Blocked Randomization with Randomly Selected Block Sizes

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jimmy Efird

2010-12-01

Full Text Available When planning a randomized clinical trial, careful consideration must be given to how participants are selected for various arms of a study. Selection and accidental bias may occur when participants are not assigned to study groups with equal probability. A simple random allocation scheme is a process by which each participant has equal likelihood of being assigned to treatment versus referent groups. However, by chance an unequal number of individuals may be assigned to each arm of the study and thus decrease the power to detect statistically significant differences between groups. Block randomization is a commonly used technique in clinical trial design to reduce bias and achieve balance in the allocation of participants to treatment arms, especially when the sample size is small. This method increases the probability that each arm will contain an equal number of individuals by sequencing participant assignments by block. Yet still, the allocation process may be predictable, for example, when the investigator is not blind and the block size is fixed. This paper provides an overview of blocked randomization and illustrates how to avoid selection bias by using random block sizes.

SOCIO-ECONOMIC DETERMINANTS OF OFF-FARM ACTIVITY PARTICIPATION IN BANGLADESH

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

M.S. Rahman

2013-01-01

Full Text Available The study was conducted in two districts of Bangladesh to determine the factors affecting the participation in off-farm activity. A total of 150 sample farmers were selected for interview through random sampling technique. The results showed that the average annual income was higher for service holders (Tk.1,83,696 compared to business (Tk. 1,69,215 and off-farm labour activities (Tk.1,09,373. Participations in activities like business and services were positively influenced by the farm size and education respectively. On the other hand, farm size and education were inversely related with participation in off-farm labour activities. Farmers in the study areas mentioned low income from agriculture as a reason for participating in off-farm activity.

Farm size - productivity relationships among arable crops farmers ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

The study was designed to analyze the relationship between farm size and resource productivity among arable crop farmers in Imo state, and isolate the major determinants of agricultural productivity. Data used for the study were collected from a sample of 120 farmers randomly selected from Okigwe and Orlu agricultural ...

Propanol in maize silage at Danish dairy farms

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Raun, Birgitte Marie Løvendahl; Kristensen, Niels Bastian

2010-01-01

The objective of the present study was to investigate the prevalence maize silage containing propanol, the seasonal variation in propanol content of maize silage, and correlations between propanol and other fermentation products in maize silage collected from 20 randomly selected Danish dairy farms...... farms, the maize silage had ≥5 g propanol/kg DM. The present study indicates that dairy cows in Denmark are commonly exposed to propanol and that approximately 20% of the dairy cows will have an intake in the range of 75-100 g propanol/d under common feeding conditions....

Risk-based audit selection of dairy farms

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Asseldonk, van M.A.P.M.; Velthuis, A.G.J.

2014-01-01

Dairy farms are audited in the Netherlands on numerous process standards. Each farm is audited once every 2 years. Increasing demands for cost-effectiveness in farm audits can be met by introducing risk-based principles. This implies targeting subpopulations with a higher risk of poor process

Training needs of farm women in dairy farming

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Durgga Rani V. And Subhadra M.R.

2009-12-01

Full Text Available A study was conducted in Thrissur taluk of Thrissur district to assess the training needs of farm women engaged in dairy farming. It was found that out of the five major farm operations studied, the farm women needed training the most in housing. The minor operations preferred the most for knowledge need were proper design of cattle shed, selection of breeds, compounding balanced feed using locally available ingredients, vaccination and banking and insurance. As for skill need, construction of scientific low cost cattle shed, selection of breeds, compounding balanced feed using locally available ingredients, symptoms of common diseases and banking and insurance were preferred the most. [Vet World 2009; 2(6.000: 221-223

Prevalence and Characterization of Motile Salmonella in Commercial Layer Poultry Farms in Bangladesh

Science.gov (United States)

Barua, Himel; Biswas, Paritosh K.; Olsen, Katharina E. P.; Christensen, Jens P.

2012-01-01

Salmonella is a globally widespread food-borne pathogen having major impact on public health. All motile serovars of Salmonella enterica of poultry origin are zoonotic, and contaminated meat and raw eggs are an important source to human infections. Information on the prevalence of Salmonella at farm/holding level, and the zoonotic serovars circulating in layer poultry in the South and South-East Asian countries including Bangladesh, where small-scale commercial farms are predominant, is limited. To investigate the prevalence of Salmonella at layer farm level, and to identify the prevalent serovars we conducted a cross-sectional survey by randomly selecting 500 commercial layer poultry farms in Bangladesh. Faecal samples from the selected farms were collected following standard procedure, and examined for the presence of Salmonella using conventional bacteriological procedures. Thirty isolates were randomly selected, from the ninety obtained from the survey, for serotyping and characterized further by plasmid profiling and pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE). Results of the survey showed that the prevalence of motile Salmonella at layer farm level was 18% (95% confidence interval 15–21%), and Salmonella Kentucky was identified to be the only serovar circulating in the study population. Plasmid analysis of the S. Kentucky and non-serotyped isolates revealed two distinct profiles with a variation of two different sizes (2.7 and 4.8 kb). PFGE of the 30 S. Kentucky and 30 non-serotyped isolates showed that all of them were clonally related because only one genotype and three subtypes were determined based on the variation in two or three bands. This is also the first report on the presence of any specific serovar of Salmonella enterica in poultry in Bangladesh. PMID:22558269

47 CFR 1.1602 - Designation for random selection.

Science.gov (United States)

2010-10-01

... 47 Telecommunication 1 2010-10-01 2010-10-01 false Designation for random selection. 1.1602 Section 1.1602 Telecommunication FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION GENERAL PRACTICE AND PROCEDURE Random Selection Procedures for Mass Media Services General Procedures § 1.1602 Designation for random selection...

47 CFR 1.1603 - Conduct of random selection.

Science.gov (United States)

2010-10-01

... 47 Telecommunication 1 2010-10-01 2010-10-01 false Conduct of random selection. 1.1603 Section 1.1603 Telecommunication FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION GENERAL PRACTICE AND PROCEDURE Random Selection Procedures for Mass Media Services General Procedures § 1.1603 Conduct of random selection. The...

Perception of poultry farmers on duck farming in Kwara State, Nigeria

African Journals Online (AJOL)

The study assessed the perception of poultry farmers on duck farming in Kwara state, Nigeria. A random sampling technique was employed in selecting 80 poultry farmers used in the study. Analytical tools used include frequency counts, charts, mean, percentage and Pearson Product moment correlation. Results showed ...

An Examination of Tenure Security for Urban Crop Farming in Lagos ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

The study examined issues surrounding tenure security of land for urban crop farming and identified constraints that must be dealt with in order to facilitate land accessibility and productivity of urban crop farmers in the Lagos metropolis. 475 respondents of seven communities were selected through simple random sampling ...

Prevention of farm injuries in Denmark

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Rasmussen, Kurt; Carstensen, Ole; Lauritsen, Jens

2003-01-01

This study examined the effects of a 4-year randomized intervention program that combined a safety audit with safety behavior training in the prevention of farm injuries.......This study examined the effects of a 4-year randomized intervention program that combined a safety audit with safety behavior training in the prevention of farm injuries....

Selection of DC/DC converter for offshore wind farms with MVDC power collection

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Dincan, Catalin Gabriel; Kjær, Philip Carne; Chen, Yu-Hsing

2017-01-01

Four DC/DC converters are analyzed and compared with respects to availability, efficiency, ratings, repair costs and power density. Intended application is offshore wind farms with MVDC power collection. The selected topology is a new series resonant converter, which offers 99% efficiency across...

Strongyle egg shedding consistency in horses on farms using selective therapy in Denmark

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nielsen, Martin Krarup; Haaning, Niels; Olsen, Susanne Nautrup

2006-01-01

Knowledge of horses that shed the same number of strongyle eggs over time can lead to the optimization of parasite control strategies. This study evaluated shedding of strongyle eggs in 424 horses on 10 farms whan a selective anthelmintic treatment regime was used over a 3-year period....

A survey of Japanese quail (Coturnix coturnix japonica) farming in selected areas of Bangladesh.

Science.gov (United States)

Nasar, Abu; Rahman, Aminoor; Hoque, Nazmul; Kumar Talukder, Anup; Das, Ziban Chandra

2016-09-01

To investigate the status, problems and prospects of Japanese quail (Coturnix coturnix japonica) farming in selected areas of Bangladesh. The study was conducted in 14 districts of Bangladesh, viz., Dhaka, Narayanganj, Munshiganj, Mymensingh, Netrakona, Faridpur, Jessore, Khulna, Satkhira, Kushtia, Bogra, Naogaon, Comilla, and Sylhet during the period from July 2011 to June 2012. A total of 52 quail farmers were interviewed for data collection using a structured questionnaire. Focus group discussions were also carried out with unsuccessful farmers and those want to start quail farming. Workers of quail farms, quail feeds and medicine suppliers, quail eggs and meat sellers were also interviewed regarding the issue. Out of 52 farms, 86.5% were operated by male, 67.3% farmers did not receive any training and 92.3% farmers had no earlier experience of quail farming although 58.0% farmers primary occupation was quail farming. Most of the farms (63.4%) were mixed in type having ≤5000 birds of two or three varieties. About 80.7% farms were operated separately round the year with no other poultry and 83.0% farmers wanted to expand their farming. The average pullet weight 145.0±0.12, 110.0±0.07, 120.0±0.22, and 128.0±0.17 g; age at the first lay 46.0±0.04, 42.0±0.31, 42.0±0.09, and 45.2±0.05 days; rearing period 15.0±0.01, 12.0±0.14, 15.0±0.32, and 15.2±0.18 months; culling period 15.5±0.14, 13.0±0.06, 15.0±0.03, and 15.4±0.26 months were for layer, parent stock, hatchery, and mixed farms, respectively. Most of the layer farms had an average egg production of ≤5000/day and net profit BDT 0.75/egg. However, an average number of birds, hatchability and net profit per day-old-chick were ≤5000, 76.8% and BDT 2.75, respectively, in the hatchery. Broiler quails were sold at 30 days with mean weight of 110.8 g and net profit BDT 9.02/bird. The major constraints of quail farming were higher feed price, outbreak of endemic diseases, lack of proper knowledge

Paratuberculosis on small ruminant dairy farms in Ontario, Canada: A survey of management practices.

Science.gov (United States)

Bauman, Cathy A; Jones-Bitton, Andria; Menzies, Paula; Jansen, Jocelyn; Kelton, David

2016-05-01

A cross-sectional study was undertaken (October 2010 to August 2011) to determine the risk factors for dairy goat herds and dairy sheep flocks testing positive for paratuberculosis (PTB) in Ontario, Canada. A questionnaire was administered to 50 producers during a farm visit in which concurrently, 20 randomly selected, lactating animals over the age of 2 years underwent sampling for paratuberculosis testing. Only 1 of 50 farms (2.0%) was closed to animal movement, whereas 96.6% of dairy goat farms and 94.1% of sheep farms purchased livestock from other producers. Only 10.3% of dairy goat, and no dairy sheep farms used artificial insemination. Manure was spread on grazing pastures by 65.5% and 70.6% of dairy goat and dairy sheep farms, respectively. Because of the high true-prevalence of paratuberculosis infection detected, no risk factor analysis could be performed. This study demonstrates that biosecurity practices conducive to transmission of PTB are highly prevalent in Ontario small ruminant dairy farms.

Antibiotic susceptibility of Brachyspira hyodysenteriae isolates from Czech swine farms: a 10-year follow-up study

OpenAIRE

Josef Prášek; Daniel Šperling; Dana Lobová; Jiří Smola; Alois Čížek

2014-01-01

Brachyspira hyodysenteriae is the causative agent of swine dysentery. Loss of clinical efficacy of some antimicrobial agents authorized for treating swine dysentery was observed on certain Czech pig farms. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the antimicrobial sensitivity of six antibiotics using a set of 202 randomly selected B. hyodysenteriae isolates obtained from farms in the Czech Republic between years 1997 and 2006. Minimum inhibitory concentration of antibiotics tylosin, linco...

A survey of Japanese quail (Coturnix coturnix japonica farming in selected areas of Bangladesh

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Abu Nasar Md. Aminoor Rahman

2016-09-01

Full Text Available Aim: To investigate the status, problems and prospects of Japanese quail (Coturnix coturnix japonica farming in selected areas of Bangladesh. Materials and Methods: The study was conducted in 14 districts of Bangladesh, viz., Dhaka, Narayanganj, Munshiganj, Mymensingh, Netrakona, Faridpur, Jessore, Khulna, Satkhira, Kushtia, Bogra, Naogaon, Comilla, and Sylhet during the period from July 2011 to June 2012. A total of 52 quail farmers were interviewed for data collection using a structured questionnaire. Focus group discussions were also carried out with unsuccessful farmers and those want to start quail farming. Workers of quail farms, quail feeds and medicine suppliers, quail eggs and meat sellers were also interviewed regarding the issue. Results: Out of 52 farms, 86.5% were operated by male, 67.3% farmers did not receive any training and 92.3% farmers had no earlier experience of quail farming although 58.0% farmers primary occupation was quail farming. Most of the farms (63.4% were mixed in type having ≤5000 birds of two or three varieties. About 80.7% farms were operated separately round the year with no other poultry and 83.0% farmers wanted to expand their farming. The average pullet weight 14.5±0.12, 11.0±0.07, 12.0±0.22, and 12.8±0.17 g; age at the first lay 46.0±0.04, 42.0±0.31, 42.0±0.09, and 45.2±0.05 days; rearing period 15.0±0.01, 12.0±0.14, 15.0±0.32, and 15.2±0.18 months; culling period 15.5±0.14, 13.0±0.06, 15.0±0.03, and 15.4±0.26 months were for layer, parent stock, hatchery, and mixed farms, respectively. Most of the layer farms had an average egg production of ≤5000/day and net profit BDT 0.75/egg. However, an average number of birds, hatchability and net profit per day-old-chick were ≤5000, 76.8% and BDT 2.75, respectively, in the hatchery. Broiler quails were sold at 30 days with mean weight of 110.8 g and net profit BDT 9.02/bird. The major constraints of quail farming were higher feed price

Using Random Forests to Select Optimal Input Variables for Short-Term Wind Speed Forecasting Models

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hui Wang

2017-10-01

Full Text Available Achieving relatively high-accuracy short-term wind speed forecasting estimates is a precondition for the construction and grid-connected operation of wind power forecasting systems for wind farms. Currently, most research is focused on the structure of forecasting models and does not consider the selection of input variables, which can have significant impacts on forecasting performance. This paper presents an input variable selection method for wind speed forecasting models. The candidate input variables for various leading periods are selected and random forests (RF is employed to evaluate the importance of all variable as features. The feature subset with the best evaluation performance is selected as the optimal feature set. Then, kernel-based extreme learning machine is constructed to evaluate the performance of input variables selection based on RF. The results of the case study show that by removing the uncorrelated and redundant features, RF effectively extracts the most strongly correlated set of features from the candidate input variables. By finding the optimal feature combination to represent the original information, RF simplifies the structure of the wind speed forecasting model, shortens the training time required, and substantially improves the model’s accuracy and generalization ability, demonstrating that the input variables selected by RF are effective.

Prevalence of and risk factors for Listeria species on dairy farms.

Science.gov (United States)

Vilar, M J; Yus, E; Sanjuán, M L; Diéguez, F J; Rodríguez-Otero, J L

2007-11-01

This cross-sectional study determined the prevalence of Listeria spp. in bulk-tank milk on dairy farms in the region of Galicia in northwest Spain. The aim was to identify management practices associated with the presence of Listeria spp. and possible effects on milk hygienic quality. A total of 98 farms was randomly selected on the basis of an expected prevalence of 6.5% for Listeria monocytogenes from 20,107 dairy farms in the region. Bulk-tank milk samples were obtained from 98 farms, fecal samples from lactating cows from 97 farms, and silage samples from 83 farms. Listeria monocytogenes was detected in 6.1, 9.3, and 6.0% of these samples, respectively. Statistical analyses confirmed the relationship between low silage quality (as indicated by high pH) and presence of Listeria spp. in silage (29.5 vs. 6.2% for pH above or below 4.5, respectively). Only milking system [tie-stall systems (28.6%) vs. parlor milking (10%)] and inadequately controlled milking order [yes (32.0%) vs. no (10.7%)] had statistically significant effects on management practices for increasing the risk of Listeria contamination of bulk-tank milk.

Profile and Role of Woman Involvement in Dry System Pig Farming

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hartoko Hartoko

2004-01-01

Full Text Available This research was purposed to study the profile and role of woman involvement in dry system pig farming (pig housing with mattress from grass, pig manure, vegetable waste and kitchen waste.  The research was carried out from August to November 2003.  Pig housing areas were located on eight villages of Kertek District in Wonosobo Regency (Central Java.  The method applied was survey with intensive observation.  Sample were randomly selected, involved 180 respondents (15 percent of total pig farmers, while the locations of the sample were selected based on purposive sampling method.  The result showed that respondents were in productive age, with low formal education level. Most of all are Moslems (98% and they have small family size.  The level of woman involvement in pig farming was high, approximately 85 percent.  They have other income source and they involve in pig farming to help their husbands in generating income.  Experience in the dry system pig farming was quite long (more than 10 years and skill come from imitating their neighbours otherwise of autodidact. (Animal Production 6(1: 23-29 (2004   Key Words: Pig, Dry System, Woman Profile and Role

OPTIMAZION STUDY OF FARM HOUSEHOLD INCOME IN KAPUAS SUBDISTRICT, MURUNG DISTRICT

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jhon Wardie

2014-01-01

Full Text Available Study aims: (1 analyze resource allocation farm households include land, labor, and capital optimally; (2 assess resources become a limiting factor in obtaining maximum revenue; and (3 analyze effect of changes in land resource constraints, price inputs and outputs as well as rice farming technology to optimal resource allocation and maximum income for farm households. Purposive sampling to select “Palingkau Lama” and “Palingkau Baru” Village, in Kapuas District. Sampling done by simple random sampling method on 50 respondents. Research objectives assessed using linear programming analysis model with software WIN-QSB. Results: (1 farming pattern is optimal on households are (local rice + rambutan with a maximum income IDR 31,590,000 per year; (2 resources become a limiting factor in achieving maximum revenue is due to land and capital used up, while labor resource is not depleted so that not limiting factor; (3 simulation led to an increase land area increased revenue to IDR 36,857,540, and pattern of optimal farming transformed into pattern (local rice + banana + rambutan, while simulating an increase in price inputs and outputs as well as technology of rice farming by 20 percent resulting in increased revenue to IDR 36,041,270 and IDR 33,594,860 but optimal farming pattern remains unchanged.

Study of decision framework of wind farm project plan selection under intuitionistic fuzzy set and fuzzy measure environment

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Wu, Yunna; Geng, Shuai; Xu, Hu; Zhang, Haobo

2014-01-01

Highlights: • Experts’ opinions are expressed by using the intuitionistic fuzzy values. • Fuzzy measure is used to solve the dependence problem of criteria. • The compensatory problem of performance scores is reasonably processed. - Abstract: Project selection plays an important role in the entire life cycle of wind farm project and the multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) methods are very important in the whole wind farm project plan selection process. There are problems in the present MCDM methods decrease evaluation quality of the wind farm project plans: first, the information loss exists in the wind farm project plan evaluation process. Second, it is difficult to satisfy the independent assumption of the multi-criteria decision making methods used in the wind farm project plan evaluation in fact. Third, the compensatory problem of performance scores of the wind farm project plans is processed unreasonably. Hence the innovation points of this paper are as follows: first, the intuitionistic fuzzy numbers are used instead of fuzzy numbers or numerical values to reflect the experts’ intuitive preferences to decrease the probability of information loss; second, the fuzzy measure is used to rate the important degrees of criteria in order to avoid the independent assumption and to increase the reasonability; third, the partial compensatory problem of performance scores is well processed by using intuitionistic fuzzy Choquet (IFC) operator and generalized intuitionistic fuzzy ordered geometric averaging (GIFOGA) operator. These operators can deal with the compensatory performance scores and non-compensatory performance scores respectively. Finally, a case study demonstrates the effectiveness of decision framework

Technical efficiency analysis for oilseed sunflower farms: a case study in Erzurum, Turkey.

Science.gov (United States)

Külekçi, Murat

2010-07-01

The main purpose of this study was to examine the technical efficiency of farms producing sunflower in Erzurum, Turkey and to identify factors that might be causing inefficiency. Stochastic frontier analysis was used to measure technical efficiency. One hundred and seventeen randomly selected farms were interviewed for farm-level data in the 2004-2005 production period. Results revealed that the mean technical efficiency for the sunflower farms, estimated by the stochastic production frontier, is 64%. At full technical efficiency, on average, the farmers could reduce their inputs by around 56% without reducing their sunflower production, simply by improving technical efficiency. In the inefficiency model the parameter estimates showed that older farmers, higher level of farmer's education, more experienced farmers, larger farm size and higher information score resulted in lower technical inefficiency, while bigger family size and more credit usage resulted in higher technical inefficiency. This study proposes strategies such as providing better extension services and farmer-training programmes, including more educated people in sunflower farming and also expanding the sunflower-growing area through provision of adequate facilities in order to increase technical efficiency.

Optimization of Wind Farm Layout: A Refinement Method by Random Search

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Feng, Ju; Shen, Wen Zhong

2013-01-01

Wind farm layout optimization is to find the optimal positions of wind turbines inside a wind farm, so as to maximize and/or minimize a single objective or multiple objectives, while satisfying certain constraints. Most of the works in the literature divide the wind farm into cells in which turbi...

Predicting farm-level animal populations using environmental and socioeconomic variables.

Science.gov (United States)

van Andel, Mary; Jewell, Christopher; McKenzie, Joanna; Hollings, Tracey; Robinson, Andrew; Burgman, Mark; Bingham, Paul; Carpenter, Tim

2017-09-15

Accurate information on the geographic distribution of domestic animal populations helps biosecurity authorities to efficiently prepare for and rapidly eradicate exotic diseases, such as Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD). Developing and maintaining sufficiently high-quality data resources is expensive and time consuming. Statistical modelling of population density and distribution has only begun to be applied to farm animal populations, although it is commonly used in wildlife ecology. We developed zero-inflated Poisson regression models in a Bayesian framework using environmental and socioeconomic variables to predict the counts of livestock units (LSUs) and of cattle on spatially referenced farm polygons in a commercially available New Zealand farm database, Agribase. Farm-level counts of cattle and of LSUs varied considerably by region, because of the heterogeneous farming landscape in New Zealand. The amount of high quality pasture per farm was significantly associated with the presence of both cattle and LSUs. Internal model validation (predictive performance) showed that the models were able to predict the count of the animal population on groups of farms that were located in randomly selected 3km zones with a high level of accuracy. Predicting cattle or LSU counts on individual farms was less accurate. Predicted counts were statistically significantly more variable for farms that were contract grazing dry stock, such as replacement dairy heifers and dairy cattle not currently producing milk, compared with other farm types. This analysis presents a way to predict numbers of LSUs and cattle for farms using environmental and socio-economic data. The technique has the potential to be extrapolated to predicting other pastoral based livestock species. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Selectivity and sparseness in randomly connected balanced networks.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Cengiz Pehlevan

Full Text Available Neurons in sensory cortex show stimulus selectivity and sparse population response, even in cases where no strong functionally specific structure in connectivity can be detected. This raises the question whether selectivity and sparseness can be generated and maintained in randomly connected networks. We consider a recurrent network of excitatory and inhibitory spiking neurons with random connectivity, driven by random projections from an input layer of stimulus selective neurons. In this architecture, the stimulus-to-stimulus and neuron-to-neuron modulation of total synaptic input is weak compared to the mean input. Surprisingly, we show that in the balanced state the network can still support high stimulus selectivity and sparse population response. In the balanced state, strong synapses amplify the variation in synaptic input and recurrent inhibition cancels the mean. Functional specificity in connectivity emerges due to the inhomogeneity caused by the generative statistical rule used to build the network. We further elucidate the mechanism behind and evaluate the effects of model parameters on population sparseness and stimulus selectivity. Network response to mixtures of stimuli is investigated. It is shown that a balanced state with unselective inhibition can be achieved with densely connected input to inhibitory population. Balanced networks exhibit the "paradoxical" effect: an increase in excitatory drive to inhibition leads to decreased inhibitory population firing rate. We compare and contrast selectivity and sparseness generated by the balanced network to randomly connected unbalanced networks. Finally, we discuss our results in light of experiments.

Farm level evaluation of biomass energy operated seed dryer at selected sites of Bangladesh

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Rahman, S.M.M.; Bhuiyan, M.G.K.; Rahman, M.A.; Baqui, M.A.; Bala, B.K.

2006-01-01

Drying is one of the major problem in post harvest and processing of farm produce specially paddy seed in Bangladesh resulting tremendous shortage of quality seed. Evaluation through demonstrations was undertaken for the resource poor farmers at the selected sites to have practical experience of the IRRI-BRRI seed dryer. Viability of the dried paddy was more than 90% after six months of storage. The farmers were satisfied on the performance of the dryer. 68-100% farmers were motivated to hire the dyer during Boro and Aus seasons. Thus, the farm level evaluation and adoption of seed dryer will give a better alternative, aware and motivate the farmers on producing quality seed through proper drying and will contribute increased production

Testing, Selection, and Implementation of Random Number Generators

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

Collins, Joseph C

2008-01-01

An exhaustive evaluation of state-of-the-art random number generators with several well-known suites of tests provides the basis for selection of suitable random number generators for use in stochastic simulations...

An Analysis of Profitability Factors for Selected Farming Types in the Minnesota Vocational Agriculture Farm Management Education Program.

Science.gov (United States)

Kleene, Marvin

1980-01-01

A study was conducted to determine the impact profitability factors have on farm labor earnings for farms enrolled in the Minnesota Vocational Agriculture Farm Management Education Program. The most important predictors of labor earnings were size of business, gross return per cropped acre, and index return per $100 of feed fed. (LRA)

Matching breeding goals with farming systems to enhance the sustainability of fish farming

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Besson, Mathieu

2017-01-01

Fish farming is growing but is also facing challenges regarding economic viability and environmental sustainability. Selective breeding could enhance the sustainability of fish farming by changing animal performances. Thus, our aim was to develop sustainable breeding goals by using economic (EV)

Wind farms and planning

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Arkesteijn, L.; Havinga, R.; Benner, J.H.B.

1992-01-01

The siting of wind farms is becoming an increasingly important issue in the Netherlands. This paper gives an overview of the current situation concerning the planning of wind farms. We will pay attention to: Wind energy in official Dutch planning policy. To select the optimal sites, the government has made an administrative agreement with the 7 windy provinces. Nevertheless, wind energy is still fighting for a rightful position in physical planning policy. Some examples will illustrate this. Studies on siting and siting problems in the Netherlands. In order to gain more insight into aspects of wind farming several studies have been executed. In this paper special attention will be paid to the results of a study on the potential impact of large windturbine clusters on an existing agricutural area. Experiences with siting of wind farms in the Netherlands. Based on experiences with the planning and realization of farms, this paper gives the main problems. In the final part of the paper we present some general conclusions. Generally speaking, the knowledge is available for selecting optimal sites in the Netherlands. The basic problems for wind farming nowadays seem to be the visual impact and actually obtaining the ground. Nevertheless, there do seem to be enough sites for realizing the goals in the Netherlands. (au)

Solving the wind farm layout optimization problem using random search algorithm

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Feng, Ju; Shen, Wen Zhong

2015-01-01

, in which better results than the genetic algorithm (GA) and the old version of the RS algorithm are obtained. Second it is applied to the Horns Rev 1 WF, and the optimized layouts obtain a higher power production than its original layout, both for the real scenario and for two constructed scenarios......Wind farm (WF) layout optimization is to find the optimal positions of wind turbines (WTs) inside a WF, so as to maximize and/or minimize a single objective or multiple objectives, while satisfying certain constraints. In this work, a random search (RS) algorithm based on continuous formulation....... In this application, it is also found that in order to get consistent and reliable optimization results, up to 360 or more sectors for wind direction have to be used. Finally, considering the inevitable inter-annual variations in the wind conditions, the robustness of the optimized layouts against wind condition...

A drought resistance-promoting microbiome is selected by root system under desert farming.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ramona Marasco

Full Text Available BACKGROUND: Traditional agro-systems in arid areas are a bulwark for preserving soil stability and fertility, in the sight of "reverse desertification". Nevertheless, the impact of desert farming practices on the diversity and abundance of the plant associated microbiome is poorly characterized, including its functional role in supporting plant development under drought stress. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: We assessed the structure of the microbiome associated to the drought-sensitive pepper plant (Capsicum annuum L. cultivated in a traditional Egyptian farm, focusing on microbe contribution to a crucial ecosystem service, i.e. plant growth under water deficit. The root system was dissected by sampling root/soil with a different degree of association to the plant: the endosphere, the rhizosphere and the root surrounding soil that were compared to the uncultivated soil. Bacterial community structure and diversity, determined by using Denaturing Gradient Gel Electrophoresis, differed according to the microhabitat, indicating a selective pressure determined by the plant activity. Similarly, culturable bacteria genera showed different distribution in the three root system fractions. Bacillus spp. (68% of the isolates were mainly recovered from the endosphere, while rhizosphere and the root surrounding soil fractions were dominated by Klebsiella spp. (61% and 44% respectively. Most of the isolates (95% presented in vitro multiple plant growth promoting (PGP activities and stress resistance capabilities, but their distribution was different among the root system fractions analyzed, with enhanced abilities for Bacillus and the rhizobacteria strains. We show that the C. annuum rhizosphere under desert farming enriched populations of PGP bacteria capable of enhancing plant photosynthetic activity and biomass synthesis (up to 40% under drought stress. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: Crop cultivation provides critical ecosystem services in arid lands with the

Impact of preparing for OSHA local emphasis program inspections of New York dairy farms: Case studies and financial cost analysis.

Science.gov (United States)

Gadomski, Anne M; Vargha, Marybeth; Tallman, Nancy; Scribani, Melissa B; Kelsey, Timothy W

2016-03-01

OSHA inspection of dairy farms began in July 1, 2014 in New York State. As of September 2014, a total of eight farms were randomly selected for inspection. This case study addresses how dairy farm managers prepared for these inspections, and identifies farm level costs preparing for inspection and/or being inspected. Four farms that were OSHA inspected and 12 farms that were not inspected were included in this mixed method evaluation using a multimodal (telephone, email, or mail) survey. Descriptive analysis was carried out using frequencies, proportions, means, and medians. Overall, the impact of OSHA inspections was positive, leading to improved safety management and physical changes on the farm and worker trainings, although the farmers' perspectives about OSHA inspection were mixed. The cost of compliance was low relative to estimated overall production costs. Clarifications and engineering solutions for specific dairy farm hazard exposures are needed to facilitate compliance with OSHA regulations. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Effect of Farming, Social, Economical and Extension Characteristics of Rice Farmers on Land Consolidation in Sari County, Iran

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

G. Dinpanah

2011-06-01

Full Text Available The purpose of this study was to determine effect of farming, social, economical and extension characteristics of rice farmer on land consolidation. The research population consisted of 329, farmers who were selected randomly by using randomized stratified sampling method. The methodological approach of this study was causal- comparative. Validity of the instrument was established by a panel of experts consisting of senior faculty members in agricultural extension and education department, and research committee advisors. Reliability analysis was conducted by using and Cronbach alpha formula and result was found to be 0.82. The results showed that means of farmers age, rice farming experience and rice-cultivated land acreage of rice were highly effective in land. Results also showed that factors like means for farm acreage, social influence, social participation, attitude of rice farmers toward land consolidation, yield, income, cost-benefit, mass media, information sources extension courses and education levels of rice farmers were very effective on land consolidation.

Emergence of highly pathogenic porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (HP-PRRS) in medium-scale swine farms in southeastern Cambodia.

Science.gov (United States)

Tornimbene, B; Frossard, J-P; Chhim, V; Sorn, S; Guitian, J; Drew, T W

2015-01-01

Since 2006, reports from China and Viet Nam have alerted of an emergent highly pathogenic variant of porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus (HP-PRRSV) in that region. The frequent occurrence of outbreaks in these countries puts Cambodian pig farms at high risk of infection, but no study had been conducted to investigate the presence of HP-PRRS in Cambodian farms. We investigated the presence of HP-PRRS in medium-scale (semi-commercial) swine farms in the Cambodian southeastern region. Specifically, one province bordering Viet Nam (Takeo) was selected due to the concentration of most semi-commercial farms in that province. A cross-sectional study was carried out, between July and September 2010 to assess whether the prevalence of infection in these farms was indicative of recent spread of PPRSV and to identify risk factors for infection. The number of farms to be sampled was established using methods for Lot Quality Assurance Surveys (LQAS), in order to achieve a pre-established ability to discriminate between two different prevalence settings. The target population comprised all semi-commercial farms in Takeo province from which a random sample of 35 farms was selected. Selected farms were visited and questionnaires administered to gather information on farm characteristics and husbandry practices. Blood samples from individual pigs were collected in each of the study farms and tested for PRRSV, along with a number of other swine respiratory pathogens in order to investigate potential interactions. Our results showed that the virus was already present in Takeo semi-commercial pig population (LQAS herd prevalence ≥85%) at the time of sampling. The presence of sows in the farm and farm density were significantly associated (P<0.05) with the introduction and the presence of PRRS - but this was an unadjusted association as small sample size precluded multivariate analysis. Spatiotemporal description of the supposed pattern of infection revealed that the

Site selection for offshore wind farms along the Indian coast

Digital Repository Service at National Institute of Oceanography (India)

ManiMurali, R.; Vidya, P.J.; Modi, P.; JayaKumar, S.

This study deals with locating the potential sites for offshore wind farms and also deals with feasibility of installing offshore wind farms through scientific examination of the requirements along the coast of India Offshore wind energy is almost...

Farm Population of the United States: 1974. Current Population Reports, Farm Population.

Science.gov (United States)

Banks, Vera J.; And Others

Based on data derived primarily from the Current Population Survey of the Bureau of the Census, this statistical report presents demographic and labor force characteristics of the U.S. farm population and a comparison of selected characteristics of the farm and nonfarm population. Tabular data are presented as follows: (1) Population of the U.S.,…

Profitability Analysis of Selected Farms in the Batinah Region of Oman

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Slim Zekri

2007-01-01

Full Text Available The agricultural sector of Oman represents less than 2% of the total GDP and uses 88% of the fresh water. Several decision makers are questioning whether the agricultural activity in the Sultanate of Oman can be sustained and if so what type of crops should be encouraged. More than 53% of the agricultural cropped area is situated in the Batinah coastal area where farming is exclusively based on groundwater pumping. A sample of 49 market-oriented farms from the Batinah region was surveyed during 2006. Four types of farms were considered. Results showed that the most profitable farms are mixing fodder crops and vegetables with a net margin of 1,412 RO/ha/year. The less profitable farms are based on tree crops and vegetables with a net margin of 847 RO/ha/year. For vegetables the most profitable crop is tomato with an average net margin of 2,580 RO/ha/year with a standard deviation of 2,043 RO/ha/year and the least profitable crop is cabbage with 113 RO/ha/ year with a standard deviation of 182 RO/ha/year. The net margin of crops grown under drip irrigation is higher than that for crops under furrow irrigation, with a difference of 548 RO/ha/year. Farms equipped with such modern irrigation systems tend to irrigate almost the same area in winter as in summer, while farms under furrow irrigation crop less than one percent of their cropped area during summer compared to winter. Consequently and contrary to expectations, modern irrigation systems tend to increase, rather than reduce, groundwater pumping given the financial incentives for farmers to grow summer vegetables instead of only winter vegetables. Even so, the net water use efficiency is greater for vegetable production under drip irrigation than it is for fodder production. The figures show that, on average, farming in the Batinah is financially profitable for the types of farm considered in this study. However, profitability varies widely between different farms and crops. The reasons for

A COPRAS-F base multi-criteria group decision making approach for site selection of wind farm

OpenAIRE

Nikhil Chandra Chatterjee; Goutam Kumar Bose

2013-01-01

Today global warming is on the rise and the natural resources are getting consumed at a faster rate. Power consumption has increased many folds to cater the human need. Thus renewable energy resources are the only option available at this juncture. Wind energy is one of the renewable energy. Location selection for wind farm takes an important role on power generation. However, the location selection is a complex multicriteria problem due to the criteria factors which are conflicting in nature...

WHAT ARE THE BARRIERS TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF ORGANIC FARMING?

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Afagh VEISI

2013-10-01

Full Text Available The main purpose of this study was to investigate the main barriers to development of organic farming system in Kermanshah Province, Iran. Statistical population in this study consisted of all farmers in Kermanshah province, Iran. Applying stratified random sampling method, 137 farmers were selected as a sample. The main instrument in this study was questionnaire which its validity was confirmed by the panel of experts and its reliability was established by Cronbach's Alpha coefficient. Data was analyzed by SPSSWin16 software. Principal component analysis was used as main statistical technique to analyze the data. The results of factor analysis revealed that 4 factors including “Infrastructural”, “technical-managerial”, “economic-financial” and “educational” explained 42.36 percent of the variance. Results of this study have applications for agriculture development policy- makers for development of organic farming in Iran.

Application of random effects to the study of resource selection by animals.

Science.gov (United States)

Gillies, Cameron S; Hebblewhite, Mark; Nielsen, Scott E; Krawchuk, Meg A; Aldridge, Cameron L; Frair, Jacqueline L; Saher, D Joanne; Stevens, Cameron E; Jerde, Christopher L

2006-07-01

1. Resource selection estimated by logistic regression is used increasingly in studies to identify critical resources for animal populations and to predict species occurrence. 2. Most frequently, individual animals are monitored and pooled to estimate population-level effects without regard to group or individual-level variation. Pooling assumes that both observations and their errors are independent, and resource selection is constant given individual variation in resource availability. 3. Although researchers have identified ways to minimize autocorrelation, variation between individuals caused by differences in selection or available resources, including functional responses in resource selection, have not been well addressed. 4. Here we review random-effects models and their application to resource selection modelling to overcome these common limitations. We present a simple case study of an analysis of resource selection by grizzly bears in the foothills of the Canadian Rocky Mountains with and without random effects. 5. Both categorical and continuous variables in the grizzly bear model differed in interpretation, both in statistical significance and coefficient sign, depending on how a random effect was included. We used a simulation approach to clarify the application of random effects under three common situations for telemetry studies: (a) discrepancies in sample sizes among individuals; (b) differences among individuals in selection where availability is constant; and (c) differences in availability with and without a functional response in resource selection. 6. We found that random intercepts accounted for unbalanced sample designs, and models with random intercepts and coefficients improved model fit given the variation in selection among individuals and functional responses in selection. Our empirical example and simulations demonstrate how including random effects in resource selection models can aid interpretation and address difficult assumptions

Local randomization in neighbor selection improves PRM roadmap quality

KAUST Repository

McMahon, Troy; Jacobs, Sam; Boyd, Bryan; Tapia, Lydia; Amato, Nancy M.

2012-01-01

Probabilistic Roadmap Methods (PRMs) are one of the most used classes of motion planning methods. These sampling-based methods generate robot configurations (nodes) and then connect them to form a graph (roadmap) containing representative feasible pathways. A key step in PRM roadmap construction involves identifying a set of candidate neighbors for each node. Traditionally, these candidates are chosen to be the k-closest nodes based on a given distance metric. In this paper, we propose a new neighbor selection policy called LocalRand(k,K'), that first computes the K' closest nodes to a specified node and then selects k of those nodes at random. Intuitively, LocalRand attempts to benefit from random sampling while maintaining the higher levels of local planner success inherent to selecting more local neighbors. We provide a methodology for selecting the parameters k and K'. We perform an experimental comparison which shows that for both rigid and articulated robots, LocalRand results in roadmaps that are better connected than the traditional k-closest policy or a purely random neighbor selection policy. The cost required to achieve these results is shown to be comparable to k-closest. © 2012 IEEE.

Local randomization in neighbor selection improves PRM roadmap quality

KAUST Repository

McMahon, Troy

2012-10-01

Probabilistic Roadmap Methods (PRMs) are one of the most used classes of motion planning methods. These sampling-based methods generate robot configurations (nodes) and then connect them to form a graph (roadmap) containing representative feasible pathways. A key step in PRM roadmap construction involves identifying a set of candidate neighbors for each node. Traditionally, these candidates are chosen to be the k-closest nodes based on a given distance metric. In this paper, we propose a new neighbor selection policy called LocalRand(k,K\\'), that first computes the K\\' closest nodes to a specified node and then selects k of those nodes at random. Intuitively, LocalRand attempts to benefit from random sampling while maintaining the higher levels of local planner success inherent to selecting more local neighbors. We provide a methodology for selecting the parameters k and K\\'. We perform an experimental comparison which shows that for both rigid and articulated robots, LocalRand results in roadmaps that are better connected than the traditional k-closest policy or a purely random neighbor selection policy. The cost required to achieve these results is shown to be comparable to k-closest. © 2012 IEEE.

Externalities in utility resource selection: A means to formally recognize the envionmental benefits of wind farms

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Birner, S.

1992-01-01

Wind can only make its full contribution to the minimization of the total cost of energy services if it is valued for all the costs that it avoids, including avoided environmental costs. Means of incorporating environmental costs, or externalities, into utility planning decisions are described. Externalities are defined as uncompensated costs or benefits of an action borne by a party other than the one causing the costs. A simple example of the use of externalities in utility resource selection is presented, comparing costs of a coal-fired power plant and a wind farm. Externalities of wind farms are analyzed and found to be very low. An examination of some aspects of legislation in the USA and Canada shows a trend for utility commissions and other regulatory bodies to determine that including externalitites lies within their mandate. By formally recognizing and accounting for the environmental benefits of wind farms, it is seen that externalities can have a significant effect on utility demand for wind energy. A review of USA state actions regarding externalities is appended. 10 refs

Farm-made aquafeeds

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

New, Michael B; Tacon, Albert G. J; Csavas, I

1995-01-01

.... Five other working papers are on economics, the selection of equipment, feed ingredients, formulation and on-farm management and supplementary feeding in semi-intensive aquaculture, all directed...

Dairy production in some selected integrated farms in Sokoto State ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

A survey of eight integrated farms in four local government areas of Sokoto state in north-western Nigeria revealed the following about dairy production on such farms:breed of cattle kept, Sokoto Gudali, Friesian, and Sahiwal; average dairy herd size,69.4 head; husbandry system was largely semi-intensive; milking was ...

Optimization of Wind Farm Layout in Complex Terrain

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Xu, Chang; Yang, Jianchuan; Li, Chenqi

2013-01-01

Microscopic site selection for wind farms in complex terrain is a technological difficulty in the development of onshore wind farms. This paper presented a method for optimizing wind farm layout in complex terrain. This method employed Lissaman and Jensen wake models, took wind velocity distribut......Microscopic site selection for wind farms in complex terrain is a technological difficulty in the development of onshore wind farms. This paper presented a method for optimizing wind farm layout in complex terrain. This method employed Lissaman and Jensen wake models, took wind velocity...... are subject to boundary conditions and minimum distance conditions. The improved genetic algorithm (GA) for real number coding was used to search the optimal result. Then the optimized result was compared to the result from the experienced layout method. Results show the advantages of the present method...

Adoption of On-farm and Post-harvest Rice Quality Enhancing Technologies in Nigeria

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Tiamiyu, SA.

2014-01-01

Full Text Available This paper examines the rate and determinants of adoption of improved rice quality enhancing technologies among a randomly selected sample of 150 farmers and 18 rice processors from six rice producing areas of Niger State. Data were collected through interview schedule using questionnaires. Descriptive statistics and regression model were adopted to analyze data. Results show that adoption of quality enhancing technologies was low among the selected sample of these rice value chain actors. The adoption indices of on-farm and post-harvest quality enhancing practices were 0.46 and 0.37 respectively. Some socioeconomic attributes including: Age, level of education, contact with extension, access to credit and level of commercialization were statistically significant determining factors (P≤0.05 influencing adoption at farm level, while post-harvest technology adoption was determined by level of education, access to credit and membership of cooperatives. Promotion of quality enhanced technologies among these actors in the rice value chain is recommended.

Logistic Regression Analysis on Factors Affecting Adoption of Rice-Fish Farming in North Iran

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Seyyed Ali NOORHOSSEINI-NIYAKI

2012-06-01

Full Text Available We evaluated the factors influencing the adoption of rice-fish farming in the Tavalesh region near the Caspian Sea in northern Iran. We conducted a survey with open-ended questions. Data were collected from 184 respondents (61 adopters and 123 non-adopters randomly sampled from selected villages and analyzed using logistic regression and multi-response analysis. Family size, number of contacts with an extension agent, participation in extension-education activities, membership in social institutions and the presence of farm workers were the most important socio-economic factors for the adoption of rice-fish farming system. In addition, economic problems were the most common issue reported by adopters. Other issues such as lack of access to appropriate fish food, losses of fish, lack of access to high quality fish fingerlings and dehydration and poor water quality were also important to a number of farmers.

A survey for selected avian viral pathogens in backyard chicken farms in Finland.

Science.gov (United States)

Pohjola, L; Tammiranta, N; Ek-Kommonen, C; Soveri, T; Hänninen, M L; Fredriksson Ahomaa, M; Huovilainen, A

2017-04-01

Backyard poultry are regaining popularity in Europe and increased interest in the health and management of non-commercial farms has resulted. Furthermore, commercial poultry farm owners have become concerned about the risk represented by contagious avian diseases that nearby backyard poultry could transmit. Fifty-one voluntary backyard chicken farms were visited between October 2012 and January 2013. Blood samples and individual cloacal swabs were collected from 457 chickens. In 44 farms (86%), one or more of the tested chickens had antibodies against avian encephalomyelitis and chicken infectious anaemia viruses, 24 farms (47%) had chickens seropositive for infectious bronchitis virus, 10 farms (20%) had chickens seropositive for infectious bursal disease virus, six farms (12%) had chickens seropositive for infectious laryngotracheitis virus and two farms (5.4%) had chickens seropositive for avian influenza virus. No farms had chickens seropositive for Newcastle disease virus. Of the 51 farms, five (10%) had chickens positive for coronavirus reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction. A phylogenetic analysis showed that all backyard chicken coronaviruses collected were QX type infectious bronchitis viruses. All chickens tested for avian influenza and Newcastle disease viruses using real time reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction were negative. To our knowledge, there is no evidence to date to suggest that these diseases would have been transmitted between commercial and non-commercial flocks.

Anaerobic digester systems (ADS) for multiple dairy farms: A GIS analysis for optimal site selection

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Thompson, Ethan; Wang, Qingbin; Li, Minghao

2013-01-01

While anaerobic digester systems (ADS) have been increasingly adopted by large dairy farms to generate marketable energy products, like electricity, from animal manure, there is a growing need for assessing the feasibility of regional ADS for multiple farms that are not large enough to capitalize their own ADS. Using geographical information system (GIS) software, this study first identifies potential sites in a dairy region in Vermont, based on geographical conditions, current land use types, and energy distribution infrastructure criteria, and then selects the optimal sites for a given number of ADS, based on the number of dairy farms to be served, the primary energy input to output (PEIO) ratio of ADS, and the existing transportation network. This study suggests that GIS software is a valid technical tool for identifying the potential and optimal sites for ADS. The empirical findings provide useful information for assessing the returns of alternative numbers of ADS in this region, and the research procedures can be modified easily to incorporate any changes in the criteria for this region and can be applied in other regions with different conditions and criteria. - Highlights: • This study examines the feasibility of regional ADS for multiple dairy farms. • GIS is used to identify candidate sites and optimal locations for ADS in a dairy region. • Model includes environmental, social, infrastructure, and energy return criteria. • Empirical analysis provides scenario results on 1–15 ADS in the study region. • Method could be applied to other regions with different conditions and criteria

Sustainable Farming Systems in the Sub-Sahelian Zone of Burkina Faso - Key Factors Sustainable Farming Systems in the Sub-Sahelian Zone of Burkina Faso - Key Factors

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

E. - Hien

2010-12-01

Full Text Available Rapid population growth and climatic change threatens the sustainability of natural resources. Farming practices can mitigate environmental change and degradation. The aim of this research conducted in Yatenga region was to describe and to analyse manure practices management. In 2005, a survey was carried out to assess the evolution of farming practices. A survey was initially conducted with a sample of 44 farmers, selected randomly in the three neighbouring villages. Subsequently, 18 farms were selected for in-depth interviews. The grain yield was measured and the different practices of soil and water conservation developed by farmers were compared. According to the enquiries, two practices, called “zaï” and “djengo”, were largely used in cereals production. The “zaï” practice, known as a traditional technique for restoration of degraded soil, is characterized by the capture of runoff by micro-watersheds and a localized organic matter supply at the soil-plant system scale. The “djengo” practice is based on the same principle of the “zaï” practice but was applied on the sandy soil as traditionally “zaï” concerned the degraded and crusty soils. The two practices could increase grain crop production but moreover could limit the risk of crops failure. In addition, our observations also showed that frequent tree regenerations occurred in plots and watersheds where “zaï” or “djengo” practices were used. This study highlights the necessity of better controlling soil, water and organic matter to improve agrosystem sustainability in sub Saharan Africa.Rapid population growth and climatic change threatens the sustainability of natural resources. Farming practices can mitigate environmental change and degradation. The aim of this research conducted in Yatenga region was to describe and to analyse manure practices management. In 2005, a survey was carried out to assess the evolution of farming practices. A survey was

Microclimatic temperatures at Danish cattle farms, 2000-2016: quantifying the temporal and spatial variation in the transmission potential of Schmallenberg virus.

Science.gov (United States)

Haider, Najmul; Cuellar, Ana Carolina; Kjær, Lene Jung; Sørensen, Jens Havskov; Bødker, Rene

2018-03-05

Microclimatic temperatures provide better estimates of vector-borne disease transmission parameters than standard meteorological temperatures, as the microclimate represent the actual temperatures to which the vectors are exposed. The objectives of this study were to quantify farm-level geographic variations and temporal patterns in the extrinsic incubation period (EIP) of Schmallenberg virus transmitted by Culicoides in Denmark through generation of microclimatic temperatures surrounding all Danish cattle farms. We calculated the hourly microclimatic temperatures at potential vector-resting sites within a 500 m radius of 22,004 Danish cattle farms for the months April to November from 2000 to 2016. We then modeled the daily EIP of Schmallenberg virus at each farm, assuming vectors choose resting sites either randomly or based on temperatures (warmest or coolest available) every hour. The results of the model output are presented as 17-year averages. The difference between the warmest and coolest microhabitats at the same farm was on average 3.7 °C (5th and 95th percentiles: 1.0 °C to 7.8 °C). The mean EIP of Schmallenberg virus (5th and 95th percentiles) for all cattle farms during spring, summer, and autumn was: 23 (18-33), 14 (12-18) and 51 (48-55) days, respectively, assuming Culicoides select resting sites randomly. These estimated EIP values were considerably shorter than those estimated using standard meteorological temperatures obtained from a numerical weather prediction model for the same periods: 43 (39-52), 21 (17-24) and 57 (55-58) days, respectively. When assuming that vectors actively select the coolest resting sites at a farm, the EIP was 2.3 (range: 1.1 to 4.1) times longer compared to that of the warmest sites at the same farm. We estimated a wide range of EIP in different microclimatic habitats surrounding Danish cattle farms, stressing the importance of identifying the specific resting sites of vectors when modeling vector-borne disease

Organic farming benefits local plant diversity in vineyard farms located in intensive agricultural landscapes.

Science.gov (United States)

Nascimbene, Juri; Marini, Lorenzo; Paoletti, Maurizio G

2012-05-01

The majority of research on organic farming has considered arable and grassland farming systems in Central and Northern Europe, whilst only a few studies have been carried out in Mediterranean agro-systems, such as vineyards, despite their economic importance. The main aim of the study was to test whether organic farming enhances local plant species richness in both crop and non-crop areas of vineyard farms located in intensive conventional landscapes. Nine conventional and nine organic farms were selected in an intensively cultivated region (i.e. no gradient in landscape composition) in northern Italy. In each farm, vascular plants were sampled in one vineyard and in two non-crop linear habitats, grass strips and hedgerows, adjacent to vineyards and therefore potentially influenced by farming. We used linear mixed models to test the effect of farming, and species longevity (annual vs. perennial) separately for the three habitat types. In our intensive agricultural landscapes organic farming promoted local plant species richness in vineyard fields, and grassland strips while we found no effect for linear hedgerows. Differences in species richness were not associated to differences in species composition, indicating that similar plant communities were hosted in vineyard farms independently of the management type. This negative effect of conventional farming was probably due to the use of herbicides, while mechanical operations and mowing regime did not differ between organic and conventional farms. In grassland strips, and only marginally in vineyards, we found that the positive effect of organic farming was more pronounced for perennial than annual species.

Seroprevalence of Toxoplasma gondii in Danish farmed mink (Mustela vison S.)

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Henriksen, P; Dietz, H. H.; Uttenthal, Åse

1994-01-01

One hundred and ninety-five mink sera randomly selected from 17 Danish mink farms were evaluated for the presence of Toxoplasma gondii antibodies in the latex agglutination test. Six (3%) sera contained T. gondii antibodies in titres of 1:64 or more. The estimated 3% prevalence means that 300 000...... mink out of a total mink population of ten million might be infected with Toxoplasma gondii. This large number of possible sero-positive mink in Denmark indicates that there exists a potential risk of acquiring toxoplasmosis by pelting mink....

The selective treatment of clinical mastitis based on on-farm culture results: II. Effects on lactation performance, including clinical mastitis recurrence, somatic cell count, milk production, and cow survival.

Science.gov (United States)

Lago, A; Godden, S M; Bey, R; Ruegg, P L; Leslie, K

2011-09-01

The objective of this multi-state, multi-herd clinical trial was to report on the efficacy of using an on-farm culture system to guide strategic treatment decisions in cows with clinical mastitis. The study was conducted in 8 commercial dairy farms ranging in size from 144 to 1,795 cows from Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Ontario, Canada. A total of 422 cows affected with mild or moderate clinical mastitis in 449 quarters were randomly assigned to either (1) a positive-control treatment program or (2) an on-farm culture-based treatment program. Quarter cases assigned to the positive-control group received immediate on-label intramammary treatment with cephapirin sodium. Quarters assigned to the culture-based treatment program were not treated until the results of on-farm culture were determined after 18 to 24h of incubation. Quarters in the culture-based treatment program that had gram-positive growth or a mixed infection were treated according to label instruction using intramammary cephapirin sodium. Quarters assigned to the culture-based treatment program that had gram-negative or no-growth did not receive intramammary therapy. It was already reported in a companion paper that the selective treatment of clinical mastitis based on on-farm culture results decreases antibiotic use by half and tends to decrease milk withholding time without affecting short-term clinical and bacteriological outcomes. The present article reports on long-term outcomes of the aforementioned study. No statistically significant differences existed between cases assigned to the positive-control program and cases assigned to the culture-based treatment program in risk and days for recurrence of clinical mastitis in the same quarter (35% and 78 d vs. 43% and 82 d), linear somatic cell count (4.2 vs. 4.4), daily milk production (30.0 vs. 30.7 kg), and risk and days for culling or death events (28% and 160 d vs. 32% and 137 d) for the rest of the lactation after enrollment of the clinical mastitis

IMPACT OF THE EU FUNDS SUPPORTING FARM MODERNISATION ON THE CHANGES OF THE ASSETS IN POLISH FARMS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Wawrzyniec Czubak

2014-06-01

Full Text Available The paper focuses on the analysis of the changes in the production potential of Polish farms after implementing CAP mechanisms (2004-2011. Two criteria were used to share the farms: investment activity and economic size. Only those farms were selected, which continuously conducted the agricultural accounting FADN system in 2004--2011. Based on the analysis it was found that in the base period, farms making the most complex investments (supported by EU funds or financed on the basin of own financial resources, had greater production potential – in the matter of area and volume of assets. The investment activities contributed to the increase in disparities between groups of farms. Especially the non-investment farms were able to preserve the area of agricultural land, but the value of their assets was significantly reduced.

Relationship of dietary factors with dialyzable iron and in vitro iron bioavailability in the meals of farm women

OpenAIRE

Singh, Anamika; Bains, Kiran; Kaur, Hapreet

2016-01-01

Sixty rural women with age varying between 25 and 35 were selected randomly to determine the role of dietary factors on bioavailability of iron in their diets. Food samples of selected subjects were collected for three major meals i.e. breakfast, lunch and dinner for three consecutive days. The samples were analyzed for meal constituents associated with iron absorption as well as for total and dialyzable iron. Based on dietary characteristics, the diets of the farm women were in the class of ...

Coordinated control strategy for hybrid wind farms with DFIG-based and PMSG-based wind farms during network unbalance

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Yao, Jun; Liu, Ruikuo; Zhou, Te

2017-01-01

This paper investigates the coordinated control strategy for a hybrid wind farm with doubly fed induction generator (DFIG)-based and direct-driven permanent-magnet synchronous generator (PMSG)-based wind farms during network unbalance. The negative-sequence current output capabilities of DFIG...... to the controllable operating regions, a targets selection scheme for each control unit is proposed to improve the stability of the hybrid wind farms containing both DFIG-based and PMSG-based wind farms during network unbalance, especially to avoid DFIG-based wind farm tripping from connected power grid under severe...... grid voltage unbalance conditions. Finally, the proposed coordinated control strategy is validated by the simulation results of a 30-MW-DFIG-based wind farm and a 30-MW-PMSG-based wind farm under different operation conditions and experimental results on a laboratory-scale experimental rig under severe...

Breeding for behavioural change in farm animails

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sandøe, Peter; D'eath, RB; Lawrence, AB

2009-01-01

In farm animal breeding, behavioural traits are rarely included in selection programmes despite their potential to improve animal production and welfare. Breeding goals have been broadened beyond production traits in most farm animal species to include health and functional traits...

Breeding for behavioural change in farm animals

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

D'Eath, R.B.; Conington, J.; Lawrence, A.B.

2010-01-01

In farm animal breeding, behavioural traits are rarely included in selection programmes despite their potential to improve animal production and welfare. Breeding goals have been broadened beyond production traits in most farm animal species to include health and functional traits...

Analyzing the Determinants of Non-farm Income Diversification of Farm Households in Peshawar District of Pakistan

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kanwal Nazish

2016-06-01

Full Text Available The agricultural sector in Pakistan is not well-established to provide full employment opportunities and sufficient income for needed living standard to the rural population. Stagnant agricultural productivity and low returns in farming have led rural residents to look for alternative livelihoods, especially non-farm employment. With this background, the present study is an endeavor to empirically determine the factors of non-farm income diversification of rural farm households in Peshawar district of Pakistan. The study was undertaken in four villages and data was amassed from 196 small farming households by using the multi-stage sampling technique. The data were analyzed using the descriptive statistical measures, the mean of income shares approach and the ordinary least squares regression analysis. The results indicate that in all the selected villages, the pattern of non-farm employment was more or less the same; however, the income from non-farm employment activities had an important contribution towards incrementing the absolute income of farm households. Non-farm income diversification is hence crucial for sustaining livelihoods and an integral dimension for invigorating rural economies. Therefore, the study recommends the promotion of non-farm employment as a good strategy for supplementing the income of small farmers without shifting attention from agriculture.

Occurrence of ESBL-Producing Escherichia coli in Livestock and Farm Workers in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Germany.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Carmen Dahms

Full Text Available In recent years, extended-spectrum β-lactamases (ESBL producing bacteria have been found in livestock, mainly as asymptomatic colonizers. The zoonotic risk for people working in close contact to animal husbandry has still not been completely assessed. Therefore, we investigated the prevalence of ESBL-producing Escherichia spp. in livestock animals and workers to determine the potential risk for an animal-human cross-transmission.In Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, northeast Germany, inguinal swabs of 73 individuals with livestock contact from 23 different farms were tested for ESBL-producing Escherichia spp. Two pooled fecal samples per farm of animal origin from 34 different farms (17 pig farms, 11 cattle farms, 6 poultry farms as well as cloacal swabs of 10 randomly selected broilers or turkeys were taken at each poultry farm. For identification, selective chromogenic agar was used after an enrichment step. Phenotypically ESBL-producing isolates (n = 99 were tested for CTX-M, OXA, SHV and TEM using PCR, and isolates were further characterized using multilocus sequence typing (MLST. In total, 61 diverse isolates from different sources and/or different MLST/PCR results were acquired. Five farm workers (three from cattle farms and two from pig farms harbored ESBL-producing E. coli. All human isolates harbored the CTX-M β-lactamase; TEM and OXA β-lactamases were additionally detected in two, resp. one, isolates. ESBL-producing Escherichia spp. were found in fecal samples at pig (15/17, cattle (6/11 and poultry farms (3/6. In total, 70.6% (24/36 of the tested farms were ESBL positive. Furthermore, 9 out of 60 cloacal swabs turned out to be ESBL positive. All isolated ESBL-producing bacteria from animal sources were E. coli, except for one E. hermanii isolate. CTX-M was the most prevalent β-lactamase at cattle and pig farms, while SHV predominated in poultry. One human isolate shared an identical MLST sequence type (ST 3891 and CTX-M allele to the

Offshore wind farm repowering optimization

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hou, Peng; Enevoldsen, Peter; Hu, Weihao

2017-01-01

is focused on optimization of offshore wind farm repowering, which is one option for the wind farm owner at end of life for the offshore wind farm. The LCoE is used as the evaluation index to identify whether it is economical to invest in such a way. In an optimized repowering strategy, different types...... of wind turbines are selected to replace the original wind turbines to reconstruct the wind farm, which is demonstrated to be better than the refurbishment approach which replaces the old wind turbines with the same type. The simulations performed in this research reveal that the reconstructed wind farm......, which consists of multiple types of wind turbine, has a smaller LCoE (10.43%) than the refurbishment approach, which shows the superiority of the proposed method. This research contributes an optimization tool to the wind industry, which consequently drives down the cost of energy produced by offshore...

Random regression analysis for body weights and main morphological traits in genetically improved farmed tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus).

Science.gov (United States)

He, Jie; Zhao, Yunfeng; Zhao, Jingli; Gao, Jin; Xu, Pao; Yang, Runqing

2018-02-01

To genetically analyse growth traits in genetically improved farmed tilapia (GIFT), the body weight (BWE) and main morphological traits, including body length (BL), body depth (BD), body width (BWI), head length (HL) and length of the caudal peduncle (CPL), were measured six times in growth duration on 1451 fish from 45 mixed families of full and half sibs. A random regression model (RRM) was used to model genetic changes of the growth traits with days of age and estimate the heritability for any growth point and genetic correlations between pairwise growth points. Using the covariance function based on optimal RRMs, the heritabilities were estimated to be from 0.102 to 0.662 for BWE, 0.157 to 0.591 for BL, 0.047 to 0.621 for BD, 0.018 to 0.577 for BWI, 0.075 to 0.597 for HL and 0.032 to 0.610 for CPL between 60 and 140 days of age. All genetic correlations exceeded 0.5 between pairwise growth points. Moreover, the traits at initial days of age showed less correlation with those at later days of age. With phenotypes observed repeatedly, the model choice showed that the optimal RRMs could more precisely predict breeding values at a specific growth time than repeatability models or multiple trait animal models, which enhanced the efficiency of selection for the BWE and main morphological traits.

Critical parameters for maize yield under irrigation farming in the ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

This study examines the critical variables that determine maize yield under irrigation farming in the savanna ecological zone of Kwara State. Seventy-five soil samples were randomly collected from irrigation farm of Oke-Oyi irrigation project of the Lower Niger River Basin Development Authority Ilorin and bulked into 15 ...

Monitoring of selected essential elements and contaminants at sheep and cow farms in Eastern Slovakia

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Martina TUNEGOVÁ

2016-12-01

Full Text Available The aim of this study was to determinate the actual contamination of selected area of Slovakia, in view of its environmental character referred both to the suitability or unsuitability of the use of milk from this area, to other food processing. This article deals with analysis of the content of selected compounds in soil, feed and milk, at the cow and sheep farms. Village in Eastern Slovakia, Tulčík, was the area of investigation. This area is characterized as an area with mild disturbance of environment. 11 compounds have been analyzed (calcium, selenium, cadmium, arsenic, polychlorinated biphenyls – congeners 138, 153, 180, and pesticides - p,p´ DDE, Endosulfan I., Beta-HCH, aflatoxin M1. Samples of soil were collected once a year (spring season, samples of feeds and milk were collected two-times a year (spring and autumn season. Analysis of samples was performed in Eurofins Bel/Novamann (Nové Zámky, Slovak Republic. Analyses were performed by routine methods, according to the valid methodologies. Levels of compounds were obtained and then results have been compared with the most acceptable limits in according to applicable legislation. At both farms, 73.08% (38 samples of analyzed compounds were below the limit of quantification (LOQ and 26.92% (14 samples of compounds were quantifiable. The most significant differences between monitored farms were recorded in soil (27 720 mg·kg-1 Ca, feed (27 620 mg·kg-1 Ca and milk (960 mg·kg-1 Ca. The high content of calcium in soil and feed did not affect the content of calcium in milk. The results showed that the content of toxic elements, polychorinated biphenyls, pesticides and aflatoxin M1 in analyzed area of Eastern Slovakia was very low and under the limit of quantification. It can be concluded, that the use of milk from this area for direct use or for dairy products is appropriate and poses no health risk to the consumers.

Pre-feasibility study of 80mw onshore wind farm

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Almas, M.S.

2014-01-01

This paper discusses a pre-feasibility study of 80MW onshore wind farm in the KPK (Khyber Pakhtunkhwa) province previously known as NWFP (North West Frontier) Province of Pakistan. The realistic data of wind speed is collected from Laboratory of Meteorology and Climatology (University of the Punjab) to study the feasibility of wind farm. Detailed analysis of wind turbines from four different manufacturers is carried out together with justifications of selecting a particular wind turbine. Issues related to site selection, wind farm civil foundation, recommendations for a particular choice of tower along with environmental effects are presented. Wind data analysis is carried out by using WINDROSE PRO software to determine the resultant direction of wind at the selected site for wind farm layout. The wind distribution at hub height of the wind turbine is calculated and is used to compute annual power production by the wind farm using power curves of the wind turbine. Electrical network integration issues of wind farm to the external grid are studied and the optimum point of connection is proposed. Finally, economic analysis of the whole wind farm project depending upon the LCC (Life Cycle Cost Analysis) is presented and the feasibility of the project from the investor's point of view is identified. The study concludes that the cost per kilowatt hour of electricity generated by this wind power plant will be 10.4 PKR/kWh and the payback period for the whole project is about 11.2 years. (author)

Quantification of landscape multifunctionality based on farm functionality indices

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Andersen, Peter Stubkjær; Vejre, Henrik; Dalgaard, Tommy

2011-01-01

) wildlife habitats, and (4) recreation. At farm level each of these functions is defined by data on a number of farmers’ activities as well as farm characteristics which can be harvested by a selection of the interview questions. The selected interview questions are attached as indicators to the relevant...... present a bottom-up method in which landscape multifunctionality is quantified by using functional indices developed from farm questionaire data. The interview survey comprised 382 farms in a rural area of Denmark. The functional classes included in the method are: (1) production, (2) residence, (3...... function. A score spectrum is assigned to each indicator to enable a representation of its relative contribution to the function on each farm depending on the question responses from the interviewees. The values for each indicator are weighted in relation to each of the others and all the values are summed...

Risk and profitability of animal and crop production in Slovak farms

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Marián Tóth

2017-10-01

Full Text Available The paper focuses on profitability and risk of crop and animal production based on an analysis of farms operating in Slovak Republic. The individual farm data used for the analysis are from the database of Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development of the Slovak Republic. For our analysis, data were selected according to the farm production orientation to the subset of crop farms and animal farms. The selecting criterion for production orientation was the percentage share of revenues from crop production, or revenues from animal production from the overall revenues from own products and services. We analyse profitability of farms divided into groups based on the type of production into crop and animal farms (according to the share in sales from crop or animal production. Using descriptive statistics and portfolio theory we simulate the total farm profitability and volatility of animal and crop production in Slovakia. The modified Markowitz portfolio theory approach was used to estimate the total risk of portfolios of crop and animal farms. Based on the results we conclude that in the long run crop farms are profitable and profit from crop production is used to cover the losses from animal production in mixed farms. Farms focused on animal production only are efficient and profitable, but the profitability is lower in comparison with crop farms. Animal farms results are less volatile than crop farms. Large farms tend to production with lower value added and can generate enough profit for the owner.

Determinants of Income Inequality among Korean Farm Households

OpenAIRE

Arayama, Yuko; Kim, Jong Moo; Kimhi, Ayal

2006-01-01

We extend the existing regression-based inequality decomposition methods to account for different income sources and different income regimes, and adequately correct for selectivity into the different income regimes. We apply these extensions to data on Korean farm households, and find that they lead to different and more informative conclusions. We also find that the correction for selectivity is essential. In particular, our results show that much of the inequality in farm household income ...

Depletion of selected polychlorodibenzodioxins and polychlorodibenzofurans in farmed trout exposed to contaminated feeds

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Brambilla, G.; Dellatte, E.; Fochi, I.; Iacovella, N.; Domenico, A. di [Dept. Food Safety and Animal Health, Ist. Superiore di Sanita, Rome (Italy)]|[Dept. Environment and Primary Health Care, Ist. Superiore di Sanita, Rome (Italy)

2004-09-15

Farmed fish can bioaccumulate persistent toxic substances when fed on animal-based fat feeds. This fact has recently prompted a re-evaluation of the overall toxicological risk associated with contamination levels recorded in farmed vs. wild salmons. The bioaccumulation of polychlorinated dibenzodioxins (PCDDs) and dibenzofurans (PCDFs) in farmed trout has recently been described nevertheless, poor information is available about their depletion under controlled conditions. In this paper, the results of a 90-day depletion study in groups of trout exposed to three different levels of feed contamination for 30 days are reported. As a follow-up of a PCB depletion study the present paper aims at giving indications for risk management in fish farming practices, to prevent an unacceptable contamination of the produce intended for human consumption.

Pre-Feasibility Study of 80MW Onshore Wind Farm

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Muhammad Shoaib Almas

2014-10-01

Full Text Available This paper discusses a pre-feasibility study of 80MW onshore wind farm in the KPK (Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province previously known as NWFP (North West Frontier Province of Pakistan. The realistic data of wind speed is collected from Laboratory of Meteorology & Climatology (University of the Punjab to study the feasibility of wind farm. Detailed analysis of wind turbines from four different manufacturers is carried out together with justifications of selecting a particular wind turbine. Issues related to site selection, wind farm civil foundation, recommendations for a particular choice of tower along with environmental effects are presented. Wind data analysis is carried out by using WINDROSE PRO software to determine the resultant direction of wind at the selected site for wind farm layout. The wind distribution at hub height of the wind turbine is calculated and is used to compute annual power production by the wind farm using power curves of the wind turbine. Electrical network integration issues of wind farm to the external grid are studied and the optimum point of connection is proposed. Finally, economic analysis of the whole wind farm project depending upon the LCC (Life Cycle Cost Analysis is presented and the feasibility of the project from the investor?s point of view is identified. The study concludes that the cost per kilowatt hour of electricity generated by this wind power plant will be 10.4 PKR/kWh and the payback period for the whole project is about 11.2 years

Practices and Factors Influencing the Use of Antibiotics in Selected Poultry Farms in Ghana

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Boamah, VE; Odoi, H; Dalsgaard, Anders

2016-01-01

and to assess factors influencing farmers’ choice of antibiotics for use on their farms. A cross-sectional survey using questionnaires and semistructured interviews was conducted among 400 poultry farms in the Ashanti, Brong-Ahafo and Greater Accra regions of Ghana. Data was analysed using IBM SPSS...... and Microsoft Excel. Multivariate analyses were used to evaluate correlations between farm variables and the dependency of antibiotic use on internal and external farm characteristics. Farmers reported the use of 35 different antimicrobial agents for management of conditions such as Newcastle, fowl pox......, coccidiosis, and coryza. From these agents, 20 essential antibiotics belonging to 10 antibiotic classes were extracted. Frequently employed antibiotics were tetracyclines (24.17%), aminoglycosides (17.87%), penicillins (16.51%) and fluoroquinolones (10.55%). Only 63% of the farms completed recommended...

Philippine Wind Farm Analysis and Site Selection Analysis, 1 January 2000 - 31 December 2000

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Conover, K.

2001-12-01

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), through the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), has been working in partnership with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) in an ongoing process to quantify the Philippine wind energy potential and foster wind farm development. As part of that process, NREL retained Global Energy Concepts, LLC (GEC) to review and update the policy needs as well as develop a site-screening process applicable for the Philippines. GEC worked closely with the Philippines National Power Corporation (NPC) in completing this work. This report provides the results of the policy needs and site selection analyses conducted by GEC.

NON-FARMING ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN THE FARM ACTIVITY DIVERSIFICATION PROCESS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Adam Czudec

2017-03-01

Full Text Available The article shows the scale and reasons of regional disparities in the development of selected activities in multifunctional farmers in Poland, which are a an example of the diversification of farm activities. Moreover, they presented the benefits for farmers as a result of taking up and pursuit of selected multifunctional activities. Empirically, the paper is based on primary and secondary data. The primary data is derived from the findings of a survey carried out among farmers (interview with a questionnaire, whereas the secondary data comes from the Central Statistical Office of Poland. The findings of the research show high regional diversification of the development level of farmers’ nonfarming activity. The highest discrepancy was observed in the case of the percentage of organic farms in the total number of farms. Less intense were those in the case of the share of agritourism farm households, whereas the lowest regional differences were recorded for the farm households holding its own direct sales scheme of farm produce. Another important finding from the survey of the farmers running nonfarming economic activity is that the highest advantages of such activity are the increase in farm household income and improvement of the farm family living standard. However, farmers found it difficult to observe any advantages of nonfarming economic activity in rural areas.

Classification of Specialized Farms Applying Multivariate Statistical Methods

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Zuzana Hloušková

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Classification of specialized farms applying multivariate statistical methods The paper is aimed at application of advanced multivariate statistical methods when classifying cattle breeding farming enterprises by their economic size. Advantage of the model is its ability to use a few selected indicators compared to the complex methodology of current classification model that requires knowledge of detailed structure of the herd turnover and structure of cultivated crops. Output of the paper is intended to be applied within farm structure research focused on future development of Czech agriculture. As data source, the farming enterprises database for 2014 has been used, from the FADN CZ system. The predictive model proposed exploits knowledge of actual size classes of the farms tested. Outcomes of the linear discriminatory analysis multifactor classification method have supported the chance of filing farming enterprises in the group of Small farms (98 % filed correctly, and the Large and Very Large enterprises (100 % filed correctly. The Medium Size farms have been correctly filed at 58.11 % only. Partial shortages of the process presented have been found when discriminating Medium and Small farms.

40 CFR 761.308 - Sample selection by random number generation on any two-dimensional square grid.

Science.gov (United States)

2010-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 30 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Sample selection by random number... § 761.79(b)(3) § 761.308 Sample selection by random number generation on any two-dimensional square... area created in accordance with paragraph (a) of this section, select two random numbers: one each for...

Applications of random forest feature selection for fine-scale genetic population assignment.

Science.gov (United States)

Sylvester, Emma V A; Bentzen, Paul; Bradbury, Ian R; Clément, Marie; Pearce, Jon; Horne, John; Beiko, Robert G

2018-02-01

Genetic population assignment used to inform wildlife management and conservation efforts requires panels of highly informative genetic markers and sensitive assignment tests. We explored the utility of machine-learning algorithms (random forest, regularized random forest and guided regularized random forest) compared with F ST ranking for selection of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) for fine-scale population assignment. We applied these methods to an unpublished SNP data set for Atlantic salmon ( Salmo salar ) and a published SNP data set for Alaskan Chinook salmon ( Oncorhynchus tshawytscha ). In each species, we identified the minimum panel size required to obtain a self-assignment accuracy of at least 90% using each method to create panels of 50-700 markers Panels of SNPs identified using random forest-based methods performed up to 7.8 and 11.2 percentage points better than F ST -selected panels of similar size for the Atlantic salmon and Chinook salmon data, respectively. Self-assignment accuracy ≥90% was obtained with panels of 670 and 384 SNPs for each data set, respectively, a level of accuracy never reached for these species using F ST -selected panels. Our results demonstrate a role for machine-learning approaches in marker selection across large genomic data sets to improve assignment for management and conservation of exploited populations.

Determinants of nutritional status of children in farming households ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

economic, household and child-related factors on the nutritional status of children (0-5yrs) in farming households of Oyo State, Nigeria. The study was conducted using a multistage sampling technique to select 201 mother-child pairs from 18 farming ...

The transect method: a novel approach to on-farm welfare assessment of commercial turkeys.

Science.gov (United States)

Marchewka, Joanna; Estevez, Inma; Vezzoli, Giuseppe; Ferrante, Valentina; Makagon, Maja M

2015-01-01

Currently, no animal-based protocol for on-farm welfare assessment of commercial turkeys is available. The birds' size and flighty nature make obtaining a representative sample using traditional methods difficult. The transect walks (TW) approach provides a potential alternative for on-farm assessments of turkey welfare. We compared the TW approach with a traditional method, and data collected as the birds were moved out of the house during the load out process (L). Ten commercial 19- to 20-week-old Hybrid turkey flocks were evaluated (1 flock/house/farm). Half of the flocks were housed on farms deemed as "faring well" by the company, the other half were on "suboptimal" farms. Each house was subdivided longitudinally into 4 transects. Two observers walked the transects in random order, recording the total number of birds per transect that were immobile; lame; aggressive towards a mate; interacting with humans; with visible head, vent, or back wounds; engaging in mounting behaviors; small; featherless; dirty; sick; terminal; or dead. Flocks were re-evaluated on the same day using the individual sampling method (S), where randomly selected birds were scored as they took 10 steps. Flocks were re-assessed within 48 h of the transect evaluation, as birds were funneled out of the house during load out. Using ANOVAs we determined the effects of observers, method, management, and their interactions on proportions of turkeys per house within each category. Outcome parameters were not affected by management (P>0.05 for all) or observer (P>0.05 for most), but an assessment method effect was detected (P<0.05). S differed from the 2 other methods (P<0.05) for most parameters except aggression towards a mate, back wounds, dirty, sick, and vent wounds. Differences were not detected between data collected using TW and during L, except for dead (P=0.0007) and immobile (P=0.007). Results suggest that the TW method is a promising tool for on-farm turkey welfare assessment as it

Assessment of Antibiotic Usage in Some Selected Livestock Farms ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

A survey to assess the use of antibiotics was conducted in 120 livestock farms across the 4 agricultural zones of Oyo state, Nigeria. Data were collected through the use of structured questionnaires on respondents characteristics; educational status, usage, adherence to prescription and withdrawal periods and were ...

Differences in the Financial Management of Conventional, Organic, and Biodynamic Farms

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Vlašicová Eliška

2015-09-01

Full Text Available The financial management of conventional, organic, and biodynamic farms was evaluated and compared. It is a highly specific issue filling in the gap namely in the area of economic research of biodynamic agriculture. Biodynamic agriculture is a less widespread concept of agriculture, the management of which meets the requirements of organic agriculture. Organic agriculture has still been gaining in importance in the Czech Republic, the number of organic farms has been growing, and availability of organic products has increased, too. Of the Czech farms receiving subsidies from the EU or state subsidies in 2007-2012, a total of 389 were selected for analysis (273 of which were conventional farms, 112 organic farms, and 4 farms were engaged in biodynamic agriculture. Subsidies, Total Costs, Operating Revenue, Profit and Gross Value Added indicators were selected for evaluation. The individual indicators within groups of companies were compared by means of a t-test. The analysis revealed significant differences in the economic indicators of individual types of farms. It was observed that organic enterprises have better economic results than conventional and biodynamic businesses. Subsidies help all types of farms achieve better results. We may hence assume dependence of these farms on subsidies.

Antibiotic susceptibility of Brachyspira hyodysenteriae isolates from Czech swine farms: a 10-year follow-up study

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Josef Prášek

2014-01-01

Full Text Available Brachyspira hyodysenteriae is the causative agent of swine dysentery. Loss of clinical efficacy of some antimicrobial agents authorized for treating swine dysentery was observed on certain Czech pig farms. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the antimicrobial sensitivity of six antibiotics using a set of 202 randomly selected B. hyodysenteriae isolates obtained from farms in the Czech Republic between years 1997 and 2006. Minimum inhibitory concentration of antibiotics tylosin, lincomycin, tylvalosin, chlortetracyclin, tiamulin and valnemulin were tested, using an agar dilution method. All antibiotics tested showed an increase in minimal inhibitory concentrations. Continual decrease in susceptibility of B. hyodysenteriae isolates to tiamulin and valnemulin was observed. Multiresistant B. hyodysenteriae were isolated more frequently in the past years. Only a careful use of antibiotics can ensure their efficacy, especially in case of pleuromutilins, in the strategic therapy of swine dysentery. This rare study demonstrates the minimal inhibitory concentration changes of selected antidysenterics among Czech isolates of Brachyspira hyodysenteriae during a ten-year period.

Interference-aware random beam selection for spectrum sharing systems

KAUST Repository

Abdallah, Mohamed M.

2012-09-01

Spectrum sharing systems have been introduced to alleviate the problem of spectrum scarcity by allowing secondary unlicensed networks to share the spectrum with primary licensed networks under acceptable interference levels to the primary users. In this paper, we develop interference-aware random beam selection schemes that provide enhanced throughput for the secondary link under the condition that the interference observed at the primary link is within a predetermined acceptable value. For a secondary transmitter equipped with multiple antennas, our schemes select a random beam, among a set of power- optimized orthogonal random beams, that maximizes the capacity of the secondary link while satisfying the interference constraint at the primary receiver for different levels of feedback information describing the interference level at the primary receiver. For the proposed schemes, we develop a statistical analysis for the signal-to-noise and interference ratio (SINR) statistics as well as the capacity of the secondary link. Finally, we present numerical results that study the effect of system parameters including number of beams and the maximum transmission power on the capacity of the secondary link attained using the proposed schemes. © 2012 IEEE.

Malaria knowledge and agricultural practices that promote mosquito breeding in two rural farming communities in Oyo State, Nigeria

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Oshiname Frederick O

2010-04-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Agricultural practices such as the use of irrigation during rice cultivation, the use of ponds for fish farming and the storage of water in tanks for livestock provide suitable breeding grounds for anthropophylic mosquitoes. The most common anthropophylic mosquito in Nigeria which causes much of the morbidity and mortality associated with malaria is the anopheles mosquito. Farmers are therefore at high risk of malaria - a disease which seriously impacts on agricultural productivity. Unfortunately information relating to agricultural practices and farmers' behavioural antecedent factors that could assist malaria programmers plan and implement interventions to reduce risk of infections among farmers is scanty. Farmers' knowledge about malaria and agricultural practices which favour the breeding of mosquitoes in Fashola and Soku, two rural farming communities in Oyo State were therefore assessed in two rural farming communities in Oyo State. Methods This descriptive cross-sectional study involved the collection of data through the use of eight Focus Group Discussions (FGDs and the interview of 403 randomly selected farmers using semi-structured questionnaires. These sets of information were supplemented with observations of agricultural practices made in 40 randomly selected farms. The FGD data were recorded on audio-tapes, transcribed and subjected to content analysis while the quantitative data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Results Most respondents in the two communities had low level of knowledge of malaria causation as only 12.4% stated that mosquito bite could transmit the disease. Less than half (46.7% correctly mentioned the signs and symptoms of malaria as high body temperature, body pains, headache, body weakness and cold/fever. The reported main methods for preventing mosquito bites in the farming communities included removal of heaps of cassava tuber peelings (62.3%, bush burning

Interference-aware random beam selection for spectrum sharing systems

KAUST Repository

Abdallah, Mohamed M.; Sayed, Mostafa M.; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim; Qaraqe, Khalid A.

2012-01-01

. In this paper, we develop interference-aware random beam selection schemes that provide enhanced throughput for the secondary link under the condition that the interference observed at the primary link is within a predetermined acceptable value. For a secondary

Seroepidemiological survey of Neospora caninum and its risk factors in farm dogs in Nakuru district, Kenya

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Tequiero Abuom Okumu

2016-10-01

Full Text Available Aim: The objective of this study was to determine the seroprevalence of Neospora caninum (NC and its risk factors in farm dogs in Kenya. Materials and Methods: As part of a longitudinal study on dairy cattle abortion in 2010 in Kenya, serum samples were collected from 84 dogs in 53 randomly selected dairy cattle farms to determine the seroprevalence and risk factors of seropositivity for NC. Results: 15 (17.9% of the dogs were seropositive to NC antibodies, and at least one seropositive dog was found in 12 (22.6% of the 53 farms. The final multivariable logistic regression model identified free-roaming as the only factor significantly associated with seropositivity (odds ratio=4.48; p=0.03. Conclusion: The findings of this study indicate that canine neosporosis does exist in Kenya and that farmers should restrict their dogs from roaming to reduce the risk of their dogs becoming a reservoir for NC. More studies need to be carried out to determine the reproductive effects of NC on dairy cattle in Kenya.

The Resistome of Farmed Fish Feces Contributes to the Enrichment of Antibiotic Resistance Genes in Sediments below Baltic Sea Fish Farms.

Science.gov (United States)

Muziasari, Windi I; Pitkänen, Leena K; Sørum, Henning; Stedtfeld, Robert D; Tiedje, James M; Virta, Marko

2016-01-01

Our previous studies showed that particular antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) were enriched locally in sediments below fish farms in the Northern Baltic Sea, Finland, even when the selection pressure from antibiotics was negligible. We assumed that a constant influx of farmed fish feces could be the plausible source of the ARGs enriched in the farm sediments. In the present study, we analyzed the composition of the antibiotic resistome from the intestinal contents of 20 fish from the Baltic Sea farms. We used a high-throughput method, WaferGen qPCR array with 364 primer sets to detect and quantify ARGs, mobile genetic elements (MGE), and the 16S rRNA gene. Despite a considerably wide selection of qPCR primer sets, only 28 genes were detected in the intestinal contents. The detected genes were ARGs encoding resistance to sulfonamide ( sul1 ), trimethoprim ( dfrA1 ), tetracycline [ tet(32), tetM, tetO, tetW ], aminoglycoside ( aadA1, aadA2 ), chloramphenicol ( catA1 ), and efflux-pumps resistance genes ( emrB, matA, mefA, msrA ). The detected genes also included class 1 integron-associated genes ( intI1, qacE Δ 1 ) and transposases ( tnpA ). Importantly, most of the detected genes were the same genes enriched in the farm sediments. This preliminary study suggests that feces from farmed fish contribute to the ARG enrichment in farm sediments despite the lack of contemporaneous antibiotic treatments at the farms. We observed that the intestinal contents of individual farmed fish had their own resistome compositions. Our result also showed that the total relative abundances of transposases and tet genes were significantly correlated ( p = 0.001, R 2 = 0.71). In addition, we analyzed the mucosal skin and gill filament resistomes of the farmed fish but only one multidrug-efflux resistance gene ( emrB ) was detected. To our knowledge, this is the first study reporting the resistome of farmed fish using a culture-independent method. Determining the possible sources of

Statistical analysis and dimensioning of a wind farm energy storage system

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Waśkowicz Bartosz

2017-06-01

Full Text Available The growth in renewable power generation and more strict local regulations regarding power quality indices will make it necessary to use energy storage systems with renewable power plants in the near future. The capacity of storage systems can be determined using different methods most of which can be divided into either deterministic or stochastic. Deterministic methods are often complicated with numerous parameters and complex models for long term prediction often incorporating meteorological data. Stochastic methods use statistics for ESS (Energy Storage System sizing, which is somewhat intuitive for dealing with the random element of wind speed variation. The proposed method in this paper performs stabilization of output power at one minute intervals to reduce the negative influence of the wind farm on the power grid in order to meet local regulations. This paper shows the process of sizing the ESS for two selected wind farms, based on their levels of variation in generated power and also, for each, how the negative influences on the power grid in the form of voltage variation and a shortterm flicker factor are decreased.

A group-based spatial decision support system for wind farm site selection in Northwest Ohio

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gorsevski, Pece V.; Cathcart, Steven C.; Mirzaei, Golrokh; Jamali, Mohsin M.; Ye, Xinyue; Gomezdelcampo, Enrique

2013-01-01

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the benefits of applying a spatial decision support system (SDSS) framework for evaluating the suitability for wind farm siting in Northwest Ohio. The multiple criteria evaluation (MCE) prototype system is intended for regional planning but also for promoting group decision making that could involve participants with different interests in the development of decision alternatives. The framework integrates environmental and economic criteria and builds a hierarchy for wind farm siting using weighted linear combination (WLC) techniques and GIS functionality. The SDSS allows the multiple participants to interact and develop an understanding of the spatial data for assigning importance values to each factor. The WLC technique is used to combine the assigned values with map layers, which are standardized using fuzzy set theory, to produce individual suitability maps. The maps created by personal preferences from the participants are aggregated for producing a group solution using the Borda method. Sensitivity analysis is performed on the group solution to examine how small changes in the factor weights affect the calculated suitability scores. The results from the sensitivity analysis are intended to aid understanding of compromised solutions through changes in the input data from the participant's perspective. - Highlights: ► We present a prototype tool that we developed for wind farm site selection. ► Multiple participants rank the factors for promoting group-based decision making. ► The factors are aggregated by WLC technique to generate maps from participants. ► Group-based solution uses Borda method to aggregate the maps from participants. ► Sensitivity analysis is performed on the group solution to examine solution affects

Sampling pig farms at the abattoir in a cross-sectional study - Evaluation of a sampling method.

Science.gov (United States)

Birkegård, Anna Camilla; Halasa, Tariq; Toft, Nils

2017-09-15

procedure was reproducible with results comparable to the collected sample. However, the sampling procedure favoured sampling of large farms. Furthermore, both under-sampled and over-sampled areas were found using scan statistics. In conclusion, sampling conducted at abattoirs can provide a spatially representative sample. Hence it is a possible cost-effective alternative to simple random sampling. However, it is important to assess the properties of the resulting sample so that any potential selection bias can be addressed when reporting the findings. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

The possibility of functioning micro-scale biogas plant in selected farm

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Czekała Wojciech

2017-12-01

Full Text Available Renewable energy sources (RES become more and more popular. In Poland, biomass has the highest energy potential among all RES. Methane fermentation is one of possible ways to use it. The aim of the study was to perform energy and economic calculations for the biogas plant installation project in an existing farm situated in the Wielkopolska voivodeship. Because of the small area of the farm and the type of production, the calculations were carried out for micro-installation biogas plants. During the preparation of the project the production potential of the substrates was determined, allowing for further analyses. It was calculated that the electrical power of the designed biogas plant was 8.10 kW, with a total annual production of biogas at 29 471 m3. The obtained amount allows to generate in the cogeneration system 66 450 kWh of electricity and 71 190 kWh of heat energy. Some of the energy produced can be used on the farm and its surplus sold to the grid, which will allow for financial and environmental benefits.

HEXAMITIASIS (Hexamita eleagridis IN TURKEY COMMERCIAL FARMS IN YUCATÁN, MÉXICO

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ronald Santos Ricalde

2014-12-01

Full Text Available The objective of the study was to estimate the prevalence and to describe the lesions and signs found in an outbreak of Hexamita meleagridis in three turkey farms in Yucatan, Mexico. Three hundred randomly selected, turkeys were sacrificed and their intestines explored for lesions associated with H. Meleagridis infection. Also, gut content, feces samples and fresh intestine smears were taken to determine the presence of H. Meleagridis parasites. Macroscopic lesions such as the presence of congested areas, and watery and foamy content in duodenum, presence of gases, fetid odor and the presence of watery and yellowish feces in the caeca were identified. The overall prevalence of H. Meleagridis was 25.3% and there was not association of the parasite with sex, age or farm. However, the thickening of some sections of the duodenum (52.3%, the presence of congested areas (23%, the watery and yellowish content of the duodenum (24.3%, the presence of gas (21.0%, fetid odor of the content (22.3%, and the watery and yellowish feces of the caeca (20.0% were associated with H. meleagridis Presence of H. meleagridis in those farms was confirmed. Diarrhea signs and intestine lesions observed in the sacrificed turkeys were associated to hexamitiasis infection. Sex, age and farm were not associated with the presence of H. meleagridis.

Social networks and mental health among a farming population.

Science.gov (United States)

Stain, Helen J; Kelly, Brian; Lewin, Terry J; Higginbotham, Nick; Beard, John R; Hourihan, Fleur

2008-10-01

The study investigated the associations between mental health and measures of community support, social support networks, sense of place, adversity, and perceived problems in a rural Australian population. There was a specific focus on farming communities due to previous qualitative research by the authors indicating distress by farmers in response to drought (Sartore et al. Aust Fam Phys 36(12), 990-993, 2007). A survey was mailed to adults randomly selected from the Australian Electoral Roll and residing within four local government areas (LGAs) of varying remoteness in rural New South Wales (NSW). Survey measures included: support networks and community attachment; recent stressors (including drought-related stress); and measures of health and related functioning. The Kessler-10 provided an index of current psychological distress. The sample (n = 449; response rate 24%) was predominantly female (58.4%) and 18.9% were farmers or farm workers. Moderate to very high psychological distress was reported for 20.7% of the sample. Half (56.1%) of all respondents, and specifically 71.8% of farmers or farm workers, reported high levels of perceived stress due to drought. Psychological distress was associated with recent adverse life events, increased alcohol use and functional impairment. Hierarchical regression analysis demonstrated an independent effect of the number of stressful life events including drought related stress, perceived social support (community and individual), alcohol use and physical functioning ability on levels of psychological distress. This model accounted for 43% of the variance in current levels of distress. Lower community support had a more marked impact on distress levels for non-farming than farming participants. This study has highlighted the association between unique rural community characteristics and rural stressors (such as drought) and measures of mental health, suggesting the important mediating role of social factors and community

Common fish diseases and parasites affecting wild and farmed ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Intensification of aquaculture production in Uganda is likely to result into disease out-breaks leading to economic losses to commercial fish farms and associated natural aquatic ecosystems. This survey assessed health profiles of selected commercial fish farms and adjacent natural aquatic ecosystemsto identify fish ...

Understanding implications of consumer behavior for wildlife farming and sustainable wildlife trade.

Science.gov (United States)

Nuno, A; Blumenthal, J M; Austin, T J; Bothwell, J; Ebanks-Petrie, G; Godley, B J; Broderick, A C

2018-04-01

Unsustainable wildlife trade affects biodiversity and the livelihoods of communities dependent upon those resources. Wildlife farming has been proposed to promote sustainable trade, but characterizing markets and understanding consumer behavior remain neglected but essential steps in the design and evaluation of such operations. We used sea turtle trade in the Cayman Islands, where turtles have been farm raised for human consumption for almost 50 years, as a case study to explore consumer preferences toward wild-sourced (illegal) and farmed (legal) products and potential conservation implications. Combining methods innovatively (including indirect questioning and choice experiments), we conducted a nationwide trade assessment through in-person interviews from September to December 2014. Households were randomly selected using disproportionate stratified sampling, and responses were weighted based on district population size. We approached 597 individuals, of which 37 (6.2%) refused to participate. Although 30% of households had consumed turtle in the previous 12 months, the purchase and consumption of wild products was rare (e.g., 64-742 resident households consumed wild turtle meat [i.e., 0.3-3.5% of households] but represented a large threat to wild turtles in the area due to their reduced populations). Differences among groups of consumers were marked, as identified through choice experiments, and price and source of product played important roles in their decisions. Despite the long-term practice of farming turtles, 13.5% of consumers showed a strong preference for wild products, which demonstrates the limitations of wildlife farming as a single tool for sustainable wildlife trade. By using a combination of indirect questioning, choice experiments, and sales data to investigate demand for wildlife products, we obtained insights about consumer behavior that can be used to develop conservation-demand-focused initiatives. Lack of data from long-term social

The signature of positive selection at randomly chosen loci.

OpenAIRE

Przeworski, Molly

2002-01-01

In Drosophila and humans, there are accumulating examples of loci with a significant excess of high-frequency-derived alleles or high levels of linkage disequilibrium, relative to a neutral model of a random-mating population of constant size. These are features expected after a recent selective sweep. Their prevalence suggests that positive directional selection may be widespread in both species. However, as I show here, these features do not persist long after the sweep ends: The high-frequ...

The Economics of Smallholder Organic Contract Farming in Tropical Africa

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Bolwig, Simon; Gibbon, Peter; Jones, Edward Samuel

2009-01-01

The paper examines the revenue effects of certified organic contract farming for smallholders and of adoption of organic agricultural farming methods in a tropical African context. The comparison in both cases is with farming systems that are "organic by default." Survey data from a large organic...... coffee contract farming scheme in Uganda are reported and analyzed using a standard OLS regression and a full information maximum likelihood (FIML) estimate of the Heckman selection model. The analysis finds that, controlling for a range of factors, there are positive revenue effects both from...... participation in the scheme and, more modestly, from applying organic farming techniques....

Simulation of power fluctuation of wind farms based on frequency domain

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Lin, Jin; Sun, Yuanzhang; Li, Guojie

2011-01-01

, however, is incapable of completely explaining the physical mechanism of randomness of power fluctuation. To remedy such a situation, fluctuation modeling based on the frequency domain is proposed. The frequency domain characteristics of stochastic fluctuation on large wind farms are studied using...... the power spectral density of wind speed, the frequency domain model of a wind power generator and the information on weather and geography of the wind farms. The correctness and effectiveness of the model are verified by comparing the measurement data with simulation results of a certain wind farm. © 2011...

Simulated Performance Evaluation of a Selective Tracker Through Random Scenario Generation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hussain, Dil Muhammad Akbar

2006-01-01

performance assessment. Therefore, a random target motion scenario is adopted. Its implementation in particular for testing the proposed selective track splitting algorithm using Kalman filters is investigated through a number of performance parameters which gives the activity profile of the tracking scenario......  The paper presents a simulation study on the performance of a target tracker using selective track splitting filter algorithm through a random scenario implemented on a digital signal processor.  In a typical track splitting filter all the observation which fall inside a likelihood ellipse...... are used for update, however, in our proposed selective track splitting filter less number of observations are used for track update.  Much of the previous performance work [1] has been done on specific (deterministic) scenarios. One of the reasons for considering the specific scenarios, which were...

Minimization over randomly selected lines

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ismet Sahin

2013-07-01

Full Text Available This paper presents a population-based evolutionary optimization method for minimizing a given cost function. The mutation operator of this method selects randomly oriented lines in the cost function domain, constructs quadratic functions interpolating the cost function at three different points over each line, and uses extrema of the quadratics as mutated points. The crossover operator modifies each mutated point based on components of two points in population, instead of one point as is usually performed in other evolutionary algorithms. The stopping criterion of this method depends on the number of almost degenerate quadratics. We demonstrate that the proposed method with these mutation and crossover operations achieves faster and more robust convergence than the well-known Differential Evolution and Particle Swarm algorithms.

Impact of Formal Financial Market Participation on Farm Size and Expenditure on Variable Farm Inputs: The Case of Maize Farmers in Ghana

OpenAIRE

Awunyo-Vitor, Dadson; Al-Hassan, Ramatu M.; Sarpong, Daniel B.

2014-01-01

The study examined maize farmers’ participation in the formal financial market and its impact on farm size and expenditure on variable farm inputs. A multistage sampling method was used in selecting 595 maize farmers from the seven districts in Ashanti and Brong Ahafo Regions of Ghana. A structured questionnaire and interview schedule were used to elicit information from the respondents. The impact of formal financial market participation on farm size and expenditure on variable inputs was es...

Antibiotic usage pattern in selected poultry farms in Ogun state

African Journals Online (AJOL)

ADEYEYE

2013-12-27

Dec 27, 2013 ... streptomycin and tylosin among poultry farms in. Ekiti State, Nigeria. ... in poultry production due to its possibility of forming residue in ... withdrawal periods are not observed before selling ... Manipulating pig production IX.

Perception of Farm Succession Planning by Poultry Farmers in ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

This study assessed poultry farm characteristics and poultry farmers' perception of farm succession planning in southwest Nigeria. A multistage sampling procedure was used in selecting poultry farmers in Oyo and Osun states. Data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Results reveal that poultry farmers ...

Selection for altruism through random drift in variable size populations

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Houchmandzadeh Bahram

2012-05-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Altruistic behavior is defined as helping others at a cost to oneself and a lowered fitness. The lower fitness implies that altruists should be selected against, which is in contradiction with their widespread presence is nature. Present models of selection for altruism (kin or multilevel show that altruistic behaviors can have ‘hidden’ advantages if the ‘common good’ produced by altruists is restricted to some related or unrelated groups. These models are mostly deterministic, or assume a frequency dependent fitness. Results Evolutionary dynamics is a competition between deterministic selection pressure and stochastic events due to random sampling from one generation to the next. We show here that an altruistic allele extending the carrying capacity of the habitat can win by increasing the random drift of “selfish” alleles. In other terms, the fixation probability of altruistic genes can be higher than those of a selfish ones, even though altruists have a smaller fitness. Moreover when populations are geographically structured, the altruists advantage can be highly amplified and the fixation probability of selfish genes can tend toward zero. The above results are obtained both by numerical and analytical calculations. Analytical results are obtained in the limit of large populations. Conclusions The theory we present does not involve kin or multilevel selection, but is based on the existence of random drift in variable size populations. The model is a generalization of the original Fisher-Wright and Moran models where the carrying capacity depends on the number of altruists.

Statistical meandering wake model and its application to yaw-angle optimisation of wind farms

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Thøgersen, Emil; Tranberg, Bo; Herp, Jürgen

2017-01-01

deterministic models to a statistical meandering wake model (SMWM), where a random directional deflection is assigned to a narrow wake in such a way that on average it resembles a broad Jensen wake. In a second step, the model is further generalised to wind-farm level, where the deflections of the multiple...... wakes are treated as independently and identically distributed random variables. When carefully calibrated to the Nysted wind farm, the ensemble average of the statistical model produces the same wind-direction dependence of the power efficiency as obtained from the standard Jensen model. Upon using...... the JWM to perform a yaw-angle optimisation of wind-farm power output, we find an optimisation gain of 6.7% for the Nysted wind farm when compared to zero yaw angles and averaged over all wind directions. When applying the obtained JWM-based optimised yaw angles to the SMWM, the ensemble-averaged gain...

Sustainable Farming Systems in the Sub-Sahelian Zone of Burkina Faso - Key Factors

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

E. - Hien

2010-12-01

Full Text Available Rapid population growth and climatic change threatens the sustainability of natural resources. Farming practices can mitigate environmental change and degradation. The aim of this research conducted in Yatenga region was to describe and to analyse manure practices management. In 2005, a survey was carried out to assess the evolution of farming practices. A survey was initially conducted with a sample of 44 farmers, selected randomly in the three neighbouring villages. Subsequently, 18 farms were selected for in-depth interviews. The grain yield was measured and the different practices of soil and water conservation developed by farmers were compared. According to the enquiries, two practices, called “zaï” and “djengo”, were largely used in cereals production. The “zaï” practice, known as a traditional technique for restoration of degraded soil, is characterized by the capture of runoff by micro-watersheds and a localized organic matter supply at the soil-plant system scale. The “djengo” practice is based on the same principle of the “zaï” practice but was applied on the sandy soil as traditionally “zaï” concerned the degraded and crusty soils. The two practices could increase grain crop production but moreover could limit the risk of crops failure. In addition, our observations also showed that frequent tree regenerations occurred in plots and watersheds where “zaï” or “djengo” practices were used. This study highlights the necessity of better controlling soil, water and organic matter to improve agrosystem sustainability in sub Saharan Africa.

Selection bias and subject refusal in a cluster-randomized controlled trial

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Rochelle Yang

2017-07-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Selection bias and non-participation bias are major methodological concerns which impact external validity. Cluster-randomized controlled trials are especially prone to selection bias as it is impractical to blind clusters to their allocation into intervention or control. This study assessed the impact of selection bias in a large cluster-randomized controlled trial. Methods The Improved Cardiovascular Risk Reduction to Enhance Rural Primary Care (ICARE study examined the impact of a remote pharmacist-led intervention in twelve medical offices. To assess eligibility, a standardized form containing patient demographics and medical information was completed for each screened patient. Eligible patients were approached by the study coordinator for recruitment. Both the study coordinator and the patient were aware of the site’s allocation prior to consent. Patients who consented or declined to participate were compared across control and intervention arms for differing characteristics. Statistical significance was determined using a two-tailed, equal variance t-test and a chi-square test with adjusted Bonferroni p-values. Results were adjusted for random cluster variation. Results There were 2749 completed screening forms returned to research staff with 461 subjects who had either consented or declined participation. Patients with poorly controlled diabetes were found to be significantly more likely to decline participation in intervention sites compared to those in control sites. A higher mean diastolic blood pressure was seen in patients with uncontrolled hypertension who declined in the control sites compared to those who declined in the intervention sites. However, these findings were no longer significant after adjustment for random variation among the sites. After this adjustment, females were now found to be significantly more likely to consent than males (odds ratio = 1.41; 95% confidence interval = 1.03, 1

A Survey of Reproductive Management Strategies on US Commercial Dairy Farms

OpenAIRE

Olynk, Nicole J.; Wolf, Christopher A.

2008-01-01

Reproductive performance on the dairy farm affects the dairy’s profit because it directly affects milk production, the availability of replacements, the amounts of voluntary and involuntary culling, breeding costs, and costs associated with veterinary care (Britt, 1985). Reproductive management programs selected for implementation differ across farms due to varying on-farm costs, such as labor costs, opportunity costs of management and labor, as well as facilities, farm goals and values, and ...

ON-FARM MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS IN ANIMAL PRODUCTION

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Aleksandra Jug

2000-06-01

Full Text Available The on-farm management systems under development in order to insure data collection, regular data processing needed on a farm as well as automatic data exchange between farm and computing centre. The core of information system presents relational database (RDBMS accompanied with tools developed in APIIS. A system analysis method has been done on two pig industrial units, on national selection program for swine in Slovenia, and compared with examples from other countries and species. Public domain software like PostgreSQL, Perl and Linux have been chosen for use on farms and can be replaced with commercial software like Oracle for more demanding central systems. The system contains at this stage applications for entering, managing, and viewing the data as well as transferring the information between local and central databases.

Climate Change Adaptation Strategies and Farm-level Efficiency in Food Crop Production in Southwestern, Nigeria

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Otitoju, MA.

2014-01-01

Full Text Available Food crop yields depend largely on prevailing climate conditions, especially in Africa, where rain-fed agriculture predominate. The extent to which climate impacts are felt depends principally on the adaptation measures used by farmers. This study focused on the effect of climate change adaptation strategies on farm-level technical efficiency. The study used primary data collected from 360 randomly selected farmers in Southwest Nigeria. Cobb-Douglass stochastic frontier production model was used to analyse the data. Multiple cropping, land fragmentation, multiple planting dates, mulching and cover cropping were the major climate change adaptation strategies employed by the farmers. While land fragmentation and multiple planting dates had significant positive relationships, years of climate change awareness and social capital had significant inverse relationships, with technical inefficiency. This may be because while land fragmentation may hinder farm mechanization, multiple planting dates may increase the monotonousness and drudgery of farming. On the other hand, social capital and climate change awareness could help ameliorate the effects of, particularly, land fragmentation through resource pooling. It is therefore recommended that the farmers be encouraged to form cooperative societies so as to leverage their resource status through collective efforts.

Record of Decision Tank Farm Soil and INTEC Groundwater

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

L. S. Cahn

2007-05-01

This decision document presents the selected remedy for Operable Unit (OU) 3-14 tank farm soil and groundwater at the Idaho Nuclear Technology and Engineering Center (INTEC), which is located on the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) Site. The tank farm was initially evaluated in the OU 3-13 Record of Decision (ROD), and it was determined that additional information was needed to make a final decision. Additional information has been obtained on the nature and extent of contamination in the tank farm and on the impact of groundwater. The selected remedy was chosen in accordance with the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Liability and Compensation Act of 1980 (CERCLA) (42 USC 9601 et seq.), as amended by the Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act of 1986 (Public Law 99-499) and the National Oil and Hazardous Substances Pollution Contingency Plan (40 CFR 300). The selected remedy is intended to be the final action for tank far soil and groundwater at INTEC.

Evaluation of selective dry cow treatment following on-farm culture: risk of postcalving intramammary infection and clinical mastitis in the subsequent lactation.

Science.gov (United States)

Cameron, M; McKenna, S L; MacDonald, K A; Dohoo, I R; Roy, J P; Keefe, G P

2014-01-01

The objective of the study was to evaluate the utility of a Petrifilm-based on-farm culture system when used to make selective antimicrobial treatment decisions on low somatic cell count cows (cows from 16 commercial dairy herds with a low bulk tank somatic cell count (cow therapy (DCT) or Petrifilm-based selective DCT. Cows belonging to the blanket DCT group were infused with a commercial dry cow antimicrobial product and an internal teat sealant (ITS) at drying off. Using composite milk samples collected on the day before drying off, cows in the selective DCT group were treated at drying off based on the results obtained by the Petrifilm on-farm culture system with DCT + ITS (Petrifilm culture positive), or ITS alone (Petrifilm culture negative). Quarters of all cows were sampled for standard laboratory bacteriology on the day before drying off, at 3 to 4d in milk (DIM), at 5 to 18 DIM, and from the first case of clinical mastitis occurring within 120 DIM. Multilevel logistic regression was used to assess the effect of study group (blanket or selective DCT) and resulting dry cow treatment (DCT + ITS, or ITS alone) on the risk of intramammary infection (IMI) at calving and the risk of a first case of clinical mastitis between calving and 120 DIM. According to univariable analysis, no difference was observed between study groups with respect to quarter-level cure risk and new IMI risk over the dry period. Likewise, the risk of IMI at calving and the risk of clinical mastitis in the first 120 DIM was not different between quarters belonging to cows in the blanket DCT group and quarters belonging to cows in the selective DCT group. The results of this study indicate that selective DCT based on results obtained by the Petrifilm on-farm culture system achieved the same level of success with respect to treatment and prevention of IMI over the dry period as blanket DCT and did not affect the risk of clinical mastitis in the first 120 d of the subsequent lactation

The relationship between animal welfare and economic performance at farm level

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Henningsen, Arne; Czekaj, Tomasz Gerard; Forkman, Björn

We propose a theoretical framework for the relationship between animal welfare and the economic performance of livestock farms. We empirically analyse this relationship based on a unique data set of randomly sampled Danish pig herds that includes information from unannounced inspections of the co......We propose a theoretical framework for the relationship between animal welfare and the economic performance of livestock farms. We empirically analyse this relationship based on a unique data set of randomly sampled Danish pig herds that includes information from unannounced inspections...... of the compliance with the animal welfare legislation. We find large variations in economic performance indicators and animal welfare indicators. The relationship between these two indicators is rather weak, but tends to be slightly positive. We conclude that management has a major influence on both economic...... performance and animal welfare so that good farm managers are able to obey all animal welfare regulations and, at the same time, achieve a high economic performance....

CALVING ANALYSIS IN COWS OF CHAROLAIS BREED AT SELECTED FARM

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

KLÁRA VAVRIŠÍNOVÁ

2001-09-01

Full Text Available At our work we have analysed the organisation of calving in Charolais breed during the years from 1998 to 2001 at selected farm. Our monitoring of calving during winter season (from January to February shows the percentage of calving was in particular years ranged from 43.2 to 71.1. The most calves were born in February. We found out (total all years diffi cult calving (value 3 in 2 cases in April (1998 and 1999 and 1 case in February (1998 and 1 in March (1999. Calving marked with value 2 (total of all years we found out in January (2 cases, February (3 cases, March (4 cases and from September to December past one case. From 18 cases of diffi cult calving what we found out, 11 calves (61.11 % come from CHV 529 bull. In calves born by normal calving was found out average weight 34.75 kg, in ones born by calving with level 2 of diffi culty 36.36 kg, and in calves born by calving with diffi culty 3 was recorded average weight 41.5 kg. Recorded weight at 210 days of age in mostly cases was similar like in published breed standard.

Interference-aware random beam selection schemes for spectrum sharing systems

KAUST Repository

Abdallah, Mohamed; Qaraqe, Khalid; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

2012-01-01

users. In this work, we develop interference-aware random beam selection schemes that provide enhanced performance for the secondary network under the condition that the interference observed by the receivers of the primary network is below a

Multi-objective random search algorithm for simultaneously optimizing wind farm layout and number of turbines

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Feng, Ju; Shen, Wen Zhong; Xu, Chang

2016-01-01

A new algorithm for multi-objective wind farm layout optimization is presented. It formulates the wind turbine locations as continuous variables and is capable of optimizing the number of turbines and their locations in the wind farm simultaneously. Two objectives are considered. One is to maximi...

Sex differences in principal farm operators' tractor driving safety beliefs and behaviors.

Science.gov (United States)

Cole, H P; Westneat, S C; Browning, S R; Piercy, L R; Struttmann, T

2000-01-01

To examine the widely accepted hypothesis that farm women are more concerned with safety issues and behaviors than their male counterparts are. A telephone survey was administered to a random sample of Kentucky principal farm operators, 90 of whom were women. Participants were questioned about their tractor safety beliefs and practices. No significant sex differences in tractor safety perceptions and behavior were observed. Socialization of women to the role of principal farm operator may override their typically greater sensitivity to safety issues, an important consideration when designing safety campaigns for this population.

Consumer perceptions of farmed fish

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Reinders, Machiel J.; Banović, Marija; Guerrero, Lluis; Krystallis, Athanasios

2016-01-01

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate possible cross-cultural consumer segments in the EU aquaculture market and provide direction and focus for marketing strategies for farmed fish products. Design/methodology/approach: Selected psychographic constructs (i.e. category involvement,

Competitiveness levels in cattle herd farms

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Pedro Rocha Marques

2015-03-01

Full Text Available The aim of this experiment was to identify improvement demands for farms with different levels of competitiveness in the west of Rio Grande do Sul state, Brazil. A total of 63 owners of large farms were interviewed (farms with an area greater than 900ha by applying a semi-structured questionnaire, guided by four drivers: technology (TEC, management (MAN, market relations (MR and the institutional environment (IE.It was used the Statistical Analysis System 9.2 software to perform the cluster analysis and identify farmers' characteristics. Three random clusters with different levels of competitiveness were observed: low competitiveness level (LCL, middle competitiveness level (MCL and high competitiveness level (HCL. The 29 variables (sub factors were evaluated in the cluster analysis according to level of impact on competitiveness, being classified into variables of high, medium or low impact. Stratification was carried out, ranking demands for improvements from aspects attributed by experts in relation to sub factors. The farmers with low competitiveness level (LTL had an unfavorable status for MAN, while the farmers belonging to clusters MCL and HCL have, respectively, favorable and neutral status for the same driver. The management characteristics determined the level of competitiveness of the farms surveyed

Coping styles in farmed fish: consequences for aquaculture

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Castanheira, Maria Filipa; Conceição, Luís E.C.; Millot, Sandie

2017-01-01

Individual differences in physiological and behavioural responses to stressors are increasingly recognised as adaptive variation and thus raw material for evolution and fish farming improvements including selective breeding. Such individual variation has been evolutionarily conserved and is present...... in all vertebrate taxa including fish. In farmed animals, the interest in consistent trait associations, that is coping styles, has increased dramatically over the last years because many studies have demonstrated links to performance traits, health and disease susceptibility and welfare. This study...... will review (i) the main behavioural, neuroendocrine, cognitive and emotional differences between reactive and proactive coping styles in farmed fish; (ii) the methodological approaches used to identify coping styles in farmed fish, including individual (group) mass-screening tests; and (iii) how knowledge...

The Outcomes of Selection in a Closed Herd on a Farm in Operation.

Science.gov (United States)

Do, ChangHee; Yang, ChangBeom; Choi, JaeGwan; Kim, SiDong; Yang, BoSeok; Park, SooBong; Joo, YoungGuk; Lee, SeokHyun

2015-09-01

A herd of Berkshire pigs was established in 2003 and subjected to selection without introduction of any genetic resources until 2007. The complete pedigree, including 410 boars and 916 sows, as well as the records from 5,845 pigs and 822 litters were used to investigate the results obtained from the selections. The index of selection for breeding values included days to 90 kg (D90kg), backfat thickness (BF) and number of piglets born alive (NBA). The average inbreeding coefficients of pigs were found to be 0.023, 0.008, 0.013, 0.025, 0.026, and 0.005 from 2003 to 2007, respectively. The genetic gains per year were 12.1 g, -0.04 mm, -3.13 days, and 0.181 head for average daily gain (ADG), BF, D90kg, and NBA, respectively. Breeding values of ADG, BF and D90kg were not significantly correlated with inbreeding coefficients of individuals, except for NBA (-0.21). The response per additional 1% of inbreeding was 0.0278 head reduction in NBA. The annual increase of inbreeding was 0.23% and the annual decrease in NBA due to inbreeding was 0.0064 head. This magnitude could be disregarded when compared with the annual gain in NBA (0.181 head). These results suggest that inbreeding and inbreeding depression on ordinary farms can be controlled with a proper breeding scheme and that breeding programs are economical and safe relative to the risks associated with importation of pigs.

Influence of farming system and production purpose on the morphostructure of Spanish goat breeds

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ana Gonzalez-Martinez

2014-02-01

Full Text Available The aim of this study was to examine the possible influence of farming systems, based on the morphostructure of 1,571 female goats drawn from 40 flocks containing seven Spanish breeds (Blanca Andaluza, Blanca Celtiberica, Negra Serrana, Pirenaica, Payoya, Murciano-Granadina and Malagueña raised under four different farming systems. Analysis of morphometric variables showed that the morphostructure of native Spanish goat breeds was linked to the farming system used and thus to the production purpose. The morphostructure of grazing breeds may be more influenced by natural selection within the physical environment and less by human selection. That of stall-fed breeds, by contrast, reflects intense artificial selection aimed at achieving a highly-productive dairy type. For this reason, morphological evaluation systems used in breeding programmes for meat or dual-purpose goat breeds farmed extensively or semi-extensively should be specific, and should reflect the influence of the environment in which these goats are farmed.

Contract farming and the development of smallholder agricultural businesses

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Contract farming has received renewed attention recently as developing economies try to grapple with how to transform the agricultural sector and its associated value chains. This book examines different contract arrangements for selected crops, applying both qualitative and quantitative approaches...... in order to examine how contract farming affects smallholders and value chain dynamics in Tanzania....

Psychodemographic profile of stockpeople working on independent and integrated swine breeding farms in Quebec.

Science.gov (United States)

Ravel, A; D'Allaire, S; Bigras-Poulin, M; Ward, R

1996-01-01

As a part of a larger study, the psychodemographic profile of Quebec pig stockpeople was described based on a sample of 48 persons working on independent farms randomly selected in the Richelieu-Saint-Hyacinthe region, and on a convenience sample of 38 others employed by 5 organizations of integrated swine production chosen among the largest ones in Québec. The 2 groups of stockpeople were described separately because of the differences between the 2 types of production. Demographic data (age, sex, level of education, training and experience in swine production, seniority on the farm) were obtained through a face-to-face interview. The personality profile was assessed using a standard personality test (French translation of the Sixteen Personality Factor Questionnaire). Both the stockpersons on independent farms and those employed by the organizations were more reserved, emotionally stable, serious, conscientious, unsentimental, controlled, introverted, and less anxious than the average person in the general population. However, multivariate analyses revealed some differences between these two groups of stock-persons (P = 0.021) as well as between the employees of the different organizations (P = 0.0038). These differences in personality profiles may reflect differences in working conditions, particularly regarding the human relationships, and in corporate cultures of the organizations. PMID:8904659

The wind farm business

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kirby, T.

1995-01-01

This article highlights the tasks to be undertaken by the wind farm business starting with the initial site selection, through the planning stage and the consideration of technical matters, to the implementation and financial aspects. The current situation in the UK with regard to installed wind turbines, public attitude, and future prospects are discussed. (UK)

Continuous-Time Mean-Variance Portfolio Selection with Random Horizon

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Yu, Zhiyong

2013-01-01

This paper examines the continuous-time mean-variance optimal portfolio selection problem with random market parameters and random time horizon. Treating this problem as a linearly constrained stochastic linear-quadratic optimal control problem, I explicitly derive the efficient portfolios and efficient frontier in closed forms based on the solutions of two backward stochastic differential equations. Some related issues such as a minimum variance portfolio and a mutual fund theorem are also addressed. All the results are markedly different from those in the problem with deterministic exit time. A key part of my analysis involves proving the global solvability of a stochastic Riccati equation, which is interesting in its own right

Continuous-Time Mean-Variance Portfolio Selection with Random Horizon

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Yu, Zhiyong, E-mail: yuzhiyong@sdu.edu.cn [Shandong University, School of Mathematics (China)

2013-12-15

This paper examines the continuous-time mean-variance optimal portfolio selection problem with random market parameters and random time horizon. Treating this problem as a linearly constrained stochastic linear-quadratic optimal control problem, I explicitly derive the efficient portfolios and efficient frontier in closed forms based on the solutions of two backward stochastic differential equations. Some related issues such as a minimum variance portfolio and a mutual fund theorem are also addressed. All the results are markedly different from those in the problem with deterministic exit time. A key part of my analysis involves proving the global solvability of a stochastic Riccati equation, which is interesting in its own right.

TEHRAN AIR POLLUTANTS PREDICTION BASED ON RANDOM FOREST FEATURE SELECTION METHOD

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

A. Shamsoddini

2017-09-01

Full Text Available Air pollution as one of the most serious forms of environmental pollutions poses huge threat to human life. Air pollution leads to environmental instability, and has harmful and undesirable effects on the environment. Modern prediction methods of the pollutant concentration are able to improve decision making and provide appropriate solutions. This study examines the performance of the Random Forest feature selection in combination with multiple-linear regression and Multilayer Perceptron Artificial Neural Networks methods, in order to achieve an efficient model to estimate carbon monoxide and nitrogen dioxide, sulfur dioxide and PM2.5 contents in the air. The results indicated that Artificial Neural Networks fed by the attributes selected by Random Forest feature selection method performed more accurate than other models for the modeling of all pollutants. The estimation accuracy of sulfur dioxide emissions was lower than the other air contaminants whereas the nitrogen dioxide was predicted more accurate than the other pollutants.

Tehran Air Pollutants Prediction Based on Random Forest Feature Selection Method

Science.gov (United States)

Shamsoddini, A.; Aboodi, M. R.; Karami, J.

2017-09-01

Air pollution as one of the most serious forms of environmental pollutions poses huge threat to human life. Air pollution leads to environmental instability, and has harmful and undesirable effects on the environment. Modern prediction methods of the pollutant concentration are able to improve decision making and provide appropriate solutions. This study examines the performance of the Random Forest feature selection in combination with multiple-linear regression and Multilayer Perceptron Artificial Neural Networks methods, in order to achieve an efficient model to estimate carbon monoxide and nitrogen dioxide, sulfur dioxide and PM2.5 contents in the air. The results indicated that Artificial Neural Networks fed by the attributes selected by Random Forest feature selection method performed more accurate than other models for the modeling of all pollutants. The estimation accuracy of sulfur dioxide emissions was lower than the other air contaminants whereas the nitrogen dioxide was predicted more accurate than the other pollutants.

Modelling Farm Animal Welfare

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Chérie E. Part

2013-05-01

Full Text Available The use of models in the life sciences has greatly expanded in scope and advanced in technique in recent decades. However, the range, type and complexity of models used in farm animal welfare is comparatively poor, despite the great scope for use of modeling in this field of research. In this paper, we review the different modeling approaches used in farm animal welfare science to date, discussing the types of questions they have been used to answer, the merits and problems associated with the method, and possible future applications of each technique. We find that the most frequently published types of model used in farm animal welfare are conceptual and assessment models; two types of model that are frequently (though not exclusively based on expert opinion. Simulation, optimization, scenario, and systems modeling approaches are rarer in animal welfare, despite being commonly used in other related fields. Finally, common issues such as a lack of quantitative data to parameterize models, and model selection and validation are discussed throughout the review, with possible solutions and alternative approaches suggested.

Analysis of Goat Farming on Integrated Farming System in Banyumas

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

NN Hidayat

2007-05-01

Full Text Available The objective of this research were : 1 to find out the income generated from goat farming and its contribution to farmer income in several farming combination, 2 to find out the economic efficiency in goat farming with paddy and fish production, 3 to determine factors affecting level of production and income in different farming system, partially and aggregately, and 4 to determine the best combination of farming which generated maximum income. Household farmer survey method was performed to conduct this research. Farming model chosen in this research was partial and average aggregate. Cobb-Douglas function were chosen to predict functional relationship. Result stated from this research were : 1 goat farming has a significant contribution in integrated farming system, 2 integrated farming (goat and paddy, goat and fish, and goat, fish and paddy in Banyumas district was economically efficient. 3 partially, factor affecting production level in goat farming was number of goat owned (P<0.01, factor affecting paddy production were urea application and number of land owned (P<0.01, TSP application (P<0.05 and man power (P<0.10. Furthermore, factor affecting fish farming were feed, breed and number of land owned (P<0.01; 4 aggregately, factor affecting integrated farming I were urea application and number of land owned (P<0.01, feed and number of land owned (P<0.01, number of goat owned (P<0.10 integrated farming II, where as in integrated farming III were number of paddy land area and breed (P<0.01 also number of goat owned (P<0.10; 5 integrated farming III (goat, paddy and fish farming gave the highest profit, which gave Rp 6.219.283,81 with relatively high efficiency. Therefore, goat farming could be an alternative solution to be developed in integrated farming and could be combined with other farming activities such as paddy and fish farming. (Animal Production 9(2: 105-110 (2007 Key Words : Goat, income, economic efficiency, survey, contribution

Wind farm density and harvested power in very large wind farms: A low-order model

Science.gov (United States)

Cortina, G.; Sharma, V.; Calaf, M.

2017-07-01

In this work we create new understanding of wind turbine wakes recovery process as a function of wind farm density using large-eddy simulations of an atmospheric boundary layer diurnal cycle. Simulations are forced with a constant geostrophic wind and a time varying surface temperature extracted from a selected period of the Cooperative Atmospheric Surface Exchange Study field experiment. Wind turbines are represented using the actuator disk model with rotation and yaw alignment. A control volume analysis around each turbine has been used to evaluate wind turbine wake recovery and corresponding harvested power. Results confirm the existence of two dominant recovery mechanisms, advection and flux of mean kinetic energy, which are modulated by the background thermal stratification. For the low-density arrangements advection dominates, while for the highly loaded wind farms the mean kinetic energy recovers through fluxes of mean kinetic energy. For those cases in between, a smooth balance of both mechanisms exists. From the results, a low-order model for the wind farms' harvested power as a function of thermal stratification and wind farm density has been developed, which has the potential to be used as an order-of-magnitude assessment tool.

Organic farming at the farm level

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Jacobsen, Brian H.; Madsen, Niels; Ørum, Jens Erik

as part of a larger project entitled “Economic analyses of the future development of organic farming – effects at the field, farm, sector and macroeconomic level”. The project links effects at the field-level with analyses at the farm level. These effects are then used in sector and macroeconomic analyses......, which are described in other reports from Food and Resource Economic Institute (Jacobsen, 2005 and Andersen et al., 2005). This gives coherent results from the field to the macroeconomic level regarding changes in technology and legislation.......The purpose of this report is to present possible impacts of new technology and changes in legislation on the profitability of different types of organic farms. The aim is also to look at both the current and future trends in the organic area in Denmark. The farm level analyses are carried out...

Farm work-related asthma among US primary farm operators.

Science.gov (United States)

Mazurek, Jacek M; White, Gretchen E; Rodman, Chad; Schleiff, Patricia L

2015-01-01

The objective of this study was to estimate the prevalence of current asthma and the proportion of current asthma that is related to work on the farm among primary farm operators. The 2011 Farm and Ranch Safety Survey data were used to produce estimates and prevalence odds ratios. An estimated 5.1% of farm operators had asthma. Of these, 15.4% had farm work-related asthma. Among operators with farm work-related asthma, 54.8% (95% confidence interval [CI]: 41.8%-68.2%) had an asthma attack in the prior 12 months and 33.3% (95% CI: 21.2%-45.4%) had an asthma attack that occurred while doing farm work. Of those who had an asthma attack that occurred while doing farm work, 65.0% associated their asthma attack with plant/tree materials. This study provides updated information on asthma and the proportion of current asthma that is related to work on the farm and identifies certain groups of farm operators that might benefit from workplace asthma prevention intervention.

Are large farms more efficient? Tenure security, farm size and farm efficiency: evidence from northeast China

Science.gov (United States)

Zhou, Yuepeng; Ma, Xianlei; Shi, Xiaoping

2017-04-01

How to increase production efficiency, guarantee grain security, and increase farmers' income using the limited farmland is a great challenge that China is facing. Although theory predicts that secure property rights and moderate scale management of farmland can increase land productivity, reduce farm-related costs, and raise farmer's income, empirical studies on the size and magnitude of these effects are scarce. A number of studies have examined the impacts of land tenure or farm size on productivity or efficiency, respectively. There are also a few studies linking farm size, land tenure and efficiency together. However, to our best knowledge, there are no studies considering tenure security and farm efficiency together for different farm scales in China. In addition, there is little study analyzing the profit frontier. In this study, we particularly focus on the impacts of land tenure security and farm size on farm profit efficiency, using farm level data collected from 23 villages, 811 households in Liaoning in 2015. 7 different farm scales have been identified to further represent small farms, median farms, moderate-scale farms, and large farms. Technical efficiency is analyzed with stochastic frontier production function. The profit efficiency is regressed on a set of explanatory variables which includes farm size dummies, land tenure security indexes, and household characteristics. We found that: 1) The technical efficiency scores for production efficiency (average score = 0.998) indicate that it is already very close to the production frontier, and thus there is little room to improve production efficiency. However, there is larger space to raise profit efficiency (average score = 0.768) by investing more on farm size expansion, seed, hired labor, pesticide, and irrigation. 2) Farms between 50-80 mu are most efficient from the viewpoint of profit efficiency. The so-called moderate-scale farms (100-150 mu) according to the governmental guideline show no

Hebbian Learning in a Random Network Captures Selectivity Properties of the Prefrontal Cortex

Science.gov (United States)

Lindsay, Grace W.

2017-01-01

Complex cognitive behaviors, such as context-switching and rule-following, are thought to be supported by the prefrontal cortex (PFC). Neural activity in the PFC must thus be specialized to specific tasks while retaining flexibility. Nonlinear “mixed” selectivity is an important neurophysiological trait for enabling complex and context-dependent behaviors. Here we investigate (1) the extent to which the PFC exhibits computationally relevant properties, such as mixed selectivity, and (2) how such properties could arise via circuit mechanisms. We show that PFC cells recorded from male and female rhesus macaques during a complex task show a moderate level of specialization and structure that is not replicated by a model wherein cells receive random feedforward inputs. While random connectivity can be effective at generating mixed selectivity, the data show significantly more mixed selectivity than predicted by a model with otherwise matched parameters. A simple Hebbian learning rule applied to the random connectivity, however, increases mixed selectivity and enables the model to match the data more accurately. To explain how learning achieves this, we provide analysis along with a clear geometric interpretation of the impact of learning on selectivity. After learning, the model also matches the data on measures of noise, response density, clustering, and the distribution of selectivities. Of two styles of Hebbian learning tested, the simpler and more biologically plausible option better matches the data. These modeling results provide clues about how neural properties important for cognition can arise in a circuit and make clear experimental predictions regarding how various measures of selectivity would evolve during animal training. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT The prefrontal cortex is a brain region believed to support the ability of animals to engage in complex behavior. How neurons in this area respond to stimuli—and in particular, to combinations of stimuli (�

Coping styles in farmed fish: consequences for aquaculture

OpenAIRE

Castanheira, Maria Filipa; Conceicao, Luis E. C.; Millot, Sandie; Rey, Sonia; Begout, Marie-laure; Damsgard, Borge; Kristiansen, Tore; Hoglund, Erik; Overli, Oyvind; Martins, Catarina I. M.

2017-01-01

Individual differences in physiological and behavioural responses to stressors are increasingly recognised as adaptive variation and thus raw material for evolution and fish farming improvements including selective breeding. Such individual variation has been evolutionarily conserved and is present in all vertebrate taxa including fish. In farmed animals, the interest in consistent trait associations, that is coping styles, has increased dramatically over the last years because many studies h...

Performance Evaluation of User Selection Protocols in Random Networks with Energy Harvesting and Hardware Impairments

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Tan Nhat Nguyen

2016-01-01

Full Text Available In this paper, we evaluate performances of various user selection protocols under impact of hardware impairments. In the considered protocols, a Base Station (BS selects one of available Users (US to serve, while the remaining USs harvest the energy from the Radio Frequency (RF transmitted by the BS. We assume that all of the US randomly appear around the BS. In the Random Selection Protocol (RAN, the BS randomly selects a US to transmit the data. In the second proposed protocol, named Minimum Distance Protocol (MIND, the US that is nearest to the BS will be chosen. In the Optimal Selection Protocol (OPT, the US providing the highest channel gain between itself and the BS will be served. For performance evaluation, we derive exact and asymptotic closed-form expressions of average Outage Probability (OP over Rayleigh fading channels. We also consider average harvested energy per a US. Finally, Monte-Carlo simulations are then performed to verify the theoretical results.

A COPRAS-F base multi-criteria group decision making approach for site selection of wind farm

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Nikhil Chandra Chatterjee

2013-01-01

Full Text Available Today global warming is on the rise and the natural resources are getting consumed at a faster rate. Power consumption has increased many folds to cater the human need. Thus renewable energy resources are the only option available at this juncture. Wind energy is one of the renewable energy. Location selection for wind farm takes an important role on power generation. However, the location selection is a complex multicriteria problem due to the criteria factors which are conflicting in nature as well as uncertain. The process becomes more complex when a group of decision makers are involved in decision making. In the present study, a COPRAS (COmplex PRoportional ASsessment based multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM methodology is done under fuzzy environment with the help of multiple decision makers. More specifically, this study is aimed to focus the applicability of COPRAS-F as a strategic decision making tools to handle the group decision-making problems.

THE USE OF CAPITAL AND CONDITION OF ECONOMICALLY WEAK FARMS IN THE SELECTED CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPEAN COUNTRIES

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Aldona SKARŻYŃSKA

2014-06-01

Full Text Available This paper shows the economic situation of economically weak farms in 8 countries of Central and Eastern Europe(CEE in 2010. The data were obtained from the survey on EU farms carried out under the FADN system. The studyincluded countries in which economically weak farms were the dominant farm type (i.e. Bulgaria, Estonia, Hungary,Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania and Slovakia. The aim of the study was to assess the economic performance ofthose farms and indicate advantages of the competing farm types. The analysis was performed in terms of totalfactor productivity, income levels, assets and debt level. The influence of CAP instruments on managementefficiency was also demonstrated. The study found a high diversity in terms of production potential as well asfinancial condition of farms in particular countries, whereas one point of correspondence between farms is theprevalence of fixed assets, i.e. an excessive assets-to-area ratio, and the dominance of own capital in financingthose assets. Romanian, Polish and Bulgarian farms are characterised by the highest efficiency of use of currentoutlays and, in turn, a lower cost of the production unit, which accounted for 66%, 86% and 87% of the outputvalue respectively. In Latvia, Estonia and Slovenia, the costs exceeded the output value by 6%, 7% and 23%respectively and, as a result, the income of those farms was generated exclusively due to subsidies.

Influence of farming system and production purpose on the morpho structure of Spanish goat breeds

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Gonzalez-Martinez, A.; Herrera, M.; Luque, M.; Rodero, E.

2014-06-01

The aim of this study was to examine the possible influence of farming systems, based on the morpho structure of 1,571 female goats drawn from 40 flocks containing seven Spanish breeds (Blanca Andaluza, Blanca Celtiberica, Negra Serrana, Pirenaica, Payoya, Murciano-Granadina and Malaguena) raised under four different farming systems. Analysis of morphometric variables showed that the morphostructure of native Spanish goat breeds was linked to the farming system used and thus to the production purpose. The morphostructure of grazing breeds may be more influenced by natural selection within the physical environment and less by human selection. That of stall-fed breeds, by contrast, reflects intense artificial selection aimed at achieving a highly-productive dairy type. For this reason, morphological evaluation systems used in breeding programmes for meat or dual-purpose goat breeds farmed extensively or semiextensively should be specific, and should reflect the influence of the environment in which these goats are farmed. (Author)

On-farm Campylobacter and Escherichia coli in commercial broiler chickens: Re-used bedding does not influence Campylobacter emergence and levels across sequential farming cycles

Science.gov (United States)

Chinivasagam, H. N.; Estella, W.; Rodrigues, H.; Mayer, D. G.; Weyand, C.; Tran, T.; Onysk, A.; Diallo, I.

2016-01-01

Limitations in quality bedding material have resulted in the growing need to re-use litter during broiler farming in some countries, which can be of concern from a food-safety perspective. The aim of this study was to compare the Campylobacter levels in ceca and litter across three litter treatments under commercial farming conditions. The litter treatments were (a) the use of new litter after each farming cycle; (b) an Australian partial litter re-use practice; and (c) a full litter re-use practice. The study was carried out on two farms over two years (Farm 1, from 2009–2010 and Farm 2, from 2010–2011), across three sheds (35,000 to 40,000 chickens/shed) on each farm, adopting three different litter treatments across six commercial cycles. A random sampling design was adopted to test litter and ceca for Campylobacter and Escherichia coli, prior to commercial first thin-out and final pick-up. Campylobacter levels varied little across litter practices and farming cycles on each farm and were in the range of log 8.0–9.0 CFU/g in ceca and log 4.0–6.0 MPN/g for litter. Similarly the E. coli in ceca were ∼log 7.0 CFU/g. At first thin-out and final pick-up, the statistical analysis for both litter and ceca showed that the three-way interaction (treatments by farms by times) was highly significant (P litter treatments across the six farming cycles on both farms. Either C. jejuni or C. coli could be the dominant species across litter and ceca, and this phenomenon could not be attributed to specific litter treatments. Irrespective of the litter treatments in place, cycle 2 on Farm 2 remained Campylobacter-free. These outcomes suggest that litter treatments did not directly influence the time of emergence and levels of Campylobacter and E. coli during commercial farming. PMID:26908887

Sampling strategies in antimicrobial resistance monitoring: evaluating how precision and sensitivity vary with the number of animals sampled per farm.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Takehisa Yamamoto

Full Text Available Because antimicrobial resistance in food-producing animals is a major public health concern, many countries have implemented antimicrobial monitoring systems at a national level. When designing a sampling scheme for antimicrobial resistance monitoring, it is necessary to consider both cost effectiveness and statistical plausibility. In this study, we examined how sampling scheme precision and sensitivity can vary with the number of animals sampled from each farm, while keeping the overall sample size constant to avoid additional sampling costs. Five sampling strategies were investigated. These employed 1, 2, 3, 4 or 6 animal samples per farm, with a total of 12 animals sampled in each strategy. A total of 1,500 Escherichia coli isolates from 300 fattening pigs on 30 farms were tested for resistance against 12 antimicrobials. The performance of each sampling strategy was evaluated by bootstrap resampling from the observational data. In the bootstrapping procedure, farms, animals, and isolates were selected randomly with replacement, and a total of 10,000 replications were conducted. For each antimicrobial, we observed that the standard deviation and 2.5-97.5 percentile interval of resistance prevalence were smallest in the sampling strategy that employed 1 animal per farm. The proportion of bootstrap samples that included at least 1 isolate with resistance was also evaluated as an indicator of the sensitivity of the sampling strategy to previously unidentified antimicrobial resistance. The proportion was greatest with 1 sample per farm and decreased with larger samples per farm. We concluded that when the total number of samples is pre-specified, the most precise and sensitive sampling strategy involves collecting 1 sample per farm.

Farm Technologies and Production Risk in the Face of Climate ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

In countries where insurance and credit markets are thin or missing, production and consumption risks play a critical role in the choice and use of production inputs and adoption of new farm technologies. This paper investigated the effect of selected farm technologies and their risk implications in different rainfall patterns of ...

Renewable Energy Use in Smallholder Farming Systems: A Case Study in Tafresh Township of Iran

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hossein Shabanali Fami

2010-03-01

Full Text Available This study was conducted to investigate use of renewable energy and materials in smallholder farming system of the Tafresh township of Iran. The population of the study consisted of 2,400 small farmers working in the smallholder farming systems of the area, in which 133 people were selected as sample using Cochran formula and simple random sampling technique. In order to gather the information, a questionnaire was developed for the study and validated by the judgment of the experts in agricultural development and extension. The reliability of the main scales of the questionnaire was examined by Cronbach Alpha coefficients, which ranged from 0.7 to 0.93, indicating the tool of study is reliable. The findings revealed that the majority of the respondents use renewable energy and materials directly in its traditional forms without enabling technologies, and they lack the access to renewable technologies to improve the efficiency of energy use. They preferred fossil energy for many activities due to its lower cost and ease of access. The overall conclusion is that there are potentials and capacities for using renewable energies and materials in the farming systems of the Tafresh township. The government has to support and encourage the adoption of renewable technologies and abandon fossil fuels wherever possible.

The Outcomes of Selection in a Closed Herd on a Farm in Operation

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

ChangHee Do

2015-09-01

Full Text Available A herd of Berkshire pigs was established in 2003 and subjected to selection without introduction of any genetic resources until 2007. The complete pedigree, including 410 boars and 916 sows, as well as the records from 5,845 pigs and 822 litters were used to investigate the results obtained from the selections. The index of selection for breeding values included days to 90 kg (D90kg, backfat thickness (BF and number of piglets born alive (NBA. The average inbreeding coefficients of pigs were found to be 0.023, 0.008, 0.013, 0.025, 0.026, and 0.005 from 2003 to 2007, respectively. The genetic gains per year were 12.1 g, −0.04 mm, −3.13 days, and 0.181 head for average daily gain (ADG, BF, D90kg, and NBA, respectively. Breeding values of ADG, BF and D90kg were not significantly correlated with inbreeding coefficients of individuals, except for NBA (−0.21. The response per additional 1% of inbreeding was 0.0278 head reduction in NBA. The annual increase of inbreeding was 0.23% and the annual decrease in NBA due to inbreeding was 0.0064 head. This magnitude could be disregarded when compared with the annual gain in NBA (0.181 head. These results suggest that inbreeding and inbreeding depression on ordinary farms can be controlled with a proper breeding scheme and that breeding programs are economical and safe relative to the risks associated with importation of pigs.

The reliability of randomly selected final year pharmacy students in ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Employing ANOVA, factorial experimental analysis, and the theory of error, reliability studies were conducted on the assessment of the drug product chloroquine phosphate tablets. The G–Study employed equal numbers of the factors for uniform control, and involved three analysts (randomly selected final year Pharmacy ...

Certified safe farm: identifying and removing hazards on the farm.

Science.gov (United States)

Rautiainen, R H; Grafft, L J; Kline, A K; Madsen, M D; Lange, J L; Donham, K J

2010-04-01

This article describes the development of the Certified Safe Farm (CSF) on-farm safety review tools, characterizes the safety improvements among participating farms during the study period, and evaluates differences in background variables between low and high scoring farms. Average farm review scores on 185 study farms improved from 82 to 96 during the five-year study (0-100 scale, 85 required for CSF certification). A total of 1292 safety improvements were reported at an estimated cost of $650 per farm. A wide range of improvements were made, including adding 9 rollover protective structures (ROPS), 59 power take-off (PTO) master shields, and 207 slow-moving vehicle (SMV) emblems; improving lighting on 72 machines: placing 171 warning decals on machinery; shielding 77 moving parts; locking up 17 chemical storage areas, adding 83 lockout/tagout improvements; and making general housekeeping upgrades in 62 farm buildings. The local, trained farm reviewers and the CSF review process overall were well received by participating farmers. In addition to our earlier findings where higher farm review scores were associated with lower self-reported health outcome costs, we found that those with higher farm work hours, younger age, pork production in confinement, beef production, poultry production, and reported exposure to agrichemicals had higher farm review scores than those who did not have these characteristics. Overall, the farm review process functioned as expected. encouraging physical improvements in the farm environment, and contributing to the multi-faceted CSF intervention program.

Modeling livestock population structure: a geospatial database for Ontario swine farms.

Science.gov (United States)

Khan, Salah Uddin; O'Sullivan, Terri L; Poljak, Zvonimir; Alsop, Janet; Greer, Amy L

2018-01-30

Infectious diseases in farmed animals have economic, social, and health consequences. Foreign animal diseases (FAD) of swine are of significant concern. Mathematical and simulation models are often used to simulate FAD outbreaks and best practices for control. However, simulation outcomes are sensitive to the population structure used. Within Canada, access to individual swine farm population data with which to parameterize models is a challenge because of privacy concerns. Our objective was to develop a methodology to model the farmed swine population in Ontario, Canada that could represent the existing population structure and improve the efficacy of simulation models. We developed a swine population model based on the factors such as facilities supporting farm infrastructure, land availability, zoning and local regulations, and natural geographic barriers that could affect swine farming in Ontario. Assigned farm locations were equal to the swine farm density described in the 2011 Canadian Census of Agriculture. Farms were then randomly assigned to farm types proportional to the existing swine herd types. We compared the swine population models with a known database of swine farm locations in Ontario and found that the modeled population was representative of farm locations with a high accuracy (AUC: 0.91, Standard deviation: 0.02) suggesting that our algorithm generated a reasonable approximation of farm locations in Ontario. In the absence of a readily accessible dataset providing details of the relative locations of swine farms in Ontario, development of a model livestock population that captures key characteristics of the true population structure while protecting privacy concerns is an important methodological advancement. This methodology will be useful for individuals interested in modeling the spread of pathogens between farms across a landscape and using these models to evaluate disease control strategies.

Veterinary antibiotic resistance, residues, and ecological risks in environmental samples obtained from poultry farms, Egypt.

Science.gov (United States)

Dahshan, Hesham; Abd-Elall, Amr Mohamed Mohamed; Megahed, Ayman Mohamed; Abd-El-Kader, Mahdy A; Nabawy, Ehab Elsayed

2015-02-01

In Egypt, poultry production constitutes one of the main sources of pollution with veterinary antibiotics (VAs) into the environment. About 80 % of meat production in Egypt is of poultry origin, and the potential environmental risks associated with the use of VAs in these farms have not yet been properly evaluated. Thus, the main purpose of this research was to evaluate the prevalence of antibiotic-resistant enteric key bacteria and the incidence of residual antibiotics in poultry farm environmental samples and to determine whether fertilizing soils with poultry litter from farms potentially brings ecological risks. From December 2011 to September 2012, a total of 225 litter, bird dropping, and water samples were collected from 75 randomly selected boiler poultry farms. A high prevalence of Escherichia coli (n = 179; 79.5 %) in contrast to the low prevalence of Salmonella spp. (n = 7; 3.1 %) was detected. Amongst E. coli isolates, serotypes O142:K86, O125:K70, O91:K, and O119:K69 were the most common. Meanwhile, Salmonella enterica serotypes emek and enteritidis were recovered. The antibiograms using the disc diffusion method revealed significantly more common resistant and multi-resistant isolates in broiler poultry farms. Residues of tetracycline and ciprofloxacin were detected at 2.125 and 1.401 mg kg(-1) mean levels, respectively, in environmental samples contaminated with E. coli-resistant strains by HPLC. The risk evaluations highlighted that tetracycline residues in poultry litter significantly display environmental risks with a hazard quotient value above 1 (1.64). Our study implies that ineffective implementation of veterinary laws which guide and guard against incorrect VA usage may potentially bring health and environmental risks.

On-farm feed: the potential for improving profitability in aquaculture

OpenAIRE

Ibiyo, L.M.O.; Olowosegun, T.

2005-01-01

The urge to develop a standard practical diet for farmed fish in Nigeria has been on the increase since the last decade. Since ages diets has ever represent the largest single cost item of most fish farm operations. This is the reason why careful selection of feed ingredients for use in aqafeed plays a vital role in the resultant nutritional and economic success of farmed fish. In an attempt to meet the objectives of culturing fish two main sources of fish feed have been identified for meetin...

Random selection of items. Selection of n1 samples among N items composing a stratum

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Jaech, J.L.; Lemaire, R.J.

1987-02-01

STR-224 provides generalized procedures to determine required sample sizes, for instance in the course of a Physical Inventory Verification at Bulk Handling Facilities. The present report describes procedures to generate random numbers and select groups of items to be verified in a given stratum through each of the measurement methods involved in the verification. (author). 3 refs

An innovative method for offshore wind farm site selection based on the interval number with probability distribution

Science.gov (United States)

Wu, Yunna; Chen, Kaifeng; Xu, Hu; Xu, Chuanbo; Zhang, Haobo; Yang, Meng

2017-12-01

There is insufficient research relating to offshore wind farm site selection in China. The current methods for site selection have some defects. First, information loss is caused by two aspects: the implicit assumption that the probability distribution on the interval number is uniform; and ignoring the value of decision makers' (DMs') common opinion on the criteria information evaluation. Secondly, the difference in DMs' utility function has failed to receive attention. An innovative method is proposed in this article to solve these drawbacks. First, a new form of interval number and its weighted operator are proposed to reflect the uncertainty and reduce information loss. Secondly, a new stochastic dominance degree is proposed to quantify the interval number with a probability distribution. Thirdly, a two-stage method integrating the weighted operator with stochastic dominance degree is proposed to evaluate the alternatives. Finally, a case from China proves the effectiveness of this method.

Off-farm employment and income poverty in favourable agro-climatic areas of Tanzania

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Msinde, John Victor; Urassa, Justin K.; Nathan, Iben

2016-01-01

Income poverty in Tanzania as elsewhere in developing countries is predominantly a rural phenomenon and affects largely households relying on subsistence farming. This is despite the fact that poverty reduction strategies have devoted increasing attention on the role farm employment in enhancing...... household income. This paper argues that, off-farm employment may have potential to contribute to reduction of rural households’ income poverty. Hence the main objective of the paper is set to examine effects of off-farm employment on income poverty. Data was collected from a random sample of 309 households...... in the first quarter of 2014 in five villages of Kilombero Valley, Tanzania using a structured questionnaire. Income poverty was analysed using the Foster-Greer-Thorbecke (FGT) poverty index and two stage least square (2SLS) regression. Households with off-farm employment income were found to be less poor...

Modelling Farm Animal Welfare

Science.gov (United States)

Collins, Lisa M.; Part, Chérie E.

2013-01-01

Simple Summary In this review paper we discuss the different modeling techniques that have been used in animal welfare research to date. We look at what questions they have been used to answer, the advantages and pitfalls of the methods, and how future research can best use these approaches to answer some of the most important upcoming questions in farm animal welfare. Abstract The use of models in the life sciences has greatly expanded in scope and advanced in technique in recent decades. However, the range, type and complexity of models used in farm animal welfare is comparatively poor, despite the great scope for use of modeling in this field of research. In this paper, we review the different modeling approaches used in farm animal welfare science to date, discussing the types of questions they have been used to answer, the merits and problems associated with the method, and possible future applications of each technique. We find that the most frequently published types of model used in farm animal welfare are conceptual and assessment models; two types of model that are frequently (though not exclusively) based on expert opinion. Simulation, optimization, scenario, and systems modeling approaches are rarer in animal welfare, despite being commonly used in other related fields. Finally, common issues such as a lack of quantitative data to parameterize models, and model selection and validation are discussed throughout the review, with possible solutions and alternative approaches suggested. PMID:26487411

Overall Optimization for Offshore Wind Farm Electrical System

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hou, Peng; Hu, Weihao; Chen, Cong

2017-01-01

Based on particle swarm optimization (PSO), an optimization platform for offshore wind farm electrical system (OWFES) is proposed in this paper, where the main components of an offshore wind farm and key technical constraints are considered as input parameters. The offshore wind farm electrical...... system is optimized in accordance with initial investment by considering three aspects: the number and siting of offshore substations (OS), the cable connection layout of both collection system (CS) and transmission system (TS) as well as the selection of electrical components in terms of voltage level...... that save 3.01% total cost compared with the industrial layout, and can be a useful tool for OWFES design and evaluation....

Oxfendazole Resistance in Gastrointestinal Nematodes of Beetal Goats at Livestock Farms of Punjab (Pakistan

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

M. Saeed

2007-01-01

Full Text Available This study was carried out to screen goat farms for anthelmintic resistance (AR against oxfendazole (OXF and to determine contributory factors for its development. For this purpose, Beetal goat farms (n = 18 were randomly selected, with natural mixed gastrointestinal nematodosis infection. In vivo (faecal egg count reduction test and in vitro (egg hatch assay tests were used to ascertain the presence of AR while a scorecard was used to determine the role of possible contributory factors for oxfendazole resistance. For in vivo test, the experimental animals were divided into two groups of 10 animals each; one group received OXF treatment, while the other served as control. Pre- and post-treatment coproculture was performed to identify the species and genera of nematodes. Egg hatch assay (EHA was used to confirm the results of FECRT. Fecal egg count reduction test (FECRT revealed the development of resistance on six farms and post-treatment larval cultures indicated Haemonchus contortus, Trichostrongylus colubriformis, Cooperia curticei, Teladorsagia circumcincta and Oesophagostomum spp. as dominant species with resistance. Furthermore, EHA confirmed the results of FECRT. Among the presumptive factors for AR, the highest composite score was for rotation of anthelmintics followed by treatment frequency, dose rate and nature of medication. The scorecard for the development of AR, used in this study, may be helpful for the assessment of contributory factors of AR.

Methodological Aspects of On-Farm Monitoring of Cropping Systems Management

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Luca Bechini

Full Text Available To conduct agro-environmental assessments at field and farm scale, detailed management data of crop and animal production systems are needed. However, this type of data is only rarely collected by public administrations. In the period 2005-2006, we made an experience of on-farm monitoring of cropping systems management, within a larger project aimed at assessing sustainability of agricultural systems in Italian Parks. In this paper, we describe and discuss the steps taken to carry out periodic face-to-face interviews in farms in the Sud Milano Agricultural Park (northern Italy. The first step was the selection of seven farms, which we identified by applying cluster analysis at a large database describing 733 farms of the Park. After having identified the most relevant agro-environmental issues in the studied area, we established a list of simple but sound indicators to evaluate the effects of agricultural management on the environment. The criteria used to select the indicators were that they should: be calculated on easily available data, not be based on direct measurements, make a synthesis of different aspects of reality, and be easily calculated and understood. The indicators selected evaluate nutrient management, fossil energy use, pesticide toxicity, soil management, and economic performance. Subsequently, we designed a data model to store input data used to calculate the indicators (farm configuration, flows of materials and money through the farm gate, animals and their rations, history of crop cultivation, crop management. The data model that we obtained is relatively complex, but adequate to store and analyse the large amount of data acquired during the two-year project. A questionnaire was developed to fully comply with the indicators selected and the data model. The questionnaire was used to carry out approximately six interviews per farm each year, with an investment of time of 1-2 hours per interview. Appropriate double checks of

Economic activities results and problems of the farm engaged in production of stick tomatoes in Erdemli (Mersin) Province

Science.gov (United States)

Direk, M.; Topkara, S.

2018-03-01

This study was carried out to investigate the socio-economic status of the stick-grown tomatoes located in Erdemli district of Mersin province and to examine the annual activity results and to reveal the problems. The data used in the research were obtained from questionnaires conducted with 44 selected farms by stratified random sampling method. The data obtained is for the 2016 production period. In the farmer surveyed, the operating area per farm was 7.01 da. In the enterprises, the average active capital per farm (69,916 ), 89.62% of the land capital and 2,40% of the operating capital. The ratio of own capital in the passive capital is 85.22%. In the examined farm, the average net yield was 3,150 , the agricultural income was 5,483 , the financial profitability was 4.29% and the economic profitability was 4.39%. As a result of the pie tomato cost analysis, the cost of tomato was determined to be below the tomato sales price. In the study, the cost of 1 kg product was calculated as 0,23 . The surplus supply in the time of the intensive production of tomatoes in the region of the study causes the prices to decrease. For this reason, it is necessary to try to ensure price stability by ensuring balanced distribution of the accrual during the season.

The mathematics of random mutation and natural selection for multiple simultaneous selection pressures and the evolution of antimicrobial drug resistance.

Science.gov (United States)

Kleinman, Alan

2016-12-20

The random mutation and natural selection phenomenon act in a mathematically predictable behavior, which when understood leads to approaches to reduce and prevent the failure of the use of these selection pressures when treating infections and cancers. The underlying principle to impair the random mutation and natural selection phenomenon is to use combination therapy, which forces the population to evolve to multiple selection pressures simultaneously that invoke the multiplication rule of probabilities simultaneously as well. Recently, it has been seen that combination therapy for the treatment of malaria has failed to prevent the emergence of drug-resistant variants. Using this empirical example and the principles of probability theory, the derivation of the equations describing this treatment failure is carried out. These equations give guidance as to how to use combination therapy for the treatment of cancers and infectious diseases and prevent the emergence of drug resistance. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Capital Strategy in Diversification Farming Efforts Using SWOT Analysis

Science.gov (United States)

Damanhuri; Setyohadi, D. P. S.; Utami, M. M. D.; Kurnianto, M. F.; Hariono, B.

2018-01-01

Wetland farm diversification program in the district of Bojonegoro, Tulungagung, and Ponorogo can not provide an optimal contribution to the income of farmers caused because farmers are not able to cultivate high value-added commodities due to limited capital. This study aims to identify the characteristics of farming, capital pattern, stakeholder role, to analyze farming to know the pattern of planting suggestions and prospects, and to formulate capital facilitation strategy. Farming capital is obtained through loans in financial institutions with different patterns. Small farmers tend to utilize savings and credit cooperatives, microcredit, and loan sharks, while farmers with large wetland holdings tend to utilize commercial banks. P enelitian using descriptive method of farming profit analysis, and SWOT. The government through the banking institutions have provided much facilitation in the form of low-interest loans with flexible payment method. The generic strategy of selected capital facilitation is to empower farmers through farmer groups who have the capability in managing the capital needs of their members.

The Milking Profile of Dairy Cattle Farms in Central Macedonia (Greece

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Ioannis Mitsopoulos

2013-05-01

Full Text Available The purpose of this paper is to provide insights of the profile of the dairy farms of Central Macedonia (Greece, in terms of their milking practices. The analysis is based on data from a random sample of 123 dairy farms, obtained by means of a survey. The employment of the Categorical Principal Component Analysis on the 14 variables initially used to describe milking practices and of the Two-Step Cluster Analysis led to the grouping of the 123 farms to three clusters. Farms of the first cluster, named “Innovative”, use state-of-the-art equipment, automatic systems and innovative milking techniques (31.1% of the sample farms. “Peasant” farms (11.4% are mainly extensive, using mainly bucket plants. The third and most abundant group, the “Modernizing” farms (54.5% are use equipment of reasonable standards and some of them are on the process of renewing it. The results of a Multinomial Logit model verify that “Innovative” farms are large and achieve high yields, while the “Modernizing” ones are smaller, producing milk of lower quality and they are owned by relatively older dairy farmers. An interesting profile is depicted for “Peasant” farms, as they achieve satisfactory economic performance, combined with adequate milk quality. The analytical framework included the reduction of analysis variables to a smaller group of “dimensions”, using the Categorical Principal Component Analysis (CatPCA, based on which farms were clustered to alternative profiles, by employing a Two-Step Cluster (TSC Analysis. Differences in elements of milk quality and in the social profile of farms and farmers were examined among alternative profiles through the estimation of Multinomial Logit Models.

Farm Typology in the Berambadi Watershed (India: Farming Systems Are Determined by Farm Size and Access to Groundwater

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Marion Robert

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Farmers’ production decisions and agricultural practices directly and indirectly influence the quantity and quality of natural resources, some being depleted common resources such as groundwater. Representing farming systems while accounting for their flexibility is needed to evaluate targeted, regional water management policies. Farmers’ decisions regarding investing in irrigation and adopting cropping systems are inherently dynamic and must adapt to changes in climate and agronomic, economic and social, and institutional, conditions. To represent this diversity, we developed a typology of Indian farmers from a survey of 684 farms in Berambadi, an agricultural watershed in southern India (state of Karnataka. The survey provided information on farm structure, the cropping system and farm practices, water management for irrigation, and economic performances of the farm. Descriptive statistics and multivariate analysis (Multiple Correspondence Analysis and Agglomerative Hierarchical Clustering were used to analyze relationships between observed factors and establish the farm typology. We identified three main types of farms: (1 large diversified and productivist farms; (2 small and marginal rainfed farms, and (3 small irrigated marketing farms. This typology represents the heterogeneity of farms in the Berambadi watershed.

Objecthood, Agency and Mutualism in Valenced Farm Animal Environments

OpenAIRE

Ian G. Colditz

2018-01-01

Genetic selection of farm animals for productivity, and intensification of farming practices have yielded substantial improvements in efficiency; however, the capacity of animals to cope with environmental challenges has diminished. Understanding how the animal and environment interact is central to efforts to improve the health, fitness, and welfare of animals through breeding and management strategies. The review examines aspects of the environment that are sensed by the animal. The predict...

Integrated Method for Optimizing Connection Layout and Cable Selection for an Internal Network of a Wind Farm

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Andrzej Wędzik

2015-09-01

Full Text Available An internal network of a wind farm is similar to a wide network structure. Wind turbines are deployed over a vast area, and cable lines used to interconnect them may have lengths reaching tens of kilometres. The cost of constructing such a network is a major component of the entire investment. Therefore, it is advisable to develop a configuration of such a farm’s internal connections which will minimise the cost, while complying with technical requirements even at the design stage. So far this has usually been done within two independent processes. At first the network structure ensuring the shortest possible connections between the turbines is determined. Then appropriate cables compliant with technical regulations are selected for the specified structure. But does this design approach ensure the optimal (lowest investment cost? This paper gives an answer to this question. A method for accomplishing the task given in the title is presented. Examples of calculations are presented and results are compared for the two methods of optimal wind farm internal connection structure design and cable cross-section dimensioning: two-stage and integrated. The usefulness of employing the Mixed Integer Nonlinear Programming (MNLP method in the process of determining the optimal structure of a wind farm’s cable network is demonstrated.

Smallholder Farms and the Potential for Sustainable Intensification.

Science.gov (United States)

Mungai, Leah M; Snapp, Sieglinde; Messina, Joseph P; Chikowo, Regis; Smith, Alex; Anders, Erin; Richardson, Robert B; Li, Guiying

2016-01-01

The sustainable intensification of African agriculture is gaining momentum with the compelling need to increase food and agricultural production. In Southern Africa, smallholder farming systems are predominately maize-based and subject to erratic climatic conditions. Farmer crop and soil management decisions are influenced by a plethora of complex factors such as market access resource availability, social relations, environment, and various messages on sustainable farming practices. Such factors pose barriers to increasing sustainable intensification in Africa. This paper characterizes smallholder farming practices in Central Malawi, at Africa Research in Sustainable Intensification for the Next Generation (Africa RISING) project sites. We present findings from a survey of 324 farmers, located within four Africa RISING sites selected in a stratified random manner to represent (1) low agricultural potential (high evapotranspiration, variable rainfall), (2) medium agricultural potential (two sites), and (3) high agricultural potential (well-distributed rainfall). Soil fertility was low overall, and certain farming practices appeared to limit the sustainability of agricultural production. Nearly half of farmers did not value legume residues as a high nutrient value resource for soil amelioration, as legume residues were removed (17.9%) or burned (21.4%). Conversely, maize residues were rarely removed (4.5%) or burned (10.4%). We found that farmers do not allocate soil amendment resources to legume fields (zero instances of mineral fertilizer or manure application to legumes compared to 88 and 22% of maize systems, respectively). Policy makers in Malawi have led initiatives to intensify agricultural systems through subsidizing farmer access to mineral fertilizer as well as maize hybrid seed, and only rarely to improved legume seed. In this survey, farmers allocate mineral fertilizer to maize systems and not legume systems. There is urgent need to invest in education

Smallholder Farms and the Potential for Sustainable Intensification

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Leah M Mungai

2016-11-01

Full Text Available The sustainable intensification of African agriculture is gaining momentum with the compelling need to increase food and agricultural production. In Southern Africa, smallholder farming systems are predominately maize-based and subject to erratic climatic conditions. Farmer crop and soil management decisions are influenced by a plethora of complex factors such as market access resource availability, social relations, environment and various messages on sustainable farming practices. Such factors pose barriers to increasing sustainable intensification in Africa. This paper characterizes smallholder farming practices in Central Malawi, at Africa Research in Sustainable Intensification for the Next Generation (Africa RISING project sites. We present findings from a survey of 324 farmers, located within four Africa RISING sites selected in a stratified random manner to represent (1 low agricultural potential (high evapotranspiration, variable rainfall, (2 medium agricultural potential (two sites, and (3 high agricultural potential (well distributed rainfall. Soil fertility was low overall, and certain farming practices appeared to limit the sustainability of agricultural production. Nearly half of farmers did not value legume residues as a high nutrient value resource for soil amelioration, as legume residues were removed (17.9% or burned (21.4%. Conversely, maize residues were rarely removed (4.5% or burned (10.4%. We found that farmers do not allocate soil amendment resources to legume fields (zero instances of mineral fertilizer or manure application to legumes compared to 88% and 22% of maize systems, respectively. Policy makers in Malawi have led initiatives to intensify agricultural systems through subsidizing farmer access to mineral fertilizer as well as maize hybrid seed, and only rarely to improved legume seed. In this survey, farmers allocate mineral fertilizer to maize systems and not legume systems. There is urgent need to invest in

A Bayesian random effects discrete-choice model for resource selection: Population-level selection inference

Science.gov (United States)

Thomas, D.L.; Johnson, D.; Griffith, B.

2006-01-01

Modeling the probability of use of land units characterized by discrete and continuous measures, we present a Bayesian random-effects model to assess resource selection. This model provides simultaneous estimation of both individual- and population-level selection. Deviance information criterion (DIC), a Bayesian alternative to AIC that is sample-size specific, is used for model selection. Aerial radiolocation data from 76 adult female caribou (Rangifer tarandus) and calf pairs during 1 year on an Arctic coastal plain calving ground were used to illustrate models and assess population-level selection of landscape attributes, as well as individual heterogeneity of selection. Landscape attributes included elevation, NDVI (a measure of forage greenness), and land cover-type classification. Results from the first of a 2-stage model-selection procedure indicated that there is substantial heterogeneity among cow-calf pairs with respect to selection of the landscape attributes. In the second stage, selection of models with heterogeneity included indicated that at the population-level, NDVI and land cover class were significant attributes for selection of different landscapes by pairs on the calving ground. Population-level selection coefficients indicate that the pairs generally select landscapes with higher levels of NDVI, but the relationship is quadratic. The highest rate of selection occurs at values of NDVI less than the maximum observed. Results for land cover-class selections coefficients indicate that wet sedge, moist sedge, herbaceous tussock tundra, and shrub tussock tundra are selected at approximately the same rate, while alpine and sparsely vegetated landscapes are selected at a lower rate. Furthermore, the variability in selection by individual caribou for moist sedge and sparsely vegetated landscapes is large relative to the variability in selection of other land cover types. The example analysis illustrates that, while sometimes computationally intense, a

Statistical meandering wake model and its application to yaw-angle optimisation of wind farms

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Thøgersen, E; Tranberg, B; Greiner, M; Herp, J

2017-01-01

The wake produced by a wind turbine is dynamically meandering and of rather narrow nature. Only when looking at large time averages, the wake appears to be static and rather broad, and is then well described by simple engineering models like the Jensen wake model (JWM). We generalise the latter deterministic models to a statistical meandering wake model (SMWM), where a random directional deflection is assigned to a narrow wake in such a way that on average it resembles a broad Jensen wake. In a second step, the model is further generalised to wind-farm level, where the deflections of the multiple wakes are treated as independently and identically distributed random variables. When carefully calibrated to the Nysted wind farm, the ensemble average of the statistical model produces the same wind-direction dependence of the power efficiency as obtained from the standard Jensen model. Upon using the JWM to perform a yaw-angle optimisation of wind-farm power output, we find an optimisation gain of 6.7% for the Nysted wind farm when compared to zero yaw angles and averaged over all wind directions. When applying the obtained JWM-based optimised yaw angles to the SMWM, the ensemble-averaged gain is calculated to be 7.5%. This outcome indicates the possible operational robustness of an optimised yaw control for real-life wind farms. (paper)

Statistical meandering wake model and its application to yaw-angle optimisation of wind farms

Science.gov (United States)

Thøgersen, E.; Tranberg, B.; Herp, J.; Greiner, M.

2017-05-01

The wake produced by a wind turbine is dynamically meandering and of rather narrow nature. Only when looking at large time averages, the wake appears to be static and rather broad, and is then well described by simple engineering models like the Jensen wake model (JWM). We generalise the latter deterministic models to a statistical meandering wake model (SMWM), where a random directional deflection is assigned to a narrow wake in such a way that on average it resembles a broad Jensen wake. In a second step, the model is further generalised to wind-farm level, where the deflections of the multiple wakes are treated as independently and identically distributed random variables. When carefully calibrated to the Nysted wind farm, the ensemble average of the statistical model produces the same wind-direction dependence of the power efficiency as obtained from the standard Jensen model. Upon using the JWM to perform a yaw-angle optimisation of wind-farm power output, we find an optimisation gain of 6.7% for the Nysted wind farm when compared to zero yaw angles and averaged over all wind directions. When applying the obtained JWM-based optimised yaw angles to the SMWM, the ensemble-averaged gain is calculated to be 7.5%. This outcome indicates the possible operational robustness of an optimised yaw control for real-life wind farms.

Selecting optimum locations for co-located wave and wind energy farms. Part II: A case study

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Astariz, S.; Iglesias, G.

2016-01-01

Highlights: • The benefits of wave and wind combined systems relative to independent farms are analysed. • This purpose is carried out through a case study off the Danish coast. • The power production, power smoothing and shadow effect are analysed. • Hindcast and measured wave and wind data from 2005 to 2015 are used. • Third-generation models of winds and waves (WAsP and SWAN) are used. - Abstract: Combined energy systems present an opportunity to enhance the competitiveness of renewables and overcome other challenges of these novel renewables by realising the synergies between them. Among the different possibilities for combined systems, this work focuses on wave and wind co-located farms with the aim of assessing their benefits relative to standalone wind farms. To this end we estimate the energy production, investigate the power smoothing and shadow effect, and quantify the reduction in downtime achieved by the co-located farm through a case study off the Danish coast – a promising area for co-located farms based on the available resource and other considerations including technical constraints. The analysis is carried out based on hindcast data and observations extending from 2005 to 2015, and by means of state-of-the-art numerical models of the wind and wave fields – WAsP and SWAN, respectively. It is found that the energy yield per unit area with the combined wave-wind farm increases by 3.4% relative to a standalone wind farm, the downtime periods decrease by 58% and the power output variability reduces by 12.5%. Moreover, the capital and operational expenditures (CAPEX and OPEX, respectively) would also be significantly reduced thanks to the synergies realised through the combination of wind and wave power.

Feasibility study on the wind farm; Wind farm no kanosei chosa

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

1997-03-01

For assessment of the possibility of the wind farm (collective wind power facility) in Japan, site conditions, business plans and various issues in development were arranged using some projects in a planning stage. The case study of a system design was also conducted for a typical site. Four sites were selected based on geographical conditions, topographic features and weather conditions. Scales of every site are as large as 1000-3000kW and 400- 750kW in wind turbine capacity. Every developer expects a subsidy, and governmental economic support is indispensable for the wind farm. In the case of Hisai city, Mie prefecture with the most favorable wind condition in Japan, the annual mean wind velocity of the site is valued at nearly 8m/s, suggesting that it is promising for the wind farm. From the planned scale of 750kWtimes4, the annual generated power and availability factor are valued at 9,800,000kWh/y and 37%, respectively. From the construction cost of 1 billion yen including a subsidy of its half, the generation cost is valued at 14.5 yen/kWh in durability of 15 years, and 12.2 yen/kWh in 20 years, and the profitability is dependent on the purchase price of a power company. 27 figs., 36 tabs.

Mortality in farmed mink: Systematic collection versus arbitrary submissions for diagnostic investigation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Rattenborg, Erik; Dietz, Hans-Henrik; Andersen, T.H.

1999-01-01

The distribution of diagnoses of mortality in mink submitted to the Danish Veterinary Laboratory (DVL) for diagnostic investigation in the calendar year 1997 was compared with the diagnoses of mortality in all dead mink collected at 4 selected farms (project farms) during the same period. A total...

Study of integrated optimization design of wind farm in complex terrain

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Xu, Chang; Chen, Dandan; Han, Xingxing

2017-01-01

wind farm design in complex terrain and setting up integrated optimization mathematical model for micro-site selection, power lines and road maintenance design etc.. Based on the existing 1-year wind measurement data in the wind farm area, the genetic algorithm was used to optimize the micro......-site selection. On the basis of location optimization of wind turbine, the optimization algorithms such as single-source shortest path algorithm and minimum spanning tree algorithm were used to optimize electric lines and maintenance roads. The practice shows that the research results can provide important...

The signature of positive selection at randomly chosen loci.

Science.gov (United States)

Przeworski, Molly

2002-03-01

In Drosophila and humans, there are accumulating examples of loci with a significant excess of high-frequency-derived alleles or high levels of linkage disequilibrium, relative to a neutral model of a random-mating population of constant size. These are features expected after a recent selective sweep. Their prevalence suggests that positive directional selection may be widespread in both species. However, as I show here, these features do not persist long after the sweep ends: The high-frequency alleles drift to fixation and no longer contribute to polymorphism, while linkage disequilibrium is broken down by recombination. As a result, loci chosen without independent evidence of recent selection are not expected to exhibit either of these features, even if they have been affected by numerous sweeps in their genealogical history. How then can we explain the patterns in the data? One possibility is population structure, with unequal sampling from different subpopulations. Alternatively, positive selection may not operate as is commonly modeled. In particular, the rate of fixation of advantageous mutations may have increased in the recent past.

Pattern of Decision Making of Irula Tribal Farm Women in Nilgiris District

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Sujeetha Natarajan

2016-07-01

Full Text Available The study was undertaken to find out the pattern of decision making of the Irula  tribal farm women of Nilgiris district in farm and home. The study revealed that Irula tribal farm women took self decision in the case of irrigating fields (85.00 followed by using plant protection measures (83.33 in case of farm management and took self decision in cases like selection and preparation of food (100.00, decorating the house (70.00 They had least participation in decisions like construction of new house (63.33 followed by borrowing and giving loans (38.33.

The National Cohort of Dairy Farms--a data collection platform for mastitis research in Canada.

Science.gov (United States)

Reyher, K K; Dufour, S; Barkema, H W; Des Côteaux, L; Devries, T J; Dohoo, I R; Keefe, G P; Roy, J-P; Scholl, D T

2011-03-01

Costs and feasibility of extensive sample collection and processing are major obstacles to mastitis epidemiology research. Studies are often consequentially limited, and fundamental mastitis researchers rarely have the opportunity to conduct their work in epidemiologically valid populations. To mitigate these limitations, the Canadian Bovine Mastitis Research Network has optimized research funds by creating a data collection platform to provide epidemiologically meaningful data for several simultaneous research endeavors. This platform consists of a National Cohort of Dairy Farms (NCDF), Mastitis Laboratory Network, and Mastitis Pathogen Culture Collection. This paper describes the implementation and operation of the NCDF, explains its sampling protocols and data collection, and documents characteristics, strengths and limitations of these data for current and potential users. The NCDF comprises 91 commercial dairy farms in 6 provinces sampled over a 2-yr period. Primarily Holstein-Friesian herds participating in Dairy Herd Improvement milk recording were selected in order to achieve a uniform distribution among 3 strata of bulk tank somatic cell counts and to reflect regional proportions of freestall housing systems. Standardized protocols were implemented for repeated milk samplings on clinical mastitis cases, fresh and randomly selected lactating cows, and cows at dry-off and after calving. Just fewer than 133,000 milk samples were collected. Demographic and production data were recorded at individual cow and farm levels. Health management data are documented and extensive questionnaire data detailing farm management and cleanliness information are also captured. The Laboratory Network represents coordinated regional mastitis bacteriology laboratories using standardized procedures. The Culture Collection archives isolates recovered from intramammary infections of cows in the NCDF and contains over 16,500 isolates, all epidemiologically cross-referenced between

Multi-objective genetic algorithm based innovative wind farm layout optimization method

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Chen, Ying; Li, Hua; He, Bang; Wang, Pengcheng; Jin, Kai

2015-01-01

Highlights: • Innovative optimization procedures for both regular and irregular shape wind farm. • Using real wind condition and commercial wind turbine parameters. • Using multiple-objective genetic algorithm optimization method. • Optimize the selection of different wind turbine types and their hub heights. - Abstract: Layout optimization has become one of the critical approaches to increase power output and decrease total cost of a wind farm. Previous researches have applied intelligent algorithms to optimizing the wind farm layout. However, those wind conditions used in most of previous research are simplified and not accurate enough to match the real world wind conditions. In this paper, the authors propose an innovative optimization method based on multi-objective genetic algorithm, and test it with real wind condition and commercial wind turbine parameters. Four case studies are conducted to investigate the number of wind turbines needed in the given wind farm. Different cost models are also considered in the case studies. The results clearly demonstrate that the new method is able to optimize the layout of a given wind farm with real commercial data and wind conditions in both regular and irregular shapes, and achieve a better result by selecting different type and hub height wind turbines.

Multi-Criteria Analysis for Solar Farm Location Suitability

Science.gov (United States)

Mierzwiak, Michal; Calka, Beata

2017-12-01

Currently the number of solar farms, as a type of renewable sources of energy, is growing rapidly. Photovoltaic power stations have many advantages, which is an incentive for their building and development. Solar energy is readily available and inexhaustible, and its production is environmentally friendly. In the present study multiple environmental and economic criteria were taken into account to select a potential photovoltaic farm location, with particular emphasis on: protected areas, land cover, solar radiation, slope angle, proximity to roads, built-up areas, and power lines. Advanced data analysis were used because of the multiplicity of criteria and their diverse influence on the choice of a potential location. They included the spatial analysis, the Weighted Linear Combination Technique (WLC), and the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) as a decisionmaking method. The analysis was divided into two stages. In the first one, the areas where the location of solar farms was not possible were excluded. In the second one, the best locations meeting all environmental and economic criteria were selected. The research was conducted for the Legionowo District, using data from national surveying and mapping resources such as: BDOT10k (Database of Topographic Objects), NMT (Numerical Terrain Model), and lands and buildings register. Finally, several areas meeting the criteria were chosen. The research deals with solar farms with up to 40 kW power. The results of the study are presented as thematic maps. The advantage of the method is its versatility. It can be used not only for any area, but with little modification of the criteria, it can also be applied to choose a location for wind farms.

Dairy farm demographics and management factors that played a role in the re-emergence of brucellosis on dairy cattle farms in Fiji.

Science.gov (United States)

Tukana, Andrew; Gummow, B

2017-08-01

Little is published on risk factors associated with bovine brucellosis in Pacific island communities. The 2009 re-emergence of bovine brucellosis in Fiji enabled us to do an interview-based questionnaire survey of 81 farms in the Wainivesi locality of the Tailevu province on the main island of Fiji to investigate what risk factors could have played a role in the re-emergence of the disease. The survey was conducted on 68 farms that had no positive cases of bovine brucellosis and on 13 farms in the same area where cattle had returned a positive result to the Brucella Rose Bengal test. Descriptive statistical methods were used to describe the demographic data while univariate analysis and multivariate logistic regression were used to evaluate the association between the selected risk factors and the presence of brucellosis on the farms at the time of the outbreak. The demographics of Fijian dairy farms are presented in the article and the biosecurity implications of those farming systems are discussed. Two risk factors were strongly associated with farms having brucellosis, and these were history of reactor cattle to brucellosis and or bovine tuberculosis on the farm (OR = 29, P ≤ 0.01) and farms that practised sharing of water sources for cattle within and with outside farms (OR = 39, P ≤ 0.01). Possible reasons why these were risk factors are also discussed. The potential risks for human health was also high as the use of personal protective equipment was low (15%). A high proportion of farmers (62%) could not recognise brucellosis thus contributing to the low frequency of disease reports (44%) made. The article also highlights other important risk factors which could be attributed to farming practices in the region and which could contribute to public health risks and the re-emergence of diseases.

Evaluation of Technological, Economic and Social Indicators for Different Farming Practices in Lithuania

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Aistė Galnaitytė

2017-12-01

Full Text Available Organic and integrated farming practices contribute to protecting biodiversity, reducing environmental pollution, improving soil quality, and providing high-quality raw material for food industry. The objective of the article is to establish the methodology and evaluate the system of indicators, which enables answering the question which farming practice has more advantages: organic or integrated? Multi-criteria analysis methods were used to achieve this objective. When being compared with between conventional and integrated farming practices, organic farming practice achieves higher profitability and greater energy efficiency. Organic farming reveals to be either superior, or similar to integrated farming practices in environmental terms. Potatoes, fruits and berries under both conventional and integrated farming practices have obtained the same rank (1–2 according to the selected criterions (yield, share of sold product, expenses on plant protection, production cost, price and labour input. Organic farming practice has shown worse rank. Organic farming practice has appeared to be the most suitable for vegetables.

A Wind Farm Electrical Systems Evaluation with EeFarm-II

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jan Pierik

2010-03-01

Full Text Available EeFarm-II is used to evaluate 13 different electrical systems for a 200 MW wind farm with a 100 km connection to shore. The evaluation is based on component manufacturer data of 2009. AC systems are compared to systems with DC connections inside the wind farm and DC connection to shore. Two options have the best performance for this wind farm size and distance: the AC system and the system with a DC connection to shore. EeFarm-II is a user friendly computer program for wind farm electrical and economic evaluation. It has been built as a Simulink Library in the graphical interface of Matlab-Simulink. EeFarm-II contains models of wind turbines, generators, transformers, AC cables, inductors, nodes, splitters, PWM converters, thyristor converters, DC cables, choppers and statcoms.

To what extent does organic farming rely on nutrient inflows from conventional farming?

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Nowak, Benjamin; Nesme, Thomas; Pellerin, Sylvain; David, Christophe

2013-01-01

Organic farming is increasingly recognized as a prototype for sustainable agriculture. Its guidelines ban the use of artificial fertilizers. However, organic farms may import nutrients from conventional farming through material exchanges. In this study, we aimed at estimating the magnitude of these flows through the quantification of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium inflows from conventional farming to organic farming. Material inflows and outflows were collected for two cropping years on 63 farms. The farms were located in three French agricultural districts distributed over a gradient of farming activity defined by both the stocking rate and the ratio of the farm area under arable crops. Our results showed that on average, inflows from conventional farming were 23%, 73% and 53% for nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, respectively. These inflows were strongly determined by the farm production systems. However, for farms similar in terms of production systems, the inflows also depended on the local context, such as the proximity of organic livestock farms: the reliance of organic farming on conventional farming was lower in mixed than in specialized districts. These results highlight the necessity to quantify the contribution of nutrient inflows from conventional farming when assessing organic farming and development scenarios. (letter)

Analysis of Goat Farming on Integrated Farming System in Banyumas

OpenAIRE

Hidayat, NN

2007-01-01

The objective of this research were : 1) to find out the income generated from goat farming and its contribution to farmer income in several farming combination, 2) to find out the economic efficiency in goat farming with paddy and fish production, 3) to determine factors affecting level of production and income in different farming system, partially and aggregately, and 4) to determine the best combination of farming which generated maximum income. Household farmer survey method was performe...

Optimal support vessel and access system selection for offshore wind farms

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Asgarpour, M.; Serraris, J.W.; Ridder, E. de; Broek, J. van den; Bos, J.E.

2016-01-01

Operation and maintenance (O&M) costs contribute to a significant part of Cost of Energy produced by offshore wind. In order to reduce the O&M costs and to guarantee safety and wellbeing of the maintenance technicians, for each individual wind farm an optimal set of support vessels and access

Land Reform and Farm Land Rental Market Operation in the Northern Uplands of Vietnam

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Nguyen Trung THANH

2009-01-01

Full Text Available This paper examines the factors affecting the participation of farmhouseholds in farm land rental markets with particular focus on the impact ofthe land reform. The operational outcomes of such market participation are alsoanalysed. The study used a panel dataset of farm households surveyed beforeand after the land reform with Random Effect Tobit model. The analysisshowed that the land reform have contributed to increased land rentalparticipation. The operation of the market has both efficiency and equityoutcomes. Therefore, constraints to functioning of land rental market aredifficult to justify. In other words, farm land rental should be promoted to bringsuch desirable outcomes.

Effect of climate and farm environment on Campylobacter spp. colonisation in Norwegian broiler flocks

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Jonsson, Malin E.; Chriél, Mariann; Norström, Madelaine

2012-01-01

of Campylobacter spp. in Norwegian broiler flocks and factors related to the climate and the farm environment. Data from 18,488 broiler flocks from 623 different farms during 2002–2007 were included in the study. A logistic regression analysis was conducted where Campylobacter spp. status of a broiler flock...... at the time of slaughter was defined as the dependent variable and farm was modelled as a random effect. The following factors were found to increase the probability for a broiler flock to test positive for Campylobacter spp.: daily mean temperature above 6°C during the rearing period, private water supply...

Differential privacy-based evaporative cooling feature selection and classification with relief-F and random forests.

Science.gov (United States)

Le, Trang T; Simmons, W Kyle; Misaki, Masaya; Bodurka, Jerzy; White, Bill C; Savitz, Jonathan; McKinney, Brett A

2017-09-15

Classification of individuals into disease or clinical categories from high-dimensional biological data with low prediction error is an important challenge of statistical learning in bioinformatics. Feature selection can improve classification accuracy but must be incorporated carefully into cross-validation to avoid overfitting. Recently, feature selection methods based on differential privacy, such as differentially private random forests and reusable holdout sets, have been proposed. However, for domains such as bioinformatics, where the number of features is much larger than the number of observations p≫n , these differential privacy methods are susceptible to overfitting. We introduce private Evaporative Cooling, a stochastic privacy-preserving machine learning algorithm that uses Relief-F for feature selection and random forest for privacy preserving classification that also prevents overfitting. We relate the privacy-preserving threshold mechanism to a thermodynamic Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution, where the temperature represents the privacy threshold. We use the thermal statistical physics concept of Evaporative Cooling of atomic gases to perform backward stepwise privacy-preserving feature selection. On simulated data with main effects and statistical interactions, we compare accuracies on holdout and validation sets for three privacy-preserving methods: the reusable holdout, reusable holdout with random forest, and private Evaporative Cooling, which uses Relief-F feature selection and random forest classification. In simulations where interactions exist between attributes, private Evaporative Cooling provides higher classification accuracy without overfitting based on an independent validation set. In simulations without interactions, thresholdout with random forest and private Evaporative Cooling give comparable accuracies. We also apply these privacy methods to human brain resting-state fMRI data from a study of major depressive disorder. Code

Mental health rehabilitation in a care farm context: A descriptive review of Norwegian intervention studies.

Science.gov (United States)

Pedersen, Ingeborg; Patil, Grete; Berget, Bente; Ihlebæk, Camilla; Gonzalez, Marianne Thorsen

2015-01-01

C are farming is a service developed at farms for promoting mental and physical health and is increasingly used in mental health rehabilitation in Norway. This article aims to present a descriptive review of Norwegian intervention research on care farms that provide rehabilitation for people with mental health disorders. This literature review applied a non-systematic search strategy: all articles in the field known to the authors were selected for inclusion. The selected studies were intervention studies that were conducted on farms in Norway, that used adult participants with mental health problems/disorders, and that reported outcome measures related to mental health. The studies and articles presented quantitative and/or qualitative data. The findings from the published articles report improvements to mental health problems, such as depression, anxiety, perceived stress, positive affect, rumination, and self-efficacy. Qualitative data describe a variety of positive experiences, such as improved coping ability, increased social support, and appreciation of the care farm activity. Participating in interventions on care farms positively influences mental health. Care farming may therefore be used as a supplementary approach in mental health rehabilitation, as it offers meaningful and engaging occupations and social inclusion.

Sustainable Site Selection for Offshore Wind Farms in the South Aegean—Greece

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Dimitra G. Vagiona

2018-03-01

Full Text Available The present research study develops and implements an integrated methodology for the evaluation and prioritization of appropriate sites for sustainable offshore wind-farm development at a regional level. The methodological framework includes the application of several siting criteria (technical, spatial, economic, social and environmental proposed either by the national legislative framework (Specific Plan for Spatial Planning and Sustainable Development for Renewable Energy or the international literature with the combined use of geographic information systems (GIS and multi-criteria decision methods, namely the analytical hierarchy process (AHP and technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS. The whole methodology provides a decision-making process for offshore wind-farm planning at regional level. The proposed methodology and the outputs of this work can be used to ensure the sustainable spatial development and policy of renewable energy resources.

The relationship between animal welfare and economic performance at farm level

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Henningsen, Arne; Czekaj, Tomasz Gerard; Forkman, Björn

2018-01-01

We propose a theoretical framework for the relationship between animal welfare and the economic performance of livestock farms. We empirically analyse this relationship based on a unique dataset of randomly sampled Danish pig herds that includes information from unannounced inspections of the com...

CleverFarm - A superSCADA system for wind farms

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Juhl, A.; Hansen, K.G.; Giebhardt, J.

2004-01-01

The CleverFarm project started out to build an integrated monitoring system for wind farms, where all information would be available and could be used across the wind farm for maintenance and component health assessments. This would enable wind farmoperators to prioritise their efforts, since the...

Interference-aware random beam selection schemes for spectrum sharing systems

KAUST Repository

Abdallah, Mohamed

2012-10-19

Spectrum sharing systems have been recently introduced to alleviate the problem of spectrum scarcity by allowing secondary unlicensed networks to share the spectrum with primary licensed networks under acceptable interference levels to the primary users. In this work, we develop interference-aware random beam selection schemes that provide enhanced performance for the secondary network under the condition that the interference observed by the receivers of the primary network is below a predetermined/acceptable value. We consider a secondary link composed of a transmitter equipped with multiple antennas and a single-antenna receiver sharing the same spectrum with a primary link composed of a single-antenna transmitter and a single-antenna receiver. The proposed schemes select a beam, among a set of power-optimized random beams, that maximizes the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) of the secondary link while satisfying the primary interference constraint for different levels of feedback information describing the interference level at the primary receiver. For the proposed schemes, we develop a statistical analysis for the SINR statistics as well as the capacity and bit error rate (BER) of the secondary link.

Integrated watershed- and farm-scale modeling framework for targeting critical source areas while maintaining farm economic viability.

Science.gov (United States)

Ghebremichael, Lula T; Veith, Tamie L; Hamlett, James M

2013-01-15

Quantitative risk assessments of pollution and data related to the effectiveness of mitigating best management practices (BMPs) are important aspects of nonpoint source pollution control efforts, particularly those driven by specific water quality objectives and by measurable improvement goals, such as the total maximum daily load (TMDL) requirements. Targeting critical source areas (CSAs) that generate disproportionately high pollutant loads within a watershed is a crucial step in successfully controlling nonpoint source pollution. The importance of watershed simulation models in assisting with the quantitative assessments of CSAs of pollution (relative to their magnitudes and extents) and of the effectiveness of associated BMPs has been well recognized. However, due to the distinct disconnect between the hydrological scale in which these models conduct their evaluation and the farm scale at which feasible BMPs are actually selected and implemented, and due to the difficulty and uncertainty involved in transferring watershed model data to farm fields, there are limited practical applications of these tools in the current nonpoint source pollution control efforts by conservation specialists for delineating CSAs and planning targeting measures. There are also limited approaches developed that can assess impacts of CSA-targeted BMPs on farm productivity and profitability together with the assessment of water quality improvements expected from applying these measures. This study developed a modeling framework that integrates farm economics and environmental aspects (such as identification and mitigation of CSAs) through joint use of watershed- and farm-scale models in a closed feedback loop. The integration of models in a closed feedback loop provides a way for environmental changes to be evaluated with regard to the impact on the practical aspects of farm management and economics, adjusted or reformulated as necessary, and revaluated with respect to effectiveness of

Precipitation-runoff relations and water-quality characteristics at edge-of-field stations, Discovery Farms and Pioneer Farm, Wisconsin, 2003-8

Science.gov (United States)

Stuntebeck, Todd D.; Komiskey, Matthew J.; Peppler, Marie C.; Owens, David W.; Frame, Dennis R.

2011-01-01

A cooperative study between the U.S. Geological Survey, the University of Wisconsin (UW)-Madison Discovery Farms program (Discovery Farms), and the UW-Platteville Pioneer Farm program (Pioneer Farm) was developed to identify typical ranges and magnitudes, temporal distributions, and principal factors affecting concentrations and yields of sediment, nutrients, and other selected constituents in runoff from agricultural fields. Hydrologic and water-quality data were collected year-round at 23 edge-of-field monitoring stations on 5 privately owned Discovery Farms and on Pioneer Farm during water years 2003-8. The studied farms represented landscapes, soils, and farming systems typical of livestock farms throughout southern Wisconsin. Each farm employed a variety of soil, nutrient, and water-conservation practices to help minimize sediment and nutrient losses from fields and to improve crop productivity. This report summarizes the precipitation-runoff relations and water-quality characteristics measured in edge-of-field runoff for 26 "farm years" (aggregate years of averaged station data from all 6 farms for varying monitoring periods). A relatively wide range of constituents typically found in agricultural runoff were measured: suspended sediment, phosphorus (total, particulate, dissolved reactive, and total dissolved), and nitrogen (total, nitrate plus nitrite, organic, ammonium, total Kjeldahl and total Kjeldahl-dissolved), chloride, total solids, total suspended solids, total volatile suspended solids, and total dissolved solids. Mean annual precipitation was 32.8 inches for the study period, about 3 percent less than the 30-year mean. Overall mean annual runoff was 2.55 inches per year (about 8 percent of precipitation) and the distribution was nearly equal between periods of frozen ground (54 percent) and unfrozen ground (46 percent). Mean monthly runoff was highest during two periods: February to March and May to June. Ninety percent of annual runoff occurred

Livestock systems and farming styles in Eastern Italian Alps: an on-farm survey

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Maurizio Ramanzin

2010-01-01

Full Text Available This research aimed to study the relationships between livestock systems, landscape maintenance and farming styles in the Belluno Province, a mountainous area of the Eastern Italian Alps. A total of 65 farms were sampled on the basis of livestock category farmed and herd size. Farms were visited to collect information on technical and productive aspects, on landscape features of land managed, which was identified by aerial photographs and digitised in a GIS environment, and on the farmers’ background, attitudes and approach to farming. Six different livestock systems were identified: intensive beef cattle (2 farms; extensive beef cattle (12 farms; large sheep/goat farms (9 farms; small sheep/goat farms (6 farms; intensive dairy cattle (14 farms and extensive dairy cattle (22 farms. The intensive systems had larger herds, modern structures and equipment, and were strongly production oriented, whereas the extensive systems had smaller herds and productivity, with often traditional or obsolete structures and equipment, but showed a tendency to diversify production by means of on-farm cheese making and/or mixed farming of different livestock categories. The ability to maintain meadows and pastures was greater for the extensive systems, especially in steep areas, while the annual nitrogen output, estimated as kg N/ha, was lower. Data on the farmers’ background and attitudes were analysed with a non-hierarchical cluster procedure that clustered the farmers into 4 farming styles widely different in motivations to farming, innovative capability, and ability to diversify income sources and ensure farm economic viability. The farming styles were distributed across all livestock systems, indicating the lack of a linkage between the assignment of a farm to a livestock system and the way the farm is managed. This study demonstrates that in mountain areas variability of livestock systems may be high, and that they differ not only in production practices

Associations between biosecurity and outbreaks of canine distemper on Danish mink farms in 2012-2013

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Gregers-Jensen, Louise; Agger, Jens Frederik; Hammer, Anne Sofie Vedsted

2015-01-01

During 8 months from July 2012 to February 2013, a major outbreak of canine distemper involving 64 mink farms occurred on the Danish peninsula of Jutland. The canine distemper outbreak was associated with exposure of farmed mink to infected wild carnivores and could represent a deficit...... distemper from July 2012 to February 2013. The control group included 54 farms without an outbreak of canine distemper in 2012 or 2013, selected as the closest geographical neighbour to a case farm. The results showed that significantly more control than case farms had vaccinated their mink against canine...... distemper virus. Mortality was only assessed on the case farms, and there was a non-significantly lower mortality on vaccinated farms than on the non-vaccinated farms. Furthermore, the proportion of farms with observations of wild red foxes (Vulpes vulpes) inside the farm enclosures were larger for case...

Goat farm management and Brucella serological test among goat keepers and livestock officers, 2011-2012, Nakhon Si Thammarat Province, southern Thailand.

Science.gov (United States)

Te-Chaniyom, Thanidtha; Geater, Alan F; Kongkaew, Wandee; Chethanond, Usa; Chongsuvivatwong, Virasakdi

2016-12-01

Brucellosis, a zoonotic disease particularly affecting goats, emerged in Thailand in 2003, resulting in both an occupational hazard for goat keepers and livestock officers, and production losses. Farm management practices have been identified as risk factors associated with Brucella sero-positivity in many studies. Our finding in this study should be considered in order to strengthen the system of biosecurity control in farm animals as one health approach. The objectives of the study were to describe the distribution of potential risk factors by types of goat farms and to document the prevalence of human Brucella sero-positivity among goat keepers and livestock officers in Nakhon Si Thammarat, Thailand. A cross-sectional study was conducted from September to December 2012. The study population included three types of goat farms: standard, community enterprise and private goat farms that were located in Nakhon Si Thammmarat Province in southern Thailand. Information on whether the farm had any Brucella sero-positivity goats since 2011 was retrieved from the local livestock office records. Information on farming management was also traced back to 2011. Field researchers collected information from goat keepers of the selected farms using a structured questionnaire. Goat keepers on all farms pre-identified (January to June 2012) as having had at least one positive goat were considered to have been exposed. Goat keepers on a random sample of farms having all goats with negative results were considered to be unexposed. Venous blood samples were collected from goat keepers exposed and unexposed and from livestock officers and the samples were tested by IgG ELISA. Statistical analysis was done under the complex survey design in R software. Fourteen standard farms, 66 community enterprise farms and 68 private farms participated in the study; 82.4% (122/148) used public pasture and 53.4% (79/148) shared breeder goats with other farms. Farm management practices corresponding

Game farming as a supplementary farming activity in the Karoo ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Game farming as a supplementary farming activity in the Karoo. ... Veld management in a game farming situation poses problems due to the ineffectiveness of rotational grazing systems. Simplification of natural ... AJOL African Journals Online.

Health impact of wind farms.

Science.gov (United States)

Kurpas, Donata; Mroczek, Bozena; Karakiewicz, Beata; Kassolik, Krzysztof; Andrzejewski, Waldemar

2013-01-01

Wind power is employed worldwide as an alternative source of energy. At the same time, however, the health effects of wind turbines have become a matter of discussion. The purpose of this study is a critical review of available reports providing arguments both for and against the construction of wind farms. The authors also attempt to propose recommendations in accordance with the Evidence-Based Medicine (EBM) guidelines. In the case of exposure to wind farms, a randomized controlled trial (RCT) is impossible. To obtain the highest-level recommendations, analysis of case-control studies or cohort studies with control groups should be performed. Preferably, it should include geostatistical analysis conducted with the use of variograms and the kriging technique. Combinations of key words were entered into the Thomson Reuters Web of Knowledge (SM) and the Internet search engine Google. SHORT DESCRIPTION OF STATE OF THE ART: The nuisance caused by wind turbines is stereotypically linked with the noise that they produce. Nevertheless, the visual aspect of wind farms, opinions about them, and sensitivity to sound seem to be of the greater importance. To date, the direct correlations between the vicinity of modern wind farms, the noise that wind turbines make, and possible consequences to health have not been described in peer reviewed articles. Health effects are more probably associated with some environmental factors leading to annoyance or frustration. All types of studies share the same conclusion: wind turbines can provoke annoyance. As with any project involving changes in the local environment, a certain level of irritation among the population can be expected. There are elected officials and government representatives who should decide what level of social annoyance is acceptable, and whether wind power advantages outweigh its potential drawbacks. The influence of wind turbines on human emotional and physical health is a relatively new field of research. Further

ANALYSIS OF FOOD SECURITY STATUS OF FARMING HOUSEHOLDS IN THE FOREST BELT OF THE CENTRAL REGION OF GHANA

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

John K.M. Kuwornu

2013-01-01

Full Text Available The study seeks to examine the Food Security Status of Farming Households in the Forest Belt of the Central Region of Ghana. A multistage sampling technique was used to select the respondents that were interviewed. In all 134 farming households were interviewed but 120 were selected for analysis after removing the questionnaires which were not properly administered. The households were selected from eight communities in two districts. Food consumption data of 851 individuals in 120 households were used for the analysis. The study reveals that the majority of the farming households (60% were found to be food insecure. Further, the Binary Logit Model results reveal that an increase in household's income, having access to credit as well as increase in the quantity of own farm production improve the food security status of farming households in the Forest Belt of the Central Region of Ghana. However, holding all other factors constant, increases in non-working member of households worsens the food security status of farming households. Most of the food insecurity coping strategies adopted by household's are not severe and can only be used to avert the impact of food insecurity on a temporal basis. These results have policy implications for Food Security Status of Farming Households in developing countries.

Topology-selective jamming of fully-connected, code-division random-access networks

Science.gov (United States)

Polydoros, Andreas; Cheng, Unjeng

1990-01-01

The purpose is to introduce certain models of topology selective stochastic jamming and examine its impact on a class of fully-connected, spread-spectrum, slotted ALOHA-type random access networks. The theory covers dedicated as well as half-duplex units. The dominant role of the spatial duty factor is established, and connections with the dual concept of time selective jamming are discussed. The optimal choices of coding rate and link access parameters (from the users' side) and the jamming spatial fraction are numerically established for DS and FH spreading.

CleverFarm - A SuperSCADA system for wind farms

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Giebel, G [ed.; Juhl, A; Gram Hansen, K; Biebhardt, J [and others

2004-08-01

The CleverFarm project started out to build an integrated monitoring system for wind farms, where all information would be available and could be used across the wind farm for maintenance and component health assessments. This would enable wind farm operators to prioritise their efforts, since they have a good view of the farm status from home. A large emphasis was placed on the integration of condition monitoring approaches in the central system, enabling estimates of the remaining lifetime of components, especially in the nacelle. During the 3,5 years of the project, software and hardware was developed and installed in two wind farms in Denmark and Germany. The connected hardware included two different condition monitoring systems based on vibration sensors from Gram&Juhl and ISET, plus a camera system developed by Overspeed. Additionally, short-term predictions of the wind farm output were delivered by DMI and Risoes Prediktor system throughout the period of the project. All these diverse information sources are integrated through a web interface based on Java Server Pages. The software was developed in Java, and is delivered as so-called CleverBeans. The main part of the software is open-sourced. The report contains the experiences and results of a one-year experimental period. This report is a slightly edited version of the final publishable report to the EU Commission as part of the requirements of the CleverFarm project.

Evaluation of wildlife pests on rural farms in Guma and Gwer-East ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

The study evaluated the challenges confronting farmers as a result of wildlife attack on rural farms in Guma and Gwer – East Local Government Areas of Benue State. Two villages (Igbor and Abinsi) were purposively selected for the study because of their high rate of farming activities. Data was collected with the aid ...

Economic Situation of Fish Farming in Southeastern Coast of the Black Sea

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ştefan Mihai Petrea

2012-10-01

Full Text Available Aquaculture industry, like most other industries, has a very powerfull correlation with the economical domain. Being an economic activity that generates profit, practicing fish farming aims profit maximization. The present study gives information regarding the economical indicators and also makes a cost structure analysis of five groups of fish farms from Southeastern Coast of the Black Sea: homestead fish farms, small scale fish farms, middle scale fish farms, big scale fish farms and floating cages. The fish farms were classified in this way by their production capacity. In order to collect data, the most representative fish farms for each group were selected and face to face interviews were made for every one of them. Data related to their source of financing, initial investment, labour costs, selling prices, feed costs and other operational costs were collected, arranged, structured and analyzed and a series of economic indicators as gross production value, gross margin, breakeven quantity, specific investment, profit, profitability ratio, rate of return or labour productivity were calculated. As a result, it was observed that fish production capacity has a big influence over the rate of return, middle scale fish farms being the most profitable, followed closely by small scale fish farms.

Profitability and Farmers Conservation Efforts on Sustainable Potato Farming in Wonosobo Regency

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Liana Fatma Leslie Pratiwi

2017-07-01

Full Text Available It takes into account in potato farming sustainability, since it was recognised as a holticultural commodity for farmers’ subsistence in Wonosobo Regency. For the reason that farming land was being degraded by errossion, the potato productivity apparently continued to decline. Potato farming sustainability can be deliberated from economic (profitability and environmental (conservation efforts points of view in order to remain profitable in a long term sustainable environment. This study is aimed to (1 to analyse the profitability of potato farming; (2 to analyse farmers’ effort on soil conservation and factors which affected sustainability of potato farming. The method used in this study was basic descriptive analysis. The study site was in Kejajar District, Wonosobo Regency, subsequently 50 random farmers as respondences was obtained. Gross Margin, Return on Invested Capital, and Operating Ratio were used to measure the profitability of potato farming. Conservation Activity Index (CAI was used to measure farmers’ effort on soil conservation, while paired liner regression model with Ordinary Least Square (OLS method was used to understand the factors which affected the conservation efforts of test sites. The study results revealed that the potato farming was profitable. Farmers conservation efforts mostly was in average category (74%, and only view in high category (16% and low category (10%. Factors affected the farmers conservation efforts i.e. land area, potato products, potato price, the off-farm income, number of family members, farmers ages, and village dummy.

Repowering of wind farms - A case study

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Nivedh, B.S. [Quality Engineering and Software Technologies, Bangalore (India); Devi, R.P.K. [College of Engineering. Power Systems Engineering, Guindy (India); Sreevalsan, E. [Gamesa Wind Turbines India Private Limited, Chennai (India)

2012-07-01

The main objective of the study is to devise a method for assessing the repowering potential and to improve the energy output from the wind farms and also to understand the impact on the power quality due to repowering. With repowering, the first-generation wind turbines can be replaced with modern multi-megawatt wind turbines. To carry-out the study an old wind farm located at Kayathar, Tamilnadu is selected. The wind farm was commissioned in 1990's with a capacity of 7.35MW, which consists of 36 Wind Turbines each with the capacity of 200kW and 225kW. The present annual energy generation of the wind farm is 7350MWhr with the plant load factor of 11.41%. The intent of this study is to predict the annual energy output of the wind farm after the repowering using WAsP (Wind Atlas Analysis Application Program). Further this study analyses the power quality issues of the various Wind Turbines. In addition, the main feeder, in which the wind farm which is taken for the study also modeled and the impact on power quality due to repowering also studied. Simulations were carried out using MATLAB. The results are analyzed to understand the significance of repowering to overcome the energy crisis of the nation since the best locations for wind in India are occupied by old wind turbines. The following are the observations and conclusions from the above study. Plant load factor (PLF) increased to 24 %, Energy yield increased to more than 4 times and the capacity of the wind farm became double. And in the view of power quality, comparing to the existing Feeder, Repowered Feeder having less reactive power consumption, voltage variations and flickers except the harmonic distortion. (Author)

Reliability of sampling strategies for measuring dairy cattle welfare on commercial farms.

Science.gov (United States)

Van Os, Jennifer M C; Winckler, Christoph; Trieb, Julia; Matarazzo, Soraia V; Lehenbauer, Terry W; Champagne, John D; Tucker, Cassandra B

2018-02-01

Our objective was to evaluate how the proportion of high-producing lactating cows sampled on each farm and the selection method affect prevalence estimates for animal-based measures. We assessed the entire high-producing pen (days in milk size calculations from the Welfare Quality Protocol; and (4) selecting the first, middle, or final third of cows exiting the milking parlor. Estimates were compared with true values using regression analysis and were considered accurate if they met 3 criteria: the coefficient of determination was ≥0.9 and the slope and intercept did not differ significantly from 1 and 0, respectively. All estimates met the slope and intercept criteria, whereas the coefficient of determination increased when more cows were sampled. All estimates were accurate for neck alterations, ocular discharge (22.2 ± 27.4%), and carpal joint hair loss (14.1 ± 17.4%). Selecting a third of the milking order or using the Welfare Quality sample size calculations failed to accurately estimate all measures simultaneously. However, all estimates were accurate when selecting at least 2 of every 3 cows locked at the feed bunk. Using restraint position at the feed bunk did not differ systematically from computer-selecting the same proportion of cows randomly, and the former may be a simpler approach for welfare assessments. Copyright © 2018 American Dairy Science Association. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Metrics and methods for characterizing dairy farm intensification using farm survey data.

Science.gov (United States)

Gonzalez-Mejia, Alejandra; Styles, David; Wilson, Paul; Gibbons, James

2018-01-01

Evaluation of agricultural intensification requires comprehensive analysis of trends in farm performance across physical and socio-economic aspects, which may diverge across farm types. Typical reporting of economic indicators at sectorial or the "average farm" level does not represent farm diversity and provides limited insight into the sustainability of specific intensification pathways. Using farm business data from a total of 7281 farm survey observations of English and Welsh dairy farms over a 14-year period we calculate a time series of 16 key performance indicators (KPIs) pertinent to farm structure, environmental and socio-economic aspects of sustainability. We then apply principle component analysis and model-based clustering analysis to identify statistically the number of distinct dairy farm typologies for each year of study, and link these clusters through time using multidimensional scaling. Between 2001 and 2014, dairy farms have largely consolidated and specialized into two distinct clusters: more extensive farms relying predominantly on grass, with lower milk yields but higher labour intensity, and more intensive farms producing more milk per cow with more concentrate and more maize, but lower labour intensity. There is some indication that these clusters are converging as the extensive cluster is intensifying slightly faster than the intensive cluster, in terms of milk yield per cow and use of concentrate feed. In 2014, annual milk yields were 6,835 and 7,500 l/cow for extensive and intensive farm types, respectively, whilst annual concentrate feed use was 1.3 and 1.5 tonnes per cow. For several KPIs such as milk yield the mean trend across all farms differed substantially from the extensive and intensive typologies mean. The indicators and analysis methodology developed allows identification of distinct farm types and industry trends using readily available survey data. The identified groups allow the accurate evaluation of the consequences of the

Metrics and methods for characterizing dairy farm intensification using farm survey data.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Alejandra Gonzalez-Mejia

Full Text Available Evaluation of agricultural intensification requires comprehensive analysis of trends in farm performance across physical and socio-economic aspects, which may diverge across farm types. Typical reporting of economic indicators at sectorial or the "average farm" level does not represent farm diversity and provides limited insight into the sustainability of specific intensification pathways. Using farm business data from a total of 7281 farm survey observations of English and Welsh dairy farms over a 14-year period we calculate a time series of 16 key performance indicators (KPIs pertinent to farm structure, environmental and socio-economic aspects of sustainability. We then apply principle component analysis and model-based clustering analysis to identify statistically the number of distinct dairy farm typologies for each year of study, and link these clusters through time using multidimensional scaling. Between 2001 and 2014, dairy farms have largely consolidated and specialized into two distinct clusters: more extensive farms relying predominantly on grass, with lower milk yields but higher labour intensity, and more intensive farms producing more milk per cow with more concentrate and more maize, but lower labour intensity. There is some indication that these clusters are converging as the extensive cluster is intensifying slightly faster than the intensive cluster, in terms of milk yield per cow and use of concentrate feed. In 2014, annual milk yields were 6,835 and 7,500 l/cow for extensive and intensive farm types, respectively, whilst annual concentrate feed use was 1.3 and 1.5 tonnes per cow. For several KPIs such as milk yield the mean trend across all farms differed substantially from the extensive and intensive typologies mean. The indicators and analysis methodology developed allows identification of distinct farm types and industry trends using readily available survey data. The identified groups allow the accurate evaluation of the

Peculiarities of the statistics of spectrally selected fluorescence radiation in laser-pumped dye-doped random media

Science.gov (United States)

Yuvchenko, S. A.; Ushakova, E. V.; Pavlova, M. V.; Alonova, M. V.; Zimnyakov, D. A.

2018-04-01

We consider the practical realization of a new optical probe method of the random media which is defined as the reference-free path length interferometry with the intensity moments analysis. A peculiarity in the statistics of the spectrally selected fluorescence radiation in laser-pumped dye-doped random medium is discussed. Previously established correlations between the second- and the third-order moments of the intensity fluctuations in the random interference patterns, the coherence function of the probe radiation, and the path difference probability density for the interfering partial waves in the medium are confirmed. The correlations were verified using the statistical analysis of the spectrally selected fluorescence radiation emitted by a laser-pumped dye-doped random medium. Water solution of Rhodamine 6G was applied as the doping fluorescent agent for the ensembles of the densely packed silica grains, which were pumped by the 532 nm radiation of a solid state laser. The spectrum of the mean path length for a random medium was reconstructed.

Farm Population Trends and Farm Characteristics. Rural Development Research Report No. 3.

Science.gov (United States)

Banks, Vera J.

While total farm population is declining, the number of people living on the farms which produce the bulk of the nation's food and fiber is increasing. The 1970-75 total farm population decline was 13 percent, but the number of people living on farms with annual sales greater than $40,000 increased 76 percent. Such farms account for about 80…

Etiological profile of bovine mastitis from dairy farms in the Western Paraná, Brazil

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Júlia Gazzoni Jardim

2014-01-01

Full Text Available ABSTRACT. Jardim J.G., Deminicis B.B., Peixoto E.C.T.M., Heinzen E.L. & Domingues P.F. [Etiological profile of bovine mastitis from dairy farms in the Western Paraná, Brazil.] Perfil etiológico da mastite bovina na bacia leiteira do oeste paranaense, Paraná, Brasil. Revista Brasileira de Medicina Veterinária, 36(1:65-70, 2014. Centro de Ciências e Tecnologias Agropecuárias, Universidade Estadual do Norte Fluminense Darcy Ribeiro, Av. Alberto Lamego, 2000, Campos dos Goytacazes, RJ 28013-600, Brasil. E-mail: jugazzoni@hotmail.com The aim of this study was evaluate the occurrence, infectious etiology and risk factors associated with mastitis in 331 dairy cows from sixteen farms located in the region of Marechal Cândido Rondon in the State of Paraná, Brazil. Both cows as the properties were selected of a non-random form and being selected 20% of lactation cows from each farm. The test for identification of subclinical mastitis was the California Mastitis Test and the diagnosis of the clinical mastitis was carried out by the observation of signs of inflammation in the udder and macroscopic changes in milk. Of lactating cows, 195 (60.77% were positive for mastitis and 93,75% of the farms analyzed had at least one positive animal. The etiologic agents isolated in a total of three hundred twenty-nine samples were Staphylococcus aureus (47.2%, Staphylococcus sp. (29.2%, Streptococcus dysgalactiae (18.1%, Streptococcus uberis (16,7%, Corynebaterium spp. (11,1% and Streptococcus intermedius (1.39%. Besides, was evaluated the interaction of the type of mechanical milking in function of the mastitis degree and the use of the disinfection of teats before and after milking was not interference in mastitis incidence, however, the accomplishment of the disinfection of teats before and after -dipping favored in the control of subclinical mastitis. We conclude that the significant occurrence of mastitis in herds is due to improper management conditions

Detection of Salmonella spp., Candida albicans, Aspergillus spp., and Antimicrobial Residues in Raw and Processed Cow Milk from Selected Smallholder Farms of Zimbabwe

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Tryness Anastazia Mhone

2012-01-01

Full Text Available A cross-sectional study was conducted to detect the presence of Salmonella spp., Candida albicans, Aspergillus spp., and antimicrobial residues in raw milk (n=120 and processed cow milk (n=20 from smallholder dairy farms from three sites in Zimbabwe. Culture and isolation of Salmonella spp., C. albicans, and Aspergillus spp. were performed using selective media, while antimicrobial residues were detected by a dye reduction test. No Salmonella, but C. albicans (17.5%; 21/120, Aspergillus spp. (0.8%; 1/120, and antimicrobial residues (2.5%; 3/120 were detected from raw milk. C. albicans was isolated from all three sites, while Aspergillus spp. and antimicrobial residues were detected from sites 1 and 3, respectively. From processed milk, only C. albicans (5% was isolated while Aspergillus spp. and antimicrobial residues were not detected. These results suggested low prevalence of Salmonella spp. and Aspergillus spp. and a relatively high prevalence of C. albicans in raw milk from the smallholder farms. The potential public health risks of C. albicans and the detected antimicrobial residues need to be considered. Thus, educating farmers on improving milking hygiene and storage of milk and establishing programmes for monitoring antimicrobial residues may help to improve the safety of milk from smallholder farms.

Social Benefits of Secondary School Farms in Rivers State, Nigeria ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

The purpose of this study was to determine the social benefits of school farms in secondary schools in Rivers State. The study used two research questions and simple random sampling technique for data collection with a total of 560 questionnaires administered to teachers and students. The results showed that 75% of ...

Assessment of Farming Systems for Sustainability of Farming Activities in the Mazandaran Province

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

H. Moumenihelali

2016-03-01

criteria were identified as sustainability criteria for agricultural activities in the province along with Cooperative, Commercial and Peasant alternatives as the dominant farming system in the present study. Consequently, the identification of the most suitable farming system for sustainable agricultural activities in the province serves as the main objective of this research. Materials and Methods: The study adopted an applied survey approach to conduct the study in 2014 in Mazandaran. The statistical population comprised of all professionals and experts working in the field of sustainability aspects and farming systems with a deep understanding and sufficient information on the issue being selected through purposive and snowball sampling summing up to 15 subjects. A questionnaire was used to collect data. In order to determine the face and content validities, the professors’ and specialists’ comments were taken into account and to estimate the reliability, the inconsistency rate was used. To achieve the main objective, the analytic hierarchy process technique by considering 5 criteria and 33 sub-criteria on three farming types (cooperative, commercial and peasant were used. The Expert Choice software 2000 was applied for data analysis. It should be noted that the analytic hierarchy process is a multi-criteria decision-making approach being based on paired comparison which enables managers and policymakers to review various scenarios. Likewise, it is sought to consider the experts’ opinions from the most central units involved instead of focusing on the number of decision-makers. Results and Discussion: Based on the results and considering criteria prioritization reveal the fact that the ecological,policy, social dimensions compared with the economic and technical criteria remain more imperative. Therefore, the ecological, political and social dimensions are the most important aspects of agricultural activities sustainability in the province. Hence, it can be

Noise impact assessment of wind farms

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hayes, M.

1993-01-01

The noise impact assessment of a wind farm is dependent upon a number of factors pertinent to the site. The most controversial is the selection of a criterion which is acceptable to both the developer of a site, in terms of maximising the number of turbines he may operate without fear of injunction to stop, and the local residents and Environmental Health Officer who will have to enforce any agreements. A number of British Standards exist which cover noise issues. There are, however, certain reservations about their use when applied to potential wind farm developments; some of the more relevant standards are outlined. In addition, Draft Planning Guidance notes which have recently been issued are discussed. These are intended to provide an indication to local planning authorities as to what noise levels and criteria may be acceptable when considering noise emitted by wind farms. No European standard for noise emission from wind farms exists but the legislative position in Denmark, the Netherlands, Germany and Sweden is briefly considered. It is considered that when a maximum level criterion is set it should take into account the existing background noise levels based on measurements which are taken at the most sensitive dwellings to the site. A method for calculating emitted noise levels from turbine arrays is described. (UK)

Leverages for on-farm innovation from farm typologies? An illustration for family-based dairy farms in north-west Michoacán, Mexico

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Cortez Arriola, J.; Rossing, W.A.H.; Amendola Massiotti, R.D.; Scholberg, J.M.S.; Groot, J.C.J.; Tittonell, P.A.

2015-01-01

Knowledge on farm diversity provides insight into differences among farms, enables scaling from individual farm to farm population level and vice versa, and has been used in the definition of recommendation domains for introduction of novel technologies. Farm diversity can be broadly described in

Farm management information systems: A case study on a German multifunctional farm

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Husemann Christoph

2014-01-01

Full Text Available Accurate and easy to use Farm Management Information Systems (FMIS are of fundamental importance for a successful operational farm management. However, still today many farmers do not use FMISs for various reasons, like lack of knowledge and the complexity of many available FMISs. In particular for small to medium-sized farms and for multifunctional farms appropriate FMISs hardly exist. This paper aims on the deduction of a concrete FMIS from a general FMIS. The concrete FMIS has to focus on the needs of medium-sized and multifunctional farms. This means that the farmer has to be empowered to allocate the scarce resources of the farm. Therefore, we picked a German farm from the state North Rhine Westphalia as a case-study to apply a system analysis. The case study farm helps to identify and to analyze relevant material and information flows, production processes, and their interconnections and synergies.

Do economic stresses influence child work hours on family farms?

Science.gov (United States)

Gadomski, Anne; de Long, Rachel; Burdick, Patrick; Jenkins, Paul

2005-01-01

Economic stresses are a frequently cited reason for children doing farm work. To explore the relationship between economic indicators and child agricultural work hours between January 2001 and October 2003. This ecologic study design compares trends in aggregate child work hours with national and regional economic indicators. Child work hours were obtained from quarterly surveillance data from a randomized field trial of agricultural task guidelines for children. 2,360 children living or working on 845 farms in central New York participated in the original study. The relationship between child work hours and three economic indicators: national all farm index (AFI) ratio, national fuel index, and regional milk prices was analyzed using times series plots, correlation, and multiple linear regression. The AFI ratio was positively correlated with child work hours (r = 0.49, p = 0.008) but there was no significant correlation between child work hours and fuel or milk prices. Multiple linear regression demonstrated that the relationship between AFI and child work hours is independent of a seasonal effect. Increased child work hours may be associated with periods of higher farm sector productivity, rather than economic stress per se. Findings are limited by the ecologic study design, use of national economic indicators, and the limited number of cycles of child work hours available for time series analysis. Economic conditions may influence decisions about children's farm work.

AN EVALUATION OF POINT AND DENSITY FORECASTS FOR SELECTED EU FARM GATE MILK PRICES

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Dennis Bergmann

2018-01-01

Full Text Available Fundamental changes to the common agricultural policy (CAP have led to greater market orientation which in turn has resulted in sharply increased variability of EU farm gate milk prices and thus farmers’ income. In this market environment reliable forecasts of farm gate milk prices are extremely important as farmers can make improved decisions with regards to cash flow management and budget preparation. In addition these forecasts may be used in setting fixed priced contracts between dairy farmers and processors thus providing certainty and reducing risk. In this study both point and density forecasts from various time series models for farm gate milk prices in Germany, Ireland and for an average EU price series are evaluated using a rolling window framework. Additionally forecasts of the individual models are combined using different combination schemes. The results of the out of sample evaluation show that ARIMA type models perform well on short forecast horizons (1 to 3 month while the structural time series approach performs well on longer forecast horizons (12 month. Finally combining individual forecasts of different models significantly improves the forecast performance for all forecast horizons.

Calculating carbon budgets of wind farms on Scottish peatlands

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

D.R. Nayak

2010-04-01

Full Text Available The reliability of calculation methods for the carbon emission savings to be achieved in Scotland by replacing power generated from fossil fuels (and other more conventional sources with that produced by large-scale wind farm developments is a cause for concern, largely in relation to wind farms sited on peatlands. Scottish Government policy is to deliver renewable energy without environmental harm, and to meet biodiversity objectives including the conservation of designated wildlife sites and important habitats such as peatlands. The implications for carbon emissions of developing a wind farm are, therefore, just one aspect of the suite of considerations that the planning system takes into account. This paper presents a simple methodology for prospectively calculating the potential carbon emission savings to be realised by developing wind farms on peatland, forestland or afforested peatland. The total carbon emission savings of an individual wind farm are estimated by accounting emissions from the power source that will be replaced by wind power against: loss of carbon due to production, transportation, erection, operation and dismantling of the wind farm components (the infrastructure overhead; loss of carbon due to backup power generation; loss of carbon stored in peat and forest; loss of carbon-fixing potential of peatland and forest; and carbon savings due to habitat improvement. Most of the carbon losses are determined by national infrastructure, but those from peat soil and plants are influenced by site selection and management practices. The extent of drainage around each constructed element of the wind farm is a major factor for greenhouse gas emissions. Consideration of an example site with a low extent of drainage, where management practices that minimise net carbon losses (e.g. undrained floating roads, habitat improvement and site restoration on decommissioning were used indicates that emissions from the soil and plants may cancel

Farm production performance in Russian regions: farm panel data analysis

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Bezlepkina, I.

2003-01-01

The Russian agricultural sector has experienced many problems since the beginning of the 1990s that resulted in a fall in farm output. Employing a production function approach and, unlike other studies, farm-level data on more than 20,000 Russian large-scale farms for the period 1995-2000, this

50 CFR 14.23 - Live farm-raised fish and farm-raised fish eggs.

Science.gov (United States)

2010-10-01

... 50 Wildlife and Fisheries 1 2010-10-01 2010-10-01 false Live farm-raised fish and farm-raised fish eggs. 14.23 Section 14.23 Wildlife and Fisheries UNITED STATES FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE, DEPARTMENT OF... Exportation at Designated Ports § 14.23 Live farm-raised fish and farm-raised fish eggs. Live farm-raised fish...

Economic analysis of wildlife conservation in crop farming

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Wenum, van J.H.

2002-01-01

The general objective of this thesis was to present an economic analysis of wildlife conservation in Dutch crop farming. This general objective was broken down into 5 specific research objectives around which the research was organised: (1) selection and definition of appropriate indicators for

Farm Population of the United States: 1975. Current Population Reports: Farm Population.

Science.gov (United States)

Banks, Vera J.; And Others

Presented via narrative and tabular data, this report includes: Population of the U.S., Total and Farm: 1960-1975; Metropolitan-Nonmetropolitan Residence of the Farm and Nonfarm Population, by Race: 1975; Fertility Characteristics of Farm and Nonfarm Women, by Race: 1975; Persons 14 Years Old and Over Employed in Agriculture, by Farm-Nonfarm…

Outsourcing mental health care services? The practice and potential of community-based farms in psychiatric rehabilitation.

Science.gov (United States)

Iancu, Sorana C; Zweekhorst, Marjolein B M; Veltman, Dick J; van Balkom, Anton J L M; Bunders, Joske F G

2015-02-01

Psychiatric rehabilitation supports individuals with mental disorders to acquire the skills needed for independent lives in communities. This article assesses the potential of outsourcing psychiatric rehabilitation by analysing care farm services in the Netherlands. Service characteristics were analysed across 214 care farms retrieved from a national database. Qualitative insights were provided by five case descriptions, selected from 34 interviews. Institutional care farms were significantly larger and older than private care farms (comprising 88.8% of all care farms). Private, independent care farms provide real-life work conditions to users who are relatively less impaired. Private, contracted care farms tailor the work activities to their capacities and employ professional supervisors. Institutional care farms accommodate for the most vulnerable users. We conclude that collaborations with independent, contracted and institutional care farms would provide mental health care organizations with a diversity in services, enhanced community integration and a better match with users' rehabilitation needs.

Integrating gene flow, crop biology, and farm management in on-farm conservation of avocado (Persea americana, Lauraceae).

Science.gov (United States)

Birnbaum, Kenneth; Desalle, Rob; Peters, Charles M; Benfey, Philip N

2003-11-01

Maintaining crop diversity on farms where cultivars can evolve is a conservation goal, but few tools are available to assess the long-term maintenance of genetic diversity on farms. One important issue for on-farm conservation is gene flow from crops with a narrow genetic base into related populations that are genetically diverse. In a case study of avocado (Persea americana var. americana) in one of its centers of diversity (San Jerónimo, Costa Rica), we used 10 DNA microsatellite markers in a parentage analysis to estimate gene flow from commercialized varieties into a traditional crop population. Five commercialized genotypes comprised nearly 40% of orchard trees, but they contributed only about 14.5% of the gametes to the youngest cohort of trees. Although commercialized varieties and the diverse population were often planted on the same farm, planting patterns appeared to keep the two types of trees separated on small scales, possibly explaining the limited gene flow. In a simulation that combined gene flow estimates, crop biology, and graft tree management, loss of allelic diversity was less than 10% over 150 yr, and selection was effective in retaining desirable alleles in the diverse subpopulation. Simulations also showed that, in addition to gene flow, managing the genetic makeup and life history traits of the invasive commercialized varieties could have a significant impact on genetic diversity in the target population. The results support the feasibility of on-farm crop conservation, but simulations also showed that higher levels of gene flow could lead to severe losses of genetic diversity even if farmers continue to plant diverse varieties.

A Wind Farm Electrical Systems Evaluation with EeFarm-II

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Pierik, J.; Axelsson, U.; Eriksson, E.; Salomonsson, D.; Bauer, P.; Czech, B.

2010-01-01

EeFarm-II is used to evaluate 13 different electrical systems for a 200 MW wind farm with a 100 km connection to shore. The evaluation is based on component manufacturer data of 2009. AC systems are compared to systems with DC connections inside the wind farm and DC connection to shore. Two options

Recurrent Selection and Participatory Plant Breeding for Improvement of Two Organic Open-Pollinated Sweet Corn (Zea mays L. Populations

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Adrienne C. Shelton

2015-04-01

Full Text Available Organic growers face unique challenges when raising sweet corn, and benefit from varieties that maintain high eating quality, germinate consistently, deter insect pests, and resist diseases. Genotype by environment rank changes can occur in the performance of cultivars grown on conventional and organic farms, yet few varieties have been bred specifically for organic systems. The objective of this experiment was to evaluate the changes made to open-pollinated sweet corn populations using recurrent selection and a participatory plant breeding (PPB methodology. From 2008 to 2011, four cycles of two open-pollinated (OP sweet corn populations were selected on a certified organic farm in Minnesota using a modified ear-to-row recurrent selection scheme. Selections were made in collaboration with an organic farmer, with selection criteria based on traits identified by the farmer. In 2012 and 2013, the population cycles were evaluated in a randomized complete block design in two certified organic locations in Wisconsin, with multiple replications in each environment. Significant linear trends were found among cycles of selection for quantitative and qualitative traits, suggesting the changes were due to recurrent selection and PPB methodology for these populations. However, further improvement is necessary to satisfy the requirements for a useful cultivar for organic growers.

The impact of farm size on sustainability of dutch dairy farms

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Meulen, van der H.A.B.; Dolman, M.A.; Jager, J.H.; Venema, G.S.

2014-01-01

Sustainable milk production systems require economically viable, environmentally sound and socially acceptable practices. This study compared the economic, environmental and societal impact of large-scale farms with other dairy farms in the Dutch Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN). Moreover the

Blind Measurement Selection: A Random Matrix Theory Approach

KAUST Repository

Elkhalil, Khalil

2016-12-14

This paper considers the problem of selecting a set of $k$ measurements from $n$ available sensor observations. The selected measurements should minimize a certain error function assessing the error in estimating a certain $m$ dimensional parameter vector. The exhaustive search inspecting each of the $n\\\\choose k$ possible choices would require a very high computational complexity and as such is not practical for large $n$ and $k$. Alternative methods with low complexity have recently been investigated but their main drawbacks are that 1) they require perfect knowledge of the measurement matrix and 2) they need to be applied at the pace of change of the measurement matrix. To overcome these issues, we consider the asymptotic regime in which $k$, $n$ and $m$ grow large at the same pace. Tools from random matrix theory are then used to approximate in closed-form the most important error measures that are commonly used. The asymptotic approximations are then leveraged to select properly $k$ measurements exhibiting low values for the asymptotic error measures. Two heuristic algorithms are proposed: the first one merely consists in applying the convex optimization artifice to the asymptotic error measure. The second algorithm is a low-complexity greedy algorithm that attempts to look for a sufficiently good solution for the original minimization problem. The greedy algorithm can be applied to both the exact and the asymptotic error measures and can be thus implemented in blind and channel-aware fashions. We present two potential applications where the proposed algorithms can be used, namely antenna selection for uplink transmissions in large scale multi-user systems and sensor selection for wireless sensor networks. Numerical results are also presented and sustain the efficiency of the proposed blind methods in reaching the performances of channel-aware algorithms.

Urban farming activity towards sustainable wellbeing of urban dwellers

Science.gov (United States)

Othman, N.; Mohamad, M.; Latip, R. A.; Ariffin, M. H.

2018-02-01

In Malaysia, urban farming is viewed as a catalyst towards achieving the well-being of urban dwellers and natural environment. Urban farming is a strategy for Malaysia’s food and economic security, and as one of the foci in the agriculture transformation whereby urban dwellers are encouraged to participate in this activity. Previous study proved that urban farming can help to address social problems of food security, urban poverty and high living cost, also provides leisure and recreation among urban dwellers. Thus, this study investigates the best urban farming practices suitable for urban setting, environment and culture of urban dwellers. Data collection was done via questionnaire survey to urban farmers of a selected community garden in Subang Jaya, Selangor. Meanwhile, on-site observations were carried out on gardening activities and the gardens’ physical attributes. The study sample encompasses of 131 urban farmers of 22 community gardens in Subang Jaya. It was found that most of the community gardens practiced crops planting on the ground or soil base planting and dwellers in the lower income group with monthly low household income constitutes the majority (83.2%) of the respondents. Social and health benefits are the highest motivating factors for urban farmers. This study provides unprecedented insights on urban farming practices and motivations in a Malaysian setting.

Farm Management: rethinking directions?

OpenAIRE

Kemp, David R.; Girdwood, John; Parton, Kevin A.; Charry, Al A.

2004-01-01

Farms and farming are major contributors to the world economy, directly responsible for a large part of GDP. These achievements are not trivial and imply that farms are being managed in reasonably effective ways, else agricultural industries would not be sustained. However has the study of Farm Management within Australia made significant contributions to agriculture or lagged in the background. Is it contributing to better Farm Management or merely cataloguing what has happened? Is it leadin...

The effect of discontinued use of antimicrobial growth promoters on the risk of therapeutic antibiotic treatment in Danish farrow-to-finish pig farms

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Vigre, Håkan; Larsen, P.B.; Andreasen, Morten

2008-01-01

) the proportion of days per farm where treatment was performed (PDT) and (2) the proportion of pigs treated per day per farm at days where treatment was performed (PPT) before and after duAGPs at 68 farrow-to-finish farms. The farms were selected using, a two-stage (veterinarian/farm) convenience sampling...

Assessing agro-environmental performance of dairy farms in northwest Italy based on aggregated results from indicators.

Science.gov (United States)

Gaudino, Stefano; Goia, Irene; Grignani, Carlo; Monaco, Stefano; Sacco, Dario

2014-07-01

Dairy farms control an important share of the agricultural area of Northern Italy. Zero grazing, large maize-cropped areas, high stocking densities, and high milk production make them intensive and prone to impact the environment. Currently, few published studies have proposed indicator sets able to describe the entire dairy farm system and their internal components. This work had four aims: i) to propose a list of agro-environmental indicators to assess dairy farms; ii) to understand which indicators classify farms best; iii) to evaluate the dairy farms based on the proposed indicator list; iv) to link farmer decisions to the consequent environmental pressures. Forty agro-environmental indicators selected for this study are described. Northern Italy dairy systems were analysed considering both farmer decision indicators (farm management) and the resulting pressure indicators that demonstrate environmental stress on the entire farming system, and its components: cropping system, livestock system, and milk production. The correlations among single indicators identified redundant indicators. Principal Components Analysis distinguished which indicators provided meaningful information about each pressure indicator group. Analysis of the communalities and the correlations among indicators identified those that best represented farm variability: Farm Gate N Balance, Greenhouse Gas Emission, and Net Energy of the farm system; Net Energy and Gross P Balance of the cropping system component; Energy Use Efficiency and Purchased Feed N Input of the livestock system component; N Eco-Efficiency of the milk production component. Farm evaluation, based on the complete list of selected indicators demonstrated organic farming resulted in uniformly high values, while farms with low milk-producing herds resulted in uniformly low values. Yet on other farms, the environmental quality varied greatly when different groups of pressure indicators were considered, which highlighted the

Is Farm Management Skill Persistent?

OpenAIRE

Li, Xin; Paulson, Nicholas

2014-01-01

Farm management skills can affect farm managers' performance. In this article, farm management performance is analyzed based on yearly Illinois Farm Business Farm Management (FBFM) panel data across 6,760 farms from 1996 through 2011. Two out-of-sample measures of skill are used to analyze the ability of farm managers that consistently perform well over yearly and longer time horizons. Persistence tests show management skills are consistent and predictable. Results also suggest that the most ...

Economics of selected water control technologies and their ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Using a production function, marginal productivity of farm inputs and benefit-cost analysis, we explore the economics of selected water control technologies. From the production function, all farm inputs, including irrigation water is found to have a significant and positive effect on yield. Marginal value products of farm inputs ...

FARM PERFORMANCE AND MANAGEMENT STRATEGIES

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Li Li

2018-04-01

Full Text Available This article emphasizes the strategic and operations aspects of managing a farm. In this article, farm management performance is analyzed based on yearly Illinois Farm Business Farm Management (FBFM panel data across 9,831 farms from 1996 through 2014. The alpha scores (or skill estimates for farm managers are analyzed to determine if most profitable farmers possess specific skills or knowledge against adverse events in a volatile environment. Farms are evaluated under different scenarios of management skill portfolios. Fundamental farm management basics are discussed in this study, including budgeting, production planning, financial analysis, financial management, investment analysis, and control management. We find substantial difference of farm management styles and performance efficiency in management skill portfolios. We also find evidence of most skilled farm managers are more efficient on both revenue side and costs side. The approaches used in this study also allow comparison among farms of different sizes and types. The activities of top farms can be replicated by poorer performers and the study provide a unique way for comparing the farm management styles and ability of most skilled farm managers to that of less skilled ones. The innovative method is framed by comparing business strategies and performance styles in the following aspects: production and operations planning, land management and control, and production costs evaluation. Farm managers will want to consult it as well to improve the effectiveness, objectivity, and success of their decisions.

Whole farm management to reduce nutrient losses from dairy farms: a simulation study

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Rotz, C.A.; Oenema, J.; Keulen, van H.

2003-01-01

Whole farm simulation provides a tool for evaluating the impact of nutrient conservation technologies and strategies on dairy farms. A farm simulation model was verified by simulating the production and nutrient flows of the De Marke experimental dairy farm in the Netherlands. Technology such as a

Efficacy of anthelmintics on South American camelid (llama and alpaca) farms in Georgia.

Science.gov (United States)

Gillespie, Rose-Ann M; Williamson, Lisa H; Terrill, Thomas H; Kaplan, Ray M

2010-08-27

The number of South American camelid (SAC; llama and alpaca) farms is growing in the southeastern United States, and infection with gastrointestinal nematodes (GIN) is a major health concern in this region. There is widespread resistance to anthelmintic remedies in small ruminants (sheep and goats), but a paucity of information on llamas and alpacas. Anthelmintic resistance was evaluated on three SAC farms (two llama; one alpaca) in Georgia in the southern United States using fecal egg count reduction (FECR) tests. For each farm, animals were randomly assigned to 1 of 5 treatment groups based on initial fecal egg count (FEC) and number of animals available (2-5 groups, n=9-11 per treatment). Ivermectin (IVM, subcutaneous injection; 0.3mg/kg body weight (BW)) and a control group were tested on an alpaca farm, and fenbendazole (FBZ, oral; 10mg/kg BW; two farms), moxidectin (MOX oral; 0.2mg/kg BW; two farms), and levamisole (LEV, oral; 8 mg/kg BW; one farm) were added for the llama farms. Anthelmintic efficacy was determined by comparing FEC of treatment and control animals 14 days post-treatment, with resistance evaluated using the World Association for the Advancement of Veterinary Parasitology (WAAVP) guidelines. Based upon these guidelines, there was GIN resistance to IVM in both llamas and alpacas in Georgia and to FBZ on both llama farms where this drug was tested. There was MOX resistance on one llama farm using the FECR test, while there was no resistance to LEV detected in this study. These data demonstrate a serious emerging problem in the United States of llama and alpaca GIN resistant to drugs from two of the three major anthelmintic classes. (c) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Participation in Farm Markets in Rural Northwest Pakistan: A Regression Analysis

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Inayatullah Jan

2012-12-01

Full Text Available Participation in farm markets is important for increasing income of farmers in the developing countries. A number of factors account for a household participation in agricultural marketing. This study attempts to explore such associated factors which playa significant role in farmers’ participation in farm markets in rural northwest Pakistan. Drawing on empirical data from the field survey; gur, vegetables, and milk were the main products offered for marketing in the area. The degree of specialization of marketrelations was based on the nature of the farm product. In gur markets, the marketing relations were based on personalized terms whereas in vegetable markets, they were exclusively commercialized. The results of the binary logit model show that size of selfcultivatedland and number of livestock, were important determinants of a household participation in agricultural marketing. The study concludes that participation in agricultural markets could be substantially increased through improved infrastructure,commercialized farming systems, and increased number of farm markets so that the dominance of few selected commission agents is minimized.

An analysis of farm services centre (fsc) approach launched for agricultural extension in NWFP, pakistan

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Haq, I.; Ali, T.; Zafar, M.I.

2009-01-01

Agricultural extension services have a pivotal role in agricultural and rural development. It is the major source of technology dissemination and helps the farmers to rationalize the use of natural resources for a sustainable agricultural development. Globally, public-private partnership approach in Agricultural Extension is considered more effective, efficient, and responsive to different categories of farmers. In Pakistan, government of North West Frontier Province (NWFP) has initiated a public-private partnership Extension Programme in the province. This is locally called as Farm Services Centre (FSC). This approach has the inbuilt mechanism of inputs delivery, market facilitation, exchange of experiences and diffusion of knowledge and technology. However, the extent to which this public-private partnership is instrumental in achieving aforementioned objectives is yet to be established. The present study was an attempt to analyze this public-private partnership approach by measuring its strengths and weaknesses. For this purpose, out of 24 districts of NWFP, two districts namely Swabi and Lakimarwat were selected randomly. From these two districts, 491 FSC's member farmers were selected as respondents for interview on random basis. The analysis showed that the most prominent strength of FSC was farmers empowerment with mean 4.05 and SD 1.29, while that of Agriculture Extension Department (AED) was effective message delivery. As per respondents, the major weakness of both (FSC and AED) systems was no marketing facility with mean 4.12 and 4.13 and SD 1.22 and 1.01 respectively. It is essential that the government should ensure the mandated activities at FSC forum particularly the facilitation by line agencies and NWFP Agricultural University, Peshawar. It should be a forum of technology dissemination, agricultural surplus produce marketing and cooperative farming. Agricultural Extension Department should provide more facilities to the staff indulged in FSC

ARIZONA FARM LABOR REPORT.

Science.gov (United States)

SALTER, RICHARD H.

THE ORGANIZATION OF THE FARM PLACEMENT PROGRAM IS DESCRIBED. INCLUDED ARE THE ADMINISTRATIVE ORGANIZATIONS, THE LOCAL LEVELS, THE STATE FARM LABOR ADVISORY COMMITTEE, AND THE PLANNING AND OPERATING METHODS USED BY FARM PLACEMENT PERSONNEL IN MEETING FARM LABOR NEEDS. MAJOR CROP ACTIVITIES ARE RELATED TO COTTON AND VEGETABLES. THE LABOR FORCE IS…

Use of a culture-independent on-farm algorithm to guide the use of selective dry-cow antibiotic therapy.

Science.gov (United States)

Vasquez, A K; Nydam, D V; Foditsch, C; Wieland, M; Lynch, R; Eicker, S; Virkler, P D

2018-06-01

An algorithm using only computer-based records to guide selective dry-cow therapy was evaluated at a New York State dairy farm via a randomized field trial. DairyComp 305 (Valley Ag Software, Tulare, CA) and Dairy Herd Improvement Association test-day data were used to identify cows as low risk (cows that might not benefit from dry-cow antibiotics) or high risk (cows that will likely benefit). Low-risk cows were those that had all of the following: somatic cell count (SCC) ≤200,000 cells/mL at last test, an average SCC ≤200,000 cells/mL over the last 3 tests, no signs of clinical mastitis at dry-off, and no more than 1 clinical mastitis event in the current lactation. Low-risk cows were randomly assigned to receive intramammary antibiotics and external teat sealant (ABXTS) or external teat sealant only (TS) at dry-off. Using pre-dry-off and postcalving quarter-level culture results, low-risk quarters were assessed for microbiological cure risk and new infection risk. Groups were also assessed for differences in first-test milk yield and linear scores, individual milk weights for the first 30 d, and culling and mastitis events before 30 d in milk. A total of 304 cows and 1,040 quarters in the ABXTS group and 307 cows and 1,058 quarters in the TS group were enrolled. Among cows to be dried, the proportion of cows that met low-risk criteria was 64% (n = 611/953). Of cultures eligible for bacteriological cure analysis (n = 171), 93% of ABXTS cured, whereas 88% of TS cured. Of the non-cures, 95% were contributed by the minor pathogens coagulase-negative staphylococci (n = 19/20). These organisms also accounted for 57.5% of new infections (n = 77/134). We found no statistical differences between treatment groups for new infection risk (TS = 7.3% quarters experiencing new infections; ABXTS = 5.5%), milk production (ABXTS = 40.5 kg; TS = 41.2 kg), linear scores (ABXTS = 2.5; TS = 2.7), culling events (ABXTS, n = 18; TS, n = 15), or clinical mastitis events (ABXTS, n

Spatial analysis and characteristics of pig farming in Thailand.

Science.gov (United States)

Thanapongtharm, Weerapong; Linard, Catherine; Chinson, Pornpiroon; Kasemsuwan, Suwicha; Visser, Marjolein; Gaughan, Andrea E; Epprech, Michael; Robinson, Timothy P; Gilbert, Marius

2016-10-06

In Thailand, pig production intensified significantly during the last decade, with many economic, epidemiological and environmental implications. Strategies toward more sustainable future developments are currently investigated, and these could be informed by a detailed assessment of the main trends in the pig sector, and on how different production systems are geographically distributed. This study had two main objectives. First, we aimed to describe the main trends and geographic patterns of pig production systems in Thailand in terms of pig type (native, breeding, and fattening pigs), farm scales (smallholder and large-scale farming systems) and type of farming systems (farrow-to-finish, nursery, and finishing systems) based on a very detailed 2010 census. Second, we aimed to study the statistical spatial association between these different types of pig farming distribution and a set of spatial variables describing access to feed and markets. Over the last decades, pig population gradually increased, with a continuously increasing number of pigs per holder, suggesting a continuing intensification of the sector. The different pig-production systems showed very contrasted geographical distributions. The spatial distribution of large-scale pig farms corresponds with that of commercial pig breeds, and spatial analysis conducted using Random Forest distribution models indicated that these were concentrated in lowland urban or peri-urban areas, close to means of transportation, facilitating supply to major markets such as provincial capitals and the Bangkok Metropolitan region. Conversely the smallholders were distributed throughout the country, with higher densities located in highland, remote, and rural areas, where they supply local rural markets. A limitation of the study was that pig farming systems were defined from the number of animals per farm, resulting in their possible misclassification, but this should have a limited impact on the main patterns revealed

The impact of micro financing on poverty levels of rural women farm households in Abia state, Nigeria; implication for policy intervention

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EZEH Innocent

2013-06-01

Full Text Available This study determined the impact of micro-finance on poverty level of rural women farm households in Abia State, Nigeria: Implication for policy intervention. A multi-stage random sampling technique was used to +select the local government areas, communities and respondents in the three (Aba, Ohafia and Umuahia agricultural zones of the State. The sample size was 240 (120 a piece for rural women farmer borrowers and non borrowers. Instrument of data collection was a set of structured and pre-tested questionnaire administered on both groups of rural women farmers. The result indicated that incidence of poverty or head count ratio was 0.558 for the rural women farmers borrowers and 0.933 for the rural women farmer non borrowers; poverty gap otherwise known as income short fall was 0.4547 for the rural women farmer borrowers and 0.6995 for the rural women farmer non borrowers. The result of the paired t-test showed that micro-finance impacted significantly on annual farm income, farm size and fertilizer use level of rural women farmer borrowers at given levels of significance. It was however, recommended that increased subsidy policy on agro-inputs and increased funding by the micro-finance will significantly aim at reducing the poverty levels of these women.

Using ArcMap, Google Earth, and Global Positioning Systems to select and locate random households in rural Haiti.

Science.gov (United States)

Wampler, Peter J; Rediske, Richard R; Molla, Azizur R

2013-01-18

A remote sensing technique was developed which combines a Geographic Information System (GIS); Google Earth, and Microsoft Excel to identify home locations for a random sample of households in rural Haiti. The method was used to select homes for ethnographic and water quality research in a region of rural Haiti located within 9 km of a local hospital and source of health education in Deschapelles, Haiti. The technique does not require access to governmental records or ground based surveys to collect household location data and can be performed in a rapid, cost-effective manner. The random selection of households and the location of these households during field surveys were accomplished using GIS, Google Earth, Microsoft Excel, and handheld Garmin GPSmap 76CSx GPS units. Homes were identified and mapped in Google Earth, exported to ArcMap 10.0, and a random list of homes was generated using Microsoft Excel which was then loaded onto handheld GPS units for field location. The development and use of a remote sensing method was essential to the selection and location of random households. A total of 537 homes initially were mapped and a randomized subset of 96 was identified as potential survey locations. Over 96% of the homes mapped using Google Earth imagery were correctly identified as occupied dwellings. Only 3.6% of the occupants of mapped homes visited declined to be interviewed. 16.4% of the homes visited were not occupied at the time of the visit due to work away from the home or market days. A total of 55 households were located using this method during the 10 days of fieldwork in May and June of 2012. The method used to generate and field locate random homes for surveys and water sampling was an effective means of selecting random households in a rural environment lacking geolocation infrastructure. The success rate for locating households using a handheld GPS was excellent and only rarely was local knowledge required to identify and locate households. This

Using ArcMap, Google Earth, and Global Positioning Systems to select and locate random households in rural Haiti

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Wampler Peter J

2013-01-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background A remote sensing technique was developed which combines a Geographic Information System (GIS; Google Earth, and Microsoft Excel to identify home locations for a random sample of households in rural Haiti. The method was used to select homes for ethnographic and water quality research in a region of rural Haiti located within 9 km of a local hospital and source of health education in Deschapelles, Haiti. The technique does not require access to governmental records or ground based surveys to collect household location data and can be performed in a rapid, cost-effective manner. Methods The random selection of households and the location of these households during field surveys were accomplished using GIS, Google Earth, Microsoft Excel, and handheld Garmin GPSmap 76CSx GPS units. Homes were identified and mapped in Google Earth, exported to ArcMap 10.0, and a random list of homes was generated using Microsoft Excel which was then loaded onto handheld GPS units for field location. The development and use of a remote sensing method was essential to the selection and location of random households. Results A total of 537 homes initially were mapped and a randomized subset of 96 was identified as potential survey locations. Over 96% of the homes mapped using Google Earth imagery were correctly identified as occupied dwellings. Only 3.6% of the occupants of mapped homes visited declined to be interviewed. 16.4% of the homes visited were not occupied at the time of the visit due to work away from the home or market days. A total of 55 households were located using this method during the 10 days of fieldwork in May and June of 2012. Conclusions The method used to generate and field locate random homes for surveys and water sampling was an effective means of selecting random households in a rural environment lacking geolocation infrastructure. The success rate for locating households using a handheld GPS was excellent and only

An Integrated Multi-Criteria Decision Making Model for Evaluating Wind Farm Performance

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Mei-Sung Kang

2011-11-01

Full Text Available The demands for alternative energy resources have been increasing exponentially in the 21st century due to continuous industrial development, depletion of fossil fuels and emerging environmental consciousness. Renewable energy sources, including wind energy, hydropower energy, geothermal energy, solar energy, biomass energy and ocean power, have received increasing attention as alternative means of meeting global energy demands. After Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant disaster in March 2011, more and more countries are having doubt about the safety of nuclear plants. As a result, safe and renewable energy sources are attracting even more attention these days. Wind energy production, with its relatively safer and positive environmental characteristics, has evolved in the past few decades from a marginal activity into a multi-billion dollar industry. In this research, a comprehensive evaluation model is constructed to select a suitable location for developing a wind farm. The model incorporates interpretive structural modeling (ISM, benefits, opportunities, costs and risks (BOCR and fuzzy analytic network process (FANP. Experts in the field are invited to contribute their expertise in evaluating the importance of the factors and various aspects of the wind farm evaluation problem, and the most suitable wind farm can finally be generated from the model. A case study is carried out in Taiwan in evaluating the expected performance of several potential wind farms, and a recommendation is provided for selecting the most appropriate wind farm for construction.

Optimizing Event Selection with the Random Grid Search

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Bhat, Pushpalatha C. [Fermilab; Prosper, Harrison B. [Florida State U.; Sekmen, Sezen [Kyungpook Natl. U.; Stewart, Chip [Broad Inst., Cambridge

2017-06-29

The random grid search (RGS) is a simple, but efficient, stochastic algorithm to find optimal cuts that was developed in the context of the search for the top quark at Fermilab in the mid-1990s. The algorithm, and associated code, have been enhanced recently with the introduction of two new cut types, one of which has been successfully used in searches for supersymmetry at the Large Hadron Collider. The RGS optimization algorithm is described along with the recent developments, which are illustrated with two examples from particle physics. One explores the optimization of the selection of vector boson fusion events in the four-lepton decay mode of the Higgs boson and the other optimizes SUSY searches using boosted objects and the razor variables.

Non-random mating for selection with restricted rates of inbreeding and overlapping generations

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Sonesson, A.K.; Meuwissen, T.H.E.

2002-01-01

Minimum coancestry mating with a maximum of one offspring per mating pair (MC1) is compared with random mating schemes for populations with overlapping generations. Optimum contribution selection is used, whereby $\\\\\\\\Delta F$ is restricted. For schemes with $\\\\\\\\Delta F$ restricted to 0.25% per

Whole Farm Management to Reduce Nutrient Losses From Dairy Farms: A Simulation Study

OpenAIRE

Rotz, C.A.; Oenema, J.; Keulen, van, H.

2006-01-01

Whole-farm simulation provides a tool for evaluating long-term impacts of nutrient conservation technologies and strategies on dairy farms. A farm simulation model was verified to predict the production and nutrient flows of the De Marke experimental dairy farm in the Netherlands. On this farm, technologies such as a low ammonia emission barn floor, enclosed manure storage, manure injection into the soil, and intraseeding of a grass cover crop on corn land were used to reduce nitrogen loss an...

Exploring the Role of Farm Animals in Providing Care at Care Farms

Science.gov (United States)

Hassink, Jan; De Bruin, Simone R.; Berget, Bente; Elings, Marjolein

2017-01-01

Simple Summary This paper provides insight into the role of farm animals in farm-based programs and their importance to different types of participants. Farm animals provide real work, close relationships, challenging tasks and opportunities for reflection. They also contribute to a welcoming atmosphere for various types of participants. Abstract We explore the role of farm animals in providing care to different types of participants at care farms (e.g., youngsters with behavioural problems, people with severe mental problems and people with dementia). Care farms provide alternative and promising settings where people can interact with animals compared to a therapeutic healthcare setting. We performed a literature review, conducted focus group meetings and carried out secondary data-analysis of qualitative studies involving care farmers and different types of participants. We found that farm animals are important to many participants and have a large number of potential benefits. They can (i) provide meaningful day occupation; (ii) generate valued relationships; (iii) help people master tasks; (iv) provide opportunities for reciprocity; (v) can distract people from them problems; (vi) provide relaxation; (vii) facilitate customized care; (viii) facilitate relationships with other people; (ix) stimulate healthy behavior; (x) contribute to a welcoming environment; (xi) make it possible to experience basic elements of life; and (xii) provide opportunities for reflection and feedback. This shows the multi-facetted importance of interacting with animals on care farms. In this study the types of activities with animals and their value to different types of participants varied. Farm animals are an important element of the care farm environment that can address the care needs of different types of participants. PMID:28574435

Alley Farming in Thailand

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Teerapol Silakul

2010-08-01

Full Text Available Poverty alleviation and environmental preservation are very important issues to many governments. Alley farming is beneficial to the environment because it conserves soil and sustains yields over time. Specifically, alley farming reduces soil erosion, which is a major problem in Thailand. Alley farming was conducted on a farmer’s field at Khaokwan Thong, a village in Uthaithani Province, Northern Thailand. We did a two-by-two factorial with and without alley farming, and with and without fertilizer. From this study, we observed that the two species used, Leucaena leucocephala and Acacia auriculiformis, grow well in Thailand, and that alley farming is suitable for Thailand. Few Thai farmers have heard about alley farming. However, it is nevertheless useful to know that there is potential for alley farming in Thailand using the two species. These plants, based upon the diameter and height measurements provided, grew well.

uFarm: a smart farm management system based on RFID

Science.gov (United States)

Kim, Hyoungsuk; Lee, Moonsup; Jung, Jonghyuk; Lee, Hyunwook; Kim, Taehyoun

2007-12-01

Recently, the livestock industry in Korea has been threatened by many challenges such as low productivity due to labor intensiveness, global competition compelled by the Free Trade Agreement (FTA), and emerging animal disease issues such as BSE or foot-and-mouth. In this paper, we propose a smart farm management system, called uFarm, which would come up with such challenges by automating farm management. First, we automate labor-intensive jobs using equipments based on sensors and actuators. The automation subsystem can be controlled by remote user through wireless network. Second, we provide real-time traceability of information on farm animals using the radio-frequency identification (RFID) method and embedded data server with network connectivity.

Treatment practices and quantification of antimicrobial drug usage in conventional and organic dairy farms in Wisconsin.

Science.gov (United States)

Pol, M; Ruegg, P L

2007-01-01

The objective of this study was to develop a method to quantify antimicrobial drug usage and treatment practices on conventional and organic dairy farms that had been recruited to represent a broad spectrum of potential exposure to antimicrobial drugs. Data on disease prevalence and treatment practices of organic (n = 20) and conventional (n = 20) farms were obtained during a farm visit using a survey instrument. A standardized estimate of antimicrobial drug usage was developed using a defined daily dose (DDD) of selected compounds. Density of antimicrobial drug usage was expressed as the number of DDD per adult cow per year. Differences in prevalence and management of selected diseases between conventional and organic farms were identified. The overall estimated prevalence of selected diseases was greater for conventional farms compared with organic farms. Organic farmers reported use of a variety of nonantimicrobial compounds for treatment and prevention of disease. Conventional farmers reported that penicillin was the compound most commonly used for dry cow therapy and cephapirin was most commonly used for treatment of clinical mastitis. On conventional farms, the estimated overall exposure to antimicrobial drugs was 5.43 DDD per cow per year composed of 3.58 and 1.85 DDD of intramammary and parenteral antimicrobial drugs, respectively. Of total intramammary antimicrobial drug usage, treatment of clinical mastitis contributed 2.02 DDD compared with 1.56 DDD attributed to the use of dry cow therapy. Of total parenteral treatments, the distribution of exposure was 0.52 (dry cow therapy), 1.43 (clinical mastitis treatment), 0.39 (treatment of foot disease), 0.14 (treatment of respiratory disease), and 0.32 (treatment of metritis) DDD. For treatments of foot infections (0.33 DDD), respiratory infections (0.07 DDD), and metritis (0.19 DDD), the mean density of ceftiofur usage was significantly greater compared with other compounds.

Stability Augmentation of Wind Farm using Variable Speed Permanent Magnet Synchronous Generator

Science.gov (United States)

Rosyadi, Marwan; Muyeen, S. M.; Takahashi, Rion; Tamura, Junji

This paper presents a new control strategy of variable speed permanent magnet wind generator for stability augmentation of wind farm including fixed speed wind turbine with Induction Generator (IG). A new control scheme is developed for two levels back-to-back converters of Permanent Magnet Synchronous Generator (PMSG), by which both active and reactive powers delivered to the grid can be controlled easily. To avoid the converter damage, the DC link protection controller is also proposed in order to protect the dc link circuit during fault condition. To evaluate the control capability of the proposed controllers, simulations are performed on two model systems composed of wind farms connected to an infinite bus. From transient and steady state analyses by using PSCAD/EMTDC, it is concluded that the proposed control scheme is very effective to improve the stability of wind farm for severe network disturbance and randomly fluctuating wind speed.

family farming; quantification; RENAF (registration of family farming; Argentina.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mabel Manzanal

2015-04-01

Full Text Available As part of an ongoing research project, this paper discusses public policies that link family farming (FF and food security and sovereignty (FSS which have been promoted in Argentina since 2010.The objective of this research is to contribute to knowledge about developmental and territorial issues, based on the study of experiences located in the provinces of Buenos Aires and Misiones.The article contextualizes and analyzes the emergence of FF and FSS policies, as well as the differences in the ways in which they were managed and implemented in the cases selected. All of this raises the following questions: what role is assigned to FF in rural development policy? What conception of "food sovereignty" lies behind these policies? 

Life cycle assessment of offshore and onshore sited wind farms

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

2004-10-15

environmental impacts. The foundations of the offshore wind farms make up a considerable factor to the total environmental impacts, as steel is a large constituent part of the foundations, some of which is abandoned at the seabed after dismantling of the farm. Therefore, the foundation of the offshore wind farms is selected as a focus area in connection with possibilities of product optimisation. Other types of foundations are assessed, and it is found that all the assessed foundation types give the same environmental impact, even though one of the types (caisson) will be completely removed from the seabed whereas in the case of other types (mono pile and tripod) everything more than 1 metre below the seabed is abandoned. Even though the operation does not contribute considerably to the environmental impacts, the environmental differences in using helicopter contra boat at maintenance of the offshore turbines have been examined. The differences are significant, as servicing by boat is insignificantly small. But irrespective of the way of transport the servicing will not contribute largely to the total impact from the entire farm in the total lifetime. (BA)

Farm workers' health and pesticide residue analysis of three farms in ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Cross sectional survey on the health status of the farm workers, engaged with pesticide use, at three agricultural farms; one in Debre zeit and two in Meki, Ethiopia, was conducted. A low prevalence of respiratory symptoms, chronic cough = 2.4%, in the farm workers as well as, chronic cough = 2.7%, in the control group was ...

FARM SUCCESSION PLANS AMONG POULTRY FARMERS IN OGUN STATE

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Fasina O.

2014-01-01

Full Text Available Ageing of farmers in Nigeria and especially in capitalized sectors of agriculture requires attention to enhance sustainability and food security. The study thus examined the farm succession plans of 60 long established poultry farmers purposively selected from the Poultry Association of Nigeria in Ogun State Nigeria. Descriptive statistics and the Chi square analysis were used to present the findings of the study. Mean age of respondents was 61years. Their children were mostly over 18years (65%. Poultry farms were solely owned (76.7% with mean age of 17.9 years. Succession rate i.e. identification of a successor was eighty percent and were mostly respondents children (63.3%. This choice was based on their level of involvement in the business (63.6%. Majority (60% were not willing to fully retire from farming until death. Chi square analysis revealed age of farmer was significantly related to succession rate.

INCLUFAR – INCLUSIVE FARMING – A NEW EDUCATIONAL APPROACH IN SOCIAL FARMING

OpenAIRE

van Elsen, Thomas; Herz, Gerhard; Ehlers, Hartwig; Schäfer, Winfried; Merckens, Klaus

2014-01-01

"Social farming" and “Green Care” are being developed throughout Europe: farms which put the "multifunctionality" demanded by the policy makers into practice, contributing to the creation of jobs in rural areas through the creation of social services. The team of authors has applied successfully to run the project “Inclusive farming – transfer of concepts, experiences, skills and training tools for Social Farming and eco-social inclusion” within the “Leonardo da Vinci - Transfer of Innovation...

Creating a typology of tobacco farms according to determinants of diversification in Valle de Lerma (Salta-Argentina)

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Chavez, M. D.; Berentsen, P. B. M.; Oude Lansink, G. J. M.

2010-07-01

The objective of this article is to identify typical tobacco farms according to determinants of diversification that can be used to explore possibilities of diversification in the province of Salta (Northwest of Argentina). National Agriculture Census data of 278 farms in the main tobacco production area of Salta were used for the analysis. The variables selected concerning determinants of diversification were: land area, irrigation, general capital goods and specific capital goods, ownership of land, education, off-farm work, and labour availability. The analysis of the principal components applied to 16 selected variables allowed to reduce the dimensionality of the data to four components. Those components were used to apply K-means cluster approach to classify the farms. Four clusters were determined. Cluster 1 and Cluster 2 are the largest clusters. These concern highly specialized tobacco farms. They differ regarding determinants for diversification due to different levels of education of the farmer and different levels of off-farm work. Both clusters are interesting for further analysis regarding diversification alternatives to maintain or improve income and to reduce soil degradation. Cluster 3 concerns large tobacco farms being somewhat less specialized than the farms in clusters 1 and 2. Intensive tobacco production makes this group interesting for exploring diversification alternatives to improve soil conditions. Farms in cluster 4 already have a high level of diversification with substantial livestock production. The presence of perennial pastures suggests a better soil management than the other clusters. This cluster looks appealing to investigate what can be done regarding diversification. (Author) 44 refs.

Comparative Evaluations of Randomly Selected Four Point-of-Care Glucometer Devices in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Science.gov (United States)

Wolde, Mistire; Tarekegn, Getahun; Kebede, Tedla

2018-05-01

Point-of-care glucometer (PoCG) devices play a significant role in self-monitoring of the blood sugar level, particularly in the follow-up of high blood sugar therapeutic response. The aim of this study was to evaluate blood glucose test results performed with four randomly selected glucometers on diabetes and control subjects versus standard wet chemistry (hexokinase) methods in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. A prospective cross-sectional study was conducted on randomly selected 200 study participants (100 participants with diabetes and 100 healthy controls). Four randomly selected PoCG devices (CareSens N, DIAVUE Prudential, On Call Extra, i-QARE DS-W) were evaluated against hexokinase method and ISO 15197:2003 and ISO 15197:2013 standards. The minimum and maximum blood sugar values were recorded by CareSens N (21 mg/dl) and hexokinase method (498.8 mg/dl), respectively. The mean sugar values of all PoCG devices except On Call Extra showed significant differences compared with the reference hexokinase method. Meanwhile, all four PoCG devices had strong positive relationship (>80%) with the reference method (hexokinase). On the other hand, none of the four PoCG devices fulfilled the minimum accuracy measurement set by ISO 15197:2003 and ISO 15197:2013 standards. In addition, the linear regression analysis revealed that all four selected PoCG overestimated the glucose concentrations. The overall evaluation of the selected four PoCG measurements were poorly correlated with standard reference method. Therefore, before introducing PoCG devices to the market, there should be a standardized evaluation platform for validation. Further similar large-scale studies on other PoCG devices also need to be undertaken.

Geography and genography: prediction of continental origin using randomly selected single nucleotide polymorphisms

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ramoni Marco F

2007-03-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Recent studies have shown that when individuals are grouped on the basis of genetic similarity, group membership corresponds closely to continental origin. There has been considerable debate about the implications of these findings in the context of larger debates about race and the extent of genetic variation between groups. Some have argued that clustering according to continental origin demonstrates the existence of significant genetic differences between groups and that these differences may have important implications for differences in health and disease. Others argue that clustering according to continental origin requires the use of large amounts of genetic data or specifically chosen markers and is indicative only of very subtle genetic differences that are unlikely to have biomedical significance. Results We used small numbers of randomly selected single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs from the International HapMap Project to train naïve Bayes classifiers for prediction of ancestral continent of origin. Predictive accuracy was tested on two independent data sets. Genetically similar groups should be difficult to distinguish, especially if only a small number of genetic markers are used. The genetic differences between continentally defined groups are sufficiently large that one can accurately predict ancestral continent of origin using only a minute, randomly selected fraction of the genetic variation present in the human genome. Genotype data from only 50 random SNPs was sufficient to predict ancestral continent of origin in our primary test data set with an average accuracy of 95%. Genetic variations informative about ancestry were common and widely distributed throughout the genome. Conclusion Accurate characterization of ancestry is possible using small numbers of randomly selected SNPs. The results presented here show how investigators conducting genetic association studies can use small numbers of arbitrarily

Real-time PCR evaluation of Strongylus vulgaris in horses on farms in Denmark and Central Kentucky.

Science.gov (United States)

Nielsen, M K; Olsen, S N; Lyons, E T; Monrad, J; Thamsborg, S M

2012-12-21

Strongyle parasites are ubiquitous in grazing horses, and the large strongyle Strongylus vulgaris is considered the most pathogenic helminth parasite of horses. Recent investigations have suggested an association between occurrence of this parasite and usage of selective therapy based on regular fecal egg counts. The established diagnostic method for S. vulgaris involves larval culture and subsequent morphological identification of third stage larvae under the microscope. Recently, a real-time PCR assay was developed and validated for the detection and semi-quantification of S. vulgaris eggs in equine fecal samples. The purposes of the present study were (a) to determine the presence of S. vulgaris by real-time PCR in Danish and American horses on farms using vastly different anthelmintic treatment regimens and (b) to evaluate the association between larval culture results and the PCR. A total of 991 horses representing 53 different horse farms in Denmark and Central Kentucky were studied. Fresh fecal samples were collected from all horses, and strongyle eggs retrieved for DNA extraction and subsequent real-time PCR analysis. Individual larval cultures were performed on the Danish part of the data set (663 horses on 42 farms). On the Danish farms, the S. vulgaris PCR prevalence was found to be 9.2% on farms not basing parasite control on fecal egg counts, and 14.1% on farms using selective therapy. No horses were PCR positive in the American part of the study (328 horses on 11 farms). Kappa-values indicated a moderate agreement between PCR and larval culture results, while McNemar tests revealed no statistical difference between the paired proportions. Significant associations were found between PCR cycle of threshold (Ct) value groups and larval culture counts. Results indicate that both diagnostic methods can be useful for determining the occurrence of S. vulgaris on horse farms, but that they both are affected by potential sources of error. The PCR results

Farm tourism

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Blichfeldt, Bodil Stilling; Nielsen, Niels Christian; Just, Flemming

2011-01-01

This paper draws on a study of one specific type of small tourism enterprises (i.e. farm tourism enterprises) and argues that these enterprises differ from other enterprises in relation to a series of issues other than merely size. The analysis shows that enterprises such as these are characterized......, our study suggests that it is problematic to threat farm tourism enterprises as if they have much in common with both larger corporations and other types of SMTEs. Farm tourism enterprises seem to differ significantly from other enterprises as the hosts are not in the tourism business because...

Whole farm quantification of GHG emissions within smallholder farms in developing countries

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Seebauer, Matthias

2014-01-01

The IPCC has compiled the best available scientific methods into published guidelines for estimating greenhouse gas emissions and emission removals from the land-use sector. In order to evaluate existing GHG quantification tools to comprehensively quantify GHG emissions and removals in smallholder conditions, farm scale quantification was tested with farm data from Western Kenya. After conducting a cluster analysis to identify different farm typologies GHG quantification was exercised using the VCS SALM methodology complemented with IPCC livestock emission factors and the cool farm tool. The emission profiles of four farm clusters representing the baseline conditions in the year 2009 are compared with 2011 where farmers adopted sustainable land management practices (SALM). The results demonstrate the variation in both the magnitude of the estimated GHG emissions per ha between different smallholder farm typologies and the emissions estimated by applying two different accounting tools. The farm scale quantification further shows that the adoption of SALM has a significant impact on emission reduction and removals and the mitigation benefits range between 4 and 6.5 tCO 2  ha −1  yr −1 with significantly different mitigation benefits depending on typologies of the crop–livestock systems, their different agricultural practices, as well as adoption rates of improved practices. However, the inherent uncertainty related to the emission factors applied by accounting tools has substantial implications for reported agricultural emissions. With regard to uncertainty related to activity data, the assessment confirms the high variability within different farm types as well as between different parameters surveyed to comprehensively quantify GHG emissions within smallholder farms. (paper)

Increased respiratory symptoms in COPD patients living in the vicinity of livestock farms.

Science.gov (United States)

Borlée, Floor; Yzermans, C Joris; van Dijk, Christel E; Heederik, Dick; Smit, Lidwien A M

2015-12-01

Several studies have investigated the effect of livestock farm emissions on the respiratory health of local residents, but results are inconsistent. This study aims to explore associations between the presence of livestock farms and respiratory health in an area of high-density livestock farming in the Netherlands. We focused especially on associations between farm exposures and respiratory symptoms within subgroups of potentially susceptible patients with a pre-existing lung disease.In total, 14 875 adults (response rate 53.4%) completed a questionnaire concerning respiratory health, smoking habits and personal characteristics. Different indicators of livestock farm exposures relative to the home address were computed using a geographic information system.Prevalence of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and asthma was lower among residents living within 100 m of a farm (OR 0.47, 95% CI 0.24-0.91 and OR 0.65, 95% CI 0.45-0.93, respectively). However, >11 farms in 1000 m compared to fewer than four farms in 1000 m (fourth quartile versus first quartile) was associated with wheezing among COPD patients (OR 1.71, 95% CI 1.01-2.89). Using general practitioners' electronic medical records, we demonstrated that selection bias did not affect the observed associations.Our data suggest a protective effect of livestock farm emissions on the respiratory health of residents. Nonetheless, COPD patients living near livestock farms reported more respiratory symptoms, suggesting an increased risk of exacerbations. Copyright ©ERS 2015.

Exploring the Role of Farm Animals in Providing Care at Care Farms.

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Hassink, Jan; De Bruin, Simone R; Berget, Bente; Elings, Marjolein

2017-01-01

We explore the role of farm animals in providing care to different types of participants at care farms (e.g., youngsters with behavioural problems, people with severe mental problems and people with dementia). Care farms provide alternative and promising settings where people can interact with

Quantifying antimicrobial resistance at veal calf farms.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Angela B Bosman

Full Text Available This study was performed to determine a sampling strategy to quantify the prevalence of antimicrobial resistance on veal calf farms, based on the variation in antimicrobial resistance within and between calves on five farms. Faecal samples from 50 healthy calves (10 calves/farm were collected. From each individual sample and one pooled faecal sample per farm, 90 selected Escherichia coli isolates were tested for their resistance against 25 mg/L amoxicillin, 25 mg/L tetracycline, 0.5 mg/L cefotaxime, 0.125 mg/L ciprofloxacin and 8/152 mg/L trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole (tmp/s by replica plating. From each faecal sample another 10 selected E. coli isolates were tested for their resistance by broth microdilution as a reference. Logistic regression analysis was performed to compare the odds of testing an isolate resistant between both test methods (replica plating vs. broth microdilution and to evaluate the effect of pooling faecal samples. Bootstrap analysis was used to investigate the precision of the estimated prevalence of resistance to each antimicrobial obtained by several simulated sampling strategies. Replica plating showed similar odds of E. coli isolates tested resistant compared to broth microdilution, except for ciprofloxacin (OR 0.29, p ≤ 0.05. Pooled samples showed in general lower odds of an isolate being resistant compared to individual samples, although these differences were not significant. Bootstrap analysis showed that within each antimicrobial the various compositions of a pooled sample provided consistent estimates for the mean proportion of resistant isolates. Sampling strategies should be based on the variation in resistance among isolates within faecal samples and between faecal samples, which may vary by antimicrobial. In our study, the optimal sampling strategy from the perspective of precision of the estimated levels of resistance and practicality consists of a pooled faecal sample from 20 individual animals, of which

Prototyping and farm system modelling - Partners on the road towards more sustainable farm systems?

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Sterk, B.; Ittersum, van M.K.; Leeuwis, C.; Wijnands, F.G.

2007-01-01

Farm system modelling and prototyping are two research methods proposed to enhance the process of developing sustainable farm systems. Farm system models provide means to formalize, expand and refine expert knowledge and to integrate this with scientific agro-ecological knowledge at the farm level.

Integration of a wind farm with a wave- and an aquaculture farm

OpenAIRE

He, J.; Weissenberger, J.; Bergh, Øivind; Hjøllo, Solfrid Sætre; Wehde, Henning; Agnalt, Ann-Lisbeth; Chen, Z.; Olason, D.; Thorsteinson, B.; Fosso, O.B.

2011-01-01

There is a growing interest in placing wind farms offshore. 140 GW of offshore wind are currently being planned to reach the EU energy 2020 goal. However, an offshore wind farm occupies a large area and competes with other users of the maritime space. The integration of an offshore wind farm with other marine energy producers such as wave energy and other maritime users such as aquaculture farms may result in significant benefits in terms of economics, optimising spatial utilization, and mini...

REVENUE ANALYSIS AND EFFICIENCY FARMING RED CHILLI IN MINGGIR DISTRIC,T SLEMAN SUB-PROVINCE

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Johan Saputro

2013-01-01

Full Text Available Red chili farm is potentially to develops because can increase the earning of farmer, but how much the farmer earning and factors that it’s production are not known. This research aim to know earnings of farmer of red chili, knowing factors any kind of influencing red chili production and efficiency usage of factors produce at red chili of farming. Basic method which is used in this research is descriptive analysis method. Research location determined with sampling purposive that is in District Stand aside. Farmer of sample determined with systematic random sampling and taken by 30 samples. Data analyze with: (1 revenue analysis, (2 multiple linear regression, (3 function of CobbDouglas. Result of research was indicated that farmer mean earning per hectare of red chili is IDR 80.098.297, 00 wide of factors of production of farm, seed, phonska fertilizer, cage manure, pesticide, and labor have an effect significant at 95 percent level while manure of urea have an effect not significant. Efficiency usage of factors produce inefficient red chili of farming for example wide of farm, seed, urea fertilizer, phonska fertilize, cage manure, pesticide, and labor.

Economic efficiency of legume-cereal intercrops in conditions of organic farming

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jaroslav Jánský

2010-01-01

Full Text Available The paper presents economic analysis of growing of legume-cereal intercropping in conditions of organic farming. Results of the analysis are based on data monitoring in chosen organic farms that grow LCI. In the paper there is also compared economic efficiency of LCI grown in organic and conventional farming system. Methodological solution results from costingness and earnings monitoring of LCI production in five chosen organic farms in the period 2007–2008.When evaluating costs existing in individual variants of LCI growing it is necessary to say that the selection of individual machines and machine aggregations represents the most important factor of influencing direct costs, namely with regard to the size of organic farms and to the area of individual field blocks. Under conditions of organic farms, the LCI production is also significantly influenced also by agrotechnical (tillage operations. As compared with conventional farms, the final yield of both green fodder and grain is lower by 14–38%. Total direct costs per hectare of harvested LCI acreage ranged in case of fodder production from 9.249 CZK to 11.620 CZK per hectare. In case of grain production, the corresponding costs ranged from 8.848 to 9.970 CZK per hectare. In case of LCI, the direct costs of organic farms per unit of production of both fodder and grain consist mainly of material costs, which represent 63–76% and 61–68% of total expenses associated with production of fodder and grain, respectively. These direct costs are influenced also by higher prices of inputs.

Environmental and economic comparisons of manure application methods in farming systems.

Science.gov (United States)

Rotz, C A; Kleinman, P J A; Dell, C J; Veith, T L; Beegle, D B

2011-01-01

Alternative methods for applying livestock manure to no-till soils involve environmental and economic trade-offs. A process-level farm simulation model (Integrated Farm System Model) was used to evaluate methods for applying liquid dairy (Bos taurus L.) and swine (Sus scrofa L.) manure, including no application, broadcast spreading with and without incorporation by tillage, band application with soil aeration, and shallow disk injection. The model predicted ammonia emissions, nitrate leaching, and phosphorus (P) runoff losses similar to those measured over 4 yr of field trials. Each application method was simulated over 25 yr of weather on three Pennsylvania farms. On a swine and cow-calf beef operation under grass production, shallow disk injection increased profit by $340 yr(-1) while reducing ammonia nitrogen and soluble P losses by 48 and 70%, respectively. On a corn (Zea mays L.)-and-grass-based grazing dairy farm, shallow disk injection reduced ammonia loss by 21% and soluble P loss by 76% with little impact on farm profit. Incorporation by tillage and band application with aeration provided less environmental benefit with a net decrease in farm profit. On a large corn-and-alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.)-based dairy farm where manure nutrients were available in excess of crop needs, incorporation methods were not economically beneficial, but they provided environmental benefits with relatively low annual net costs ($13 to $18 cow). In all farming systems, shallow disk injection provided the greatest environmental benefit at the least cost or greatest profit for the producer. With these results, producers are better informed when selecting manure application equipment.

Exploring the role of farm animals in providing care at care farms

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Hassink, Jan; Bruin, de Simone R.; Berget, Bente; Elings, Marjolein

2017-01-01

We explore the role of farm animals in providing care to different types of participants at care farms (e.g., youngsters with behavioural problems, people with severe mental problems and people with dementia). Care farms provide alternative and promising settings where people can interact with

Vancomycin resistant enterococci in farm animals – occurrence and importance

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Oskar Nilsson

2012-04-01

Full Text Available The view on enterococci has over the years shifted from harmless commensals to opportunistic but important pathogens mainly causing nosocomial infections. One important part of this development is the emergence of vancomycin resistance enterococci (VRE. The term VRE includes several combinations of bacterial species and resistance genes of which the most clinically important is Enterococcus faecium with vanA type vancomycin resistance. This variant is also the most common VRE among farm animals. The reason for VRE being present among farm animals is selection by extensive use of the vancomycin analog avoparcin for growth promotion. Once the use of avoparcin was discontinued, the prevalence of VRE among farm animals decreased. However, VRE are still present among farm animals and by spread via food products they could potentially have a negative impact on public health. This review is based on the PhD thesis Vancomycin Resistant Enterococci in Swedish Broilers – Emergence, Epidemiology and Elimination and makes a short summary of VRE in humans and food producing animals. The specific situation regarding VRE in Swedish broiler production is also mentioned.

Tourism as revitalizing factor of farms- example of Cvetni salaš (Flowery farm and Majkin salaš (Grandma′s farm in Palić

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Dragićević Vanja

2007-01-01

Full Text Available Farms are cultural and ambience special feature of pannonian plain and, in the sense of cultural heritage, they are the protective symbol of Northern Bačka. Farm or "salaš" on Serbian language, represents green oasis made of house, farm buildings, sweep and the endless cultivated plain, but also represents the way of living. As a specific creation of folk architecture and as a special ethnographic museum, with preserved old tools, pottery, folk costume and folk customs, usually situated in preserved natural ambience, farms are attractive for tourists. Unfortunately, they have never been used enough in tourist presentation. The best results in tourist valorization are achieved with farms near towns Subotica and Sombor. These farms require relatively small investments for tourist arrangement and farmers are interested in developing tourism, which can contribute in different ways to revitalization of farms. Farms should create tourist offer, based on unique experience of the plain, authentic ambience, tradition, healthy food. In many European countries, tourism has been recognized as an appropriate tool to revitalize rural areas and to ensure their sustainable development. In this paper, there is going to be presented tourist arrangement and offer of Cvetni salaš (Flowery farm and Majkin salaš (Grandma’s farm, which are situated on Palić, settlement with long tourist tradition.

Farm Management Basic Core Curriculum. Kansas Postsecondary Farm and Ranch Management Project.

Science.gov (United States)

Albracht, James, Ed.

Thirty-five units of instruction are included in this core curriculum in farm management for postsecondary farm and ranch management programs. Units of instruction are divided into 12 instructional areas: (1) Introduction to Financial Management, (2) Farm Business Arrangement, (3) Credit Management, (4) Budgeting, (5) Recordkeeping, (6) Record…

Genetic diversity of pheasants from natural habitat and farm ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

The original source of the pheasants living in the natural habitat is the farm, and the present genetic variation between the two groups of birds can be interpreted as an effect of natural selection. Keywords: Common pheasant (Phasianus colchicus), genetic distance, genetic polymorphism, genetic similarities, genetic ...

The efficacy of ivermectin, pyrantel and fenbendazole against Parascaris equorum infection in foals on farms in Australia.

Science.gov (United States)

Armstrong, S K; Woodgate, R G; Gough, S; Heller, J; Sangster, N C; Hughes, K J

2014-10-15

This study was performed to estimate the prevalence of patent Parascaris equorum infections and determine the efficacy of ivermectin, pyrantel and fenbendazole against P. equorum infection in foals on farms in southern Australia. Foals aged >3 months on five farms in the south-western slopes region of New South Wales were used. Faeces were collected from each foal and foals with a P. equorum faecal egg count (FEC) of >100 eggs per gram (EPG) were used to measure anthelmintic efficacy using the FEC reduction (FECR) test, after random allocation to a control group or an ivermectin, pyrantel embonate or fenbendazole treatment group. Treatment was administered on day 0 and faeces were collected on day 14 and a FEC was performed. For determination of anthelmintic efficacy, FECRs and lower 95% confidence intervals (LCL) were calculated using previously described methods, based on individual or group FECRs. P. equorum populations were considered susceptible when FECR was >90% and LCL >90%, suspected resistant when FECR was FECR was 80-90% and LCL Fenbendazole was effective on two farms, equivocal on one farm and ineffective on one farm. Pyrantel embonate was effective on three farms and ineffective on one farm. These data indicate that anthelmintic-resistant P. equorum populations are present on farms in Australia and multiple drug resistance may occur on individual farms. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Modelling the smart farm

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Michael J. O'Grady

2017-09-01

Full Text Available Smart farming envisages the harnessing of Information and Communication Technologies as an enabler of more efficient, productive, and profitable farming enterprises. Such technologies do not suffice on their own; rather they must be judiciously combined to deliver meaningful information in near real-time. Decision-support tools incorporating models of disparate farming activities, either on their own or in combination with other models, offer one popular approach; exemplars include GPFARM, APSIM, GRAZPLAN amongst many others. Such models tend to be generic in nature and their adoption by individual farmers is minimal. Smart technologies offer an opportunity to remedy this situation; farm-specific models that can reflect near real-time events become tractable using such technologies. Research on the development, and application of farm-specific models is at a very early stage. This paper thus presents an overview of models within the farming enterprise; it then reviews the state-of the art in smart technologies that promise to enable a new generation of enterprise-specific models that will underpin future smart farming enterprises.

On-farm welfare assessment for regulatory purposes: Issues and possible solutions

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sørensen, Jan Tind; Fraser, David

2010-01-01

On-farm welfare assessment has been used mainly for non-regulatory purposes such as producer education or to qualify for voluntary welfare-assurance programs. The application of on-farm assessments in regulatory programs would require four issues to be addressed: (1) selecting criteria...... solution. Issues 3 and 4 (fairness and efficiency) require scientific data on the precision, repeatability, independence, and cost-of-scoring for the various candidate criteria. A process is also needed to bring the scientific information into the deliberative process, either as formal recommendations and...

Development and testing of a European Union-wide farm-level carbon calculator.

Science.gov (United States)

Tuomisto, Hanna L; De Camillis, Camillo; Leip, Adrian; Nisini, Luigi; Pelletier, Nathan; Haastrup, Palle

2015-07-01

Direct greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from agriculture accounted for approximately 10% of total European Union (EU) emissions in 2010. To reduce farming-related GHG emissions, appropriate policy measures and supporting tools for promoting low-C farming practices may be efficacious. This article presents the methodology and testing results of a new EU-wide, farm-level C footprint calculator. The Carbon Calculator quantifies GHG emissions based on international standards and technical specifications on Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and C footprinting. The tool delivers its results both at the farm level and as allocated to up to 5 main products of the farm. In addition to the quantification of GHG emissions, the calculator proposes mitigation options and sequestration actions that may be suitable for individual farms. The results obtained during a survey made on 54 farms from 8 EU Member States are presented. These farms were selected in view of representing the diversity of farm types across different environmental zones in the EU. The results of the C footprint of products in the data set show wide range of variation between minimum and maximum values. The results of the mitigation actions showed that the tool can help identify practices that can lead to substantial emission reductions. To avoid burden-shifting from climate change to other environmental issues, the future improvements of the tool should include incorporation of other environmental impact categories in place of solely focusing on GHG emissions. © 2015 The Authors. Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of SETAC.

Wind Energy Development in India and a Methodology for Evaluating Performance of Wind Farm Clusters

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sanjeev H. Kulkarni

2016-01-01

Full Text Available With maturity of advanced technologies and urgent requirement for maintaining a healthy environment with reasonable price, India is moving towards a trend of generating electricity from renewable resources. Wind energy production, with its relatively safer and positive environmental characteristics, has evolved from a marginal activity into a multibillion dollar industry today. Wind energy power plants, also known as wind farms, comprise multiple wind turbines. Though there are several wind-mill clusters producing energy in different geographical locations across the world, evaluating their performance is a complex task and is an important focus for stakeholders. In this work an attempt is made to estimate the performance of wind clusters employing a multicriteria approach. Multiple factors that affect wind farm operations are analyzed by taking experts opinions, and a performance ranking of the wind farms is generated. The weights of the selection criteria are determined by pairwise comparison matrices of the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP. The proposed methodology evaluates wind farm performance based on technical, economic, environmental, and sociological indicators. Both qualitative and quantitative parameters were considered. Empirical data were collected through questionnaire from the selected wind farms of Belagavi district in the Indian State of Karnataka. This proposed methodology is a useful tool for cluster analysis.

Fuzzy Random λ-Mean SAD Portfolio Selection Problem: An Ant Colony Optimization Approach

Science.gov (United States)

Thakur, Gour Sundar Mitra; Bhattacharyya, Rupak; Mitra, Swapan Kumar

2010-10-01

To reach the investment goal, one has to select a combination of securities among different portfolios containing large number of securities. Only the past records of each security do not guarantee the future return. As there are many uncertain factors which directly or indirectly influence the stock market and there are also some newer stock markets which do not have enough historical data, experts' expectation and experience must be combined with the past records to generate an effective portfolio selection model. In this paper the return of security is assumed to be Fuzzy Random Variable Set (FRVS), where returns are set of random numbers which are in turn fuzzy numbers. A new λ-Mean Semi Absolute Deviation (λ-MSAD) portfolio selection model is developed. The subjective opinions of the investors to the rate of returns of each security are taken into consideration by introducing a pessimistic-optimistic parameter vector λ. λ-Mean Semi Absolute Deviation (λ-MSAD) model is preferred as it follows absolute deviation of the rate of returns of a portfolio instead of the variance as the measure of the risk. As this model can be reduced to Linear Programming Problem (LPP) it can be solved much faster than quadratic programming problems. Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) is used for solving the portfolio selection problem. ACO is a paradigm for designing meta-heuristic algorithms for combinatorial optimization problem. Data from BSE is used for illustration.

A Development Strategy for Dairy Goat Farms in Bogor Regency - West Java

OpenAIRE

Cyrilla, L; Purwanto, B. P; Astuti, D. A; Atabany, A; Sukmawati, A

2016-01-01

The objectives of present study were to formulate development strategies for dairy goat' farms that capable of supporting goat's milk agribusiness. Three medium scale dairy goat farms located in Bogor Regency which has population of more than 100 heads and has established more than 10 years were purposively selected for the study. Data were collected during February to May 2014. The design of this study was based on descriptive qualitative approach (rapid appraisal approach). Data were analiz...

The Interactive Effect of Diversification and Farming Scale on Productivity of Family Farm:Taking Rice Cultivation as An Example

Science.gov (United States)

Wei, Zhou

2017-05-01

Based on the diversification and cultivation scale, the rice cropping data of rural fixed observation points in 2011 were selected and the effect of diversification degree on rice productivity was analyzed by the Tobit model. The empirical results of the model show that diversification of sample farm will lead to loss of rice production efficiency. With the increase of rice planting scale, the loss of rice production efficiency will need to be further increased by diversification. Thus, we should stick to the family farm of specialized production operation. The transfer of land, the price and quantity of leasing, respecting the law of the market; the raising of funds can be considered non-subsidized capital market financing to help, while maintaining a certain degree of diversification, to avoid idle assets, low resource efficiency loss.

Farm Mapping to Assist, Protect, and Prepare Emergency Responders: Farm MAPPER.

Science.gov (United States)

Reyes, Iris; Rollins, Tami; Mahnke, Andrea; Kadolph, Christopher; Minor, Gerald; Keifer, Matthew

2014-01-01

Responders such as firefighters and emergency medical technicians who respond to farm emergencies often face complex and unknown environments. They may encounter hazards such as fuels, solvents, pesticides, caustics, and exploding gas storage cylinders. Responders may be unaware of dirt roads within the farm that can expedite their arrival at critical sites or snow-covered manure pits that act as hidden hazards. A response to a farm, unless guided by someone familiar with the operation, may present a risk to responders and post a challenge in locating the victim. This project explored the use of a Web-based farm-mapping application optimized for tablets and accessible via easily accessible on-site matrix barcodes, or quick response codes (QR codes), to provide emergency responders with hazard and resource information to agricultural operations. Secured portals were developed for both farmers and responders, allowing both parties to populate and customize farm maps with icons. Data were stored online and linked to QR codes attached to mailbox posts where emergency responders may read them with a mobile device. Mock responses were conducted on dairy farms to test QR code linking efficacy, Web site security, and field usability. Findings from farmer usability tests showed willingness to enter data as well as ease of Web site navigation and data entry even with farmers who had limited computer knowledge. Usability tests with emergency responders showed ease of QR code connectivity to the farm maps and ease of Web site navigation. Further research is needed to improve data security as well as assess the program's applicability to nonfarm environments and integration with existing emergency response systems. The next phases of this project will expand the program for regional and national use, develop QR code-linked, Web-based extrication guidance for farm machinery for victim entrapment rescue, and create QR code-linked online training videos and materials for limited

FARM LABOR COSTS AND FOOD PRICES, 1964-65.

Science.gov (United States)

1966

TO MEASURE THE IMPACT OF THE DECLINE OF FOREIGN AGRICULTURAL WORKER EMPLOYMENT ON FARM-LABOR COSTS, FOOD PRICES, AND RETURN TO THE FARMER, AN ANALYSIS WAS MADE OF THE 1964-65 CHANGES IN THESE FACTORS FOR SELECTED CALIFORNIA CROPS. TOMATOES, LETTUCE, STRAWBERRIES, CANTALOUPES, CELERY, LEMONS, AND ASPARAGUS, WHICH ACCOUNTED FOR 71 PERCENT OF THE…

Farm Population of the United States: 1976. Current Population Reports: Farm Population.

Science.gov (United States)

Banks, Vera J.; And Others

Prepared cooperatively by the Bureau of the Census and the Economic Research Service of the U.S. DeparLment of Agriculture, this document presents narrative and tabular data on: demographic and social characteristics of the farm population; economic characteristics of the farm population; revision of farm population processing procedures; and…

Pediatric selective mutism therapy: a randomized controlled trial.

Science.gov (United States)

Esposito, Maria; Gimigliano, Francesca; Barillari, Maria R; Precenzano, Francesco; Ruberto, Maria; Sepe, Joseph; Barillari, Umberto; Gimigliano, Raffaele; Militerni, Roberto; Messina, Giovanni; Carotenuto, Marco

2017-10-01

Selective mutism (SM) is a rare disease in children coded by DSM-5 as an anxiety disorder. Despite the disabling nature of the disease, there is still no specific treatment. The aims of this study were to verify the efficacy of six-month standard psychomotor treatment and the positive changes in lifestyle, in a population of children affected by SM. Randomized controlled trial registered in the European Clinical Trials Registry (EuDract 2015-001161-36). University third level Centre (Child and Adolescent Neuropsychiatry Clinic). Study population was composed by 67 children in group A (psychomotricity treatment) (35 M, mean age 7.84±1.15) and 71 children in group B (behavioral and educational counseling) (37 M, mean age 7.75±1.36). Psychomotor treatment was administered by trained child therapists in residential settings three times per week. Each child was treated for the whole period by the same therapist and all the therapists shared the same protocol. The standard psychomotor session length is of 45 minutes. At T0 and after 6 months (T1) of treatments, patients underwent a behavioral and SM severity assessment. To verify the effects of the psychomotor management, the Child Behavior Checklist questionnaire (CBCL) and Selective Mutism Questionnaire (SMQ) were administered to the parents. After 6 months of psychomotor treatment SM children showed a significant reduction among CBCL scores such as in social relations, anxious/depressed, social problems and total problems (Pselective mutism, even if further studies are needed. The present study identifies in psychomotricity a safe and efficacy therapy for pediatric selective mutism.

Improving environmental management on small-scale farms: perspectives of extension educators and horse farm operators.

Science.gov (United States)

Rebecca, Perry-Hill; Linda, Prokopy

2015-01-01

Although the number of small-scale farms is increasing in North America and Europe, few studies have been conducted to better understand environmental management in this sector. We investigate this issue by examining environmental management on horse farms from both the perspective of the "expert" extension educator and horse farm operator. We conducted a Delphi survey and follow-up interviews with extension educators in Indiana and Kentucky. We also conducted interviews and farm assessments with 15 horse farm operators in the two states. Our results suggest a disconnection between the perceptions of extension educators and horse farm operators. Extension educators believed that operators of small horse farms are unfamiliar with conservation practices and their environmental benefits and they found it difficult to target outreach to this audience. In the interviews with horse farm operators, we found that the majority were somewhat familiar with conservation practices like rotational grazing, soil testing, heavy use area protection, and manure composting. It was not common, however, for practices to be implemented to generally recognized standards. The horse farm respondents perceived these practices as interrelated parts of a system of farm management that has developed over time to best deal with the physical features of the property, needs of the horses, and available resources. Because conservation practices must be incorporated into a complex farm management system, traditional models of extension (i.e., diffusion of innovations) may be inappropriate for promoting better environmental management on horse farms.

Modelling the economics of farm-based anaerobic digestion in a UK whole-farm context

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Jones, Philip; Salter, Andrew

2013-01-01

Anaerobic digestion (AD) technologies convert organic wastes and crops into methane-rich biogas for heating, electricity generation and vehicle fuel. Farm-based AD has proliferated in some EU countries, driven by favourable policies promoting sustainable energy generation and GHG mitigation. Despite increased state support there are still few AD plants on UK farms leading to a lack of normative data on viability of AD in the whole-farm context. Farmers and lenders are therefore reluctant to fund AD projects and policy makers are hampered in their attempts to design policies that adequately support the industry. Existing AD studies and modelling tools do not adequately capture the farm context within which AD interacts. This paper demonstrates a whole-farm, optimisation modelling approach to assess the viability of AD in a more holistic way, accounting for such issues as: AD scale, synergies and conflicts with other farm enterprises, choice of feedstocks, digestate use and impact on farm Net Margin. This modelling approach demonstrates, for example, that: AD is complementary to dairy enterprises, but competes with arable enterprises for farm resources. Reduced nutrient purchases significantly improve Net Margin on arable farms, but AD scale is constrained by the capacity of farmland to absorb nutrients in AD digestate. -- Highlights: •Lack of empirical data on UK farm AD is barrier to investment and policy formulation. •A modelling approach used to assess economic viability of AD in whole-farm context. •AD increases dairy and arable farm net margin including by savings in nutrient costs. •AD margins better for a few crops than other uses, especially wheat and beet crops. •AD co-exists with dairy, but to obtain best margin displaces conventional cropping

Productive, economic and environmental effects of optimised feeding strategies in small-scale dairy farms in the Highlands of Mexico

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

José Velarde-Guillén

2017-06-01

Full Text Available Since most dairy production in developing countries comes from small farms, there is scope to reduce their contribution to greenhouse gas (GHG emissions. In the highlands of Mexico, the limitations in these systems are high feeding costs. This paper assessed the production, economics and estimated methane emissions from traditional feeding strategies (TFS in 22 small-scale dairy farms compared to optimised feeding strategies (OFS evaluated through on-farm research in eight participating farms in the dry (DS and in the rainy (RS seasons. Results were analysed with a completely randomized design. There were no differences (P>0.05 in milk fat, body condition score (BCS or live weight between TFS and OFS, but there was higher (P

SWEET CORN FARMING: THE EFFECT OF PRODUCTION FACTOR, EFFICIENCY AND RETURN TO SCALE

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Dwijatenaya I.B.M.A.

2017-10-01

Full Text Available This research aims to determine the effect of production factors on the sweet corn production, the efficiency of sweet corn farming, and the return to scale of sweet corn production. The sampling technique was taken by proportionate stratified random sampling method with the sample number of 57 people while the analyzer used was the program of Frointer 4.1c. The results show that the production factors of the land farm, seed, and fertilizer have a positive and significant effect on sweet corn production. On the other hand, labor production factors have a positive but not significant effect on sweet corn production. It also found that technical efficiency, price efficiency, and economic efficiency of sweet corn farming in Muara Wis Sub-district of Kutai Kartanegara Regency are not efficient yet. The return to scale of sweet corn yield has an increasing return to scale condition.

Farm Household Survival Strategies and Diversification on Marginal Farms

Science.gov (United States)

Meert, H.; Van Huylenbroeck, G.; Vernimmen, T.; Bourgeois, M.; van Hecke, E.

2005-01-01

On marginal farms, and in agriculture in general, sustainability is largely guaranteed by a broad range of survival strategies, closely interlinked and embedded in the household structure of typical family farms. This paper reports results of a socio-economic study carried out among Belgian farmers, focusing specifically on the opportunities…

Relationship of dietary factors with dialyzable iron and in vitro iron bioavailability in the meals of farm women.

Science.gov (United States)

Singh, Anamika; Bains, Kiran; Kaur, Hapreet

2016-04-01

Sixty rural women with age varying between 25 and 35 were selected randomly to determine the role of dietary factors on bioavailability of iron in their diets. Food samples of selected subjects were collected for three major meals i.e. breakfast, lunch and dinner for three consecutive days. The samples were analyzed for meal constituents associated with iron absorption as well as for total and dialyzable iron. Based on dietary characteristics, the diets of the farm women were in the class of intermediate diets as per FAO/WHO classification with iron bioavailability of 8.11 %. The statistical analysis revealed that the meal constituents which were found to influence iron absorption positively were ascorbic acid and β-carotene in breakfast and only β-carotene in dinner. The meal constituents which affected iron absorption negatively were zinc and calcium in breakfast as well as lunch and phytates and NDF in dinner, however, polyphenols present in the meals of the subjects did not show any relationship with iron absorption.

Primitive polynomials selection method for pseudo-random number generator

Science.gov (United States)

Anikin, I. V.; Alnajjar, Kh

2018-01-01

In this paper we suggested the method for primitive polynomials selection of special type. This kind of polynomials can be efficiently used as a characteristic polynomials for linear feedback shift registers in pseudo-random number generators. The proposed method consists of two basic steps: finding minimum-cost irreducible polynomials of the desired degree and applying primitivity tests to get the primitive ones. Finally two primitive polynomials, which was found by the proposed method, used in pseudorandom number generator based on fuzzy logic (FRNG) which had been suggested before by the authors. The sequences generated by new version of FRNG have low correlation magnitude, high linear complexity, less power consumption, is more balanced and have better statistical properties.

The Hierarchy of Control in the Epidemic of Farm Injury.

Science.gov (United States)

Dosman, James; Hagel, Louise; King, Nathan; Koehncke, Niels; Kirychuk, Shelley; Trask, Catherine; Neudorf, Joshua; Day, Lesley; Voaklander, Donald; Pickett, William

2015-01-01

The application of the hierarchy of control (HOC) is a well-established approach to hazard reduction in industrial workplaces. However, it has not been generally applied in farm workplaces. The objective was to determine current practices of farmers in the context of a modified HOC, and the effect of these practices on farm injury outcomes. A self-reported mail survey of 1196 Saskatchewan farm operations was conducted in 2013. Selected survey questions were used as proxy measures of the farm owner-operator's practices relevant to each of the six steps of increasing importance in a modified HOC: (1) hazard identification; (2) risk assessment; (3) personal protection; (4) administrative controls; (5) engineering controls; and (6) elimination of the hazard. Analysis used basic descriptive statistics and logistic regression to examine associations of interest. When four of the six HOC steps were adhered to, there was a significant protective effect: odds ratio (OR) = 0.32 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.14-0.74) for any injury and OR = 0.27 (95% CI: 0.07-0.99) for serious injury in the overall study population. For farm owner-operators utilizing four of the six steps in the modified HOC, there was a significant protective effect for any injury (OR = 0.30, 95% CI: 0.11-0.83). Although there is a considerable absence of use of elements of the HOC among farm operators, for farmers who adhere to these steps, there is a significant reduction in their risk for injury. Prevention strategies that embrace the practice of these principles may be effective in the control of farm workplace injury.

Farm Population of the United States: 1972. Current Population Reports: Farm Population.

Science.gov (United States)

Bureau of the Census (DOC), Suitland, MD. Population Div.

Based on data derived from the Current Population Survey of the Bureau of Census, this statistical report presents demographic and labor force characteristics of the U.S. farm population and comparisons of the farm and nonfarm populations. Tabular data are presented as follows: (1) U.S. Population, Total and Farm: April 1960 to 1972; (2) Persons…

Farm Population of the United States: 1971. Current Population Reports: Farm Population.

Science.gov (United States)

Bureau of the Census (DOC), Suitland, MD. Population Div.

Based on data derived from the Current Population Survey of the Bureau of the Census, this statistical report presents demographic and labor force characteristics of the U.S. farm population and comparisons of the farm and nonfarm populations. Tabular data are presented as follows: (1) U.S. Population, Total and Farm: April 1960 and 1971; (2)…

Socio-economic determinants of growing trees on farms in the middle hills of Nepal

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Oli, B.N.; Treue, Thorsten; Larsen, Helle Overgaard

2015-01-01

were found. The Shannon–Wiener index was 2.46 and Simpson’s Dominance index was 0.15. Trees on farmland contributed on average 43 % of households’ firewood and fodder consumption. Apparent determinants of tree growing were identified through OLS regression; they included size of land and livestock......On-farm tree growing is potentially important for livelihood strategies and forest conservation, and varies greatly according to local contexts. A detailed knowledge base is therefore needed, requiring, inter alia, the documentation of factors associated with growing trees on farms. The present...... study surveyed 304 randomly sampled households in ten community forestry user groups in Nepal, eliciting data on demographics, income and consumption of tree products. All trees on households’ farm land were registered by species. Farmers had on average 65 trees per hectare and a total of 92 species...

Where is Farm Management Going?

OpenAIRE

Kemp, David R.; Girdwood, John; Parton, Kevin A.; Charry, Al A.

2003-01-01

Farms and farming are major contributors to the world economy, directly responsible for a large part of GDP. These achievements are not trivial and imply that farms are being managed in reasonably effective ways, else agricultural industries would not be sustained. However the study of Farm Management within Australia has been limited over recent decades. Is it contributing to better farm management or merely cataloguing what has happened? Is it leading or following? During that time there ha...

A stated preference investigation into the Chinese demand for farmed vs. wild bear bile.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Adam J Dutton

Full Text Available Farming of animals and plants has recently been considered not merely as a more efficient and plentiful supply of their products but also as a means of protecting wild populations from that trade. Amongst these nascent farming products might be listed bear bile. Bear bile has been exploited by traditional Chinese medicinalists for millennia. Since the 1980s consumers have had the options of: illegal wild gall bladders, bile extracted from caged live bears or the acid synthesised chemically. Despite these alternatives bears continue to be harvested from the wild. In this paper we use stated preference techniques using a random sample of the Chinese population to estimate demand functions for wild bear bile with and without competition from farmed bear bile. We find a willingness to pay considerably more for wild bear bile than farmed. Wild bear bile has low own price elasticity and cross price elasticity with farmed bear bile. The ability of farmed bear bile to reduce demand for wild bear bile is at best limited and, at prevailing prices, may be close to zero or have the opposite effect. The demand functions estimated suggest that the own price elasticity of wild bear bile is lower when competing with farmed bear bile than when it is the only option available. This means that the incumbent product may actually sell more items at a higher price when competing than when alone in the market. This finding may be of broader interest to behavioural economists as we argue that one explanation may be that as product choice increases price has less impact on decision making. For the wildlife farming debate this indicates that at some prices the introduction of farmed competition might increase the demand for the wild product.

A stated preference investigation into the Chinese demand for farmed vs. wild bear bile.

Science.gov (United States)

Dutton, Adam J; Hepburn, Cameron; Macdonald, David W

2011-01-01

Farming of animals and plants has recently been considered not merely as a more efficient and plentiful supply of their products but also as a means of protecting wild populations from that trade. Amongst these nascent farming products might be listed bear bile. Bear bile has been exploited by traditional Chinese medicinalists for millennia. Since the 1980s consumers have had the options of: illegal wild gall bladders, bile extracted from caged live bears or the acid synthesised chemically. Despite these alternatives bears continue to be harvested from the wild. In this paper we use stated preference techniques using a random sample of the Chinese population to estimate demand functions for wild bear bile with and without competition from farmed bear bile. We find a willingness to pay considerably more for wild bear bile than farmed. Wild bear bile has low own price elasticity and cross price elasticity with farmed bear bile. The ability of farmed bear bile to reduce demand for wild bear bile is at best limited and, at prevailing prices, may be close to zero or have the opposite effect. The demand functions estimated suggest that the own price elasticity of wild bear bile is lower when competing with farmed bear bile than when it is the only option available. This means that the incumbent product may actually sell more items at a higher price when competing than when alone in the market. This finding may be of broader interest to behavioural economists as we argue that one explanation may be that as product choice increases price has less impact on decision making. For the wildlife farming debate this indicates that at some prices the introduction of farmed competition might increase the demand for the wild product.

A COMPARATIVE STOCHASTIC FRONTIER ANALYSIS OF IRRIGATED AND RAIN-FED POTATO FARMS IN EASTERN ETHIOPIA

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Kumilachew Alamerie Melesse

2015-12-01

Full Text Available Irrigation development has been considered as one of the viable strategies for achieving food security. Accordingly, the government of Ethiopia has been increasing water resource development and utilization. However, to what extent the irrigation users are better off than rainfall dependent counterparts on their technical effi ciency (TE and variability in productivity among the farmers is not well known. Therefore, this study compared the technical effi ciency of farmers who are producing potato under irrigation and through rainfall in Eastern Ethiopia. Propensity Score Matching was applied to select irrigated farms with comparable attributes to rain-fed farms to see the true effi ciency diff erences between the two groups. Cobb-Douglas production function was fi tted using the stochastic production frontier for both irrigated and rain fed farming. The result indicated that irrigated farms have high ineffi ciencies compared with the rain-fed farms. This indicates the existence of considerable potential for increasing output by improving the effi ciency of irrigated farms than rain-fed farms. Among the factors hypothesized to determine the level of TE, landholding, family size and extension contact were found to have a signifi cant eff ect on irrigated farms whereas, landholding, non/off income, farm income, livestock size and extension contact were the determinants in rain-fed farms. This indicates that factors that aff ect technical effi - ciency in irrigated farms are not necessarily the same as rain fed farms. Therefore, it is important to consider both farms groups in evaluating strategies aimed at improving technical effi ciency of smallholder farmers

Gender participation in sheep and goat farming in Najran, Southern Saudi Arabia

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Fahad O. Aldosari

2018-01-01

Full Text Available Sheep and goat farming is a major source of income in the rural areas of Al-Wadiah in Najran region of Southern Saudi Arabia. The study aims to identify the factors and parameters that influence gender participation in sheep and goat farming. Data were collected by interviewing 167 high school students, including 70 male and 97 female students, in Al-Wadiah, by using the simple random sampling technique. Data were statistically analyzed to establish the relationship between gender and participation in sheep and goat farming. The study revealed significant differences between the two genders, for instance, male herders were more experienced, received more benefits, showed greater interest in discussions on topics related to sheep and goat farming, followed information from TV and radio, and received more services offered by veterinary clinics, which proved more beneficial for them. On the other hand, female herders received fewer services, and the veterinary clinics proved less beneficial for them. However, the correlation between the participation of both genders in sheep and goats management was non-significant toward the statement “feeling ashamed of participating in sheep and goat farming.” Generally, sheep and goat rearing proves more beneficial for male participants than female participants, owing to their greater experience and interest in livestock farming. Moreover, they receive more benefits from TV, radio and veterinary clinics to maintain better health of their livestock. Both male and female herders contribute equally to sheep and goat farming by limiting the time spent on their daily routine. This study would enable policymakers and planners to develop more strategies and extension education programs to overcome the identified barriers and improve the livelihood of herders through their enhanced participation in remote areas.

Gender participation in sheep and goat farming in Najran, Southern Saudi Arabia.

Science.gov (United States)

Aldosari, Fahad O

2018-01-01

Sheep and goat farming is a major source of income in the rural areas of Al-Wadiah in Najran region of Southern Saudi Arabia. The study aims to identify the factors and parameters that influence gender participation in sheep and goat farming. Data were collected by interviewing 167 high school students, including 70 male and 97 female students, in Al-Wadiah, by using the simple random sampling technique. Data were statistically analyzed to establish the relationship between gender and participation in sheep and goat farming. The study revealed significant differences between the two genders, for instance, male herders were more experienced, received more benefits, showed greater interest in discussions on topics related to sheep and goat farming, followed information from TV and radio, and received more services offered by veterinary clinics, which proved more beneficial for them. On the other hand, female herders received fewer services, and the veterinary clinics proved less beneficial for them. However, the correlation between the participation of both genders in sheep and goats management was non-significant toward the statement "feeling ashamed of participating in sheep and goat farming." Generally, sheep and goat rearing proves more beneficial for male participants than female participants, owing to their greater experience and interest in livestock farming. Moreover, they receive more benefits from TV, radio and veterinary clinics to maintain better health of their livestock. Both male and female herders contribute equally to sheep and goat farming by limiting the time spent on their daily routine. This study would enable policymakers and planners to develop more strategies and extension education programs to overcome the identified barriers and improve the livelihood of herders through their enhanced participation in remote areas.

Values in Organic Farming

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kjærgård, Bente; Pedersen, Kirsten Bransholm; Land, Birgit

The study focuses on the recent debate about what is, or what constitutes, organic farming and what is the right path for organic farming in the future. The study is based on a critical discourse analysis of the controversy about suspending the private standard for organic farming adopted by the ...

Health effects of agrochemicals among farm workers in commercial farms of Kwekwe district, Zimbabwe.

Science.gov (United States)

Magauzi, Regis; Mabaera, Bigboy; Rusakaniko, Simbarashe; Chimusoro, Anderson; Ndlovu, Nqobile; Tshimanga, Mufuta; Shambira, Gerald; Chadambuka, Addmore; Gombe, Notion

2011-01-01

Farm workers are at a very high risk of occupational diseases due to exposure to pesticides resulting from inadequate education, training and safety systems. The farm worker spends a lot of time exposed to these harmful agrochemicals. Numerous acute cases with symptoms typical of agrochemical exposure were reported from the commercial farms. We assessed the health effects of agrochemicals in farm workers in commercial farms of Kwekwe District (Zimbabwe), in 2006. An analytical cross sectional study was conducted amongst a sample of 246 farm workers who handled agrochemicals when discharging their duties in the commercial farms. Plasma cholinesterase activity in blood specimens obtained from farm workers was measured using spectrophotometry to establish levels of poisoning by organophosphate and/or carbamates. Information on the knowledge, attitudes and practices of farm workers on agrochemicals use was collected using a pre-tested interviewer administered questionnaire. Bivariate and multivariate analyses were conducted to determine factors that were associated with abnormal cholinesterase activity. The prevalence of organophosphate poisoning, indicated by cholinesterase activity of 75% or less, was 24.1%. The median period of exposure to agrochemicals was 3 years (Q(1):=1 year, Q(3):=7 years). Ninety eight (41.5%) farm workers knew the triangle colour code for the most dangerous agrochemicals. Not being provided with personal protective equipment (OR 2.00; 95% CI: 1.07 - 3.68) and lack of knowledge of the triangle colour code for most dangerous agrochemicals (OR 2.02; 95% CI: 1.02 - 4.03) were significantly associated with abnormal cholinesterase activity. There was organophosphate poisoning in the commercial farms. Factors that were significantly associated with the poisoning were lack of protective clothing and lack of knowledge of the triangle colour code for most dangerous agrochemicals. We recommended intensive health education and training of farm workers on

PERFORMANCE AND ANALYSIS OF MUSTARD FARMING IN JAYAPURA PAPUA

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Herman Tangkelayuk

2014-01-01

Full Text Available Research aim was to see variability, feasibility, and mustard farm income cultivated in Jayapura . The experiment was conducted in Kampung Yobeh, District of Sentani, Jayapura regency, on November to December 2013, using data growing season in October 2013, in form of a survey involving 30 mustard farmers as respondents . Determination of respondent using simple random method by getting farmers planting mustard continuously. Results: average mustard farmers area of 0,099 ha, seed expenses of IDR 37,400, the use of 9.20 kg Urea, NPK 2.80 kg, 526 kg manure , and cost of medicines IDR 26.366, male workers 2.66 HOK and women 2.03 HOK , and other expenses (shrinkage values and land tax .The level of productivity of mustard is 538.6 kg/0.99 ha/cropping season. Total revenue mustard farming with land size 0,099 ha/growing season is IDR 1.615.800, total spending is IDR 562 18. Benefit of farmers is IDR 1,053,618 with value of R/C ratio of 2.87. Analysis shows that mustard farming in Yobeh village, Sentani, Jayapura profitable, it is advisable for further development. Need guidance from Field Extension so that increased production increased.

Record of Decision for Tank Farm Soil and INTEC Groundwater, Operable Unit 3-14

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

L. S. Cahn

2007-05-16

This decision document presents the selected remedy for Operable Unit (OU) 3-14 tank farm soil and groundwater at the Idaho Nuclear Technology and Engineering Center (INTEC), which is located on the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) Site. The tank farm was initially evaluated in the OU 3-13 Record of Decision (ROD), and it was determined that additional information was needed to make a final decision. Additional information has been obtained on the nature and extent of contamination in the tank farm and on the impact to groundwater. The selected remedy was chosen in accordance with the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Liability and Compensation Act of 1980 (CERCLA) (42 USC 9601 et seq.), as amended by the Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act of 1986 (Public Law 99-499) and the National Oil and Hazardous Substances Pollution Contingency Plan (40 CFR 300). The selected remedy is intended to be the final action for tank farm soil and groundwater at INTEC. The response action selected in this ROD is necessary to protect the public health, welfare, or the environment from actual or threatened releases of hazardous substances into the environment. Such a release or threat of release may present an imminent and substantial endangerment to public health, welfare, or the environment. The remedial actions selected in this ROD are designed to reduce the potential threats to human health and the environment to acceptable levels. In addition, DOE-ID, EPA, and DEQ (the Agencies) have determined that no action is necessary under CERCLA to protect public health, welfare, or the environment at 16 sites located outside the tank farm boundary. The purposes of the selected remedy are to (1) contain contaminated soil as the radionuclides decay in place, (2) isolate current and future workers and biological receptors from contact with contaminated soil, and (3) restore the portion of Snake River Plain Aquifer contaminated by INTEC releases to Idaho Ground Water Quality

Emerging practices of wind farm planning in a dense bird migration area

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Clausen, Niels-Erik; Mortensen, N.G.; Hansen, J.C.

2003-01-01

The objective of this paper is to present part of The Wind Atlas for Egypt project aiming at developing a firm basis for planning and utilization of the vast wind energy resources available in Egypt. The project should recommend a common planning framework for wind farm development in Egypt...... is briefly introduced. As a case study to illustrate the planning process a 60 MW wind farm located at the Gulf of El-Zayt at the Gulf of Suez in Egypt will be analysed. This area is chosen for its very high wind energy potential and the high concentration of migrating birds during spring and autumn. During...... the site selection and layout of a wind farm the balancing of interests and land use will be described....

The importance of the western corn rootworm (Diabrotica virgifera virgifera LeConte in Bavaria – local relevance and economic impact on single farms

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Köhler, Katrin

2014-02-01

Full Text Available The western corn rootworm (Diabrotica virgifera virgifera LeConte, holding a quarantine status in the European Union, was first discovered in 2007 in southern Bavaria. In the course of Diabrotica Research Program of Germany and the states of Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg, an economic accompanying research is conducted at single farm level in Bavaria. This aims to evaluate different adaptation measures concerning the eradication and containment strategies economically. The focus of the analysis is mainly the crop rotation and the reduction of the proportion of maize at farm level. InVeKoS-data are analyzed, in order to assess the economic relevance of the pest in Bavaria in a better way. These enable detailed information on the development of maize production and cropping intensity. Subsequently research regions are defined with a high maize density, expecting enhanced damage from the beetle. In these selected areas single farms are selected. For considerations on single farm level, farms with different farm types are chosen by which adaptation measures are evaluated and realistic impact assessment could be made. For the evaluation of the economic impacts a whole-farm simulation has been used to include indirect effects of different adoption strategies. Additional, semi-structured interviews were conducted at selected farms in order to prove the results of the case study, obtain more information about the consequences on farm level and to evaluate the proposed cultivation alternatives for maize. A benefit-cost analysis and the comparative analysis of possible damage caused by the beetle and cost adjustments complete the study.

PORFLOW Modeling Supporting The H-Tank Farm Performance Assessment

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Jordan, J. M.; Flach, G. P.; Westbrook, M. L.

2012-01-01

Numerical simulations of groundwater flow and contaminant transport in the vadose and saturated zones have been conducted using the PORFLOW code in support of an overall Performance Assessment (PA) of the H-Tank Farm. This report provides technical detail on selected aspects of PORFLOW model development and describes the structure of the associated electronic files. The PORFLOW models for the H-Tank Farm PA, Rev. 1 were updated with grout, solubility, and inventory changes. The aquifer model was refined. In addition, a set of flow sensitivity runs were performed to allow flow to be varied in the related probabilistic GoldSim models. The final PORFLOW concentration values are used as input into a GoldSim dose calculator

PORFLOW Modeling Supporting The H-Tank Farm Performance Assessment

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Jordan, J. M.; Flach, G. P.; Westbrook, M. L.

2012-08-31

Numerical simulations of groundwater flow and contaminant transport in the vadose and saturated zones have been conducted using the PORFLOW code in support of an overall Performance Assessment (PA) of the H-Tank Farm. This report provides technical detail on selected aspects of PORFLOW model development and describes the structure of the associated electronic files. The PORFLOW models for the H-Tank Farm PA, Rev. 1 were updated with grout, solubility, and inventory changes. The aquifer model was refined. In addition, a set of flow sensitivity runs were performed to allow flow to be varied in the related probabilistic GoldSim models. The final PORFLOW concentration values are used as input into a GoldSim dose calculator.

MOTIVATIONS FOR INVOLVEMENT IN URBAN CATFISH FARMING AND SUSTAINABLE FOOD SECURITY IN NIGERIA

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Afolabi Monisola TUNDE

2017-10-01

Full Text Available Fish farming is known as one of the ways of ensuring food security and alleviating poverty through income generation. It is very common in the urban areas of Nigeria because of great demand for fish. This study determines motivations for involvement in urban catfish farming and sustainable food security in Ilorin, Kwara State, Nigeria. Specifically, the study identifies fish farmers and their socio-demographic characteristics in the study area; it examines motives of fish farming; examines the contributions of fish farming to household food security; and assesses the challenges faced by fish farmers for increased production. Both primary and secondary sources of information were employed and a total of 120 fish farmers were sampled randomly with copies of structured questionnaire. Frequency counts, percentages, tabulations and matrix ranking were employed to analyze the gathered data. The findings revealed that catfish production has actually contributed immensely to sustainable food security by making fish available, accessible and stable within the study area. The main motive for involvement in fish farming by the farmers includes food security (with a mean value of 3.80. This was followed by income supplement (x = 3.50, source of employment (x = 3.42 and increase in price of meat (x = 3.37. It can therefore be concluded that catfish farming in the study area has not only improve practitioners’ food security but has also contributed immensely to their income. The paper recommends the need to include fish farming in urban planning and that it should be encouraged in both rural and urban areas so as to have sustainable food security in the country as a whole.

Vaccine breaks: Outbreaks of myxomatosis on Spanish commercial rabbit farms.

Science.gov (United States)

Dalton, K P; Nicieza, I; de Llano, D; Gullón, J; Inza, M; Petralanda, M; Arroita, Z; Parra, F

2015-08-05

Despite the success of vaccination against myxoma virus, myxomatosis remains a problem on rabbit farms throughout Spain and Europe. In this study we set out to evaluate possible causes of myxoma virus (MYXV) vaccine failures addressing key issues with regard to pathogen, vaccine and vaccination strategies. This was done by genetically characterising MYXV field isolates from farm outbreaks, selecting a representative strain for which to assay its virulence and measuring the protective capability of a commercial vaccine against this strain. Finally, we compare methods (route) of vaccine administration under farm conditions and evaluate immune response in vaccinated rabbits. The data presented here show that the vaccine tested is capable of eliciting protection in rabbits that show high levels of seroconversion. However, the number of animals failing to seroconvert following subcutaneous vaccination may leave a large number of rabbits unprotected following vaccine administration. Successful vaccination requires the strict implication of workable, planned, on farm programs. Following this, analysis to confirm seroconversion rates may be advisable. Factors such as the wild rabbit reservoir, control of biting insects and good hygienic practices must be taken into consideration to prevent vaccine failures from occurring. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Randomizing Roaches: Exploring the "Bugs" of Randomization in Experimental Design

Science.gov (United States)

Wagler, Amy; Wagler, Ron

2014-01-01

Understanding the roles of random selection and random assignment in experimental design is a central learning objective in most introductory statistics courses. This article describes an activity, appropriate for a high school or introductory statistics course, designed to teach the concepts, values and pitfalls of random selection and assignment…

Farm Population of the United States: 1977. Current Population Reports: Farm Population.

Science.gov (United States)

Banks, Vera J.; DeAre, Diana

The farm population has declined fairly steadily for more than half a century. By 1970 the proportion of the U.S. population residing on farms had fallen to about 5 per cent, and by 1977 had dropped to 3.6 per cent. About 1.4 per cent of the farm population was of Spanish origin (represented for the first time in this year's report), as compared…

A survey of anthelmintic resistance on ten sheep farms in Mashonaland East Province, Zimbabwe : research communication

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

S. Mukaratirwa

1997-07-01

Full Text Available A survey to detect anthelmintic resistance in nematode parasites of sheep was conducted on 10 randomly-distributed farms in the Chivhu District, Mashonaland East Province, Zimbabwe. Before the survey, a questionnaire was circulated to the farmers concerning nematode parasite control. Results showed that parasite control using anthelmintic treatment was the only method practised and that the benzimidazoles were the most frequently used anthelmintic drugs. The faecal egg count reduction test was used to detect resistance. The anthelmintic groups tested were benzimidazoles, levamisole and ivermectin. Resistance to benzimidazoles was detected on 6 of 10 farms and levamisole resistance on 2 of 3 farms. Ivermectin resistance was not observed on the farms surveyed. Post-treatment larval cultures indicated that Haemonchus contortus survived administration of fenbendazole, albendazole, oxfendazole and levamisole. A Cooperia sp. strain resistant to albendazole was detected and this is the first report in Zimbabwe of a resistant parasite in this genus.

Efficiency assessment of wind farms in China using two-stage data envelopment analysis

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Wu, Yunna; Hu, Yong; Xiao, Xinli; Mao, Chunyu

2016-01-01

Highlights: • The efficiency of China’s wind farms is assessed by data envelopment analysis. • Tobit model is used to analyze the impact of uncontrollable factors on efficiency. • Sensitivity analysis is conducted to verify the stability of evaluation results. • Efficiency levels of Chinese wind farms are relatively high in general. • Age and wind curtailment rate negatively affect the productive efficiency. - Abstract: China has been the world’s leader in wind power capacity due to the promotion of favorable policies. Given the rare research on the efficiency of China’s wind farms, this study analyzes the productive efficiency of 42 large-scale wind farms in China using a two-stage analysis. In the first stage, efficiency scores of wind farms are determined with data envelopment analysis and the sensitivity analysis is conducted to verify the robustness of efficiency calculation results. In the second stage, the Tobit regression is employed to explore the relationship between the efficiency scores and the environment variables that are beyond the control of wind farms. According to the results, all wind farms studied operate at an acceptable level. However, 50% of them overinvest in the installed capacity and about 48% have the electricity-saving potential. The most important factors affecting the efficiency of wind farms are the installed capacity and the wind power density. In addition, the age of the wind farm and the wind curtailment rate have a negative effect on productive efficiency, whereas the ownership of the wind farm has no significant effect. Findings from this study may be helpful for stakeholders in the wind industry to select wind power projects, optimize operational strategies and make related policies.

Associations between biosecurity and outbreaks of canine distemper on Danish mink farms in 2012-2013.

Science.gov (United States)

Gregers-Jensen, Louise; Agger, Jens Frederik; Hammer, Anne Sofie Vedsted; Andresen, Lars; Chrièl, Mariann; Hagberg, Emma; Jensen, Mette Kragh; Hansen, Mette Sif; Hjulsager, Charlotte Kristiane; Struve, Tina

2015-09-30

During 8 months from July 2012 to February 2013, a major outbreak of canine distemper involving 64 mink farms occurred on the Danish peninsula of Jutland. The canine distemper outbreak was associated with exposure of farmed mink to infected wild carnivores and could represent a deficit in biosecurity on the mink farms. The aim of this study was to investigate the extent and association of specific biosecurity measures with the outbreak. The study was carried out in an epidemiological case-control design. The case group consisted of the 61 farms, which had a confirmed outbreak of canine distemper from July 2012 to February 2013. The control group included 54 farms without an outbreak of canine distemper in 2012 or 2013, selected as the closest geographical neighbour to a case farm. The results showed that significantly more control than case farms had vaccinated their mink against canine distemper virus. Mortality was only assessed on the case farms, and there was a non-significantly lower mortality on vaccinated farms than on the non-vaccinated farms. Furthermore, the proportion of farms with observations of wild red foxes (Vulpes vulpes) inside the farm enclosures were larger for case farms, indicating that the control farms had a better biosecurity or were not equally exposed to canine distemper virus. Generally, all farms had very few specific precautions at the gate entrance in respect to human visitors as well as animals. The use of biosecurity measures was very variable in both case and control farms. Not using plastic boot covers, presence of dogs and cats, presence of demarcated area for changing clothes when entering and leaving the farm area and presence of hand washing facilities significantly lowered the odds of the farm having a canine distemper virus outbreak. The results of the study indicate that consistent use of correct vaccination strategies, implementation of biosecurity measures and limiting human and animal access to the mink farm can be

Genetic Analysis of Daily Maximum Milking Speed by a Random Walk Model in Dairy Cows

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Karacaören, Burak; Janss, Luc; Kadarmideen, Haja

Data were obtained from dairy cows stationed at research farm ETH Zurich for maximum milking speed. The main aims of this paper are a) to evaluate if the Wood curve is suitable to model mean lactation curve b) to predict longitudinal breeding values by random regression and random walk models of ...... filter applications: random walk model could give online prediction of breeding values. Hence without waiting for whole lactation records, genetic evaluation could be made when the daily or monthly data is available......Data were obtained from dairy cows stationed at research farm ETH Zurich for maximum milking speed. The main aims of this paper are a) to evaluate if the Wood curve is suitable to model mean lactation curve b) to predict longitudinal breeding values by random regression and random walk models...... of maximum milking speed. Wood curve did not provide a good fit to the data set. Quadratic random regressions gave better predictions compared with the random walk model. However random walk model does not need to be evaluated for different orders of regression coefficients. In addition with the Kalman...

Assessing farm animal welfare without visiting the farm

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sørensen, Jan Tind; Houe, Hans; Sandøe, Peter

Animal welfare is typically assessed on farms by external observers making systematic observations of animals and/or the environment. External observers are costly, and efforts to minimize the time spent by external observers are giving rise to a delicate discussion of priorities of costs, validity...... and reliability. In this situation, it is worthwhile to consider the option of systems for assessing the animal welfare without having an external observer visiting the farm....

Identifying Farm Pond Habitat Suitability for the Common Moorhen (Gallinula chloropus: A Conservation-Perspective Approach

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Chun-Hsien Lai

2018-04-01

Full Text Available The purpose of this study was to establish a habitat-suitability assessment model for Gallinula chloropus, or the Common Moorhen, to be applied to the selection of the most suitable farm pond for habitat conservation in Chiayi County, Taiwan. First, the fuzzy Delphi method was employed to evaluate habitat selection factors and calculate the weights of these factors. The results showed that the eight crucial factors, by importance, in descending order, were (1 area ratio of farmlands within 200 m of the farm pond; (2 pond area; (3 pond perimeter; (4 aquatic plant coverage of the pond surface; (5 drought period; (6 coverage of high and low shrubs around the pond bank; (7 bank type; and (8 water-surface-to-bank distance. Subsequently, field evaluations of 75 farm ponds in Chiayi County were performed. The results indicated that 15 farm ponds had highly-suitable habitats and were inhabited by unusually high numbers of Common Moorhens; these habitats were most in need of conservation. A total of two farm ponds were found to require habitat-environment improvements, and Common Moorhens with typical reproductive capacity could be appropriately introduced into 22 farm ponds to restore the ecosystem of the species. Additionally, the habitat suitability and number of Common Moorhens in 36 farm ponds were lower than average; these ponds could be used for agricultural irrigation, detention basins, or for recreational use by community residents. Finally, the total habitat suitability scores and occurrence of Common Moorhens in each farm pond were used to verify the accuracy of the habitat-suitability assessment model for the Common Moorhen. The overall accuracy was 0.8, and the Kappa value was 0.60, which indicates that the model established in this study exhibited high credibility. To sum up, this is an applicable framework not only to assess the habitat suitability of farm ponds for Common Moorhens, but also to determine whether a particular location may

Materials selection for oxide-based resistive random access memories

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Guo, Yuzheng; Robertson, John

2014-01-01

The energies of atomic processes in resistive random access memories (RRAMs) are calculated for four typical oxides, HfO 2 , TiO 2 , Ta 2 O 5 , and Al 2 O 3 , to define a materials selection process. O vacancies have the lowest defect formation energy in the O-poor limit and dominate the processes. A band diagram defines the operating Fermi energy and O chemical potential range. It is shown how the scavenger metal can be used to vary the O vacancy formation energy, via controlling the O chemical potential, and the mean Fermi energy. The high endurance of Ta 2 O 5 RRAM is related to its more stable amorphous phase and the adaptive lattice rearrangements of its O vacancy

29 CFR 500.41 - Farm labor contractor is responsible for actions of his farm labor contractor employee.

Science.gov (United States)

2010-07-01

..., prior to such employee's engagement in any activity enumerated in section 3(6) of the Act. A farm labor... farm labor contractor employee. 500.41 Section 500.41 Labor Regulations Relating to Labor (Continued... PROTECTION Registration of Farm Labor Contractors and Employees of Farm Labor Contractors Engaged in Farm...

The Implications of Ranaviruses to European farmed and wild freshwater fish

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Jensen, Ann Britt Bang

The present thesis explores the implications of ranaviruses to European farmed and wild freshwater fish. The work presented was carried out as a part of the EU project “Risk assessment of new and emerging systemic iridoviral diseases for European fish and aquatic ecosystems” which was initiated...... in 2005 as a reaction to the speculation that ranaviruses might pose a serious threat to both farmed and wild-living freshwater fish and amphibians within the European community. In the present thesis, the purpose is to determine the implications of ranaviruses to European freshwater farmed and wild......-living fish. The following specific objectives are addressed: Objective 1: To determine the susceptibility of selected European freshwater fish to a panel of ranaviruses Objective 2: To determine whether ornamental fish are susceptible to or can be carriers of ranaviruses Objective 3: To develop a model...

Offshore Wind Farms

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Lundtang Petersen, Erik; Hasager, Charlotte Bay; Courtney, Michael

2015-01-01

: the rotor, the nacelle, the tower, and the foundation. Further the determinations of the essential environmental conditions are treated: the wind field, the wave field, the sea current, and the soil conditions. The various options for grid connections, advantages, and disadvantages are discussed. Of special...... concern are the problems associated with locating the turbines close together in a wind farm and the problems of placing several large wind farms in a confined area. The environmental impacts of offshore wind farms are also treated, but not the supply chain, that is, the harbors, the installation vessels...

Evaluation of the sustainability of contrasted pig farming systems: breeding programmes.

Science.gov (United States)

Rydhmer, L; Gourdine, J L; de Greef, K; Bonneau, M

2014-12-01

The sustainability of breeding activities in 15 pig farming systems in five European countries was evaluated. One conventional and two differentiated systems per country were studied. The Conventional systems were the standard systems in their countries. The differentiated systems were of three categories: Adapted Conventional with focus on animal welfare, meat quality or environment (five systems); Traditional with local breeds in small-scale production (three systems) and Organic (two systems). Data were collected with a questionnaire from nine breeding organisations providing animals and semen to the studied farming systems and from, on average, five farmers per farming system. The sustainability assessment of breeding activities was performed in four dimensions. The first dimension described whether the market for the product was well defined, and whether the breeding goal reflected the farming system and the farmers' demands. The second dimension described recording and selection procedures, together with genetic change in traits that were important in the system. The third dimension described genetic variation, both within and between pig breeds. The fourth dimension described the management of the breeding organisation, including communication, transparency, and technical and human resources. The results show substantial differences in the sustainability of breeding activities, both between farming systems within the same category and between different categories of farming systems. The breeding activities are assessed to be more sustainable for conventional systems than for differentiated systems in three of the four dimensions. In most differentiated farming systems, breeding goals are not related to the system, as these systems use the same genetic material as conventional systems. The breeds used in Traditional farming systems are important for genetic biodiversity, but the small scale of these systems renders them vulnerable. It is hoped that, by

Interactions of glyphosate use with farm characteristics and cropping patterns in Central Europe.

Science.gov (United States)

Wiese, Armin; Schulte, Michael; Theuvsen, Ludwig; Steinmann, Horst-Henning

2018-05-01

Although glyphosate is the most widely used herbicide in the European Union, little is known about the patterns of its usage in arable farming. Therefore, a nationwide survey of 2026 German farmers was analysed to obtain further knowledge about glyphosate applications in conventional European arable farming. Given its broad range of agri-environmental and farm-type conditions, Germany can be regarded as a suitable study region to represent Central European farming. The growing season 2013/2014 was set as a reference. Farmers who participated in the survey employ diverse patterns of glyphosate use. While 23% stated that they did not use glyphosate in the season in question, others applied glyphosate to their total arable area. However, most applications occurred on specific parts of the farm. Application patterns of oilseed rape, winter wheat, maize and sugar beet were studied in detail, and U-shaped distributions of glyphosate use intensity were observed. The effects of farm type and management practices on glyphosate use patterns were mixed in the various crops. Motivation for glyphosate use differs widely within the farming community. Agricultural researchers, extension services and policy makers are recommended to mitigate vulnerabilities associated with glyphosate use, such as routine spraying and practices that increase selection pressure for the evolution of glyphosate-resistant weeds. © 2017 Society of Chemical Industry. © 2017 Society of Chemical Industry.

Generic Escherichia coli contamination of spinach at the preharvest stage: effects of farm management and environmental factors.

Science.gov (United States)

Park, Sangshin; Navratil, Sarah; Gregory, Ashley; Bauer, Arin; Srinath, Indumathi; Jun, Mikyoung; Szonyi, Barbara; Nightingale, Kendra; Anciso, Juan; Ivanek, Renata

2013-07-01

The objective of this study was to determine the effects of farm management and environmental factors on preharvest spinach contamination with generic Escherichia coli as an indicator of fecal contamination. A repeated cross-sectional study was conducted by visiting spinach farms up to four times per growing season over a period of 2 years (2010 to 2011). Spinach samples (n = 955) were collected from 12 spinach farms in Colorado and Texas as representative states of the Western and Southwestern United States, respectively. During each farm visit, farmers were surveyed about farm-related management and environmental factors using a questionnaire. Associations between the prevalence of generic E. coli in spinach and farm-related factors were assessed by using a multivariable logistic regression model including random effects for farm and farm visit. Overall, 6.6% of spinach samples were positive for generic E. coli. Significant risk factors for spinach contamination with generic E. coli were the proximity (within 10 miles) of a poultry farm, the use of pond water for irrigation, a >66-day period since the planting of spinach, farming on fields previously used for grazing, the production of hay before spinach planting, and the farm location in the Southwestern United States. Contamination with generic E. coli was significantly reduced with an irrigation lapse time of >5 days as well as by several factors related to field workers, including the use of portable toilets, training to use portable toilets, and the use of hand-washing stations. To our knowledge, this is the first report of an association between field workers' personal hygiene and produce contamination with generic E. coli at the preharvest level. Collectively, our findings support that practice of good personal hygiene and other good farm management practices may reduce produce contamination with generic E. coli at the preharvest level.

Generic Escherichia coli Contamination of Spinach at the Preharvest Stage: Effects of Farm Management and Environmental Factors

Science.gov (United States)

Navratil, Sarah; Gregory, Ashley; Bauer, Arin; Srinath, Indumathi; Jun, Mikyoung; Szonyi, Barbara; Nightingale, Kendra; Anciso, Juan; Ivanek, Renata

2013-01-01

The objective of this study was to determine the effects of farm management and environmental factors on preharvest spinach contamination with generic Escherichia coli as an indicator of fecal contamination. A repeated cross-sectional study was conducted by visiting spinach farms up to four times per growing season over a period of 2 years (2010 to 2011). Spinach samples (n = 955) were collected from 12 spinach farms in Colorado and Texas as representative states of the Western and Southwestern United States, respectively. During each farm visit, farmers were surveyed about farm-related management and environmental factors using a questionnaire. Associations between the prevalence of generic E. coli in spinach and farm-related factors were assessed by using a multivariable logistic regression model including random effects for farm and farm visit. Overall, 6.6% of spinach samples were positive for generic E. coli. Significant risk factors for spinach contamination with generic E. coli were the proximity (within 10 miles) of a poultry farm, the use of pond water for irrigation, a >66-day period since the planting of spinach, farming on fields previously used for grazing, the production of hay before spinach planting, and the farm location in the Southwestern United States. Contamination with generic E. coli was significantly reduced with an irrigation lapse time of >5 days as well as by several factors related to field workers, including the use of portable toilets, training to use portable toilets, and the use of hand-washing stations. To our knowledge, this is the first report of an association between field workers' personal hygiene and produce contamination with generic E. coli at the preharvest level. Collectively, our findings support that practice of good personal hygiene and other good farm management practices may reduce produce contamination with generic E. coli at the preharvest level. PMID:23666336

Emergence of multilevel selection in the prisoner's dilemma game on coevolving random networks

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Szolnoki, Attila; Perc, Matjaz

2009-01-01

We study the evolution of cooperation in the prisoner's dilemma game, whereby a coevolutionary rule is introduced that molds the random topology of the interaction network in two ways. First, existing links are deleted whenever a player adopts a new strategy or its degree exceeds a threshold value; second, new links are added randomly after a given number of game iterations. These coevolutionary processes correspond to the generic formation of new links and deletion of existing links that, especially in human societies, appear frequently as a consequence of ongoing socialization, change of lifestyle or death. Due to the counteraction of deletions and additions of links the initial heterogeneity of the interaction network is qualitatively preserved, and thus cannot be held responsible for the observed promotion of cooperation. Indeed, the coevolutionary rule evokes the spontaneous emergence of a powerful multilevel selection mechanism, which despite the sustained random topology of the evolving network, maintains cooperation across the whole span of defection temptation values.

Agrichem.ical safety practices on farm.s in the western Cape

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Abstract In order to study agrichemical safety practices in a rural farming area in the western ... their work, the environment and intentional misuse.I.}-; Little information is ... the farmer, farm manager or supervisor directly involved in production ...

Reproductive performance of gilts in a big farm in Vojvodina

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Gagrčin Mladen

2009-01-01

Full Text Available The reproductive performance of gilts significantly affects the number of annually produced piglets per sow. The paper presents the results of an analysis of the reproductive performance of gilts on a big pig farm in Vojvodina (Republic of Serbia, with a capacity of around 5,500 sows. Out of the total of 19,000 female piglets selected for reproduction, insemination, aged 210 days, a total of 5,420 (28.5% gilts are prepared, and 70% of these are inseminated. A total of 29.3% gilts are culled for reproduction because of longterm pre insemination anestria (estrus was not established until the age of 9 months. It is believed that the basic reason for the occurrence of long-term anestrias is the inadequate technology for detecting estrus on the farm (once every 24 hours, without direct contact between the test boar and the gilts. As a consequence, there are significant economic losses in piglet production on the examined farm.

Assessing the accuracy and stability of variable selection methods for random forest modeling in ecology

Science.gov (United States)

Random forest (RF) modeling has emerged as an important statistical learning method in ecology due to its exceptional predictive performance. However, for large and complex ecological datasets there is limited guidance on variable selection methods for RF modeling. Typically, e...

Genetic characterization and relatedness of wild and farmed Eurasian perch (Perca fluviatilis: Possible implications for aquaculture practices

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sana Ben Khadher

2016-05-01

Full Text Available Aquaculture of the Eurasian perch, Perca fluviatilis, in recirculating systems has emerged over the past decades to become a significant way of diversification for inland areas in Europe. The development of such a production relies partly on the improvement of growth performance (i.e., reducing production costs, which requires suitable genetic management of broodstocks and the development of selective breeding programs. In this context, the present study was undertaken assessing for the first time the genetic diversity of farmed stocks of perch. Twelve microsatellite loci were used to investigate the genetic diversity of nine farmed stocks (547 individuals from two perch farms located in France and their supposedly wild founder population from Lake Geneva (394 individuals. First, the wild population displayed the lowest genetic diversity and differed genetically from all farmed populations except one, XB2. Second, genetic diversity did not decrease between farmed breeders and their potential offspring. However, in the three groups of broodstock-offspring the number of alleles decreased by 10%, 21%, and 15%, respectively. In addition, effective population size decreased in all offspring groups. A family structuring was also observed among broodstocks and their offspring, with an unequal family contribution being suspected. In the absence of parental information, these results attest to the utility of genetic tools to evaluate genetic diversity and the necessity of a monitoring program to maintain genetic variability among farmed perch. Genetic variability among farmed stocks appears to be sufficient for perch production to be sustainable and selective breeding programs to be developed. Keywords: Perca fluviatilis, Genetic diversity, Domestication, Microsatellites

Optimization of the Dutch Matrix Test by Random Selection of Sentences From a Preselected Subset

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Rolph Houben

2015-04-01

Full Text Available Matrix tests are available for speech recognition testing in many languages. For an accurate measurement, a steep psychometric function of the speech materials is required. For existing tests, it would be beneficial if it were possible to further optimize the available materials by increasing the function’s steepness. The objective is to show if the steepness of the psychometric function of an existing matrix test can be increased by selecting a homogeneous subset of recordings with the steepest sentence-based psychometric functions. We took data from a previous multicenter evaluation of the Dutch matrix test (45 normal-hearing listeners. Based on half of the data set, first the sentences (140 out of 311 with a similar speech reception threshold and with the steepest psychometric function (≥9.7%/dB were selected. Subsequently, the steepness of the psychometric function for this selection was calculated from the remaining (unused second half of the data set. The calculation showed that the slope increased from 10.2%/dB to 13.7%/dB. The resulting subset did not allow the construction of enough balanced test lists. Therefore, the measurement procedure was changed to randomly select the sentences during testing. Random selection may interfere with a representative occurrence of phonemes. However, in our material, the median phonemic occurrence remained close to that of the original test. This finding indicates that phonemic occurrence is not a critical factor. The work highlights the possibility that existing speech tests might be improved by selecting sentences with a steep psychometric function.

Farm Building Contractors and Manufacturers: Their Role in Midwest Farm Construction

Science.gov (United States)

Lyle Solverson; David C. Baumgartner

1974-01-01

Describes and analyzes the activities of farm building contractors and manufacturers in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, and Missouri. Contractors and manufacturers are setting the trend in the farm building market in terms of building type and size and materials used.

Exploring the Framing of Animal Farming and Meat Consumption: On the Diversity of Topics Used and Qualitative Patterns in Selected Demographic Contexts.

Science.gov (United States)

Nijland, Hanneke J; Aarts, Noelle; van Woerkum, Cees M J

2018-01-24

In various contexts, people talk about animal farming and meat consumption using different arguments to construct and justify their (non-)acceptability. This article presents the results of an in-depth qualitative inquiry into the content of and contextual patterns in the everyday-life framing regarding this issue, performed among consumers in various settings in two extremes in the European sphere: the Netherlands and Turkey. We describe the methodological steps of collecting, coding, and organizing the variety of encountered framing topics, as well as our search for symbolic convergence in groups of consumers from different selected demographic contexts (country, urban-rural areas, gender, age, and education level). The framing of animal farming and meat consumption in everyday-life is not a simple one-issue rational display of facts; people referred to a vast range of topics in the categories knowledge, convictions, pronounced behaviour, values, norms, interests, and feelings. Looking at framing in relation to the researched demographic contexts, most patterns were found on the level of topics; symbolic convergence in lines of reasoning and composite framing was less prominent in groups based on single demographic contexts than anticipated. An explanation for this lies in the complexity of frame construction, happening in relation with multiple interdependent contextual features.

Free-range farming: a natural alternative to produce vitamin D-enriched eggs.

Science.gov (United States)

Kühn, Julia; Schutkowski, Alexandra; Kluge, Holger; Hirche, Frank; Stangl, Gabriele I

2014-04-01

Food-based strategies need to be developed to improve the vitamin D status of individuals. Recent studies identified ultraviolet B irradiation as an efficient method to enrich mushrooms and eggs with vitamin D. The aim of this study was to determine whether free-range farming of hens could provide a valuable method to produce vitamin D-enriched eggs. Laying hens were randomly assigned to three groups of 33 to 34 animals each, and were kept either indoors (indoor group), outdoors (outdoor group), or with an indoor/outdoor option (indoor/outdoor group) over 4 wk. The study shows that the vitamin D3 content of egg yolk was three- to fourfold higher in the groups that were exposed to sunlight (outdoor and indoor/outdoor groups) compared with the indoor group (P Egg yolk from the outdoor group revealed the highest vitamin D3 content, which averaged 14.3 μg/100 g dry matter (DM), followed by that from the indoor/outdoor group (11.3 μg/100 g DM). Yolk from indoor eggs contained only 3.8 μg vitamin D/100 g DM. The 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25[OH]D3) content of egg yolk was also influenced by sunlight exposure, although less pronounced than the vitamin D content (P eggs randomly acquired from supermarkets had relatively low vitamin D contents. Free-range farming offers an efficient alternative to fortify eggs with vitamin D, provided that farming conditions are sufficiently attractive for hens to range outside. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Summary of Data Farming

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Gary Horne

2016-03-01

Full Text Available Data Farming is a process that has been developed to support decision-makers by answering questions that are not currently addressed. Data farming uses an inter-disciplinary approach that includes modeling and simulation, high performance computing, and statistical analysis to examine questions of interest with a large number of alternatives. Data farming allows for the examination of uncertain events with numerous possible outcomes and provides the capability of executing enough experiments so that both overall and unexpected results may be captured and examined for insights. Harnessing the power of data farming to apply it to our questions is essential to providing support not currently available to decision-makers. This support is critically needed in answering questions inherent in the scenarios we expect to confront in the future as the challenges our forces face become more complex and uncertain. This article was created on the basis of work conducted by Task Group MSG-088 “Data Farming in Support of NATO”, which is being applied in MSG-124 “Developing Actionable Data Farming Decision Support for NATO” of the Science and Technology Organization, North Atlantic Treaty Organization (STO NATO.

Wind farm production estimates

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Larsen, Torben J.; Larsen, Gunner Chr.; Aagaard Madsen, Helge

2012-01-01

In this paper, the Dynamic Wake Meandering (DWM) model is applied for simulation of wind farm production. In addition to the numerical simulations, measured data have been analyzed in order to provide the basis for a full-scale verification of the model performance. The basic idea behind the DWMm......In this paper, the Dynamic Wake Meandering (DWM) model is applied for simulation of wind farm production. In addition to the numerical simulations, measured data have been analyzed in order to provide the basis for a full-scale verification of the model performance. The basic idea behind...... the DWMmodel is to model the in- stationary wind farm flow characteristics by considering wind turbine wakes as passive tracers continuously emitted from the wind farm turbines each with a downstream transport pro- cess dictated by large scale turbulent eddies (lateral and ver- tical transportation; i.......e. meandering) and Taylor advection. For the present purpose, the DWM model has been im- plemented in the aeroelastic code HAWC2 [1], and the per- formance of the resulting model complex is mainly verified by comparing simulated and measured loads for the Dutch off-shore Egmond aan Zee wind farm [2]. This farm...

The economic impact of a rural land tax on selected commercial farms in Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

MAG Darroch

2012-10-01

Full Text Available This study investigates the economic impact of a land tax implemented under the Local Government Municipal Property Rates Act No. 6 of 2004 on commercial farms using five case studies with five-year data sets in the Mtonjaneni and Umgeni municipal districts of KwaZulu-Natal. The case farms’ ability to pay annual rates between 0.25 per cent and 1 per cent of the value of improved land using real annual economic profit with and without rebates of up to 70 per cent proposed by the Department: Provincial and Local Government ranged from zero to five out of five years, with a mean of two out of five years. A 2 per cent land tax rate with such rebates could also be financed only in two out of five years on average. These results suggest that proposed annual land tax rates of 1.5 per cent (Mtonjaneni or 1 per cent (Umgeni on these specific farms would markedly reduce the incentive to invest in farm improvements

Farm and cow-level prevalence of bovine digital dermatitis on dairy farms in Taranaki, New Zealand.

Science.gov (United States)

Yang, D A; Heuer, C; Laven, R; Vink, W D; Chesterton, R N

2017-09-01

The aims of this cross-sectional study were to investigate the herd and cow-level prevalence of bovine digital dermatitis (BDD) in dairy farms in the northern Taranaki region of New Zealand, and to identify whether there was any spatial clustering of herds with the disease. A survey of 224 dairy farms in the northern Taranaki region of New Zealand was undertaken from September 2014 to February 2015. Following training in robust criteria to confirm BDD visually, a technician inspected the rear feet of every milking cow on the farms during milking. The identity of cows with lesions and the feet involved were recorded. The proportion of cows affected among the inspected population (cow-level prevalence), the proportion of a herd affected (farm-level prevalence), and proportion of farms with ≥1 cow with lesions, were calculated. A bivariate K function analysis was then used to assess whether farms with ≥1 cow with lesions were clustered, after accounting for the distribution of the farms involved in the study. Bovine digital dermatitis lesions were observed on 143/224 (63.8 (95% CI=57.5-70.1)%) farms. Within-farm prevalence was 0% on 81 (36.2%) farms, between >0 and cow-level prevalence was 707/60,455 (1.2 (95% CI=0.9-3.0)%), and on affected farms was 707/41,116 (1.7 (95% CI=1.4-2.1)%). In affected cows, 268/707 (37.9%) had a lesion on left foot only, 262/707 (37.1%) on the right foot only and 177/707 (25.0%) on both feet. The K function analysis showed no evidence of clustering of farms with BDD. Bovine digital dermatitis was widespread among the survey farms, but there was no evidence that there was any clustering of herds with BDD. The cow-level prevalence on affected farms was much lower than reported elsewhere. Although the prevalence at the cow level was low, if these data are representative of other regions of New Zealand, BDD could easily become a major problem on dairy farms in New Zealand, as has been observed in other countries.

Wind farm acceptance for sale? Evidence from the Danish wind farm co-ownership scheme

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Johansen, K.; Emborg, J.

2018-01-01

-investors already support the planned wind farm projects, and many project opponents will not engage themselves in something they are against in principle. Finally, economic benefits potentially gained via OPSS do not appear to compensate for values feared violated by wind farms by many wind farm project...

Determinants of condom use among selected migrant commercial ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Using data from the Integrated Biological and Behavioural Surveillance Survey implemented by the International Organisation for Migration in 2010 among farm workers, this study seeks to investigate factors associated with condom use among migrant men and women in selected commercial farms in two provinces of ...

PLASMID PROFILES AND PHAGE TYPES OF SALMONELLA-TYPHIMURIUM ISOLATED FROM SUCCESSIVE FLOCKS OF CHICKENS ON 3 PARENT STOCK FARMS

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Baggesen, Dorte Lau; Olsen, J. E.; Bisgaard, M.

1992-01-01

Three-hundred-and-eighty-seven strains of Salmonella typhimurium obtained from successive generations of parent stock originating from three different rearing farms were characterized by phage typing and plasmid profiling. Seventy-six strains representing dominant types were selected for restrict......Three-hundred-and-eighty-seven strains of Salmonella typhimurium obtained from successive generations of parent stock originating from three different rearing farms were characterized by phage typing and plasmid profiling. Seventy-six strains representing dominant types were selected...

Random drift versus selection in academic vocabulary: an evolutionary analysis of published keywords.

Science.gov (United States)

Bentley, R Alexander

2008-08-27

The evolution of vocabulary in academic publishing is characterized via keyword frequencies recorded in the ISI Web of Science citations database. In four distinct case-studies, evolutionary analysis of keyword frequency change through time is compared to a model of random copying used as the null hypothesis, such that selection may be identified against it. The case studies from the physical sciences indicate greater selection in keyword choice than in the social sciences. Similar evolutionary analyses can be applied to a wide range of phenomena; wherever the popularity of multiple items through time has been recorded, as with web searches, or sales of popular music and books, for example.

Evaluation of the use of an on-farm system for bacteriologic culture of milk from cows with low-grade mastitis.

Science.gov (United States)

Neeser, Nicole L; Hueston, William D; Godden, Sandra M; Bey, Russell F

2006-01-15

To determine factors associated with implementation and use of an on-farm system for bacteriologic culture of milk from cows with lowgrade mastitis, including information on how producers used the on-farm bacteriologic culture system to guide antimicrobial selection practices and the resulting impact on patterns of antimicrobial use. Retrospective cohort study. Producers of 81 dairy farms. Farms that used an on-farm system for bacteriologic culture of milk from January 2001 to July 2003 were surveyed. Over half of those producers continuing to use the on-farm culture delayed antimicrobial treatment pending results of bacteriologic culture. Most other producers initiated empirical antimicrobial treatment while bacteriologic culture results were pending. Several barriers to the use of an on-farm system were identified. Significant reductions in rates of antimicrobial use were detected when comparing antimicrobial use rates before and during use of the on-farm system. Most producers chose to treat cows with mastitis caused by gram-positive pathogens with antimicrobials, whereas treatment choices for cows with mastitis caused by gram-negative bacteria and in cases in which no growth was detected varied. Readily available results permit antimicrobial selections to be made on the basis of the causative agent of mastitis. Adoption of an on-farm system for bacteriologic culture of milk may result in significant reductions in the percentage of cows treated with antimicrobials. Decreasing antimicrobial use may have several benefits including preventing unnecessary discarding of milk, decreasing the potential for drug residues in milk, and improving treatment outcomes as a result of targeted treatments.

The role of women on Dutch farms

OpenAIRE

Meulen, van der, H.A.B.; Terluin, I.J.; Matser, I.A.

2015-01-01

In this paper an analysis is made of the contribution of women to labour input and management on Dutch farms. We used a written survey among the participants of the Dutch Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN), in-depth interviews and a group discussion with farm women. Over half of the women on Dutch farms spend more than ten hours per week on agricultural activitieson the farm. More than 40% of women on Dutch farms have paid work off farm. The majority of the respondents’ farms is legally org...

Three-fold embeddedness of farm development

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Methorst, R.G.; Roep, D.; Verstegen, J.A.A.M.

2016-01-01

Farm development strategy is affected by, and affects, the biophysical and socio-economic context of the farm leading to agri-environmental challenges for farm development. For effective policies and support programmes it is important to understand the drivers for choices farm development.

Tank farms essential drawing plan

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Domnoske-Rauch, L.A.

1998-01-01

The purpose of this document is to define criteria for selecting Essential Drawings, Support Drawings, and Controlled Print File (CPF) drawings and documents for facilities that are part of East and West Tank Farms. Also, the drawings and documents that meet the criteria are compiled separate listings. The Essential Drawing list and the Support Drawing list establish a priority for updating technical baseline drawings. The CPF drawings, denoted by an asterisk (*), defined the drawings and documents that Operations is required to maintain per the TWRS Administration Manual. The Routing Boards in Buildings 272-WA and 272-AW are not part of the CPF

Materials selection for oxide-based resistive random access memories

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Guo, Yuzheng; Robertson, John [Engineering Department, Cambridge University, Cambridge CB2 1PZ (United Kingdom)

2014-12-01

The energies of atomic processes in resistive random access memories (RRAMs) are calculated for four typical oxides, HfO{sub 2}, TiO{sub 2}, Ta{sub 2}O{sub 5}, and Al{sub 2}O{sub 3}, to define a materials selection process. O vacancies have the lowest defect formation energy in the O-poor limit and dominate the processes. A band diagram defines the operating Fermi energy and O chemical potential range. It is shown how the scavenger metal can be used to vary the O vacancy formation energy, via controlling the O chemical potential, and the mean Fermi energy. The high endurance of Ta{sub 2}O{sub 5} RRAM is related to its more stable amorphous phase and the adaptive lattice rearrangements of its O vacancy.

Characterization of Heavy metals from banana farming soils

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Lin, Dian; Huang, Cheng He; Huang, Dong Yi [College of Agronomy, Hainan University, Haikou City, Hainan Province (China); Ouyang, Ying [Department of Water Resources, St. Johns River Water Management District, Palatka, FL (United States)

2010-06-15

There is a growing public concern about the contamination of heavy metals in agricultural soils in China due to the increasingly applications of chemical fertilizers and pesticides during the last two decades. This study characterized the variability of heavy metals, including copper (Cu), zinc (Zn), lead (Pb), cadmium (Cd), and nickel (Ni), from the banana farming soils in western Hainan Island, China. Five banana farms from different locations in the island were selected to collect 69 mixed-soil samples in this study. Experimental data showed that concentrations of Cu ranged from 3.38 to 54.52, Zn from 24.0 to 189.8, Pb from 15.98 to 58.42, Cd from 0.43 to 3.21, and Ni from 3.47 to 121.86 mg kg{sup -1} dry wt. In general, concentrations of the heavy metals varied with metal species and changed from location to location, which occurred presumably due to the variations of soil parent materials and to a certain extent due to the use of different types of agrochemicals. Our study further revealed that concentrations of Cu and Zn were higher in the banana farming soils than in the natural (control) soils among all of the five locations, whereas mixed results were observed for Pb, Cd, and Ni in both the banana farming and control soils, depending on the locations. Comparisons of the heavy metal concentrations with the Chinese Soil Quality Standards (CSQSs) showed that Cu, Zn, and Pb contents were lower but Cd and Ni contents were higher in the banana farming soils than the Class II standard of the CSQSs. Results suggested that accumulation of Cu, Zn, and Pb in the soils is safe for banana fruit production, whereas accumulation of Cd and Ni in the same soils could potentially pose threats to banana fruit safety. (Abstract Copyright [2010], Wiley Periodicals, Inc.)

Flexible Exchange of Farming Device Data

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Iftikhar, Nadeem; Pedersen, Torben Bach

2011-01-01

A new trend in the farming business is to replace conventional farming devices with computerized farming devices. Accordingly, numerous computer-based farming devices for logging, processing and exchanging data have recently been installed on moving farm machinery such as tractors. The exchange o......-directional data exchange as well as efficient requirements change management through a graphical user interface. The paper also demonstrates the use of the proposed solution based on a farming case study and open source technologies....... and systems to exchange data based on a predefined set of rules. In consequence, many hand-coded data exchange solutions have been developed in the farming business. Although efforts regarding incorporating data exchange standards have been made, their actual usage so far has been limited, due to the fact...

Towards realistic designs of wind farm layouts: Application of a novel placement selector approach

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Rahbari, Omid; Vafaeipour, Majid; Fazelpour, Farivar; Feidt, Michel; Rosen, Marc A.

2014-01-01

Highlights: • Challenges of turbine arrangement in wind farms are addressed. • Turbine properties and land restrictions are considered in optimization process. • The proposed approach can incorporate designer’s preferences into the optimal design. • Superior performance is attained compared to previous similar studies. • The proposed algorithm provided optimal wind farm layouts for four case studies. - Abstract: The optimal arrangement of wind turbines plays a significant role in obtaining the expected output power from wind farms. This paper addresses challenges related to typical restriction assumptions of turbine arrangement in wind farms with candidate selection approach. An applicable hybrid (quadratic assignment problem-genetic algorithm) evolutionary method with an initial candidate points selection (ICPS) approach is proposed and applied to four case studies to obtain optimal layout designs with maximum efficiency. The current study considers not only the previously utilized indicators found in the literature, such as wake effects, turbine hub height and rotor diameter, but also accounts for additional criteria such as the load-bearing capacity of soil and restrictions regarding the existence of prohibited places as well as varying wind velocities and directions. This is done to make the approach more applicable for realistic cases, and also to incorporate the preferences of expert designers. The results suggest that superior performance is attained with the proposed algorithm compared to previous similar studies. An efficiency improvement of about 3% is achieved for case one, and the algorithm provides reasonable optimal wind farm design layouts for cases two, three, and four where more restrictions exist

Economic Indicators of the Farm Sector. Farm Sector Review, 1985.

Science.gov (United States)

Economic Research Service (USDA), Washington, DC.

Farm production rose 6 percent in 1985 due to record high yields in corn, soybeans, cotton, and several other crops. While United States consumption increased slightly, exports of farm products fell 23 percent in value and 19 percent in volume. Net cash income increased 12 percent due to increased output, lower cash expenses, and unusually high…

Development of FAST.Farm: A New Multiphysics Engineering Tool for Wind-Farm Design and Analysis

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Jonkman, Jason; Annoni, Jennifer; Hayman, Greg; Jonkman, Bonnie; Purkayastha, Avi

2017-01-09

This paper presents the development of FAST.Farm, a new multiphysics tool applicable to engineering problems in research and industry involving wind farm performance and cost optimization that is needed to address the current underperformance, failures, and expenses plaguing the wind industry. Achieving wind cost-of-energy targets - which requires improvements in wind farm performance and reliability, together with reduced uncertainty and expenditures - has been eluded by the complicated nature of the wind farm design problem, especially the sophisticated interaction between atmospheric phenomena and wake dynamics and array effects. FAST.Farm aims to balance the need for accurate modeling of the relevant physics for predicting power performance and loads while maintaining low computational cost to support a highly iterative and probabilistic design process and system-wide optimization. FAST.Farm makes use of FAST to model the aero-hydro-servo-elastics of distinct turbines in the wind farm, and it is based on some of the principles of the Dynamic Wake Meandering (DWM) model, but avoids many of the limitations of existing DWM implementations.

Evaluation of 'best practice' (SCOPS) guidelines for nematode control on commercial sheep farms in England and Wales.

Science.gov (United States)

Learmount, Jane; Gettinby, George; Boughtflower, Valerie; Stephens, Nathalie; Hartley, Kayleigh; Allanson, Peter; Gutierrez, Alba Barrecheguren; Perez, David; Taylor, Mike

2015-01-30

Parasitic diseases are a major constraint to optimum livestock production and are the major cause of economic loss in UK sheep flocks, with farmers remaining dependant on anthelmintics for control. In the UK, research and evidence based, "best practice" guidelines for sustainable control of parasites in sheep (SCOPS) were first produced in 2004 and have been regularly updated since. This study was designed to evaluate the effect of these best practice guidelines for worm control on lamb production and infection levels, compared with more traditional management. Sixteen farms were selected based on a 2 cube factorial design with 3 factors known to affect worm epidemiology: control regimen; farm type; and climatic region. A formalised plan for worm control using 7 potential resistance-delaying practices was prepared for each of the 8 best practice (SCOPS) farms, in conjunction with the farms veterinarians. The 8 farms in the traditional management group (CONTROL farms) were selected based on ongoing evidence of them using worm control strategies deemed to be "higher-risk". A cohort of 40-50 study lambs at each farm was monitored from birth to finishing, allowing evaluation of lamb productivity, worm infection levels and for comparison of numbers of anthelmintic treatments. Birth and mid-season weights were used to calculate daily live-weight gain. Birth and finish dates were used to calculate time to finish and finish weights were also compared. Faecal egg counts, larval culture and species differentiation were undertaken throughout the year to assess the impact of the control strategies on worm burdens. There was no significant difference in results for any of the 3 production responses when comparing predicted means accounting for the differences in birth weight. In fact SCOPS farms had, on average, a higher daily weight gain and finish weight than CONTROL farms when comparing observed means. Statistical analysis of infection levels clearly showed no significant

Ships as future floating farm systems?

Science.gov (United States)

Moustafa, Khaled

2018-04-03

Environmental and agriculture challenges such as severe drought, desertification, sprawling cities and shrinking arable lands in large regions in the world compel us to think about alternative and sustainable farming systems. Ongoing projects to build floating cities in the sea suggest that building specific ships for farming purposes (as farming ships or farming boats) would also be attainable to introduce new farming surfaces and boost food production worldwide to cope with food insecurity issues.

A systematic review characterizing on-farm sources of Campylobacter spp. for broiler chickens.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Agnes Agunos

Full Text Available Campylobacter and antimicrobial-resistant Campylobacter are frequently isolated from broiler chickens worldwide. In Canada, campylobacteriosis is the third leading cause of enteric disease and the regional emergence of ciprofloxacin-resistant Campylobacter in broiler chickens has raised a public health concern. This study aimed to identify, critically appraise, and synthesize literature on sources of Campylobacter in broilers at the farm level using systematic review methodology. Literature searches were conducted in January 2012 and included electronic searches in four bibliographic databases. Relevant studies in French or English (n = 95 conducted worldwide in any year and all study designs were included. Risk of Bias and GRADE criteria endorsed by the Cochrane collaboration was used to assess the internal validity of the study and overall confidence in the meta-analysis. The categories for on-farm sources were: broiler breeders/vertical transfer (number of studies = 32, animals (n = 57, humans (n = 26, environment (n = 54, and water (n = 63. Only three studies examined the antimicrobial resistance profiles of Campylobacter from these on-farm sources. Subgroups of data by source and outcome were analyzed using random effect meta-analysis. The highest risk for contaminating a new flock appears to be a contaminated barn environment due to insufficient cleaning and disinfection, insufficient downtime, and the presence of an adjacent broiler flock. Effective biosecurity enhancements from physical barriers to restricting human movement on the farm are recommended for consideration to enhance local on-farm food safety programs. Improved sampling procedures and standardized laboratory testing are needed for comparability across studies. Knowledge gaps that should be addressed include farm-level drug use and antimicrobial resistance information, further evaluation of the potential for vertical transfer, and improved genotyping

Hydroacoustic registration of fish abundance of offshore wind farms. Horns Rev offshore wind farm. Annual report 2004.

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Hvidt, C.B.; Bruenner, L.; Reier Knudsen, F.

2005-05-15

study and the subsequent analysis of recorded data of the project have exposed the need for minor alterations including extended night surveys, the addition of more or longer transects, and considerations of the seabed topography, time of year and weather conditions. In conclusion: 1) The hydroacoustic technique is a suitable technique to evaluate fish densities. 2) A large diurnal variation of fish densities was encountered in the entire study area. 3) The results indicate that offshore wind farms attract fish beyond a distance of 500 metres and it is recommended to select reference areas further away. 4) A significant higher density of fish in connection to turbine foundations (hard bottom substrates) was only found in one out of four transects. (au)

An Optimization Scheme for Water Pump Control in Smart Fish Farm with Efficient Energy Consumption

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Israr Ullah

2018-06-01

Full Text Available Healthy fish production requires intensive care and ensuring stable and healthy production environment inside the farm tank is a challenging task. An Internet of Things (IoT based automated system is highly desirable that can continuously monitor the fish tanks with optimal resources utilization. Significant cost reduction can be achieved if farm equipment and water pumps are operated only when required using optimization schemes. In this paper, we present a general system design for smart fish farms. We have developed an optimization scheme for water pump control to maintain desired water level in fish tank with efficient energy consumption through appropriate selection of pumping flow rate and tank filling level. Proposed optimization scheme attempts to achieve a trade-off between pumping duration and flow rate through selection of optimized water level. Kalman filter algorithm is applied to remove error in sensor readings. We observed through simulation results that optimization scheme achieve significant reduction in energy consumption as compared to the two alternate schemes, i.e., pumping with maximum and minimum flow rates. Proposed system can help in collecting the data about the farm for long-term analysis and better decision making in future for efficient resource utilization and overall profit maximization.

Evaluation of wind farm efficiency and wind turbine wakes at the Nysted offshore wind farm

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Barthelmie, Rebecca Jane; Jensen, L.E.

2010-01-01

Here, we quantify relationships between wind farm efficiency and wind speed, direction, turbulence and atmospheric stability using power output from the large offshore wind farm at Nysted in Denmark. Wake losses are, as expected, most strongly related to wind speed variations through the turbine...... thrust coefficient; with direction, atmospheric stability and turbulence as important second order effects. While the wind farm efficiency is highly dependent on the distribution of wind speeds and wind direction, it is shown that the impact of turbine spacing on wake losses and turbine efficiency can...... be quantified, albeit with relatively large uncertainty due to stochastic effects in the data. There is evidence of the ‘deep array effect’ in that wake losses in the centre of the wind farm are under-estimated by the wind farm model WAsP, although overall efficiency of the wind farm is well predicted due...

Farm specific risk factors for Campylobacter colonisation in Danish and Norwegian broilers

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Borck Høg, Birgitte; Sommer, Helle Mølgaard; Larsen, Lars Stehr

2016-01-01

cups. Additional country specific risk factors were also identified. For Norway, the risk of colonisation increased with increasing numbers of houses on a farm and when the water used for the broilers originated from surface water or bore holes instead of mains. For Denmark, having boot dips or low...... to a standardised questionnaire, with more than 40 explanatory variables from 277 Danish and Norwegian farms. We explored several models by using different combinations of the Danish and Norwegian data, including models with single-country datasets. All models were analysed using a generalized linear model using...... backwards elimination and forward selection. The results show that Norwegian broiler flocks had a lower risk of being colonised than Danish flocks. Farm specific variables that increased the risk of flocks becoming colonised with Campylobacter in both countries were: broiler houses older than five years...

Researching the potentials and limitations of contract farming in sub-Saharan Africa

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kuzilwa, Joseph A.; Fold, Niels; Henningsen, Arne

2017-01-01

Contract farming has received renewed attention recently as developing economies try to grapple with how to transform the agricultural sector and its associated value chains. This book examines different contract arrangements for selected crops, applying both qualitative and quantitative approach...

Integrative modeling and novel particle swarm-based optimal design of wind farms

Science.gov (United States)

Chowdhury, Souma

allowing simultaneous optimization of the type and the location of the turbines. Layout optimization (using UWFLO) of a hypothetical 25-turbine commercial-scale wind farm provides a remarkable 4.4% increase in capacity factor compared to a conventional array layout. A further 2% increase in capacity factor is accomplished when the types of turbines are also optimally selected. The scope of turbine selection and placement however depends on the land configuration and the nameplate capacity of the farm. Such dependencies are not clearly defined in the existing literature. We develop response surface-based models, which implicitly employ UWFLO, to quantify and analyze the roles of these other crucial design factors in optimal wind farm planning. The wind pattern at a site can vary significantly from year to year, which is not adequately captured by conventional wind distribution models. The resulting ill-predictability of the annual distribution of wind conditions introduces significant uncertainties in the estimated energy output of the wind farm. A new method is developed to characterize these wind resource uncertainties and model the propagation of these uncertainties into the estimated farm output. The overall wind pattern/regime also varies from one region to another, which demands turbines with capabilities uniquely suited for different wind regimes. Using the UWFLO method, we model the performance potential of currently available turbines for different wind regimes, and quantify their feature-based expected market suitability. Such models can initiate an understanding of the product variation that current turbine manufacturers should pursue, to adequately satisfy the needs of the naturally diverse wind energy market. The wind farm design problems formulated in this dissertation involve highly multimodal objective and constraint functions and a large number of continuous and discrete variables. An effective modification of the PSO algorithm is developed to address such

40 CFR 761.306 - Sampling 1 meter square surfaces by random selection of halves.

Science.gov (United States)

2010-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 30 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Sampling 1 meter square surfaces by...(b)(3) § 761.306 Sampling 1 meter square surfaces by random selection of halves. (a) Divide each 1 meter square portion where it is necessary to collect a surface wipe test sample into two equal (or as...

Environmental farm accounting: the case of the Dutch nutrients accounting system.

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Breembroek, J.A.; Koole, B.; Poppe, K.J.; Wossink, G.A.A.

1996-01-01

In the Netherlands bookkeeping of inputs and outputs at the level of individual farms has been selected as a new solution to control nutrient use and to tax nutrient surpluses in agriculture. At the same time, nutrient accounting presents important management information. This paper presents a

Smart Farming: A Transdisciplinary Data Revolution for Agriculture

OpenAIRE

Brym, Zack

2018-01-01

This is a presentation for the 1st University of Florida Data Symposium.Major advances in knowledge and technology have transformed farming throughout history; examples include the plow, selective breeding, chemical fertilization, mechanized cultivation, and genetically modified organisms. Systems that integrate these advances are often billed as revolutions for the benefits they deliver to farmers and the food system. Yet, advancements in agriculture are only beginning to respect the collect...

Empirical investigation of wind farm blockage effects in Horn Rev 1 offshore wind farm

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Mitraszewski, Karol; Hansen, Kurt Schaldemose; Nygaard, Nicolai

We present an empirical study of wind farm blockage effects based on Horns Rev 1 SCADA data. The mean inflow non-uniformities in wind speed are analyzed by calculating the mean power outputs of turbines located along the outer edges of the farm for different wind directions, wind speeds and stabi......We present an empirical study of wind farm blockage effects based on Horns Rev 1 SCADA data. The mean inflow non-uniformities in wind speed are analyzed by calculating the mean power outputs of turbines located along the outer edges of the farm for different wind directions, wind speeds...

From Protocols to Publications: A Study in Selective Reporting of Outcomes in Randomized Trials in Oncology

Science.gov (United States)

Raghav, Kanwal Pratap Singh; Mahajan, Sminil; Yao, James C.; Hobbs, Brian P.; Berry, Donald A.; Pentz, Rebecca D.; Tam, Alda; Hong, Waun K.; Ellis, Lee M.; Abbruzzese, James; Overman, Michael J.

2015-01-01

Purpose The decision by journals to append protocols to published reports of randomized trials was a landmark event in clinical trial reporting. However, limited information is available on how this initiative effected transparency and selective reporting of clinical trial data. Methods We analyzed 74 oncology-based randomized trials published in Journal of Clinical Oncology, the New England Journal of Medicine, and The Lancet in 2012. To ascertain integrity of reporting, we compared published reports with their respective appended protocols with regard to primary end points, nonprimary end points, unplanned end points, and unplanned analyses. Results A total of 86 primary end points were reported in 74 randomized trials; nine trials had greater than one primary end point. Nine trials (12.2%) had some discrepancy between their planned and published primary end points. A total of 579 nonprimary end points (median, seven per trial) were planned, of which 373 (64.4%; median, five per trial) were reported. A significant positive correlation was found between the number of planned and nonreported nonprimary end points (Spearman r = 0.66; P < .001). Twenty-eight studies (37.8%) reported a total of 65 unplanned end points; 52 (80.0%) of which were not identified as unplanned. Thirty-one (41.9%) and 19 (25.7%) of 74 trials reported a total of 52 unplanned analyses involving primary end points and 33 unplanned analyses involving nonprimary end points, respectively. Studies reported positive unplanned end points and unplanned analyses more frequently than negative outcomes in abstracts (unplanned end points odds ratio, 6.8; P = .002; unplanned analyses odd ratio, 8.4; P = .007). Conclusion Despite public and reviewer access to protocols, selective outcome reporting persists and is a major concern in the reporting of randomized clinical trials. To foster credible evidence-based medicine, additional initiatives are needed to minimize selective reporting. PMID:26304898

Joint random beam and spectrum selection for spectrum sharing systems with partial channel state information

KAUST Repository

Abdallah, Mohamed M.

2013-11-01

In this work, we develop joint interference-aware random beam and spectrum selection scheme that provide enhanced performance for the secondary network under the condition that the interference observed at the primary receiver is below a predetermined acceptable value. We consider a secondary link composed of a transmitter equipped with multiple antennas and a single-antenna receiver sharing the same spectrum with a set of primary links composed of a single-antenna transmitter and a single-antenna receiver. The proposed schemes jointly select a beam, among a set of power-optimized random beams, as well as the primary spectrum that maximizes the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) of the secondary link while satisfying the primary interference constraint. In particular, we consider the case where the interference level is described by a q-bit description of its magnitude, whereby we propose a technique to find the optimal quantizer thresholds in a mean square error (MSE) sense. © 2013 IEEE.

Joint random beam and spectrum selection for spectrum sharing systems with partial channel state information

KAUST Repository

Abdallah, Mohamed M.; Sayed, Mostafa M.; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim; Qaraqe, Khalid A.

2013-01-01

In this work, we develop joint interference-aware random beam and spectrum selection scheme that provide enhanced performance for the secondary network under the condition that the interference observed at the primary receiver is below a predetermined acceptable value. We consider a secondary link composed of a transmitter equipped with multiple antennas and a single-antenna receiver sharing the same spectrum with a set of primary links composed of a single-antenna transmitter and a single-antenna receiver. The proposed schemes jointly select a beam, among a set of power-optimized random beams, as well as the primary spectrum that maximizes the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) of the secondary link while satisfying the primary interference constraint. In particular, we consider the case where the interference level is described by a q-bit description of its magnitude, whereby we propose a technique to find the optimal quantizer thresholds in a mean square error (MSE) sense. © 2013 IEEE.

ANALYSIS OF FOOD SECURITY AMONG SMALLHOLDER FARMING HOUSEHOLDS IN ARID AREAS OF BORNO STATE, NIGERIA

OpenAIRE

Mohammed, , D; Bukar , U; Umar , J; Abdulsalam , B; Dahiru , B

2016-01-01

International audience; The study assessed food security situation among smallholder farming househ Borno State, Nigeria. Multi-stage sampling procedure was used in selecting 200 household respondents. Data were collected with the use of interview scheduled and structured questionnaires. Result revealed that 91% of the respondents were male, 59% were full time farmers and 33% of the households had farming experience of 11 household respondents were food secure. Logit result indicates that the...

The RANDOM computer program: A linear congruential random number generator

Science.gov (United States)

Miles, R. F., Jr.

1986-01-01

The RANDOM Computer Program is a FORTRAN program for generating random number sequences and testing linear congruential random number generators (LCGs). The linear congruential form of random number generator is discussed, and the selection of parameters of an LCG for a microcomputer described. This document describes the following: (1) The RANDOM Computer Program; (2) RANDOM.MOD, the computer code needed to implement an LCG in a FORTRAN program; and (3) The RANCYCLE and the ARITH Computer Programs that provide computational assistance in the selection of parameters for an LCG. The RANDOM, RANCYCLE, and ARITH Computer Programs are written in Microsoft FORTRAN for the IBM PC microcomputer and its compatibles. With only minor modifications, the RANDOM Computer Program and its LCG can be run on most micromputers or mainframe computers.

Analysis and applications of a frequency selective surface via a random distribution method

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Xie Shao-Yi; Huang Jing-Jian; Yuan Nai-Chang; Liu Li-Guo

2014-01-01

A novel frequency selective surface (FSS) for reducing radar cross section (RCS) is proposed in this paper. This FSS is based on the random distribution method, so it can be called random surface. In this paper, the stacked patches serving as periodic elements are employed for RCS reduction. Previous work has demonstrated the efficiency by utilizing the microstrip patches, especially for the reflectarray. First, the relevant theory of the method is described. Then a sample of a three-layer variable-sized stacked patch random surface with a dimension of 260 mm×260 mm is simulated, fabricated, and measured in order to demonstrate the validity of the proposed design. For the normal incidence, the 8-dB RCS reduction can be achieved both by the simulation and the measurement in 8 GHz–13 GHz. The oblique incidence of 30° is also investigated, in which the 7-dB RCS reduction can be obtained in a frequency range of 8 GHz–14 GHz. (condensed matter: electronic structure, electrical, magnetic, and optical properties)

Farming for Health: Aspects from Germany

OpenAIRE

Neuberger, Konrad; Stephan, Ingrid; Hermanowski, Robert; Flake, Albrecht; Post, Franz-Joseph; van Elsen, Thomas

2006-01-01

Until now, the term ‘Farming for Health’ is unknown in Germany but it would cover a wide spectrum of different kinds of social agriculture already existing in Germany, such as farms that integrate disabled people or drug therapy into their farming system, or farms that integrate children, pupils or older people. Relevant work in Germany is done in ‘Sheltered Workshops’, where supporting and healing powers of farming and gardening are used for disabled people with a diversity of work possibili...

A Wind Farm Controller for Load and Power Optimization in a Farm

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Soleimanzadeh, Maryam; Brand, Arno; Wisniewski, Rafal

2011-01-01

This paper describes the design procedure of an optimal wind farm controller. The controller optimizes the structural load and power production simultaneously, on the basis of an analytical wind farm model. The farm model delivers maps of wind, loads and energy in the wind farm. Moreover, the model...... computes the wind speed at the turbines, turbine bending moments and aerodynamic power and torque. The optimal control problem is formulated based on the model for two different wind directions. The controller determines the reference signals for each individual wind turbine controller in two scenarios...... based on low and high wind speed. In low wind speed, the reference signals for rotor speed are adjusted, taking the trade-off between power maximization and load minimization into account. In high wind speed, the power and pitch angle reference signals are determined while structural loads are minimized....

Random drift versus selection in academic vocabulary: an evolutionary analysis of published keywords.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

R Alexander Bentley

Full Text Available The evolution of vocabulary in academic publishing is characterized via keyword frequencies recorded in the ISI Web of Science citations database. In four distinct case-studies, evolutionary analysis of keyword frequency change through time is compared to a model of random copying used as the null hypothesis, such that selection may be identified against it. The case studies from the physical sciences indicate greater selection in keyword choice than in the social sciences. Similar evolutionary analyses can be applied to a wide range of phenomena; wherever the popularity of multiple items through time has been recorded, as with web searches, or sales of popular music and books, for example.

On theoretical models of gene expression evolution with random genetic drift and natural selection.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Osamu Ogasawara

2009-11-01

Full Text Available The relative contributions of natural selection and random genetic drift are a major source of debate in the study of gene expression evolution, which is hypothesized to serve as a bridge from molecular to phenotypic evolution. It has been suggested that the conflict between views is caused by the lack of a definite model of the neutral hypothesis, which can describe the long-run behavior of evolutionary change in mRNA abundance. Therefore previous studies have used inadequate analogies with the neutral prediction of other phenomena, such as amino acid or nucleotide sequence evolution, as the null hypothesis of their statistical inference.In this study, we introduced two novel theoretical models, one based on neutral drift and the other assuming natural selection, by focusing on a common property of the distribution of mRNA abundance among a variety of eukaryotic cells, which reflects the result of long-term evolution. Our results demonstrated that (1 our models can reproduce two independently found phenomena simultaneously: the time development of gene expression divergence and Zipf's law of the transcriptome; (2 cytological constraints can be explicitly formulated to describe long-term evolution; (3 the model assuming that natural selection optimized relative mRNA abundance was more consistent with previously published observations than the model of optimized absolute mRNA abundances.The models introduced in this study give a formulation of evolutionary change in the mRNA abundance of each gene as a stochastic process, on the basis of previously published observations. This model provides a foundation for interpreting observed data in studies of gene expression evolution, including identifying an adequate time scale for discriminating the effect of natural selection from that of random genetic drift of selectively neutral variations.

Reindeer habitat use in relation to two small wind farms, during preconstruction, construction, and operation.

Science.gov (United States)

Skarin, Anna; Alam, Moudud

2017-06-01

Worldwide there is a rush toward wind power development and its associated infrastructure. In Fennoscandia, large-scale wind farms comprising several hundred windmills are currently built in important grazing ranges used for Sámi reindeer husbandry. In this study, reindeer habitat use was assessed using reindeer fecal pellet group counts in relation to two relatively small wind farms, with 8 and 10 turbines, respectively. In 2009, 1,315 15-m 2 plots were established and pellet groups were counted and cleaned from the plots. This was repeated once a year in May, during preconstruction, construction, and operation of the wind farms, covering 6 years (2009-2014) of reindeer habitat use in the area. We modeled the presence/absence of any pellets in a plot at both the local (wind farm site) and regional (reindeer calving to autumn range) scale with a hierarchical logistic regression, where spatial correlation was accounted for via random effects, using vegetation type, and the interaction between distance to wind turbine and time period as predictor variables. Our results revealed an absolute reduction in pellet groups by 66% and 86% around each wind farm, respectively, at local scale and by 61% at regional scale during the operation phase compared to the preconstruction phase. At the regional, scale habitat use declined close to the turbines in the same comparison. However, at the local scale, we observed increased habitat use close to the wind turbines at one of the wind farms during the operation phase. This may be explained by continued use of an important migration route close to the wind farm. The reduced use at the regional scale nevertheless suggests that there may be an overall avoidance of both wind farms during operation, but further studies of reindeer movement and behavior are needed to gain a better understanding of the mechanisms behind this suggested avoidance.

Optimizing transmission from distant wind farms

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Pattanariyankool, Sompop; Lave, Lester B.

2010-01-01

We explore the optimal size of the transmission line from distant wind farms, modeling the tradeoff between transmission cost and benefit from delivered wind power. We also examine the benefit of connecting a second wind farm, requiring additional transmission, in order to increase output smoothness. Since a wind farm has a low capacity factor, the transmission line would not be heavily loaded, on average; depending on the time profile of generation, for wind farms with capacity factor of 29-34%, profit is maximized for a line that is about 3/4 of the nameplate capacity of the wind farm. Although wind generation is inexpensive at a good site, transmitting wind power over 1600 km (about the distance from Wyoming to Los Angeles) doubles the delivered cost of power. As the price for power rises, the optimal capacity of transmission increases. Connecting wind farms lowers delivered cost when the wind farms are close, despite the high correlation of output over time. Imposing a penalty for failing to deliver minimum contracted supply leads to connecting more distant wind farms.

From Protocols to Publications: A Study in Selective Reporting of Outcomes in Randomized Trials in Oncology.

Science.gov (United States)

Raghav, Kanwal Pratap Singh; Mahajan, Sminil; Yao, James C; Hobbs, Brian P; Berry, Donald A; Pentz, Rebecca D; Tam, Alda; Hong, Waun K; Ellis, Lee M; Abbruzzese, James; Overman, Michael J

2015-11-01

The decision by journals to append protocols to published reports of randomized trials was a landmark event in clinical trial reporting. However, limited information is available on how this initiative effected transparency and selective reporting of clinical trial data. We analyzed 74 oncology-based randomized trials published in Journal of Clinical Oncology, the New England Journal of Medicine, and The Lancet in 2012. To ascertain integrity of reporting, we compared published reports with their respective appended protocols with regard to primary end points, nonprimary end points, unplanned end points, and unplanned analyses. A total of 86 primary end points were reported in 74 randomized trials; nine trials had greater than one primary end point. Nine trials (12.2%) had some discrepancy between their planned and published primary end points. A total of 579 nonprimary end points (median, seven per trial) were planned, of which 373 (64.4%; median, five per trial) were reported. A significant positive correlation was found between the number of planned and nonreported nonprimary end points (Spearman r = 0.66; P medicine, additional initiatives are needed to minimize selective reporting. © 2015 by American Society of Clinical Oncology.

Immigrant Workers and Farm Performance

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Malchow-Møller, Nikolaj; Munch, Jakob R.; Seidelin, Claus Aastrup

2013-01-01

for Danish farms in 1980–2008 to analyze the micro-level relationship between these two developments. Farms employing immigrants tend to be both larger than and no less productive than other farms. Furthermore, an increased use of immigrants is associated with an improvement in job creation and revenue......In many developed countries, the agricultural sector has experienced a significant inflow of immigrants. At the same time, agriculture is still in a process of structural transformation, resulting in fewer but larger and presumably more efficient farms. We exploit matched employer-employee data...

Farm profitability and structural challenges

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Jensen, Jørgen Dejgård; Kristensen, Inge Toft

2013-01-01

The objective of the paper is to demonstrate a methodology to establish data for analysing the geographical patterns in the economic performance of farms. The methodology combines population-based agricultural register data on physical activity levels with sample-based farm economic accounts data....... Using a least-squares approach, the method estimates economic figures for each farm in the population conditional on farm size, land allocation and number of different types of livestock. The method is used for describing the spatial patterns in economic returns to agriculture, using Denmark...

Diversity in the dry land mixed system and viability of dairy sheep farming

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jose Rivas

2015-05-01

Full Text Available Castilla La Mancha is a Spanish region where sheep farming system is traditionally pasture-based. Recently, this territory has undergone a recession of dairy sheep activity, which changed the type and intensity of land utilization and led to environmental and landscape degradation. The present study analyzed the diversity and viability of dairy sheep of mixed systems. Multivariate analysis was conducted on 157 dairy sheep farms, factor analysis selected 3 productivity factors (level of intensification, land use, size and family labour, and cluster analysis classified farms into three groups. Group 1, smallholders – with the smallest size (405.5 ewes and 564.7 ha, lowest area in ownership (1.5%, and agriculture activity (6.5% crops area: family farms (90.8% highly dependent on external inputs. Group 2, large-scale farms (1058.7 ewes and 1755.1 ha – with the lowest stocking rate (0.14 livestock unit/ha and productivity: nonfamily farms (39.1% with low area in ownership (4.1% and agriculture activity (7.6%. Group 3, mixed-technified – with the highest levels of technology and least use of family labour (27.0%: large-scale farms (1387.4 ewes and 955.8 ha, combining milk production with agricultural activities (55.7% crops area, with the highest area in ownership (63.1% and the best productivity performance. In conclusion, the dry land mixed system of Castilla La Mancha showed diversity of farms. Improving viability requires a systemic approach where the key tool is grazing, allowing the mixed system to be consolidated as a model that enhances the positive impact of livestock on the environment in the Mediterranean basin.

CleverFarm final report

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

2003-09-15

Wind turbine technology has ventured in recent years from prototypes and first deployments towards large power plant scale projects. With this, also the ownership structure of wind farms changed: from single farmers to cooperatives, and to large multi-national developers specialised in building and running wind power projects. At the same time, the best sites for wind energy were already taken, leading to more remote sites and offshore sites being developed. Both these developments lead to an increased wish for remote monitoring of turbines. Ideally, the turbine would know on its own accord when it would need maintenance, and call the maintenance crew autonomously. The crew then would have all the information they need to have before they go out to the turbine and do the necessary tasks. Having knowledge of the type of fault that has happened would help the maintenance crew to deal with it efficiently. This also could mean to wait until the next scheduled maintenance is due. The potential savings for this alone are considerable, if you think of the plans for offshore wind farms tens of kilometres from the coast, where access would probably be by helicopter. The idea behind this project was to take the existing techniques developed for optimising and enhancing the performance of wind farms, integrate them into one system and implement the system at a number of wind farms. The techniques include remote measuring of the status and production of the wind farm, short-term prediction of the expected wind speeds at and power output from the wind farm, models for wake calculations, remote control of wind farm production and so on. (au)

Effect of climate and farm environment on Campylobacter spp. colonisation in Norwegian broiler flocks.

Science.gov (United States)

Jonsson, Malin E; Chriél, Mariann; Norström, Madelaine; Hofshagen, Merete

2012-11-01

Campylobacteriosis is the most frequently reported zoonosis in the EU. A recent report states that between 50% and 80% of the human campylobacteriosis cases could be attributed to broiler as a reservoir. The current study was conducted to investigate associations between the presence of Campylobacter spp. in Norwegian broiler flocks and factors related to the climate and the farm environment. Data from 18,488 broiler flocks from 623 different farms during 2002-2007 were included in the study. A logistic regression analysis was conducted where Campylobacter spp. status of a broiler flock at the time of slaughter was defined as the dependent variable and farm was modelled as a random effect. The following factors were found to increase the probability for a broiler flock to test positive for Campylobacter spp.: daily mean temperature above 6°C during the rearing period, private water supply, presence of other livestock farms within a distance of 2 km, presence of other broiler farms within a distance of 4 km with flocks positive for Campylobacter spp. within 30 days prior to slaughter, heavy rainfall 11-30 days prior to slaughter, region and year. Daily mean temperature below 0°C reduced the probability. The study emphasises the importance of the farm environment and the climate for the occurrence of Campylobacter spp. in broiler flocks. The farm environment is probably a part of the Campylobacter spp. pathway into and between broiler flocks where farmyard run-off and humans or flies entering the houses might constitute vehicles transporting the organism. Fly activity is temperature-driven and flies might be a part of the explanation of the increased risk for Campylobacter spp. related to increased temperature demonstrated in the study. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

The optimal access system for future far-offshore wind farms

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Obdam, T.S.; Rademakers, L.W.M.M.; Savenije, L.B. [ECN Wind Energy, Petten (Netherlands)

2013-12-15

Operation and maintenance (O and M) of offshore wind turbines is one of the main cost drivers of offshore wind energy. One of the aspects critical for an efficient and cost-effective O and M strategy is the selection of the access system which is used to transfer technicians and, optionally, small spare parts. Currently, most offshore wind farms are located close to shore, and their size is relatively small. For these farms the typical access system consists of catamaran-like workboats, which are used to transfer both technicians and small spare parts. As wind farms move further offshore this O and M concept might no longer be cost-effective. Currently, different alternative O and M concepts are being considered for the future far-offshore sites. In this paper an extensive and holistic comparison of different O and M concepts including different access system solutions is presented. This analysis has been performed using the OMCECalculator, ECN's software for advanced O and M cost modelling. Different sites have been considered, which are typical for the future offshore wind farms that will be commissioned during the next five years. The results of the performed analyses indicate that when moving further offshore harbour-based O and M strategies are no longer economical, even when helicopters are added to the mix. Looking at farm-based O and M concepts a supply vessel with a compensated access gangway offers great potential. However, the calculations also indicate that its ability to transfer small spare parts, in addition to technicians, is crucial.

Development of FAST.Farm: A New Multiphysics Engineering Tool for Wind Farm Design and Analysis: Preprint

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Jonkman, Jason; Annoni, Jennifer; Hayman, Greg; Jonkman, Bonnie; Purkayastha, Avi

2017-01-01

This paper presents the development of FAST.Farm, a new multiphysics tool applicable to engineering problems in research and industry involving wind farm performance and cost optimization that is needed to address the current underperformance, failures, and expenses plaguing the wind industry. Achieving wind cost-of-energy targets - which requires improvements in wind farm performance and reliability, together with reduced uncertainty and expenditures - has been eluded by the complicated nature of the wind farm design problem, especially the sophisticated interaction between atmospheric phenomena and wake dynamics and array effects. FAST.Farm aims to balance the need for accurate modeling of the relevant physics for predicting power performance and loads while maintaining low computational cost to support a highly iterative and probabilistic design process and system-wide optimization. FAST.Farm makes use of FAST to model the aero-hydro-servo-elastics of distinct turbines in the wind farm, and it is based on some of the principles of the Dynamic Wake Meandering (DWM) model, but avoids many of the limitations of existing DWM implementations.

12 CFR 619.9145 - Farm Credit Bank.

Science.gov (United States)

2010-01-01

... 12 Banks and Banking 6 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Farm Credit Bank. 619.9145 Section 619.9145 Banks and Banking FARM CREDIT ADMINISTRATION FARM CREDIT SYSTEM DEFINITIONS § 619.9145 Farm Credit Bank. The term Farm Credit Bank refers to a bank resulting from the mandatory merger of the Federal land...

Interrill Erodibility of P and C on conventially and organically farmed Devon soils

Science.gov (United States)

Kuhn, N. J.

2012-04-01

Soil erosion can have significant off-site effects on water quality and thus human and habitat health. Apart from sedimentation, the transfer of nutrients, both dissolved and particulate, is a major concern. The particulate transfer of nutrients from agricultural land can occur either by rill or interrill erosion. Rill erosion is non-selective and affects only a limited extent of agricultural land. Interrill processes such as crusting, splash and raindrop-impacted wash, on the other hand, act on all cropland and affect the quality of the water from all areas generating runoff. A significant amount of phosphorus (P) is contained in the surface soil layer transformed by interrill processes annually. In the EU, the P content of a crusted (2 mm) surface layer corresponds to 4 to 40 kg ha-1 of P on arable land (1.094 mil km2). Therefore, the role of interrill processes and erosion for regional nutrient cycling requires close attention. Interrill erosion is a complex phenomenon, involving the detachment, transport and deposition of soil particles by raindrop impacted flow. Resistance to interrill erosion varies between soils depending on their physical, chemical and mineralogical properties. In addition, significant changes in soil resistance to interrill erosion occur during storms as a result of changes in surface roughness, cohesion and particle size. As a consequence, erosion on interrill areas is selective, moving the most easily detached small and/or light soil particles which are often enriched in clay, P and organic C. Commonly, the risk of erosion associated with organically farmed soils is lower than those farmed in a conventional way. This is attributed to greater aggregate stability and thus greater infiltration and lower erodibility. Erosion of nutrients on organically farmed soils is therefore considered to be reduced by the same order of magnitude than the amount of eroded soil compared to conventionally farmed soils. However, the selective nature of

Comparisons of management practices and farm design on Australian commercial layer and meat chicken farms: Cage, barn and free range.

Science.gov (United States)

Scott, Angela Bullanday; Singh, Mini; Toribio, Jenny-Ann; Hernandez-Jover, Marta; Barnes, Belinda; Glass, Kathryn; Moloney, Barbara; Lee, Amanda; Groves, Peter

2017-01-01

There are few published studies describing the unique management practices, farm design and housing characteristics of commercial meat chicken and layer farms in Australia. In particular, there has been a large expansion of free range poultry production in Australia in recent years, but limited information about this enterprise exists. This study aimed to describe features of Australian commercial chicken farms, with particular interest in free range farms, by conducting on-farm interviews of 25 free range layer farms, nine cage layer farms, nine barn layer farms, six free range meat chicken farms and 15 barn meat chicken farms in the Sydney basin bioregion and South East Queensland. Comparisons between the different enterprises (cage, barn and free range) were explored, including stocking densities, depopulation procedures, environmental control methods and sources of information for farmers. Additional information collected for free range farms include range size, range characteristics and range access. The median number of chickens per shed was greatest in free range meat chicken farms (31,058), followed by barn meat chicken (20,817), free range layer (10,713), barn layer (9,300) and cage layer farms (9,000). Sheds had cooling pads and tunnel ventilation in just over half of both barn and free range meat chicken farms (53%, n = 8) and was least common in free range layer farms (16%, n = 4). Range access in free range meat chicken farms was from sunrise to dark in the majority (93%, n = 14) of free range meat chicken farms. Over half of free range layer farms (56%, n = 14) granted range access at a set time each morning; most commonly between 9:00 to 10.00am (86%, n = 12), and chickens were placed back inside sheds when it was dusk.

Including spatial data in nutrient balance modelling on dairy farms

Science.gov (United States)