Purpose: Why do farmers not take better care of their soils? This article aims to give insight into how farmers look at soil quality management. Design/methodology/approach: It analyses diverse land management practices and visions on soils and soil quality of ten agroecological and 14 conventional smallholder farmers in Araponga, Minas Gerais, Brazil. As agroecological farming (that is, managing soils with minimum use of external inputs) requires more complex knowledge, it is assumed that agroecological farmers would be more knowledgeable on soils compared to conventional farmers.

Changes affecting livestock farming systems have made farm work a central concern for both the sector and for farmers themselves. Increased pressure on farms to be competitive and productive together with farmers’ demand for greater autonomy, holidays or time to spend on private activities and the family converge to underline the two key dimensions of work – productivity and flexibility – required for the assessment of work organization.

Agrarian reform has been a key theme on the development agenda of many countries in the Global South for decades. Whilst such interventions are often pursued for political goals and in the interests of empowerment, there is often a mismatch between these goals and the actual outcomes achieved. Within this context, this study investigates the impacts of agrarian reform in Del Rosario, a former coconut hacienda in the Philippines.

The Yi minority group has a long history, and their livelihoods and culture exist in complex, holistic interrelationship with forests. This paper aims to document the dynamic, traditional forest knowledge (TFK) of the Yi, including: forest categorization methods; routine forest utilization; land tenure and use-right arrangements; benefit-sharing mechanisms; customary regulations; and forest-related beliefs. Our analysis is based on rapid investigations conducted in two dozen Yi ‘natural villages’ and in-depth studies of three Yi natural villages in Nanhua County, Yunnan.

BackgroundGrasslands are a major part of the global ecosystem, covering 37 % of the earth's terrestrial area. For a variety of reasons, mostly related to overgrazing and the resulting problems of soil erosion and weed encroachment, many of the world's natural grasslands are in poor condition and showing signs of degradation. This review examines their contribution to global food supply and to combating climate change.ScopeGrasslands make a significant contribution to food security through providing part of the feed requirements of ruminants used for meat and milk production.

Engagement with farmers and landowners is often undertaken by the research community to obtain information relating to typical land, livestock and enterprise management and generally centres on responses to questionnaire surveys. Farmers and land managers are constituted as expert observers of ground-level processes and provide diverse information on farming practices, enterprise economics and underpinning attitudes towards risk.

SUMMARYThis paper analyses the differences between forestland tenure systems in Canada and the US. Evolution of the two systems is primarily explained by variation of scarcity and land productivity. In early colonial times, Canada's economy was tightly linked to the fur trade with Indian people, while New England's economy was based more on agriculture with more intensive land use.

Historical domestic livestock grazing in sensitive landscapes has commonly been regarded as a major cause of land degradation in Iceland. Shieling areas, where milking livestock were taken to pasture for the summer, represented one element of grazing management and in this paper we consider the extent to which historical shieling-based grazing pressure contributed to land degradation.

Sustainable land management involves preservation of soil properties associated with soil quality and fertility. Conservation or no-tillage farming by retaining crop residues after harvesting can considerably contribute to soil fertility and crop productivity. The objective of this study is to evaluate and compare effects of two agricultural practices, conventional using mouldboard ploughing (CP) and no-tillage (NT), on soil fertility and on root growth of maize. The study is conducted on two adjoined fields on Chernozem in Eastern Austria.

The advent of grid electrification in the Sandveld region of South Africa in the 1980s increased the utilisation of groundwater resources for commercial irrigation purposes. In the wake of the consequent increased pressure on the resource, it behooves landowners to use water more productively and responsibly. This paper calculated the marginal product value (MPV) of irrigation water for potatoes and vine production in this region to assess and to allow the comparison of the productivity of irrigation water with other commodities and regions.

An effective response to future risk within socio-ecosystems will require the retention of local diversity, not just in more vulnerable communities on the margins but also in regions vital to industrialised countries. A case study is presented that examines agroecosystem vulnerability to climate change within an Australian multifunctional rural landscape adjacent to the city of Adelaide.