On the Description of Soil Variability Through EMI Sensors and Traditional Soil Surveys in Precision Agriculture

In Precision Agriculture electromagnetic induction (EMI) sensors are generally used to obtain soil electrical conductivity (EC) maps for the delineation of homogeneous management zones (MZ). EC measurements are related to many physical-chemical soil properties and, moreover, are average values referred to the soil depth explored by the sensor. Consequently, the following questions arise: how reliable are EC measurements to describe soil variability, compared to the data provided by a pedological survey? To which extent MZs correspond to pedological units in a soil map? Texture analysis was conducted on 38 soils samples collected at three depths with a manual auger in a rice farm (province of Pavia, Italy) characterized by sandy-loamy soils. Four pedological units were recognized, mainly based on differences in clay content distribution with depth. Four MZs were recognized from the EC maps. MZ and pedological soil maps showed similar spatial distributions of soil types, particularly at field scale. However, at the farm scale, different MZs may correspond to the same pedological unit, because of the different soil properties to which the two classification approaches are sensitive: clay contents for pedological soil mapping, and sand contents for MZ mapping. Finally, ANOVA was carried out to evaluate the statistical significance of this result

Tourism Development As a Resident-Tourist Exchange Process: an Economic Theoretic Interpretation

Many attemps have been made to theoretically base research in tourism development. However, a discernible bias towards residents’ perceptions exists. Since tourism involves the meeting of (at least) two populations, residents’ perception ha to be analysed as part of an exchange process where hosts and guests are both considered. This paper presents and partially develops the Exchange Economic Model implemented by Bimonte and Punzo (Tour Manage 55:199–208, 2016) to investigate the possible scenarios and dynamics that tourism development may imply. The theoretical framework takes an economic perspective and assumes that agents’ preferences are endogenous. This means that the population’s interactions and experiences influence guests’ and/or hosts’ attitudes and opinions, which may in turn cause structural changes in individuals’ preferences. As a consequence, populations may split and inter- and/or intra-community conflict may arise that affects individual quality of life (QOL). The paper addresses this issue theoretically, suggesting some possible solutions