Agricultural Communities Research Articles

Agricultural Communities’ Risk Assessment and the Effects of Climate Change: A Pathway Toward Green Productivity and Sustainable Development

This study was carried out to assess agricultural communities’ understanding of climate change, the adaptation measures being undertaken against climate change, and industrial wastewater irrigation. It was considered important to check agricultural communities’ understanding of climate change, as the majority of the study area belongs to the farming and industry sector. This study was based on primary data collected through a survey in the study area. The results of present study showed that agricultural communities with sufficient resources and assets consider themselves to be safer and more capable of coping with the negative effects of climate change. Agricultural communities used different techniques to deal with the impacts of climate change in present study area. This study produced findings about agricultural households’ adaptation tactics that are unique and will aid policymakers in assisting agricultural communities in their day-to-day activities and farming practices, as well as in the implementation of proper monitoring and public policies to ensure integration and sustainability. This research is based on the sustainable livelihoods approach (SLA), which investigates how livelihood assets support agricultural communities by combining household adoption/adaptation strategies and livelihood outcomes.

Climate change and COVID-19: Interdisciplinary perspectives from two global crises

The repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change – two major current global crises – are far-reaching, the parallels between the two are striking, and their influence on one another are significant. Based on the wealth of evidence that has emerged from the scientific literature during the first two years of the pandemic, this study argues that these two global crises require holistic multisectoral mitigation strategies. Despite being different in nature, neither crisis can be effectively mitigated without considering their interdependencies. Herein, significant interactions between these two crises are highlighted and discussed. Major implications related to the economy, energy, technology, environment, food systems and agriculture sector, health systems, policy, management, and communities are detailed via a review of existing joint literature. Based on these outcomes, practical recommendations for future research and management are provided. While the joint timing of these crises has created a global conundrum, the COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated opportunities and lessons for devising sustainable recovery plans in relation to the climate crisis. The findings indicated that governments should work collaboratively to develop durable and adjustable strategies in line with long-term, global decarbonisation targets, promote renewable energy resources, integrate climate change into environmental policies, prioritise climate-smart agriculture and local food systems, and ensure public and ecosystem health. Further, differences in geographic distributions of climate change and COVID-19 related death cases revealed that these crises pose different threats to different parts of the world. These learnings provide insights to address the climate emergency – and potential future global problems with similar characteristics – if international countries act urgently and collectively.

“The village that learns”: a learning journey across intraventions and domains over two decades in a rural Thai community

ABSTRACT What does it mean to become a village that learns? In this paper we document the transformative learning journey of a small Thai village over 24 years, becoming a community that identified, tackled, and iterated on problems, altering their everyday practices and lives. In that process the village shifted from a subsistence agricultural community staggeringly in debt to one known for its sustainable environmental, agricultural, and financial initiatives. To understand the village’s learning journey, we consider the village itself as the primary unit of analysis, applying an iterative case study approach, with chronological sequencing, thematic, and biographical narrative analysis across 37 hours of interviews and over 350 pages of scanned project documentation (mostly from village records and writings) collected across four visits. Throughout the paper we elaborate on the role of learner interest and agency, the necessity of infrastructural (often policy) changes, the prioritized role of children in leadership, and the method of “Thai Constructionism” that the village iteratively applied to support their learning. In the discussion we argue that to understand the village’s learning journey, we must study it across multiple scales of time, multiple series of village-initiated formative intraventions across domains, and within larger ecological systems.

Bengkulu Coffee Production Development

As an agricultural community, in general, Bengkulu province has gardening. The largest plantations for the community are oil palm, rubber and coffee commodities. People depend their lives on abundant natural potentials but have not been able to manage them properly to stimulate added value. All potentials are still managed traditionally so that productivity is very low. The province of Bengkulu is the 3rd largest national coffee producer, but so far Bengkulu coffee is sold through Lampung and Palembang so it is not known outside. The problems are: The low income and welfare of the coffee farmers in Bengkulu province; The promotion and branding of Bengkulu coffee has not been recognized either nationally or internationally. The intention of compiling the Bengkulu coffee development master plan. One of the activities carried out is conducting research or mapping potential and mapping policy directions in the field of coffee development in Bengkulu Province. The aim of compiling the Bengkulu coffee development master plan a) Increasing the income of coffee farmers in Bengkulu province, b) Increasing the promotion and branding of Bengkulu Coffee at the national and international levels c) Increasing the knowledge of farmers and field officers towards coffee cultivation technology farmers: d) Increasing the role and function of farmer institutions in plantation areas coffee; e) Preparing technological innovations to increase coffee production and quality; The scope of activities is focused on coffee development in the Bengkulu area from upstream, production, downstream and provincial, district / city governments as well as Stake Holders / stakeholders.

Prenatal Exposure to Organophosphorus Pesticides and Preschool ADHD in the Norwegian Mother, Father and Child Cohort Study.

Prenatal organophosphorus pesticide (OPP) exposure has been associated with child attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in agricultural communities and those that are exposed to residentially applied insecticides. To examine this association in populations that are exposed primarily through diet, we estimate the associations between prenatal OPP exposure and preschool ADHD in the Norwegian Mother, Father and Child Cohort Study (MoBa), and describe modification by paraoxonase 1 (PON1) gene variants. We used participants from the MoBa Preschool ADHD Sub-study (n = 259 cases) and a random sample of MoBa sub-cohort participants (n = 547) with birth years from 2004 to 2008. Prenatal urinary dialkylphosphate (DAP) metabolites (total diethylphosphate [∑DEP] and total dimethylphosphate [∑DMP]) were measured by an ultra-performance liquid chromatography-time-of-flight system and summed by molar concentration. Maternal DNA was genotyped for coding variants of PON1 (Q192R and L55M). We used a multivariable logistic regression to calculate the odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals, adjusted for maternal education, parity, income dependency, age, marital status, ADHD-like symptoms, pesticide use, produce consumption, and season. We found no associations between DAP metabolite concentrations and preschool ADHD. The adjusted ORs for exposure quartiles 2–4 relative to 1 were slightly inverse. No monotonic trends were observed, and the estimates lacked precision, likely due to the small sample size and variation in the population. We found no evidence of modification by PON1 SNP variation or child sex. Maternal urinary DAP concentrations were not associated with preschool ADHD.

The Old Toponymy and New Topography of Zion: Utah, Photography, and Daniel George's Series God to Go West

The Old Toponymy and New Topography of Zion: Utah, Photography, and Daniel George's Series <i>God to Go West</i>

Using renewable energy to meet the energy needs of smallholder farmers: Are there policies to promote adoption in Ghana?

Integrating renewable energy (RE) technologies into agriculture can contribute to attaining sustainable production. Farmers’ adoption of RE in agriculture can lead to substantial reductions in Greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions as well as providing alternative income sources for farmers, and reliable energy supplies for farms and households. Policies can facilitate, support, or encourage farmers’ adoption of RE. However, it is not clear what policies currently exist which facilitate or promote the adoption of RE technologies in Ghanaian agriculture. This paper aims to identify policies in Ghana that can facilitate the adoption of RE in agricultural production. A policy review was conducted to identify such policies, evaluate their potential impact on RE adoption, and suggest paths to enhance RE adoption by farmers. These policies are focused on two aspects: 1) promoting solar energy and 2) the conversion of agricultural waste to energy. Noting limitations including the underdevelopment of the RE sector and the lack of a central policy to promote RE utilization in Ghanaian agriculture, the review suggests that policymakers need to fully implement provisions of the Renewable Energy Act-(832) (2011) through the application of, for example, policy levers such as subsidies, tax exemptions, financing, and training potential end-users in the agricultural community.

Heterogeneous Effects of Migration and Remittances on Migrant- Sending Agricultural Communities: The Case of Southern Ethiopia

Using household survey data, the paper empirically evaluates the heterogeneous effects of migration and remittances on migrant-sending communities in southern Ethiopia. A multi-stage stratified sampling procedure was used to select sample villages from each survey area and households from each sample unit. To account for several econometric issues and consistently estimate the impacts of migration and remittances, the study adopted a three-stage least-squares method complemented with endogeneity and multicollinearity test. The findings of the paper reveal that the migration of labor out of agriculture has a significant negative effect on a household’s adoption of different agricultural technologies, as well as crop yield. By contrast, the remittances sent by migrants partially compensate for the lost-labor deficit, leading to increased use of modern agricultural inputs and crop yield. Besides, it’s observed that the adoption of different agricultural technology is invariant to the migrants’ gender. Overall, the return of migration suggests that the adoption of modern agricultural technologies and crop yield in migrant-sending communities are found to be higher after migration participation, though the impacts vary for households with different production conditions.

Melatonin ameliorates renal dysfunction in glyphosate- and hard water-treated mice

Chronic interstitial nephritis in agricultural communities (CINAC) is a severe and widespread disease that has been associated with environmental and occupational exposure to glyphosate and hard water. However, the potential underlying mechanisms remain incompletely understood. Melatonin is reported to exert protective effects on the kidney, but whether melatonin can attenuate renal tubular injury in mice exposed to glyphosate combined with hard water is unclear. Here, mice were treated with high doses and environmentally relevant doses of glyphosate (100 mg/kg·bw and 0.7 mg/L, respectively) and/or hard water (2500 mg/L CaCO3 and 250 mg/L Ca2+, respectively) via their drinking water for 12 weeks. We found that high-dose glyphosate or hard water treatment significantly increased the levels of biomarkers of renal damage, including β2-microglobulin, neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipid carrier protein, and/or albumin, in the urine; these increased biomarker levels were correlated with obvious morphological changes, and all of these changes were also observed in animals exposed to environmentally relevant doses of glyphosate and/or high Ca2+ water. Melatonin (10 mg/kg·bw, intraperitoneal injection, daily for 12 weeks) administered concomitantly with high doses of glyphosate and hard water inhibited the glyphosate- and hard water-induced increases in the levels of kidney injury biomarkers and changes in morphology; this result was intriguing. Additionally, glyphosate combined with hard water at both high and environmentally relevant doses significantly upregulated the expression of the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress marker proteins Bip, ATF6, and PERK as well as the pyroptosis-related proteins (NLRP3 and caspase 1 signaling proteins) in renal tissues. Similarly, melatonin significantly attenuated the increased ER stress and pyroptosis induced by high doses of glyphosate and hard water. In summary, we conclude that exposure to glyphosate and hard water at both high doses and environmentally relevant doses causes renal dysfunction in mice, and this dysfunction can be attenuated by melatonin, possibly through the inhibition of ER stress and pyroptosis. Our results support the notion that melatonin may have therapeutic potential for the treatment of chronic kidney diseases.

Tree planting for climate change: Coverage in the UK farming sector press

In recent years tree planting as a response to climate change has acquired a very high profile amongst policy-makers, scientists, the media, and the public. This ‘afforestation’, however, requires space: that is, land. Agriculture currently occupies very large areas of land globally meaning that it is commonly targeted as needing to make way for tree planting, and making farmers important gatekeepers to this climate change mitigation strategy. Given the importance of farming sector media outlets in reflecting, shaping and leading values and attitudes amongst the agricultural community, this paper investigates how tree planting is presented within the UK's two leading sectoral publications, Farmers Guardian and Farmers Weekly. We sample coverage at four points over a two-year period (2019–2021) which began with high-profile national media and scientific engagement with the topic. Our analysis reveals very low levels of coverage within these key publications with, on average, just 1 in 200 articles within our sample focussing on tree planting. Within this limited coverage we identify four themes which range from hostility towards the notion of trees on farms replacing agricultural practices, through to occasional recognition of the positive roles that trees on farms can play in climate change mitigation. Arguably, the lack of legitimisation within the coverage constitutes a significant barrier to woodland expansion on agricultural land. We conclude that farming media outlets could play a much stronger role in supporting the agricultural community to understand how it could contribute to climate change mitigation through bringing trees ‘in’ to farming systems, and to the normalisation of this within modern farming culture.

The Role of Social Work in Confronting the Farmer Suicide Crisis: Best Practice Recommendations and a Call to Action

ABSTRACT Although estimates of prevalence vary, suicide rates among farmers are high and pose an important challenge for mental health policy and practice. The lack of mental health resources in many rural communities is a significant barrier to improving farmer mental health outcomes. The current paper will review (1) current findings related to the psychosocial functioning of agriculturalists including rates of suicide and common mental health concerns within this population; (2) describe stressors and risk factors associated with mental health symptoms in rural and agricultural communities; and (3) discuss barriers associated with accessing mental health treatment. This article also includes recommendations for increasing the cultural competence of social work practitioners working with rural communities. Finally, existing research on using technology and workforce development approaches for increasing access to mental health in rural communities is presented and recommendations for future research are explored.

Using Youth-Led Participatory Action Research to Advance the Mental Health Needs of Latinx Youth During COVID-19

Youth-led participatory action research (YPAR) is a collaborative approach for engaging young people as experts and leaders in the research process. The purpose of this study is to showcase the potential of this methodology as a tool for social justice and equity work in schools. First, we review transformative and critical research paradigms that underpin the YPAR approach. Second, we provide an illustration of a YPAR project on youth well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic (May–June 2020). Participants included 375 middle- and high-school students living in an agricultural community (92% Latinx/Hispanic). The research design, recruitment, analysis, and interpretation were youth-led with support from adult allies. Youth researchers identified mental health and academic challenges among peers, and they successfully used survey results to advocate for increased mental health support at school. We discuss the potential and challenges of YPAR as a strategy to inspire youth-led changes to local policy and practice. Impact Statement This study is one of only a few published articles coauthored by youth researchers and sharing findings from a youth-led participatory action research (YPAR) project. We demonstrate how powerful youth leadership and advocacy can be for increasing access to mental health support in schools. School psychologists and adult allies should consider using YPAR as a tool for advancing equity and justice in collaboration with young people.

A Solution Management in Handling Economic Inequality Among Agrarian Communities

Agriculture has been an inherent part of human civilization for centuries. Therefore, this study aims to analyze the relationship between agricultural production and agricultural community income. The pattern of their relationship followed the dynamics of the Lotka-Volterra model. Two of the six critical phenomena that might occur: first, if the farmer's crop were abundant, the farmers' income would increase rapidly; second, if the farmers' yields decreased, the farmer's income would automatically decrease. Low and unstable farmer income could lead to poor productivity and low economic growth. Thus, monitoring and early warning were essential to effectively prevent possible negative impacts on agricultural product production, consumption, and changes in market prices. Sustainable agricultural systems included maintenance or enhancement of environmental natural resources, food supply, and social welfare. In brief, good agricultural management could maintain the balance of the ecosystem, contribute to the economy continuously, and increase agrarian communities' economic resilience. Keywords: agrarian community; ecosystem; harvest cycle; income; Lotka-Volterra

Plasmodiophora brassicae in Mexico: From Anecdote to Fact.

For years, the presence of clubroot disease and its causal agent, Plasmodiophora brassicae, in Mexico has been stated as a fact. However, an intensive search of the scientific literature in English and Spanish, as well as gray literature including theses and government reports, did not reveal any information about the actual detection of the pathogen, affected hosts, or areas with clubroot presence, or any information about clubroot (hernia de la col in Mexico). We followed a multistep process to confirm whether P. brassicae was indeed in Mexico. First, we identified agricultural communities with a history of cruciferous crop cultivation. Second, we asked growers if they had seen clubroot on their crops, using pictures of the characteristic root galls. Third, we collected soil from the locations where clubroot was reported and looked for clubroot/P. brassicae in the soil using several cruciferous bait plants. For the first time we confirm the presence of the clubroot pathogen P. brassicae in Mexico, through a bioassay, the presence of resting spores, and a P. brassicae-specific PCR assay. The identification of P. brassicae in Mexico will contribute to our understanding of the genetic diversity of this elusive and devastating plant pathogen in future studies.[Formula: see text] Copyright © 2022 The Author(s). This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license.

Development and Governance of FAIR Thresholds for a Data Federation

The FAIR (findable, accessible, interoperable, and re-usable) principles and practice recommendations provide high level guidance and recommendations that are not research-domain specific in nature. There remains a gap in practice at the data provider and domain scientist level demonstrating how the FAIR principles can be applied beyond a set of generalist guidelines to meet the needs of a specific domain community. We present our insights developing FAIR thresholds in a domain specific context for self-governance by a community (agricultural research). ‘Minimum thresholds’ for FAIR data are required to align expectations for data delivered from providers’ distributed data stores through a community-governed federation (the Agricultural Research Federation, AgReFed). Data providers were supported to make data holdings more FAIR. There was a range of different FAIR starting points, organisational goals, and end user needs, solutions, and capabilities. This informed the distilling of a set of FAIR criteria ranging from ‘Minimum thresholds’ to ‘Stretch targets’. These were operationalised through consensus into a framework for governance and implementation by the agricultural research domain community. Improving the FAIR maturity of data took resourcing and incentive to do so, highlighting the challenge for data federations to generate value whilst reducing costs of participation. Our experience showed a role for supporting collective advocacy, relationship brokering, tailored support, and low-bar tooling access particularly across the areas of data structure, access and semantics that were challenging to domain researchers. Active democratic participation supported by a governance framework like AgReFed’s will ensure participants have a say in how federations can deliver individual and collective benefits for members.

On legal income targets for agriculture in Switzerland and in the European Union

This article deals with the legislation regulating income from agriculture in Switzerland and in the EU. The provision of Article 5(1) of the Swiss Agriculture Act treats agricultural income similarly to incomes from other branches of economy This regulation, however, does not ensure farmers any income guarantee and is not enforceable in courts. The Common Agricultural Policy provisions are more general and also unenforceable. Article 39(1)(b) of the TFEU refers to a “fair standard of living for the agricultural community.” While the average agricultural income in Switzerland in the period 1997–1999 was only 52% of the comparative income, this percentage was already 66% by the period 2017–2019. The agricultural policy 22+ seeks to reduce this income gap even more. In the EU, the average income from agricultural activity increased from 32% in 2009 to 49% in 2017 of the comparative income from other branches and the new CAP policy 2022–2025 also seeks to reduce this income gap further. As can be seen, when compared to income in the economy as a whole, farmers’ income in Switzerland is substantially higher than in the EU. However, both Switzerland and the EU must undertake further efforts to comply with the current legal requirements to support legal income targets in agriculture.

Knowledge, perceptions, and attitudes by residents in Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan in connection with bats

BackgroundFruit bats play an important role in pollination and seed dispersal, and their conservation is important to maintain the productivity of some crops and natural ecosystems. The objective of this study was to investigate the knowledge, attitudes, and perception of fruit bats by orchard farmers and agricultural communities in Pakistan.MethodsThe present survey was conducted in two districts (i.e. Sheikhupura and Malakand districts) within Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces based on the higher number of fruit growing areas and bat roosting sites. A total of 200 (100 per district) close-ended questionnaires with 53 questions were administered to randomly selected respondents within the selected communities associated with fruit orchards, including orchard owners, laborers, and members of the surrounding community. Each questionnaire was divided into seven sections (i.e., demographic information, environmental and public health effects of bats, knowledge about bats, perception and control of bats, non-lethal methods adopted to control bats, and different myths about bats).ResultsA majority of respondents (59%, n = 118) mis-classified bats as birds instead of mammals despite more than 84% reporting that they have observed bats. Nearly 71.5% of orchard farmers perceived that their fruits are contaminated by bats during consumption, and a majority believe that bats destroy orchards (62.5%) and are responsible for spreading disease. Mythology about bats was ambiguous, as 49% of those surveyed did not perceived bats to bring good luck (49%), and 50% did not perceived them to be bad omens either. Most respondents have never killed a bat (68%) nor would they kill a bat if given the opportunity (95%). Regarding the control of bats, the greatest percentage of respondents strongly disagree with shooting bats (36%) and strongly agree with leaving bats alone (42.5%).ConclusionsThis study provides a better understanding of the sociodemographic factors associated with knowledge, attitude and perception of bats from fruit orchard owners, labourers and local people. We recommend educational interventions for targeted groups in the community, highlighting the ecosystem services and importance of bat conservation to improve people’s current knowledge regarding the role of bats and reduce direct persecution against bats.

Influence of Environmental Pollution and Living Conditions on Parasite Transmission among Indigenous Ecuadorians.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the influence of environmental pollution and the living conditions of indigenous Ecuadorians on the transmission of enteroparasites in an Andean agricultural area located at high altitude. Environmental pollution was recorded after observation in each community. The parasites were identified by microscopic sediment analysis using physiological saline solution from macerated arthropods, washed vegetables, and human stools, utilizing four coproparasitological techniques (direct examination, Kato–Katz, ether concentration, and Ziehl–Neelsen). The results show that the inadequate disposal of human and animal excreta that contaminate soil and water, incorrect food hygiene, inadequate sanitary infrastructure in houses, a lack of animal veterinary care, and rodent proliferation are important reservoirs of zoonotic parasites. The use of excrement as fertilizer increases the number of flies, which act as mechanical vectors, and vegetables grown in areas with disperse infective parasitic forms act as vehicles that are marketed at the local, regional, and international levels. These analyses verify contamination levels of 52.7% in mechanical vectors, 70.6% in vegetables, and 98.2% in human stools. The agricultural communities analyzed maintained poor hygienic–sanitary and environmental conditions, which had a significant influence on the transmission of enteroparasites that affect human health.

Exploring the Inefficient Groundwater Use by Wheat Farmers: An Evidence from Sindh, Pakistan

Pakistan's agricultural production is lower than that of many other developing countries. The agricultural community is nearly illiterate and uses old and conservative farming methods. These constraints impede the adoption and spread of new technologies at the agricultural level. The objective of this study was to calculate economic, allocative, technical, and water-use efficiency. In addition, the drivers of inefficiency for wheat fields in Benazirabad and Naushahro Feroz districts were measured. For the analysis, 390 farmers' data were used, 195 from each of the Chihu and Malwa minor canals. Data-envelopment-analysis, a non-parametric method, was utilized to determine the ratings of efficiency. The findings revealed that the mean economic, allocative, and technical efficiency scores of farms in the study region were 52%, 62%, and 83%. The average water-use efficiency score was found to be 52%. For the improvement in the present farming system, quantified results suggested the need for potential increase in wheat production by 17% with keeping the same level of inputs. Results further revealed that the production cost can be reduced by 48% by producing the same level of output leading to optimal allocation of resources. There is also a potential gap of improvement for water-use efficiency. Improvement in agriculture extension services, timely and proper supply of inputs and the creation of local level marketplaces at lower administrative entities can improve the efficiency scores of wheat farmers.

The contributions of agritourism to the local food system

PurposeThis study aims to evaluate the contributions of agritourism towards the local food system (LFS) by studying three small-scale agritourism farms in Brunei. More specifically, it looks at the role of farm agribusinesses and heritagisation efforts of indigenous farmers.Design/methodology/approachThis qualitative study uses semi-structured interviews to collect data. This method is widely seen as more suitable to gain the unexplored perspectives of the agriculture community at the three agritourism farms.FindingsThe results suggest that the agritourism farms contribute to mild local food activism through their small-scale production of sustainable food products. Another significant finding affirms that these farms also contribute to preserving ethno-culinary heritage through heritagisation of indigenous food and their ancestral agriculture knowledge. The farms’ involvement in agribusiness and efforts in food heritagisation contributes towards a more sustainable LFS and stimulates the rural area as a reinvigorated space for agritourism transactions.Originality/valueThere are lack of research on the contributions of agritourism towards the LFS, especially in Brunei. This study will provide evidence of the overlooked significance of agribusiness and heritagisation efforts conducted by the local farms.