Soil Quality and Agricultural Sustainability
Soil Quality and Agricultural Sustainability

Author: R. Lal

Publisher: CRC Press

Published: 1998-11-01

Total Pages: 396

ISBN-13: 9781575040820

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Soil degradation causes a shrinking of arable land resources, and the persistence of starvation and malnutrition. The depletion is compounded by the increasing populations of developing tropical nations, and the conversion of agricultural land to other uses. As a result, per capita grain harvesting and irrigated land is in steady decline all over the world. The decrease in horticultural resources and productivity has inspired Soil Quality and Agricultural Sustainability, which is based primarily on papers presented at the 1996 conference on soil degradation, sponsored by Ohio State University, the USAID and the International Agricultural Research Centers. The book addresses itself to six concerns: basic concepts and global issues, nutrient and water inputs, soil quality management in Asia, in Africa, and in the Tropical Americas, and future priorities. The Editor's goal is a new paradigm in soil quality research: a multidisciplinary approach. He proposes that an erosion management program include soil scientists, hydrologists, climatologists, sedimentologists, geographers, agronomists, agricultural engineers, land use planners, economists, anthropologists and social scientists. Lal advocates an optimistic, forward-thinking brand of soil science that concentrates on conservation and fertility. The 26 chapters explore what Lal considers to be the priorities: agricultural sustainability, soil quality, food security, quality restoration, long-term management, and the failure to adopt new technology. In sum, they paint a comprehensive portrait of the current state, and future prospects, for worldwide agronomic viability.

Science Breakthroughs to Advance Food and Agricultural Research by 2030
Science Breakthroughs to Advance Food and Agricultural Research by 2030

Author: National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine

Publisher: National Academies Press

Published: 2019-04-21

Total Pages: 243

ISBN-13: 0309473926

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For nearly a century, scientific advances have fueled progress in U.S. agriculture to enable American producers to deliver safe and abundant food domestically and provide a trade surplus in bulk and high-value agricultural commodities and foods. Today, the U.S. food and agricultural enterprise faces formidable challenges that will test its long-term sustainability, competitiveness, and resilience. On its current path, future productivity in the U.S. agricultural system is likely to come with trade-offs. The success of agriculture is tied to natural systems, and these systems are showing signs of stress, even more so with the change in climate. More than a third of the food produced is unconsumed, an unacceptable loss of food and nutrients at a time of heightened global food demand. Increased food animal production to meet greater demand will generate more greenhouse gas emissions and excess animal waste. The U.S. food supply is generally secure, but is not immune to the costly and deadly shocks of continuing outbreaks of food-borne illness or to the constant threat of pests and pathogens to crops, livestock, and poultry. U.S. farmers and producers are at the front lines and will need more tools to manage the pressures they face. Science Breakthroughs to Advance Food and Agricultural Research by 2030 identifies innovative, emerging scientific advances for making the U.S. food and agricultural system more efficient, resilient, and sustainable. This report explores the availability of relatively new scientific developments across all disciplines that could accelerate progress toward these goals. It identifies the most promising scientific breakthroughs that could have the greatest positive impact on food and agriculture, and that are possible to achieve in the next decade (by 2030).

The Agricultural Scientific Enterprise
The Agricultural Scientific Enterprise

Author: Lawrence M Busch

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2019-07-11

Total Pages: 319

ISBN-13: 1000314529

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The State Agricultural Experiment Stations have played a fundamental role in the development of science and agriculture in the United States. From their inception in 1887, the experiment stations have attempted to wed basic research with practical application and have helped institutionalize a utilitarian approach to agricultural science. Agricultural research and the new technology it helped to generate were major factors in the transformation of U.S. agriculture into a high technology, mechanized, science-based industry. Moreover, the experiment stations, as the first large-scale, publicly supported scientific research institutions in the United States, have also long been models for scientific institutions both here and abroad. Compiled for the 1987 centennial of the State Agricultural Experiment Stations, this volume critically examines past performance, current issues, and future directions for public agricultural research in the United States. Each of the authors, drawn from disciplines as diverse as philosophy and agronomy, focuses on a central concern for the scientific enterprise. Issues include priority setting, maintaining and promoting disciplinary and interdisciplinary effectiveness, supporting higher education for agriculture, and efficacious dissemination of research findings. By setting these issues in their historical and philosophical context, the volume suggests new approaches for meeting the continuing challenge to achieve equity, efficiency, sustainability, flexibility, conservation, and consistency with other objectives of U.S. society.

An Assessment of the International Science and Technology Center
An Assessment of the International Science and Technology Center

Author: National Research Council

Publisher: National Academies Press

Published: 1996-11-15

Total Pages: 59

ISBN-13: 0309175097

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This report reviews the ISTC's objectives and plans, discussed its activities with U.S. and FSU officials, and met with FSU grant recipients and institute directors. The committee concludes that during its first two years the ISTC was successful and effective in meeting its primary objective, which, in turn, has contributed to the larger goal of diminishing the risk of weapons proliferation. Moreover, the opportunities provided to FSU scientists and engineers do indeed offer meaningful nonweapons-related work, which helps address the demoralization that may otherwise contribute to scientists' being lured into work for unfriendly governments. The committee believes the ISTC has also been successful in addressing its secondary objectivesâ€"namely, the solution of national and international technical problems; the support of basic and applied research and technology development for peaceful purposes; and, to a lesser degree, reinforcement of the transition of the FSU to a market-driven economy.