Use of untreated wastewater in peri-urban agriculture in Pakistan: risks and opportunities

Water reuse / Waste waters / Water quality / Groundwater / Irrigation practices / Soil properties / Environmental effects / Conjunctive use / Pakistan / Haroonabad

Effects of Maturity and Drying Method on the Nutritive Value of Tropical Grasses in Nicaragua

Tropical grasses are key components for both grazing and conserved forages in sustainable livestock systems (beef and dairy) in Central America. The objective of the study was to evaluate grasses used in Nicaragua and their nutritive value contribution as preserved forage during the dry season under different drying methods. Five tropical bunch grasses (Andropogon gayanus, Hyparrheniarufa, Urochloabrizantha, Megathyrsus maximus, and Cenchruspurpureus) were sampled across different farms in Nicaragua in 2014 and 2015 using three replications. Forage samples were collected at 2, 4, 6, and 8-wk maturity as well as season long samples. Samples drying methods included sun- and oven-dried. Sun-dried samples were air dried outdoors for five days while oven-driedused forced air at 55 oC. Samples were analyzed for nutritive value using wet chemistry protocols for crude protein (CP), acid detergent fiber (ADF), neutral detergent fiber (NDF) and in vitro total digestibility (IVTD). Drying methods did not influence CP, ADF, NDF and IVTD concentrations. There were significant differences among grass species in CP levels (P= 0.0003), ADF (P= 0.0009), and IVTD (P= 0.0083). U.brizantha had the greatest CP concentration (79 g/kg) while C. purpureus had the lowest CP (44 g/kg). U. brizantha had the lowest ADF (340 g/kg) concentration. Species A. gayanus, H. rufa, and Megathyrsus maximus had similar NDF concentrations. In vitro total digestibility ranged from 680 to 750 g/kg with M. maximus having the lowest digestibility. Significant differences in forages nutritive value were observed among maturity stages for CP (P\u3c 0.0001), ADF (P= 0.0022), NDF (P= 0.0006), and IVTD (P= 0.0241), but U. brizantha maintained higher CP and IVTD concentrations compared other species, indicating that could be a more preferred species for off-season feeding

Irrigation water management and the Bundala National Park: Proceedings of the Workshop on Water Quality of the Bundala Lagoons, held at IIMI, in Colombo, Sri Lanka 03 April 1998

Water resource management / Water use efficiency / Environmental degradation / Water quality / Irrigation effects / Hydrology / Social aspects / Wildlife / Cattle / Wetlands / Lagoons / Drainage / Agriculture / Land degradation / Water scarcity / Sri Lanka / Kirindi Oya / Bundala

Urban wastewater: A valuable resource for agriculture - A case study from Haroonabad, Pakistan

Waste waters / Irrigation water / Water reuse / Economic analysis / Soil properties / Households / Water availability / Water use / Water quality / Groundwater / Public health / Risks / Case studies

Irrigation and irrigated agriculture potential in the Sahel: The case of the Niger river basin.

The report assesses the potential of developing irrigation in the Niger River Basin under various agricultural scenarios accounting for biophysical and socio-economic variables, and for expected climate change. Irrigation potential is assessed in two parts. The first reviews recent literature in English and French (2010 onwards) on sustainable irrigation potential in the Sahel (i.e. Lake Chad basin, Niger, Senegal Volta River basins). Sahel agriculture possesses a significant irrigation potential. However, estimates fluctuate greatly depending on the scale of irrigation schemes, whether the resource is surface or ground water, expected and actual irrigation costs but also on determinants of success of irrigation schemes, including the varying effects when interacting with other inputs, such as fertilisers. Past, and not always successful, efforts were based on large public irrigation schemes (i.e. river dams and related canals). In a growing number of contexts, investments in small and micro-irrigation systems are identified as more desirable than conventional large schemes. Existing small-scale irrigation systems in the region are known to be developing however limited systematised evidence exists. The realisation of this potential is very sensitive to the costs of irrigation, among the highest in the world, with some technologies more sensitive than others (i.e. small river diversions). Moreover, irrigation potential is influenced by synergies among irrigation and other agricultural production technologies – it is maybe worthwhile to recall that irrigation potential is not a static concept, but it is contingent on levels of other inputs. Hence, irrigation investments need to be put in the broader context of productivity enhancement, rural development efforts and global changes such as urbanisation The development of irrigation in the Sahel and in the Niger River basin in particular is a key intervention area for agriculture and development policy in general. Current policy identifies irrigation development as an instrument fostering food security. However, from the angle of optimization, rainfed agriculture retains the larger potential for development when looking at costs and overall potential profits. Moreover, support to the development of irrigated agriculture needs to be fully integrated with a relevant and adapted support to agriculture in general, particularly with regards to how it mitigates risk. Access to irrigation is expected to expand farmers' production opportunities. It mitigates production risks, even in low quantities as crop-saving irrigation. By reducing risk, it encourages farmers to make more intensive use of inputs and land. Moreover, this dynamic effect is also influenced by the type of irrigation systems accessed. For example, the literature has identified that farmers which have some off-farm income are particularly interested in investing in agriculture if irrigation is made available, whereas other groups may be interested in improving first their access to credit for farm inputs with then a view on irrigation. How production risks are perceived need to be clearly identified so that the irrigation systems fostered can be seen as risk-reducing Functioning supply chains would also make irrigation more profitable as they reduce losses of potentially more valuable products from irrigated agriculture and enhance market access. Recently, registered regional increases in groundwater storage have been associated to diffuse recharge, partially compensating for groundwater withdrawal associated with irrigation development. Hence, hinting at some level of sustainability in the use of groundwater for small-scale irrigation in the Sahel, despite the risks associated with salinization. The second part focuses on the Niger Basin to assess and quantify its irrigation potential through modelling. The model uses static biophysical and socio-economic indicators in model optimising profits of mainly small holder farms under 4 possible agricultural scenarios with distinctive productivity levels. In general, the projected irrigated area does not evolve much between scenarios mainly because of high productions costs associated with increased irrigation. Although irrigation potential is theoretically large, investing in both irrigated and rainfed input intensification offers the largest potential gains. The results for total irrigation potential in terms of farmed area are in the range of 0.6-09M hectares, from the estimated current 0.53M hectares of irrigated land under the most productive scenario in terms of agricultural yields. However, even the most yielding scenario results of the current study are significantly lower than previous estimates developed in the literature, and depend on assumed irrigation and input costs. The specific strengths of this new estimation are that of using input costs from recent agricultural surveys (i.e. LSMS-ISA) along with crop suitability maps. Its main limitation is that is does not distinguish between irrigation technologies and related costs, constraining estimates to a generic (gravity) irrigation. In turn, the expansion of agriculture is exogenously determined and does not depend upon the variables analysed.JRC.D.4-Economics of Agricultur

Reasoning about strategies under partial observability and fairness constraints

A number of extensions exist for Alternating-time Temporal Logic; some of these mix strategies and partial observability but, to the best of our knowledge, no work provides a unified framework for strategies, partial observability and fairness constraints. In this paper we propose AT LK^F_po, a logic mixing strategies under partial observability and epistemic properties of agents in a system with fairness constraints on states, and we provide a model checking algorithm for i

Exposure of African ape sites to climate change impacts

Large gaps remain in our understanding of the vulnerability of specific animal taxa and regions to climate change, especially regarding extreme climate impact events. Here, we assess African apes, flagship and highly important umbrella species for sympatric biodiversity. We estimated past (1981–2010) and future exposure to climate change impacts across 363 sites in Africa for RCP2.6 and RCP6.0 for near term (2021–2050) and long term (2071–2099). We used fully harmonized climate data and data on extreme climate impact events from the Inter-Sectoral Impact Model Intercomparison Project (ISIMIP). Historic data show that 171 sites had positive temperature anomalies for at least nine of the past ten years with the strongest anomalies (up to 0.56°C) estimated for eastern chimpanzees. Climate projections suggest that temperatures will increase across all sites, while precipitation changes are more heterogeneous. We estimated a future increase in heavy precipitation events for 288 sites, and an increase in the number of consecutive dry days by up to 20 days per year (maximum increase estimated for eastern gorillas). All sites will be frequently exposed to wildfires and crop failures in the future, and the latter could impact apes indirectly through increased deforestation. 84% of sites are projected to be exposed to heatwaves and 78% of sites to river floods. Tropical cyclones and droughts were only projected for individual sites in western and central Africa. We further compiled available evidence on how climate change impacts could affect apes, for example, through heat stress and dehydration, a reduction in water sources and fruit trees, and reduced physiological performance, body condition, fertility, and survival. To support necessary research on the sensitivity and adaptability of African apes to climate change impacts, and the planning and implementation of conservation measures, we provide detailed results for each ape site on the open-access platform A.P.E.S. Wiki

Complexity and Expressivity of Branching- and Alternating-Time Temporal Logics with Finitely Many Variables

We show that Branching-time temporal logics CTL and CTL*, as well as Alternating-time temporal logics ATL and ATL*, are as semantically expressive in the language with a single propositional variable as they are in the full language, i.e., with an unlimited supply of propositional variables. It follows that satisfiability for CTL, as well as for ATL, with a single variable is EXPTIME-complete, while satisfiability for CTL*, as well as for ATL*, with a single variable is 2EXPTIME-complete,--i.e., for these logics, the satisfiability for formulas with only one variable is as hard as satisfiability for arbitrary formulas.Comment: Prefinal version of the published pape