Adoption des Technologies Agro-Écologiques : Perception et Préférence des Agriculteurs de la Zone Cotonnière du Bénin

La promotion des pratiques agro-écologiques est devenue l’une des options favorables pouvant contribuer durablement à la gestion des sols et à la préservation des écosystèmes pour la sécurité alimentaire et nutritionnelle dans le contexte actuel des changements climatiques. Cette étude vise à analyser la perception et la préférence des producteurs sur les pratiques agroécologiques innovantes promues dans le cadre du « projet d’appui à la Transition Agro-écologique dans les Zones Cotonnières du Bénin (TAZCO) ». Pour faciliter l’adoption de telles technologies par les producteurs, il faut agir sur les déterminants qui leurs sont favorables. La perception étant un déterminant de l’adoption et la présente étude a été réalisée pour proposer par commune, au moins cinq technologies pour lesquelles les producteurs ont une bonne préférence. Cette étude a été conduite dans la zone d’intervention du TAZCO, constituée de Banikoara, Kandi, Oussa-Péhunco, Parakou et Savalou. En utilisant la méthode d’échantillonnage aléatoire avec le paramètre de disponibilité des producteurs impliqués, 282 producteurs ont été enquêtés lors de la collecte des données parmi les 300 impliqués dans la phase pilote du projet. Les données ont été collectées à l’aide d’un questionnaire structuré, développé sur smartphones avec l’application ‘’KoBocollect’’. Ces données ont été analysées à l’aide de méthode multicritère d’aide à la décision et une liste de cinq technologies variant d’une zone à l’autre a été établie. L’étude a montré que les technologies de la famille « Gestion Intégrée de la Fertilité du Sol » et « Gestion Intégrée Agriculture-Elevage » viennent en tête dans la majorité des zones d’intervention du TAZCO. Agro-ecological practices promotion become one of the favorable options that can sustainably contribute to soil management and ecosystem preservation for food and nutrition security under climate change context. This study aims to analyze producers’ perception and preference on agro-ecological practices promoted by TAZCO project (Agro-ecological Transition in Benin Cotton Areas). To facilitate promoted technologies adoption by producers, it is necessary to act on determinants affecting thempositively. Based on the fact that perception is one of the technology adoption determinants, the study was carried out to suggesting each of the municipalities involved in the study at least five technologies which received producers’ favorable preference. The study was conducted in the area covered by TAZCO activities (Banikoara, Kandi, Oussa-Péhunco, Parakou and Savalou). Using the random sampling method with producers involved’s availability parameter, 282 producers over to the 300 involved in the pilot project were interwied during data collecting. Data were collected using a structured questionnaire developed under ''Kobocollect'' application on smartphones. The multi-criteria decision-support method was used to analyze collected data and a list of five technologies varying from one zone to another was established. The study showed that the technologies named "IntegratedManagement of Soil Fertility" and "Integrated Management Agriculture-Livestock" revealed to be the most important in the majority of TAZCO intervention areas

Ground penetrating radar at work: A realistic perspective on utility surveying in the Netherlands through a comprehensive ground-truth dataset

This dataset provides a comprehensive compilation of Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) surveys across 125 utility surveying activities in the Netherlands. The dataset details the specific use of GPR in each authentic real-life utility surveying activity, whether employed independently or as a complementary tool alongside existing surveying methods, with or without post-processing. The dataset includes 959 radargrams, ground-truth information obtained from trial trenches, and an inventory of construction, geophysical, infrastructural, and technical features. The GPR utilised in all activities is an air-coupled radar with a 500 MHz frequency antenna, a GNSS RTK positioning system, and a measuring wheel encoder. This ground-truth dataset provides researchers with a valuable resource to further assess the practical efficacy of GPR as a utility surveying method, refine radargram processing algorithms and techniques, and explore the possibilities of predictive modelling

Review of Detection and Monitoring Systems for Buried High Pressure Pipelines:Final Report

The Netherlands has approximately two million kilometers of underground cables and pipelines. One specific type of buried infrastructure is the distribution network of hazardous material such as gas, oil, and chemicals (‘transportleiding gevaarlijke stoffen’). This network comprises 22.000 kilometers of high-pressure transportation pipelines. Because they are located under the ground, these pipelines are subject to excavation damages. Incidents in them Belgian Gellingen (2004) and German Ludwigshafen (2014) show that consequences of pipeline damages are significant. They can cause fatalities to excavation workers and impact the environment too. In addition, only direct costs for recovery of damages are estimated by the pipeline owner association (VELIN) to range already from several hundreds of thousands to even a few millions of euros. This figure does not yet include the indirect costs. Serious incidents will eventually undermine the public’s acceptance for hazardous pipelines, so it goes without saying that pipeline excavation incidents should, therefore, be avoided. Nowadays, third parties seem to be causing most of the damage to underground pipelines (Capstick, 2007; CONCAWE, 2013; EGIG, 2015; J. M. Muggleton & Rustighi, 2013). Reasons for this, often mentioned by industry, are that utility location information (KLIC-melding) is not always available and, when available, it is not always accurate or too difficult to interpret by excavator operators. It is crucial to detect underground infrastructure in a timely fashion to avoid damages. For this purpose, initiatives are needed to help excavator operators to detect pipelines and monitor groundworks taking place close to pipelines. Such initiatives could focus on the identification and the development of technologies for pipeline strike avoidance. The first step in this direction was this study – which in turn is related to the Safety Deals that are prepared by the association of pipeline owners in the Netherlands (VELIN) and the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and the Environment. VELIN and I&M requested the University of Twente to systematically review existing technologies for excavation damage avoidance. Such an overview is not available to the Dutch industry to date. The project team therefore identified and described existing systems for global monitoring and detection of utilities. These systems eventually help detect clashes between excavator equipment and high-pressure transportation pipelines

Diffraction in low-energy electron scattering from DNA: bridging gas phase and solid state theory

Using high-quality gas phase electron scattering calculations and multiple scattering theory, we attempt to gain insights on the radiation damage to DNA induced by secondary low-energy electrons in the condensed phase, and to bridge the existing gap with the gas phase theory and experiments. The origin of different resonant features (arising from single molecules or diffraction) is discussed and the calculations are compared to existing experiments in thin films.Comment: 40 pages preprint, 12 figures, submitted to J. Chem. Phy

A comparative study of three indices of umbilical blood flow in relation to prediction of growth retardation

Peer Reviewe

The stellar velocity dispersion of the lens galaxy in MG2016+112 at z=1.004

We present a direct measurement of the stellar velocity dispersion of the early-type lens galaxy D in the system MG2016+112 (z=1.004), determined from a spectrum obtained with the Echelle Spectrograph and Imager (ESI) on the W.M. Keck-II Telescope, as part of the Lenses Structure and Dynamics (LSD) Survey. We find a velocity dispersion of sigma_ap=304+-27 km/s inside an effective circular aperture with a radius of 0.65'', corresponding to a central velocity dispersion of sigma=328+-32 km/s. From a Hubble Space Telescope F160W-band image, we measure the effective radius and effective surface brightness in order to determine the offset of the lens galaxy with respect to the local Fundamental Plane. The offset corresponds to an evolution of the rest-frame effective mass-to-light ratio of Delta log(M/L_B)=-0.62+-0.08 from z=0 to z=1.004. By interpreting colors and offset of the FP with two independent stellar population synthesis models, we obtain a single-burst equivalent age of 2.8+-0.8 Gyr (i.e. z_f>1.9) and a supersolar metallicity of log[Z/Z_sun]=0.25+-0.25. The lens galaxy is therefore a massive elliptical dominated by an old and metal rich stellar population at z>1. The excellent agreement of the stellar velocity dispersion with that predicted from recent lens models confirms that the angular separation of the multiple images of the background QSO is predominantly due to the lens galaxy, and not to a massive ``dark cluster'', in agreement with recent weak lensing and X-ray observations. However, the significant overdensity of galaxies in the field might indicate that this system is a proto-cluster, in formation around galaxy D, responsible for the ~10% external shear inferred from the strong lens models.Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ Letters -- conclusions unchanged, revision of figure