Using Community-Generated Data for Water Management Policy

This Policy Notes documents the experience of Lantapan, a watershed community in Bukidnon, where data collected by a community-based group to monitor its watershed's quality through the years helped alert the local government on the critical state of their water resources, thereby helping avert a possible water crisis. At the same time, the findings indicate the urgency to have a consistency of policies at both the national and local levels in order to ensure a more effective, efficient and sustainable management of natural resources, especially water resources.watershed, water resource management, water quality

Can Agroforestry Farmers Attain Sustainability? Case of Farmers in Selected Upland Farming Communities in the Philippines

This article is based on the study which investigated the socioeconomic and biophysical conditions of the upland farming communities in the Philippines; identified the development pathways that were undertaken by the upland farmers; and determined level of sustainability of the upland farming communities on the basis of their development pathways. This article argues that agroforestry farmers in upland farming communities in the Philippines can attain sustainability. This argument is based on the study conducted in the three pilot upland communities of the Conservation Farming Villages program in Albay, Ifugao and Negros Oriental, Philippines. From seven focus group discussions (FGDs) with at least 12 participants per FGD for a total of 147 farmers, and farm household survey of 230 upland farmers, research results indicate that agroforestry farmers in the three study sites were smallholders and were cultivating in areas with marginal conditions. There were five development pathways identified. These are monocropping in contour, multiple cropping in contour, agroforestry, agroforestry with non-farm activities, and multiple cropping/monocropping without contour. With the community capitals framework as the theoretical foundation, analysis indicated that the five development pathways contributed to a high level of social, human and political capitals having mean scores of 0.73, 0.55 and 0.54, respectively; a moderate level of physical, financial and natural capital, with mean scores of 0.23, 0.20 and 0.23, respectively; and a very low level of cultural capital with mean score of -0.08. At the community level, on the other hand, research results revealed that the CFV sites in Ligao, Albay and La Libertad, Negros Oriental have almost similar contributions to the sustainability of the upland farming communities, while Alfonso Lista, Ifugao had the lowest. Thus, institutional arrangements with the farmers’ association and the local government units also played a key role in the sustainability of the upland farming communities. These results imply the need for a holistic and collaborative engagement towards attaining sustainable upland farming communities

The Top 100 questions for the sustainable intensification of agriculture in India’s rainfed drylands

India has the largest area of rainfed dryland agriculture globally, with a variety of distinct types of farming systems producing most of its coarse cereals, food legumes, minor millets, and large amounts of livestock. All these are vital for national and regional food and nutritional security. Yet, the rainfed drylands have been relatively neglected in mainstream agricultural and rural development policy. As a result, significant social-ecological challenges overlap in these landscapes: endemic poverty, malnutrition and land degradation. Sustainable intensification of dryland agriculture is essential for helping to address these challenges, particularly in the context of accelerating climate change. In this paper, we present 100 questions that point to the most important knowledge gaps and research priorities. If addressed, these would facilitate and inform sustainable intensification in Indian rainfed drylands, leading to improved agricultural production and enhanced ecosystem services. The horizon scanning method used to produce these questions brought together experts and practitioners involved in a broad range of disciplines and sectors. This exercise resulted in a consolidated set of questions covering the agricultural drylands, organized into 13 themes. Together, these represent a collective programme for new cross- and multi-disciplinary research on sustainable intensification in the Indian rainfed drylands

Temporal Dynamics of Interferon Gamma Responses in Children Evaluated for Tuberculosis

BACKGROUND: Development of T-cells based-Interferon gamma (IFNgamma) assays has offered new possibilities for the diagnosis of latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI) and active disease in adults. Few studies have been performed in children, none in France. With reference to the published data on childhood TB epidemiology in the Paris and Ile de France Region, we considered it important to evaluate the performance of IGRA (QuantiFERON TB Gold In Tube(R), QF-TB-IT) in the diagnosis and the follow-up through treatment of LTBI and active TB in a cohort of French children. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: 131 children were recruited during a prospective and multicentre study (October 2005 and May 2007; Ethical Committee St Louis Hospital, Paris, study number 2005/32). Children were sampled at day 0, 10, 30, 60 (except Healthy Contacts, HC) and 90 for LTBI and HC, and a further day 120, and day 180 for active TB children. Median age was 7.4 years, with 91% of the children BCG vaccinated. LTBI and active TB children undergoing therapy produced significant higher IFNgamma values after 10 days of treatment (p = 0.035). In addition, IFNgamma values were significantly lower at the end of treatment compared to IFNgamma values at day 0, although the number of positive patients was not significantly different between day 0 and end of treatment. CONCLUSIONS/ SIGNIFICANCE: By following quantitative IFNgamma values in each enrolled child with LTBI or active TB and receiving treatment, we were able to detect an increase in the IFNgamma response at day 10 of treatment which might allow the confirmation of a diagnosis. In addition, a decline in IFNgamma values during treatment makes it possible for clinicians to monitor the effect of preventive or curative therapy

Economic Perspective for Agricultural Biotechnology Research Planning

There is no other agricultural technology that has been subjected to a lot of controversies than agricultural biotechnology. More than ever, intelligent decisions about this technology would be based on scientific data and objective analyses. As we meet the challenges of food security in a sustainable way, and given the very limited land and energy resources; available alternatives are few. Because of its unique features, the economic study in biotechnology deviates from the standard economic impact of technological changes, such as mechanization. It is more closely related to measuring the impact of pesticides, though the issue of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) has not been raised in the chemical technology. In addition, just like pesticides, some biotechnology products have externality effects. Thus the economic framework for its analysis will be consistent with the issues about the economics of sustainability, which has long-term benefits/costs and considered to be very knowledge intensive for both farmers and other handlers. Some of the features that could impinge on the economic issues of agricultural biotechnology are the private-public sector partnership in research, development, and technology transfer; the role of the IPRs in both technology development and transfer; the regulations about biosafety and other licensing requirements for ultimate commercialization; and the management of the technology once in the market and in the farmers’ fields. These could affect the cost and the output price structure. The ex ante economic analysis could guide us in the measurement of potential effectiveness and efficiency of biotechnology, and in general, in the research prioritization.biotechnology

Research Program Planning for Natural Resource Management: A Background Analysis

Conventionally, agricultural resource management per se is not a popular area of research. Agricultural production research was crop and input specific. Earlier studies recommended fertilizer levels that maximize yields; or cropping patterns that maximize output and profits. Water was considered a fixed input; water productivity was not an issue, so was soil productivity. A review of the results of studies on soil and water conducted in the 1980s and the 1990s showed deficiencies in taking into account the optimal management of these agricultural resources that could have assured sustainable productivity impacts. For soil management for instance, there is a need to unravel that black box of the processes on how farmers decide in agricultural resource management. It is a well known fact that information is the most important input in sustainable agriculture. How do farmers handle this information? What are their knowledge bases? For water management, the issue is about water productivity. This is however, a function of water quantity, quality, and water delivery efficiency. Agricultural decision makers should take active part in the management of the watershed as a significant source of surface water for irrigation. But we also have to guard our shallow groundwater from the environmental pollutants that could affect its utility in agriculture. The current debate by experts on the optimal combination of two sources of irrigation water, i.e. surface water and groundwater, should also be taken into consideration. Finally, the most efficient mode of delivery should be studied. Research on soil and water is numerous. However, the fact that we still observe a lot of resource degradation implies that the desired impact in terms of sustainability outcomes of all these, is not attained. Maybe, a reexamination of the context in which we design soil and water management research agenda, and the process of filtering the results to people who actually use and /or decide on use of the resource is the first item of study. In this regard, an alternative research paradigm for natural resource management (NRM) is proposed. NRM research will go beyond commodities and beyond disciplines. NRM research should be treated from the watershed scale; and take into account the broad range of stakeholders that will be affected and the role of the institutions in the process. Some of the recorded products of research on NRM are actually based on indigenous farmer knowledge. It is only with the building up of the farmer knowledge bases that research can make an impact on farmers’ practices. Moreover, diagnostics and other farmer/extension friendly kits have to be developed and used as early warning devices. How do farmers learn about these knowledge intensive technologies (KIT)? And also, the role of the various institutions in the promotion or in the constraint to adoption of sustainable technologies should be noted. NRM research is not to be confined to the study of agriculture technologies or the environmental management alone; but rather to the broader, intersectoral linkages that potentially affect farmer behaviour and farmer land use and technology decisions.natural resources and environment, environmental issues, environmental management

Groundwater Irrigation and Production Risks in Rice Farming in Southern Philippines

A stochastic production function specification is used to value the variability in agricultural productivity of groundwater use in rainfed lowland rice areas by farmers using shallow tube wells (STWs). The study was done in Southern Philippines Province o f Cotabato. Using survey data, this study first estimated the mean rice yield function with the cost of pumping, which represents well depth and water availability, used as water supply proxy variable input into the stochastic production function. The results of the estimated mean yield function showed that machineries cost, cost of pesticides, and cost of pumping are the most important determinants of yield levels of rice grown during wet season cropping. The mean yield function revealed a diminishing marginal productivity for the cost of pumping. Nitrogen fertilizer was found to be positively related to yield in the dry season cropping in the sample study area. The variance function of the stochastic production function provided empirical evidence that the cost of pumping reduces rice yield variability in the wet season cropping. This implies that risk-averse rainfed lowland rice farmers concerned with reducing production risk, hence income variability could use groundwater as source of irrigation. The study proposes, though subject to further verification, that the use of shallow tube well stabilizes rice yield in rainfed lowland irrigation agriculture. The significant higher difference in gross margin (P7,323 ha-1) attained by farmers in high recharge areas in dry season cropping is probably due to higher water levels in turn more water availability than in low recharge areas. The welfare loss associated with increased pumping cost could shed some light on the lower bound estimate valuation of raw water fees for irrigation agriculture that use groundwater. This lower bound estimate only considers the extraction cost but consideration on the in-situ value of the groundwater resource is highly important though it is not included in this study

Realities of Watershed Management in the Philippines: Synthesis of Case Studies

This paper presents a synthesis of four case studies of watershed management experiences in the Philippines, primarily to provide insight on why watershed management approach has not gained wider recognition in the country despite being renowned internationally. A brief description was presented for each case study involving the watersheds of Maasin, Magat, Manupali, and Balian sub-watershed to account for their critical role as water supply support systems to downstream communities. It provides highlights on various initiatives undertaken by the Local government Units, NGOs, private sector etc. in their effort to protect these watersheds from environmental degradation. The case studies have shown that the effective implementation of watershed management requires some level of financial capital, a community or group of communities with good enough level of intellectual and social capitals, and the presence of a legal and institutional framework to support the watershed approach. The level of these various forms of capital vary across watershed, thereby leading to differences in the level of watershed management implementation as well. The study also puts forward the need for payments of environmental services as previous initiatives undertaken by national forest protection programs and other community-based livelihood activities and reforestation projects are just short-lived management initiatives.financial capital, intellectual capital, watershed management approach, social capital, legal and institutional framework