Estimating the Impact of Crop Diversity on Agricultural Productivity in South Africa

Crop biodiversity has the potential to enhance resistance to strains due to biotic and abiotic factors and to improve crop production and farm revenues. To investigate the effect of crop biodiversity on crop productivity, we build a probabilistic model based on ecological mechanisms to describe crop survival and productivity according to diversity. From this analytic model, we derive reduced forms that are empirically estimated using detailed field data of South African agriculture combined with satellite derived data. Our results confirm that diversity has a positive and significant impact on crop survival odds. We show the consistency of these results with the underlying ecologic and agricultural mechanisms.

This discussion explores the opportunities and challenges in enhancing food production and security in the context of climatic variability in Sub Saharan Africa. The promotion of sustainable use of plant and animal products with emphasis on satisfying basic human needs, improving people’s standard of living, enhancing food security and reducing poverty have taken a center stage in Sub Saharan Africa. However, the efforts in this direction are being impacted negatively by climate change, through animal and crop production which have not been spared due to the natural disasters and environmental challenges which have affected all regions of Sub Saharan Africa indiscriminately. Climate is a particularly important driver of food production systems performance at the agriculture end of the food chain. It can affect the quantities and types of food produced as well as production-related income especially for the poor resource farmers. In order to be able to adequately address food production and security in the context of climate, there is need for the region to carry out thorough climatic vulnerability and adaptation assessments. Supporting research and training of experts to carry out vulnerability and adaptation assessments on crop and livestock production is crucial in order for respective countries to develop climate change adaptation measures to meet the obligation on food production and security. Sub Saharan Africa’s agro-ecological regions are variable and need to develop specific adaptive measures to reduce vulnerability to climate change. Due to the changing climatic conditions which the continent has already witnessed many severe climatic induced vulnerability such as decline in rainfall amounts and intensity, reduced length of rain season and increasing warm and occasionally very hot conditions has affected food production and security. Crop and livestock production systems will need to adapt to higher ambient temperatures, lower nutritional value of feed resources and new diseases and parasites occurrence. It can be seen that the present crop and livestock production systems based on pastoral or rangeland grazing husbandry systems, ecological destruction through climatic variability and overgrazing due to high stocking rates in areas where feed and water has been compromised due to high temperatures caused by climate change does not augur well for future livestock productivity. The understanding of climate change variables and their impacts is the first step in climate change research and prerequisite for defining appropriate adaptive responses by local crop and livestock farmers. Sustainable crop and livestock production supporting rural development should be compatible with the goals of curbing the effects of climate change. Production priorities should be directed towards promoting local crop and livestock genetic resources by providing comprehensive research support services on the impact of climate change. Both crops and livestock play important roles in farming systems, as they offer opportunities for risk coping, farm diversification and intensification, and provide significant livelihood benefits and food security. The discussion therefore, concludes that the effectiveness of biophysical responses of crop and livestock production systems to specific environmental challenges that are anticipated as a result of climate change, and then the range of adaptive measures that might be taken by local producers to ameliorate their effects will be the prerequisite for defining appropriate societal responses and meet food security targets.

Climate change vis-a-vis agriculture: Indian and global view-implications, abatement, adaptation and trade-off, Sumit Chakravarty, Anju Puri and Gopal Shukla Climate change and agromet advisory services in Indian agriculture, H.S. Bhadoria and Rakesh Singh Sengar Crop modelling for agriculture production and management, Padmakar Tripathi and Arvind Kumar Statistical techniques for studying effect ofclimate change on crop production, Seema Jaggi, Eldho Varghese and Arpan Bhowmik Nanotechnological interventions for mitigating global warming, Anjali Pande, Madhu Rawat, Rajeev Nayan, S.K.Guru and Sandeep Arora Role of biotechnology in climate resilient agriculture, Pradeep K. Jain, Pooja Choudhary and Dinesh K. Sharma Climate change effect on sugarcane productivity, Kalpana Sengar, Rakesh Singh Sengar, and Ashu Singh Global warming impact on rice crop productivity, D.P. Singh Unfolding the climate change impact on medicinal and aromatic plants, Manish Das Impact of climate change on Indian agriculture, Samarendra Mahapatra Crop adaptation to climate change: An insight, Ashu Singh, Rakesh Singh Sengar, Kalpana Sengar and R.S. Kureel Influence of biotic and abiotic factors on yield and quality of medicinal and aromatic plants, Amit Chauhan, Ram Swaroop Verma and Rajendra Chandra Padalia Understanding the patterns of gene expression during climate change: For enhancing crop productivity, Rakesh Srivastava, Rashmi Srivastava and Uma Maheshwar Singh Acclimation and adaptation of plants to different environmental abiotic stresses, Amit Kumar, Rakesh Singh Sengar and Shivendra Vikram Sahi Global warming impact on crop productivity, S.C. Santra, Anusaya Mallick and A.C. Samal Climate change and sustainability of biodiversity, M.K. Sarma, Sangeeta Baruah and A.K. Sharma Marker-assisted breeding approaches for enhancing stress tolerance in crops in changing climate scenarios, Uma Maheswar Singh, Gunjan Tiwari,B. Kalyana Babu, and Rakesh Srivastava Global climate change with reference to microorganisms in soil-agriculture ecosystem, Vivek Kumar Climate change impacts on agricultural productivity in Norway, Asbjorn Torvanger, Michelle Twena and Bard Romstad Index

Enhanced agricultural productivity is the key issue being presently discussed by agricultural stakeholders as being imperative to the attainment of food security, reducing the present high rate of unemployment and the diversification of Nigeria’s economy from being oil dependent. This study therefore attempts to isolate factors that drive agricultural crop productivity in Nigeria. The study made use of panel data from 36 states and Federal Capital territory between 1995 and 2006. Livestock, Fisheries and forestry data were not readily available and therefore not analyzed in this report. The econometric model used in this paper is a panel data model that takes into consideration OLS random and fixed effects as well as GLS with fixed state effect models. The results indicate that increase in agricultural crop production in Nigeria is based on land expansion. The share of the female labour is positively associated with productivity suggesting higher productivity of the female labour. The results confirm the important role that female farmers play in food production and ensuring food security. Fertilizer use was positively associated with productivity but the association was not significant. The non-significant impact of fertilizer on crop productivity might be due to inadequate use of fertilizer, while the positive association is an indication that it is a yield enhancing technology.The results of the models with year dummies show that crop area has a slightly negative and significant association with value of production. The finding of this paper makes it imperative to suggest the need for adoption of technologies that will bring about productivity gains in crop production through less of land expansion practices. It is also recommended that farmers’ capacity in terms of right quantity use of fertilizer should be enhanced, while female farmers’ participation in crop production should be encouraged.

Greenhouse gas emissions from different crop production and management practices in South Africa

Science, Technology, and Competitiveness in Alberta's Agriculture and Food Sector

This thesis comprises of four essays that seek to advance understanding of the role that climatic constraints have on agricultural productivity in India and Pakistan. This work emphasises that the constraints posed to agricultural production must be understood within the context of an evolving set of environmental and technological conditions. The thesis employs empirical methods to understand these relationships, where particular emphasis is placed on methods suitable for learning about the challenges agriculture will face in the future. The first chapter studies the impact of climate change on rice yields in India by modelling the inter-annual distribution of yield conditional on projected temperature increases. The results suggest a decrease in average yield and a substantial increase in the probability of low yields. It is also shown that yields have become increasingly resilient to heat over time. The second chapter studies the e↵ect of drought on cereal production in India by estimating thresholds of drought impact. By examining thresholds over time, evidence is found of decreasing average impacts, but with evidence of an abrupt increase in average drought impacts in more recent years. Thresholds of precipitation are also estimated, indicating substantial heterogeneity in resilience to drought across crop types and regions of India. The third chapter examines how changes in agricultural technology brought about by the Green Revolution a↵ected the relative importance of agro-climatic factors in determining crop yields. Using a detailed measure of crop suitability it is found that yields increased relatively more in areas of higher suitability, indicating complementarity between agricultural technologies and favourable agro-climatic characteristics. The final chapter uses farm-level data from a specifically-designed survey to assess the impact and determinants of climate change adaptation strategies on crop productivity in Pakistan. Adaptation has a beneficial e↵ect on rice yields, but not on wheat yields. This chapter also finds that a number of household and institutional factors are strongly related to whether households have adapted to climate change.

Agriculture is one sector of the economy which is highly vulnerable to climate change because of the natural relationship between environment, particularly temperature and water availability, and agricultural productivity. Changing climate is increasingly affecting high-value perennial plantation crops such as tea, rubber, coconut, palm oil, and coffee which generate significant export revenues and provide a major source of employment for rural populations in developing countries. Many studies in the literature have focused on climate change impacts on major annual crops; however, to date, there have been very few assessments of the economic impacts of climate change on perennial plantation agriculture. This thesis therefore seeks to estimate the impacts of climate change on two important aspects of plantation agriculture - crop production and labour demand - for the case of the tea plantation sector in Sri Lanka, as an example of a high-value perennial plantation crop in a developing country. The thesis also aims to identify enablers and barriers of adaptation to climate change for this sector of Sri Lanka’s economy. The impacts of climate change on production in Sri Lanka’s tea plantations are studied at estate-level (the primary decision making production unit) across all of the country’s tea growing regions using monthly resolution primary data for the period 2000-2014. The study employs a novel two-stage panel data approach to analyse weather and climate change effects on tea production and then to estimate production impacts for the short-, medium- and long-term future under three different global emissions scenarios. These analyses indicate that a hotter and wetter climate will have a detrimental effect on production. In high, medium and low emissions futures, the predictions show a negative proportional impact on production from increased rainfall and increased average temperature. On average across the data sample, a 12% decline in annual tea production is predicted under a high emissions scenario by 2050. The impacts of climate change on labour demand in tea plantations in Sri Lanka are investigated by implementing a panel structural model of profit maximisation based on a normalised quadratic functional form. The analysis uses historical primary data on estate profits, input prices and output prices, together with monsoonal rainfall, temperature and wet days for years between 2002-2014 to quantify climate impacts on estates’ demand for labour. Anticipated changes in rainfall are predicted to reduce annual labour demand by 2.6% across the tea plantation sector. This could have considerable social and welfare implications, particularly for the Indian Tamil women who comprise the majority of the sector’s workforce. Plantation agriculture is likely to be highly vulnerable to climate change because of its reliance on rain-fed production, long economic life span and the inability to easily switch crops due to high upfront capital costs. These distinct differences between annual and perennial agriculture, and the important role which plantation cropping plays in developing world agriculture, suggest that it is important to identify factors which affect choice of climate adaptation options in perennial crop production. Comprehensive knowledge of available adaptation options is of utmost importance if Sri Lanka’s tea estate managers are to counteract production losses from climate change and maintain their competitiveness in the international market. This is also vital for efficient and effective channeling of society’s resources to address the consequences of climate change. Employing data derived from face-to-face interviews with 50 tea estate managers in Sri Lanka, this study examines factors affecting choice of preferred adaptation options, barriers to adaptation and associated policy implications for tea production in Sri Lanka, as an example of a perennial tree crop system in a developing country. Tea estate managers are already adapting to a changing climate; however, particular adaptation methods are only adopted in some situations and locations. Multinomial logit analysis of data from estate manager interviews indicates that availability of information on climate change, company size, tea growing elevation, and observed increases in temperature and rainfall are key factors influencing the choice of preferred adaptation option. Analysis also finds that barriers such as a lack capital, inadequate access to near-term and medium-term climate knowledge, and poor governmental and institutional support may prevent estate managers from experimenting with new adaptation options. Policies should, therefore, be aimed at promoting new adaptation options through information exchange between stakeholders and integrating climate change adaptation with Sri Lanka’s national sustainable developmental goals. The primary message of the adaptation analysis in this study is that governmental and institutional support and involvement are critical requirements for facilitating effective adaptation. Findings from the thesis will help inform decision makers of the likely impacts of climate change on plantation cropping systems, and provide insights into barriers to adaptation and potential policy responses to improve the effectiveness of adaptation.

Agricultural production strategies: world experience

Title of dissertation: ESSAYS ON THE ECONOMETRIC ANALYSIS OF U.S. AGRICULTURE Shinsuke Uchida, Doctor of Philosophy, 2014 Dissertation directed by: Professor Erik Lichtenberg Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics This dissertation consists of three essays empirically investigating three important aspects of the U.S. agriculture: conservation, subsidy, and productivity. Each essay is conducted with the U.S. Census of Agriculture micro file data. Availability of cross-sectional and time variations of detailed individual farm production and demographic characteristics allows for uncovering heterogeneous relationships between farm production decisions and the corresponding aspects of U.S. agriculture. The first essay examines an adverse effect of a cropland retirement policy. A cropland retirement policy contributes to the reduction of environmental externalities from agricultural production such as soil erosion, nutrient runoff and loss of wildlife habitat. On the other hand, participant’s potential adverse behavior could undermine the environmental benefits of the policy. Several sources of such an unintended effect, known as “slippage”, have been conceptually identified, but their empirical evidence has been scarce. This article tests one source of slippage caused by in-farm land substitution from noncropland to cropland as a result of farmland retirement in the U.S. Conservation Reserve Program (CRP). The causal relationship of CRP participation and subsequent slippage through in-farm land substitution is identified by employing farm fixed effects, time-varying county fixed effects, and selection-on-observables. These could eliminate effects of unobservables that are potentially correlated with both the program participation and subsequent farmland reallocation decisions. Overall, slippage seems evident and fairly robust among specifications. It is found that an average program participant converts 14% of noncropland to cropping activities after enrollment. Results further show that participants with a larger share of uncropped land contribute more to slippage, indicating that farms with the excess capacity of conversion are more flexible in the land allocation decision and thus likely to give rise to slippage. This suggests that additional restrictions on the rest of land use for participants and/or introduction of penalty points reflecting the share of noncropland in the current auction mechanism can hinder such a backward incentive offsetting the program benefits. The second essay examines the distortionary effects of agricultural policy on farm productivity by examining the response of U.S. tobacco farmers’ productivity to the quota buyout of 2004. We focus on the impact of distortionary policy, i.e., the tobacco quota, by decomposing aggregate productivity growth into the contribution of farm-level productivity growth and the contribution of reallocation of resources among tobacco growers. We find that the aggregate productivity of Kentucky tobacco farms grew 44% between 2002 and 2007. The elimination of quota rental costs and reallocation of resources, including entry and exit, accounted for most of the post-buyout productivity growth. It is also noted that the aggregate productivity of Kentucky tobacco farms vary across farm characteristics and locations. This highlights the importance of using highly disaggregated data to uncover the sources of aggregate productivity growth. The third essay examines the relationship between farm size and productivity growth. In the past several decades, crop production in the U.S. has shifted to larger farms. During the same period, crop productivity has fairly improved. While these two events seem clearly associated, no studies have fully uncovered the link between them. Using farm-level longitudinal data from the Censuses of Agriculture from 1987-2007 enables us to decompose the contributions of aggregate productivity growth (APG) by farm size, but also by farm entry/exit and by technology/reallocation. We have three main findings. First, productivity growth is clearly non-uniform among farm sizes. Between 1987 and 2007, virtually all of the aggregate productivity growth of crop farms came from farms with annual sales of more than $500,000. These farms account for only 8% of U.S. crop farms. A closer look at the APG contributions to productivity growth from surviving farms confirms the findings for all crop farms: the productivity of mid-size farms has barely increased, and the productivity of smaller farms has fallen. Finally, the relative importance of technical efficiency growth and resource reallocation varies over time. Technical efficiency growth seems to be a larger source of APG for large farms between 1987 and 1997, whereas reallocation across all sales classes contributes more to APG between 1997 and 2007. Overall, our finding provides the concrete evidence that farm consolidation has been strongly associated with the productivity growth of U.S. crop farms. Our finding that resource reallocation through farm consolidation is nontrivial for the APG of crop farms highlights the usefulness of farm-level panel data for studying structural changes and APG. ESSAYS ON THE ECONOMETRIC ANALYSIS OF U.S. AGRICULTURE

Implementation Feasibility of Wheat- Canola Rotation to Develop Conservation Agriculture in GIS (Case Study: Maroon Basin of Khuzestan Province) Introduction Undoubtedly the development of production systems in agriculture, without sufficient knowledge of the current situation and define constraints are not possible. The prediction of potential agricultural land and the environment in proportion to each region for planning and policymakers, is very important and is often an integrated assessment of climate, soil and topography of each area in the system software geographic information is determined (Grassano et al., 2011). This software as a useful tool, decision-making and flexibility and suitability for analysis is able to incorporate a lot of data inside a new set them usable in the form of maps and data show (Khahro et al., 2014; Javadian et al., 2011). The aim of this study is to investigate the feasibility of potential lands for the cultivation of canola and wheat products in order to increase the productivity of land in Maroon basin of Khuzestan province is to develop conservation agriculture system. Materials and methods The study area is located in the Maroon basin of Khuzestan Province in South West Iran with hot and dry climatic conditions was performed. The study area covered about 30 percent of land in the Khuzestan province, including existent agricultural land Maroon basin in which to locate suitable areas for the cultivation of canola and wheat, and implementation of environmental requirements them with agronomic characteristics, according to FAO guidelines was. For this purpose, environmental requirements and agricultural products using scientific resources available canola and wheat were determined and classification. Then, based on growth parameters affecting them and the status available, digital information layers after the weighting of AHP in GIS environment for both products were prepared and finally land evaluation canola and wheat products in the development of the rotation system of the main objectives is the development of conservation farming systems, were classified. This classification based on FAO guidelines in five very suitable (S1), suitable (S2), moderate (S3), low suitable (N1) and unsuitable (N2) was done. Results and discussion The results of the analysis of hierarchical analysis of questionnaires showed that among the factors contributing to land, measures soil salinity and slope, weighing 0.2231 and 0.0254 had the highest and lowest limit, respectively. The weights are applied in overlapping layers of existing conditions using GIS software shows that an area of 632473 hectares of land in the basin Maroon, each year, the different potential for canola and wheat crops. So that 7.4 and 9.8 percent of the studied levels for canola rotation - wheat classes have been very suitable and suitable. In these regions the limitations of lower salinity and access to water resources and rain is more. However, the average and low suitable classes, 57.2 percent of total land and 25.6 of the remainder classified as unsuitable in South and West Maroon Basin study area are located. In these areas, ecological environmental conditions in accordance with the requirements of canola and wheat products are not. Conclusion The results of the prepared layers agro-ecological based on the weighted with AHP in GIS shows that Maroon basin have had varying degrees of suitability and knowledge of environmental conditions is essential. Therefore, this study may help as an indicator for planners, decision-makers and farmers to choose the type of product, acted and in this regard, the determination of position land at very suitable for wheat and canola and alternation between them, the desirability of observing the rotation will assist in the development of conservation agriculture and sustainable production. Keywords: Agro- ecological; Analytical Hierarchy Process; Land Suitability References -Grassano, N., Tedone, L., Verdini, L., De Mastro, G., 2011. Evaluation of rapeseed cultivation suitability in Apulia with GIS multi criteria analysis. Italian Journal of Agronomy 6 (2): 101–105. -Javadian, M., Shamskooshki, H., Momeni, M., 2011. Application of sustainable urban development in environmental suitability analysis of educational land use by using Ahp and Gis in Tehran. Procedia Engineering 21: 72–80. -Khahro, S.H., Matori, A.N., Chandio, I.A., Talpur, M.A.H., 2014. Land suitability analysis for installing new petrol filling stations using GIS. Procedia Engineering 77: 28–36.

Ecological plasticity and productive potential of tobacco in Central Forest Steppe of Ukraine

Government expenditure has been considered to be having an extent of impact on economic performance at both sectoral level and aggregate national level. Evidence from literature, however shows that this notion has not been generally accepted across countries and sectors. Considering the significance of agriculture in an economy most especially in Africa, and the consequent role of government, this study examines the impact of government expenditure on agricultural productivity in South Africa using annual time series data from 1983 to 2016. It is shown that there exists a long-run relationship between government expenditure on agriculture and agricultural productivity, and a positive significant effect only to be expected in the long-run. The finding underscores the non-negotiable role of the South African government funding of agricultural sector in an era of climate change and a highly commercialized agricultural system. Furthermore, considering the low and declining pattern of government expenditure in the sector in South Africa, the desired productivity growth impact will only be experienced in the long-run all things being equal. Improving government funding in the sector could accelerate the desired agricultural productivity in the short-term.

Agriculture remains the most important occupation and source of livelihood for the majority of the population in our country. The study of cropping patterns, diversification and production is important in agricultural development. Cropping pattern is the proportion of area under various crops while crop diversification refers to the raising of various crops. Agricultural productivity is an input-output ratio that facilitates efficient comparison. These concepts are influenced by various geo-climatic, socio-economic and institutional factors. Tarai region is a marshy moist area lying between Himalayan foothills and Gangetic plains. In Uttar Pradesh, the region extends over 7 districts from Pilibhit to Maharajganj. This region is predominantly agrarian. The present paper aims to study the cropping pattern, Spatio-temporal pattern of crop diversification and production of crops at the district level in the Tarai region of Uttar Pradesh for the period of 2007-08 to 2017-18. The study is based on agricultural data collected from Statistical Abstract of Uttar Pradesh. 13 crops under 4 categories are selected in total. The study uses the location quotient technique for calculating crop concentration, the Gibbs-Martin (1962) method for calculating crop diversification and other statistical measures for analysis. It was found that cropped area of the region has decreased in the reference period and the region is dominated by the cultivation of cereal crops and sugarcane. Low crop diversification was recorded in the region due to similar physical conditions and the practice of traditional agriculture. Production and productivity of crops have greatly increased primarily due to the increasing production of sugarcane. It is believed that the present study will help ascertain the ground reality of agriculture in the study region.

While information and communication technologies (ICT) have proven to be useful in boosting agricultural production and productivity, regardless of the geographical location, much of the discussion on ICT and their impact focus on the global north, with deficient literature on the global south. The limited account of the global south shows mixed conclusions on the impact of information and communication technologies on agricultural production, with most studies focusing on crop production, as a proxy for agricultural production, leaving out livestock production. Animated by this concern, this article explores the impact of ICTs on agricultural production (crop and livestock) in Africa using panel data from 32 African countries and the panel autoregressive distributed lag model as the estimation technique. We find that individuals using internet significantly increased crop production in the long run. Specifically, a percentage increase in internet patronage increases crop production by 0.071% but significantly decreases the livestock production index, both in the short and long run. Mobile phone subscriptions had a significant negative impact on crop production in the long run but had a significant positive impact on livestock production in the long run. Fixed phone subscriptions significantly increased crop production in the long run but significantly decreased livestock production index in the long run. The findings show bidirectional causality between crop production and internet patronage, livestock production and individuals using internet, crop production and mobile cellular subscription, crop production and net national income, and rural population and both crop and livestock production. We recommend that governments in Africa increase funding investment in digital technologies to foster increased agricultural production while addressing structural challenges that constrain increased access to digital agricultural technologies. It might be useful if governments in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) incentivize the telecommunication companies to extend digital coverage to rural areas through tax rebates and holidays to encourage rural inclusion in the digital space to bridge the digital divide.