42,684 research outputs found
Cultivating compliance: governance of North Indian organic basmati smallholders in a global value chain
Focusing on a global value chain (GVC) for organic basmati rice, we study how farmersâ practices are governed through product and process standards, organic certification protocols, and contracts with buyer firms. We analyze how farmersâ entry into the GVC reconfigures their agencements (defined as heterogeneous arrangements of human and nonhuman agencies which are associated with each other). These reconfigurations entail the severance of some associations among procedural and material elements of the agencements and the formation of new associations, in order to produce cultivation practices that are accurately described by the GVCâs standards and protocols. Based on ethnography of two farmers in Uttarakhand, North India, we find that the same standards were enacted differently on the two farmersâ fields, producing variable degrees of (selective) compliance with the âofficialâ GVC standards. We argue that the disjuncture between the âofficialâ scripts of the standards and actual cultivation practices must be nurtured to allow farmersâ agencements to align their practices with local sociotechnical relations and farm ecology. Furthermore, we find that compliance and disjuncture were facilitated by many practices and associations that were officially ungoverned by the GVC
Public policies and food security and family farming networks: contributions to the construction of effectiveness indicators.
This work presents a methodology for investigating the performance of public politics regarding food security networks formed in Brazilian municipalities aimed at increasing income and employment in familiar farming. These programs need to further develop the methodologies used for studying their efficiency so that they can reach a new stage in the improvement and use of management tools thereby achieving beteer results of social inclusion and/or food security. This paper constitutes a first effort to bring together indicators for the evaluation of the efficiency of public politicies
Right to farm laws
In the lead up to the 2015 State election it was reported in The Land that the Coalition Government and NSW Farmers had entered into âan unprecedentedâ memorandum of understanding. Among the âkey commitmentsâ entered into were the reform of biodiversity laws and consideration of âproposals for a Right to Farm policy during 2015â.
In July 2014, at its annual conference, NSW Farmers passed a motion calling for âright to farmâ legislation. Based on an article by Graham Brown, a NSW Farmersâ executive councillor, that argument seems to have two main aspects:
primarily, granting immunity to farmers from litigation involving nuisance complaints, in particular those arising from the interface between the âsmelly, sometimes noisyâ realities of farming and âexpanding urban centresâ; and
secondarily, providing protection from regulatory imposition by governments, State and local, referred to as âhindrancesâ to land use, including the placing by local councils of e-zones over agricultural property.
The article by Graham Brown concluded:
"In the face of extractive issues, expanding urban centres and red and green tape on-farm, protecting and promoting our farmersâ ability to conduct business, manage the landscape, provide environmental stewardship and grow food, must be supported in legislation."
The case was expressly adopted on 23 June 2015 by Robert Brown MLC of the Shooters and Fishers Party. He spoke in favour of âright to farmâ policy and, calling for a parliamentary inquiry into the issue, Mr Brown argued that:
"The increasing trend of urban sprawl has presented some grim implications when the interests of agriculture clash with the lifestyle expectations of semi-rural property owners on the fringes of urban areas, or indeed in whole regions of New South Wales."
This e-brief discusses the history and purpose of âright to farmâ laws and their application in the US and Canada. The position in Australia is also discussed, as is the question of the place of such laws in the broader context of the system of planning legislation. 
Interpersonal communication pattern of farmers through key communicators regarding some selected Gram Panchayat activities
Devolution of power to the grassroot organisations has increasingly been supported in recent years within the context of participatory development. The role of interpersonal communication to actualise such development has also become an area of fresh enquiry. To explore the pattern of interpersonal communication regarding the functioning of panchayati raj institutions (PRI), hence, was taken up for the present study. Key communicator network of farmers was studied as neighbourhood, friendship and discussion group pattern to explore farmersâ interpersonal communication pattern regarding PRI activities. Sociometric technique was employed to identify the key communicators and their networks. Neighbourhood pattern of interaction showed least dense key communicator network and least dependence of farmers on these key communicators for securing information. Friendship pattern of interaction featured higher number of respondents seeking information from more than one key communicator; whereas, discussion group pattern of interaction showed least number of key communicators and highest inter-key communicator interaction. These networks can be fruitfully used to identify and facilitate information flow regarding PRI functioning; at the same time capacity building of key communicators can contribute towards the smooth functioning of these grassroot organisations.Panchayati Raj Institutions, interpersonal communication, key communicator, key communicator network
Farm Subsidies at Record Levels As Congress Considers New Farm Bill
After six decades of rising subsidy levels and expansive regulatory controls, it appeared that Washington's role in agriculture would be reduced with the enactment of the 1996 Federal Agriculture Improvement and Reform Act. That act aimed to decrease subsidies over seven years and to move farming toward greater reliance on market supply and demand. Unfortunately, that promise collapsed in an orgy of supplemental spending bills that have increased federal farm subsidies to all-time highs. Total direct subsidy payments to farmers have soared to more than 9 billion per year in the early 1990s. There is little justification for the special hold that the agricultural industry has on tax-payers' wallets. Other industries, such as the high-tech industry, are also risky and subject to large price swings but do not receive large-scale government subsidies. Moreover, farm households have higher incomes, on average, than do nonfarm U.S. households, and subsidies are skewed toward the largest and wealthiest farm businesses. Farm subsidies also subvert their own goal: farmers demand subsidies because of low market prices for their products, but subsidies themselves contribute to lower prices. As Congress works to reauthorize farm programs, it threatens to move further away from reform by institutionalizing high levels of farm welfare. Instead, Congress should push the farm sector back into the market economy by repealing federal farm subsidies
Interpersonal communication pattern of farmers through key communicators regarding some selected Gram Panchayat activities
Devolution of power to the grassroot organisations has increasingly been supported in recent years within the context of participatory development. The role of interpersonal communication to actualise such development has also become an area of fresh enquiry. To explore the pattern of interpersonal communication regarding the functioning of panchayati raj institutions (PRI), hence, was taken up for the present study. Key communicator network of farmers was studied as neighbourhood, friendship and discussion group pattern to explore farmersâ interpersonal communication pattern regarding PRI activities. Sociometric technique was employed to identify the key communicators and their networks. Neighbourhood pattern of interaction showed least dense key communicator network and least dependence of farmers on these key communicators for securing information. Friendship pattern of interaction featured higher number of respondents seeking information from more than one key communicator; whereas, discussion group pattern of interaction showed least number of key communicators and highest inter-key communicator interaction. These networks can be fruitfully used to identify and facilitate information flow regarding PRI functioning; at the same time capacity building of key communicators can contribute towards the smooth functioning of these grassroot organisations.Panchayati Raj Institutions, interpersonal communication, key communicator, key communicator network
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