book would be a great resource for a wide and multi-disciplinary readership base ranging from researchers to academics, policy makers, innovators, corporates, and non-profit organizations working in this area.

Biocontrol and Secondary Metabolites: Applications and Immunization for Plant Growth and Protection covers established and updated research on emerging trends in plant defense signaling in, and during, stress phases. Other topics cover growth at interface as a sustainable way of life and the context of human welfare and conservation of fungi as a group of organisms. Further, the book explores induced systemic resistance using biocontrol agents and/or secondary metabolites as a milestone for sustainable agricultural production, thus providing opportunities for the minimization or elimination of the use of fungicides.

Population Dynamics of the Reef Crisis, Volume 87 in the Advances in Marine Biology series, updates on many topics that will appeal to postgraduates and researchers in marine biology, fisheries science, ecology, zoology and biological oceanography. Chapters in this new release cover SCTL disease and coral population dynamics in S-Florida, Spatial dynamics of juvenile corals in the Persian/Arabian Gulf, Surprising stability in sea urchin populations following shifts to algal dominance on heavily bleached reefs, Biophysical model of population connectivity in the Persian Gulf, Population dynamics of 20-year decline in clownfish anemones on coral reefs at Eilat, northern Red Sea, and much more.

Originally published in 1981, The Origins of Open Field Agriculture looks at the problems connected with open field agriculture - the origins of strip cultivation, the three-field system, the adaptation of 'Celtic' fields, and the development of ploughing techniques. The book looks at the challenges to traditional ideas on the origins of settlement and their associated economy, and casts new light on understandings of village development. The book suggests that conventional views of the nucleated village, in the midst of open field strips as a product of the Anglo-Saxon migration, is no longer tenable. The book brings together the work of distinguished archaeologists, historians, and historical geographers and opens up a new perspective on the early development of medieval agriculture.

Development and Application of Classical Capillary Curve Theory shows readers how to improve chemical flooding recovery procedures in enhanced oil recovery (EOR) using sophisticated numerical modeling techniques for oil displacement that build on, and enhance, the accepted capillary curve in a novel way. The title presents research and technical data that amends the classical capillary curve, giving new impetus to chemical flooding research. By analyzing the capillary number experiment QL, the book models oil and water distribution in the micro-space of the reservoir core. Finally, the book discusses chemical flooding software, reservoir geological modeling, field tests, and a new technique of digital oil displacement testing being developed.

Disturbance ecology continues to be an active area of research, having undergone advances in many areas in recent years. One emerging direction is the increased coupling of physical and ecological processes, in which disturbances are increasingly traced back to mechanisms that cause the disturbances themselves, such as earth surface processes, mesoscale, and larger meteorological processes, and the ecological effects of interest are increasingly physiological. Plant Disturbance Ecology, 2nd Edition encourages movement away from the informal, conceptual approach traditionally used in defining natural disturbances and clearly presents how scientists can use a multitude of approaches in plant disturbance ecology. This edition includes nine revised chapters from the first edition, as well new, more comprehensive chapters on fire disturbance and beaver disturbance. Edited by leading experts in the field, Plant Disturbance Ecology, 2nd Edition is an essential resource for scientists interested in understanding plant disturbance and ecological processes.

Given the central role of the food and agriculture system in driving so many of the connected ecological, social and economic threats and challenges we currently face, Rethinking Food and Agriculture reviews, reassesses and reimagines the current food and agriculture system and the narrow paradigm in which it operates. Rethinking Food and Agriculture explores and uncovers some of the key historical, ethical, economic, social, cultural, political, and structural drivers and root causes of unsustainability, degradation of the agricultural environment, destruction of nature, short-comings in science and knowledge systems, inequality, hunger and food insecurity, and disharmony. It reviews efforts towards 'sustainable development', and reassesses whether these efforts have been implemented with adequate responsibility, acceptable societal and environmental costs and optimal engagement to secure sustainability, equity and justice. The book highlights the many ways that farmers and their communities, civil society groups, social movements, development experts, scientists and others have been raising awareness of these issues, implementing solutions and forging 'new ways forward', for example towards paradigms of agriculture, natural resource management and human nutrition which are more sustainable and just. Rethinking Food and Agriculture proposes ways to move beyond the current limited view of agro-ecological sustainability towards overall sustainability of the food and agriculture system based on the principle of 'inclusive responsibility'. Inclusive responsibility encourages ecosystem sustainability based on agro-ecological and planetary limits to sustainable resource use for production and livelihoods. Inclusive responsibility also places importance on quality of life, pluralism, equity and justice for all and emphasises the health, well-being, sovereignty, dignity and rights of producers, consumers and other stakeholders, as well as of nonhuman animals and the natural world.

Throughout the 1990s, Russian households experienced a dramatic fall in their traditional sources of subsistence: wages and social benefits. Many commentators have argued that households have adopted 'survival strategies' that enable them to make ends meet, particularly taking second jobs, growing their own food and calling on the help of family and friends. This book reviews the available data to analyse the forms, scale and incidence of these phenomena. The author finds that so-called 'survival strategies' merely represent a continuation of traditional soviet practices. He demonstrates that they disproportionately benefit the better off and that they do not provide a means by which those who have suffered misfortune can compensate for a fall in their earnings. Instead, he illustrates that most Russian households have adapted simply by cutting expenditure rather than by finding new sources of income. The author concludes by arguing that the notion of a 'household survival strategy' is inappropriate for the study of post-soviet society. Based on the analysis of a wide range of qualitative and quantitative data, Making Ends Meet in Contemporary Russia provides a comprehensive analysis of the means by which Russian households have secured their subsistence in the face of a collapse in wages and employment since the end of the soviet system. It will be required reading for all students, scholars and researchers of transition studies, development studies and human geography.

"From the International Institute for Environment and Society."

World Statistics on Mining and Utilities 2016 provides a unique biennial overview of the role of mining and utility activities in the world economy. This extensive resource from UNIDO provides detailed time series data on the level, structure and growth of international mining and utility activities by country and sector. Country level data is clearly presented on the number of establishments, employment and output of activities such as: coal, iron ore and crude petroleum mining as well as production and supply of electricity, natural gas and water. This unique and comprehensive source of information meets the growing demand of data users who require detailed and reliable statistical information on the primary industry and energy producing sectors. The publication provides internationally comparable data to economic researchers, development strategists and business communities who influence the policy of industrial development and its environmental sustainability.

Now in its second edition, Agriculture in World History presents a unique exploration of farmers and farming, and their relationships to non-farmers and urban societies from the ancient world to the 21st century. From its origins, civilization has depended on the food, fiber, and other goods produced by farmers. This book illustrates how urban societies both exploited and supported farmers, and together endured economic and environmental crises. Viewing farmers as the crucial interface between civilization and the natural world, Mark Tauger examines the environmental changes, political and social transformations, and scientific and technological developments in farming. The second edition draws attention to the modern period, particularly the effects of war, depression, and authoritarianism on world agriculture, scientific advances and the problems they created, increased international competition between countries with the expanding role of corporations, the threats posed by climate change, and some of agriculture's future prospects. Accessibly written and following a chronological structure, the volume enables readers to easily gain a foundational understanding of an important aspect of world history. This survey will be an indispensable text for world history students and for anyone interested in the historical development of the present agricultural and food crises.

Economic Effects of Natural Disasters explores how natural disasters affect sources of economic growth and development. Using theoretical econometrics and real-world data, and drawing on advances in climate change economics, the book shows scholars and researchers how to use various research methods and techniques to investigate and respond to natural disasters. No other book presents empirical frameworks for the evaluation of the quality of macroeconomic research practice with a focus on climate change and natural disasters. Because many of these subjects are so large, different regions of the world use different approaches, hence this resource presents tailored economic applications and evidence.

This book argues that development strategies have thus far failed in Western Africa because the many challenges afflicting the area have yet to be explored and understood from the perspective of institutional resources. With a particular focus on three countries on the bend of the Upper West African coast - Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone - this book offers a theory to account for the nature of these institutional elements, to test deductions against evidence, and finally to propose a reset for rural development policy to make fuller use of local institutional resources. Based on quantitative analysis and eight years of multidisciplinary field research, this volume features several large-scale RCTs in the domain of rural development, local governance, and nature conservation. The authors address one of the biggest topics in agricultural and development economics today: the structural transformation of poor, agrarian economies, and they do so through the important and unique lens of institutions.

Cereal Crops: Genetic Resources and Breeding Techniques provides the reader practical tools for understanding relationships and challenges of successful farming; improvements to genetic modifications; and environmentally sound methods of production of bulk and quality cereals including wheat, maize, rice, barley, and millets. It explores the trait mapping, cropping systems, genome engineering, and identification of specific germplasms needed for the more effective development of biotic and abiotic stress resistant cereals within the framework of ensuring future food supplies around the world. Features: Focuses on cropping systems, genetics and genome engineering for higher crop production at a global level. Features information on specific prebiotic formulas to ward off adverse effects of antibiotics. Covers mechanistic as well as practical approaches for enhancing crop production in a sustainable way. Includes further in depth analysis of various topics following each chapter. This is a vital resource for researchers, crop biologists, and students working with crop production and climate changes that have a significant impact on crop production, spanning basic to advanced level discussions of plant breeding, molecular genetics, and agronomy. Covering mechanistic and practical approaches for enhancing crop production in a sustainable way, this text is beneficial to intensive farmers and stakeholders in the field of crop production.

Originally published in 1971, this book is a systematic study of the major features and factors of the location and distribution of global agricultural enterprises. Special emphasis is given to approaches to the subject developed by economists and economic geographers, but all aspects of agricultural geography are reviewed including physical environmental problems. An introduction to the problem of classification and data collection together with instruction in some simple analytical techniques is given to equip the student with the basic methods for their own research.

Both authors are ideally suited to prepare this book, offering a nice mix of biological and geological expertise on coral reef systems. There is a glaring gap in the market for this book - there is no literature or database that comprehensively summarises the latest remote sensing imagery for global atolls. There is no comparable book. The treatment employs state-of-the-art satellite imagery and updates the existing Atlas of Coral Reefs by Spalding et al which came out more than 20 years ago. Atolls are a favorite topic of research in the biological/ecological and geological sciences due to their unusual ring-like reef form and their laboratory-like, isolated settings. The great strength and contribution of this book is the comprehensive analysis and summary of all these different atolls and their main characteristics in one place. The writing is excellent, striking a nice balance between providing enough detail while also being accessible to a general reader. A useful resource for a range of higher education courses, undergraduate and masters level courses i.e., coastal processes and environments, coral reefs and climate change, oceans coasts and climate. One reviewer says: "This is a superb volume, which I suspect will be much referred to. The authors a pre-eminent in this, and it will be authoritative as well as useful to a wide range of people."

The rapidly changing climatic condition coupled with habitat destruction, aquatic pollution and increasing anthropogenic pressure on water bodies have resulted in decline of many important fish population and some of them even become endangered. As of now the breeding protocol for seed production in captivity is developed for only handful of fish species and mostly their seed is collected from natural resources for aquaculture. This factor limits the efforts for species diversification in aquaculture. There are approaches/ technologies to generate seed of such fish species for aquaculture, especially the species that are too large to propagate in captivity or species those do not response to hormonal treatments due to stress of confinement. One of the viable approach is surrogate broodstock development using adult fish as the recipient. The obvious advantage of using adult fish as recipient is that, the donor-derived gametes can be generated within few months after stem cell transplantation; oppose to using embryos or young hatchlings those take years together to attain sexual maturity. Note: T& F does not sell or distribute the Hardback in India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

Agroforestry has significantly impacted our forests, but an often-overlooked issue is the effect of harvesting on soils and root systems. Soil and Root Damage in Forestry explains how soil and roots might be damaged through logging activities or silvicultural activities, how resulting root diseases impact the root and soil systems, and the impacts of chemical applications on the soil and root system. This book goes beyond the 'why' to also provide methods to reduce the impacts of machines on soils and offers solutions to minimize the impacts of machines on soils. Soil and Root Damage in Forestry serves as a valuable resource not only for those already working in soil science and forest ecology, but also provides insights for advanced students seeking an entrance to the "hidden half" of the planet.

This book focuses on analysing how legal systems set the terms for interactions between human beings and plants. The story that the book recounts is one of experimental lawmaking in Ecuador, a country where over the past decade, governmental officials and civil society advocates have attempted to reconfigure how human individuals and institutions relate to nature, by following an "eco-centric" approach to lawmaking. In doing so, Ecuadorian legislators, administrators, and judges have taken seriously the ontologies of non-human entities, including plants, through a process that has required the continuous navigation of tensions with certain "logics" that pervade conventional legal regimes. The book endeavours to disrupt these conventional assumptions and approaches to lawmaking by taking seriously alternative strategies to reconstitute interactions between people and plants. In doing so, the book argues in favour of an "ecological turn" in laws that govern vegetal life. The analysis is based on a close examination of the experiences that lawmakers in Ecuador have had when experimenting with innovative approaches to re-form relationships between human and non-human beings. Concretely, these experiments have yielded constitutional, legislative, and regulatory changes that inform the inquiry of how intellectual property and plant genetic resources laws - both in Ecuador and worldwide - could become more "ecological" in nature. The argument that the book develops is based on extensive ethnographic fieldwork and empirical research in Ecuador, complemented by archival and doctrinal legal analysis. The contents of the book will be of interest to an academic audience of legal scholars and postgraduate students in law, in addition to scholars and students in the fields of anthropology, sociology, socio-legal studies, and science and technology studies.

This volume of papers from the Eighth World Congress deals with changes in proportions and growth rates of sectors of the economy in relation to economic development. It includes a survey of theories of sectoral balance and studies of structural transformation in the Kuznets tradition but with richer economometric models and data on more than 100 countries over several decades. There are in-depth country analyses of India, Korea and Nigeria and for Eastern Europe, the GDR and Hungary. In the last part of the volume the link between agriculture and industry is studied in terms of the importance of rural non-farm activities, the effectiveness of balanced growth and of an agriculture-led development strategy. A wide range of data is examined with one chapter focusing particularly on Japan. Jeffrey Williamson has also written "Modelling Growth Economics in Equilibrium and Disequilibrium" with A.Kelley and "Did British Capitalism Breed Inequality". Amongst his other publications, Vadiraj Panchamukhi has written "Trade Policies in India: A Case Study of Karnataka, Capital Formation and Output in the Third World" and "Planning, Development and World Economic Order".

Coal and Coalbed Gas: Future Directions and Opportunities, Second Edition introduces the latest in coal geology research and the engineering of gas extraction. Importantly, the second edition examines how, over the last 10 years, research has both changed focus and where it is conducted. This shift essentially depicts "a tale of two worlds"—one half (Western Europe, North America) moving away from coal and coalbed gas research and production towards cleaner energy resources, and the other half (Asia–Pacific region, Eastern Europe, South America) increasing both research and usage of coal. These changes are marked by a precipitous fall in coalbed gas production in North America; however, at the same time there has been a significant rise in coal and coalbed gas production in Australia, China, and India. The driver for higher production and its associated research is a quest for affordable energy and economic security that a large resource base brings to any country like Australia’s first large-scale coalbed gas to liquid natural gas projects supplying the demand for cleaner burning LNG to the Asian-Pacific region. Since the last edition of this book, global climate change policies have more forcibly emphasized the impact of methane from coal mines and placed these emissions equal to, or even more harmful than, CO2 emissions from fossil fuels in general. Governmental policies have prioritized capture, use, and storage of CO2, burning coal in new highly efficient low emission power plants, and gas pre-drainage of coal mines. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries and China are also introducing new research into alternative, non-fuel uses for coal, such as carbon fibers, nanocarbons, graphene, soil amendments, and as an unconventional ore for critical elements. New to this edition: Each chapter is substantially changed from the 1st edition including expanded and new literature citations and reviews, important new data and information, new features and materials, as well as re-organized and re-designed themes. Importantly, three new chapters cover global coal endowment and gas potential, groundwater systems related to coalbed gas production and biogenic gas generation as well as the changing landscape of coal and coalbed gas influenced by global climate change and net-zero carbon greenhouse gas emissions. FOREWORD When I reviewed the first edition of this book, my initial thought was, "Do we need another book on coal geology?" and then I read it and realised, "Yes, we need this book" and my students downloaded copies as soon as it was available. So now we come to 2023, and a lot has happened in the past decade. For a different reason we might ask if we still need this book, or even coal geoscientists and engineers, as the world aims for rapid decarbonisation of the energy sector and a reduction of coal as a feedstock for industrial resources, like steel manufacture. Natural gas is earmarked as a transition fuel to enable the shift to renewables. In some basins, the source of that gas is directly from coalbed gas production or from conventional reservoirs that were charged by coal and terrestrial organic source rocks. Although the transition is escalating, there are projections that coal will remain part of our future, even after 2050, and can also provide alternative non-fuel resources (e.g., critical elements and carbon-based nanomaterials). Between now and then, we’d best ensure that we extract and utilise coal and coalbed gas as efficiently and safely as possible, that we mitigate any environmental and social impact of the process, and that we improve our certainty of predicting the behaviour of the material and material impacts. To do this we need to understand coal as a material and the inherent variability of its quality and behaviour as a source rock and host of coalbed gas. One can change the technologies but not the geological ground conditions or coal character of the targeted resource. The authors have taken on this ambitious endeavour during their careers and have attempted to capture their knowledge gained from first-hand experience in countries around the world and comprehensive review of published material, within this book. At least three generations of knowledge are drawn upon here. Tim Moore was a student of both Romeo Flores and his supervisor John Ferm, who was the "Warrior of Gentleness" when it came to coal research, teaching, and supervision. This book also reflects the broad and multidisciplinary aspects of coal geology and coal science and provides the tenets for one to understand different disciplines and how they interact to form an integrated view of the resource—technically, economically, and politically. Each chapter takes the reader through different concepts, first setting the scene by examining the status of coal and coalbed gas in a carbon-conscious world, then looking at the science behind coal as a source of gas and as a reservoir- in its own right. Further reading leads to learning about geological settings and the processes through time that led to present-day endowments around the globe and this theme continues throughout the book with detailed examples from different countries. Personally, I like the emphasis on the depositional environments that lead to peat accumulation and preservation—it’s all about the ingredients—which leads nicely into the world of coal macerals and minerals, and why they matter. Coalification and its role in changing the chemistry and material properties of coal is covered from a reservoir perspective, as is the role of biogenic processes. These have produced some of the enormous gas resources we exploit today and could also provide a future circular economy for neo-biogenic gas. The role of groundwater in this past and potentially future endeavour is presented, along with possible adverse effects where there is unexpected communication with regional and local aquifers and surface assets that detract from environmental and social licence. In addition to describing the geology and engineering technologies required to explore for, access, and utilise these resources, the book also provides insights into geostatistical and economic modelling for reserves estimation and challenges as reservoirs become more geologically and politically complex for extraction and alternatively, for injection and carbon sequestration. The final chapters revisit and integrate concepts presented in the book in order to examine global gas production and the geographic shifts in production and research that have occurred over the past decade(s). The also show how government and the market play a role, and project future trends. The authors provide discussion points for the outlook of coal as a fuel feedstock in a carbon-constrained world and the ongoing search for options and alternative non-fuel uses of coal while highlighting the important role that coal and coalbed gas still play during the transition period and beyond. There is much to learn from this book, which is based on decades of observing and interpreting patterns and trends in coal and coal-bearing basins. There is a growing trend towards using machine learning and artificial intelligence to find patterns in data and provide solutions. I’d suggest that domain intelligence, such as that provided in this book, is critical to supervising this process and is required for understanding and validating the outputs upon which many decisions are made and will continue to be made in the future. So yes, we need this book and I invite you to read, learn, and form your own ideas. If you find any gaps—write about them. Joan S. Esterle Emeritus Professor Vale Chair of Coal Geosciences The University of Queensland, AustraliaMay 2023

In this second edition of a bestseller, authors Paul H. Brunner and Helmut Rechberger guide professional newcomers as well as experienced engineers and scientists towards mastering the art of material flow analysis (MFA) from the very beginning to an advanced state of material balances of complex systems. Handbook of Material Flow Analysis: For Environmental, Resource, and Waste Engineers, Second Edition serves as a concise and reproducible methodology as well as a basis for analysis, assessment and improvement of anthropogenic systems through an approach that is helpfully uniform and standardized. The methodology featured in this book is a vital resource for generating new data, fostering understanding, and increasing knowledge to benefit the growing MFA community working in the fields of industrial ecology, resource management, waste management, and environmental protection. This new second edition takes into account all new developments and readers will profit from a new exploration of STAN software, newly added citations, and thoroughly described case studies that reveal the potential of MFA to solve industrial ecology challenges.

1. Provides comprehensive analysis of the eco-physiological aspects of the novel plant growth regulators 2. Useful for investigators in plant physiology, developmental biology, crop biotechnology, plant breeding, plant signaling and communication. 3. Explains the integrative role of strigolactones, karrikins and alkamides in plant development and signaling