Download or read book Peasants Farmers and Scientists written by H.J.W. Mutsaers and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2007-09-04 with total page 621 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the story of tropical agricultural science and agricultural development in the 20th century, focusing on the African farmer and African farming methods. It describes successes as well as fads and failures, many based on the author’s first-hand observations during more than 40 years in tropical agronomy-related fields. Moving into the 21st century, the book explores the rise of computer modeling of crops and crop production.
Download or read book Agroecology written by Peter Rosset and published by Practical Action. This book was released on 2017 with total page 146 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Introduction : why agroecology? -- The scientific principles of agroecology -- The scientific evidence for agroecology : can it feed the world? -- Scaling up agroecology : social process and organization -- The politics of agroecology -- Conclusions : conform or transform?
Download or read book The Unsettling of America written by Wendell Berry and published by Turtleback Books. This book was released on 1996-03-01 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A critical inquiry into the ways Americans have exploited and continue to exploit the land that sustains them, tracing attitudes toward and methods of farming from the eighteenth century to the present
Download or read book Peasants and the Art of Farming written by Jan Douwe van der Ploeg and published by . This book was released on 2014-12-15 with total page 158 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Peasants and the Art of Farming: A Chayanovian Manifesto focuses on the structure and dynamics of peasant farms and the historically highly variable relations that govern the processes of labour and production within peasant farms. Jan Douwe van der Ploeg argues that peasant agriculture can play an important, if not central, role in augmenting food production and creating sustainability. However, peasants today, as in the past, are materially neglected. By building on the pioneering work of Chayanov, this book seeks to address this neglect and to show how important peasants are in the ongoing struggles for food, food sustainability and food sovereignty. Full Text - Short description/annotation (Text)
Download or read book From British Peasants to Colonial American Farmers written by Allan Kulikoff and published by Univ of North Carolina Press. This book was released on 2014-02-01 with total page 501 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With this book, Allan Kulikoff offers a sweeping new interpretation of the origins and development of the small farm economy in Britain's mainland American colonies. Examining the lives of farmers and their families, he tells the story of immigration to the colonies, traces patterns of settlement, analyzes the growth of markets, and assesses the impact of the Revolution on small farm society. Beginning with the dispossession of the peasantry in early modern England, Kulikoff follows the immigrants across the Atlantic to explore how they reacted to a hostile new environment and its Indian inhabitants. He discusses how colonists secured land, built farms, and bequeathed those farms to their children. Emphasizing commodity markets in early America, Kulikoff shows that without British demand for the colonists' crops, settlement could not have begun at all. Most important, he explores the destruction caused during the American Revolution, showing how the war thrust farmers into subsistence production and how they only gradually regained their prewar prosperity.
Download or read book Red Revolution Green Revolution written by Sigrid Schmalzer and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2016-01-20 with total page 323 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1968, the director of USAID coined the term “green revolution” to celebrate the new technological solutions that promised to ease hunger around the world—and forestall the spread of more “red,” or socialist, revolutions. Yet in China, where modernization and scientific progress could not be divorced from politics, green and red revolutions proceeded side by side. In Red Revolution, Green Revolution, Sigrid Schmalzer explores the intersection of politics and agriculture in socialist China through the diverse experiences of scientists, peasants, state agents, and “educated youth.” The environmental costs of chemical-intensive agriculture and the human costs of emphasizing increasing production over equitable distribution of food and labor have been felt as strongly in China as anywhere—and yet, as Schmalzer shows, Mao-era challenges to technocracy laid important groundwork for today’s sustainability and food justice movements. This history of “scientific farming” in China offers us a unique opportunity not only to explore the consequences of modern agricultural technologies but also to engage in a necessary rethinking of fundamental assumptions about science and society.
Download or read book Living Under Contract written by Peter D. Little and published by Univ of Wisconsin Press. This book was released on 1994 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Wracked by poverty, famine, and drought, Africa is typically represented as agriculturally stagnant, backward, and crisis-prone. Living Under Contract, however, highlights the dynamic, changing character of sub-Saharan agrarian systems by focusing on contract farming. A relatively new and increasingly widespread way of organizing peasant agriculture, contract farming promotes production of a wide variety of crops--from flowers to cocoa, from fresh vegetables to rice--under contract to agribusinesses, exporters, and processers. The proliferation of African growers producing under contract is in fact part of broader changes in the global agro-food system. In this examination of agricultural restructuring and its effect upon various African societies, editors Peter Little and Michael Watts bring together anthropologists, economists, geographers, political scientists, and sociologists to explore the origins, forms, and consequences of contract production in several African countries, particularly Kenya, the Gambia, Zimbabwe, and the Ivory Coast. Documenting how contract production links farmers, agribusiness, and the state, the contributors examine problematic aspects of this method of agrarian reform. Their case studies, based on long-term field work and analysis on the village and household level, chart the complex effects of contract production on the organization of work and the labor process, rural inequality, gender relations, labor markets, local accumulation strategies, and regional development. Living Under Contract reveals that contract farming represents a distinctive form in which African growers are incorporated into national and world markets. Contract production, which has been a central feature of the agricultural landscape in the advanced capitalist states, is an emerging strategy for "capturing peasants" and for confronting the agrarian question in the late twentieth century.
Download or read book A History of Weed Science in the United States written by Robert L Zimdahl and published by Elsevier. This book was released on 2010-02-04 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It is important that scientists think about and know their history - where they came from, what they have accomplished, and how these may affect the future. Weed scientists, similar to scientists in many technological disciplines, have not sought historical reflection. The technological world asks for results and for progress. Achievement is important not, in general, the road that leads to achievement. What was new yesterday is routine today, and what is described as revolutionary today may be considered antiquated tomorrow. Weed science has been strongly influenced by technology developed by supporting industries, subsequently employed in research and, ultimately, used by farmers and crop growers. The science has focused on results and progress. Scientists have been--and the majority remain--problem solvers whose solutions have evolved as rapidly as have the new weed problems needing solutions. In a more formal sense, weed scientists have been adherents of the instrumental ideology of modern science. That is an analysis of their work, and their orientation reveals the strong emphasis on practical, useful knowledge; on know how. The opposite, and frequently complementary orientation, that has been missing from weed science is an emphasis on contemplative knowledge; that is, knowing why. This book expands on and analyzes how these orientations have affected weed science's development. - The first analytical history of weed science to be written - Compares the development of weed science, entomology and plant pathology - Identifies the primary founders of weed science and describes their role
Download or read book Endangered Maize written by Helen Anne Curry and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2022-01-25 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Charting the political, social, and environmental history of efforts to conserve crop diversity. Many people worry that we're losing genetic diversity in the foods we eat. Over the past century, crop varieties standardized for industrial agriculture have increasingly dominated farm fields. Concerned about what this transition means for the future of food, scientists, farmers, and eaters have sought to protect fruits, grains, and vegetables they consider endangered. They have organized high-tech genebanks and heritage seed swaps. They have combed fields for ancient landraces and sought farmers growing Indigenous varieties. Behind this widespread concern for the loss of plant diversity lies another extinction narrative that concerns the survival of farmers themselves, a story that is often obscured by urgent calls to collect and preserve. Endangered Maize draws on the rich history of corn in Mexico and the United States to uncover this hidden narrative and show how it shaped the conservation strategies adopted by scientists, states, and citizens. In Endangered Maize, historian Helen Anne Curry investigates more than a hundred years of agriculture and conservation practices to understand the tasks that farmers and researchers have considered essential to maintaining crop diversity. Through the contours of efforts to preserve diversity in one of the world's most important crops, Curry reveals how those who sought to protect native, traditional, and heritage crops forged their methods around the expectation that social, political, and economic transformations would eliminate diverse communities and cultures. In this fascinating study of how cultural narratives shape science, Curry argues for new understandings of endangerment and alternative strategies to protect and preserve crop diversity.
Download or read book Rethinking Food and Agriculture written by Amir Kassam and published by Woodhead Publishing. This book was released on 2020-10-18 with total page 478 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Given the central role of the food and agriculture system in driving so many of the connected ecological, social and economic threats and challenges we currently face, Rethinking Food and Agriculture reviews, reassesses and reimagines the current food and agriculture system and the narrow paradigm in which it operates. Rethinking Food and Agriculture explores and uncovers some of the key historical, ethical, economic, social, cultural, political, and structural drivers and root causes of unsustainability, degradation of the agricultural environment, destruction of nature, short-comings in science and knowledge systems, inequality, hunger and food insecurity, and disharmony. It reviews efforts towards 'sustainable development', and reassesses whether these efforts have been implemented with adequate responsibility, acceptable societal and environmental costs and optimal engagement to secure sustainability, equity and justice. The book highlights the many ways that farmers and their communities, civil society groups, social movements, development experts, scientists and others have been raising awareness of these issues, implementing solutions and forging 'new ways forward', for example towards paradigms of agriculture, natural resource management and human nutrition which are more sustainable and just. Rethinking Food and Agriculture proposes ways to move beyond the current limited view of agro-ecological sustainability towards overall sustainability of the food and agriculture system based on the principle of 'inclusive responsibility'. Inclusive responsibility encourages ecosystem sustainability based on agro-ecological and planetary limits to sustainable resource use for production and livelihoods. Inclusive responsibility also places importance on quality of life, pluralism, equity and justice for all and emphasises the health, well-being, sovereignty, dignity and rights of producers, consumers and other stakeholders, as well as of nonhuman animals and the natural world. - Explores some of the key drivers and root causes of unsustainability , degradation of the agricultural environment and destruction of nature - Highlights the many ways that different stakeholders have been forging 'new ways forward' towards alternative paradigms of agriculture, human nutrition and political economy, which are more sustainable and just - Proposes ways to move beyong the current unsustainable exploitation of natural resources towards agroecological sustainability and overall sustainability of the food and agriculture system based on 'inclusive responsibility'
Download or read book The New Peasantries written by Jan Douwe van der Ploeg and published by Earthscan. This book was released on 2012-05-23 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the position, role and significance of the peasantry in an era of globalization, particularly of the agrarian markets and food industries. It argues that the peasant condition is characterized by a struggle for autonomy that finds expression in the creation and development of a self-governed resource base and associated forms of sustainable development. In this respect the peasant mode of farming fundamentally differs from entrepreneurial and corporate ways of farming. The author demonstrates that the peasantries are far from waning. Instead, both industrialized and developing countries are witnessing complex and richly chequered processes of 're-peasantization', with peasants now numbering over a billion worldwide. The author's arguments are based on three longitudinal studies (in Peru, Italy and The Netherlands) that span 30 years and provide original and thought-provoking insights into rural and agrarian development processes. The book combines and integrates different bodies of literature: the rich traditions of peasant studies, development sociology, rural sociology, neo-institutional economics and the recently emerging debates on Empire.
Download or read book A People s History of Science written by Clifford Conner and published by Bold Type Books. This book was released on 2005-11-08 with total page 572 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Challenges popular beliefs that credit such figures as Galileo, Newton, and Einstein with bringing about modern science, explaining how everyday laborers participated in creating science and continue to do so today, in an account that also documents how the development of science affects ordinary people. Original.
Download or read book Scientific writing for agricultural research scientists written by Youdeowei, A. and published by CTA. This book was released on 2012-12-31 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This new, fully revised edition aims to serve as a guide for agricultural research scientists and other practitioners in writing papers for publication. It also looks to provide a resource manual for training courses in scientific writing. There are three new chapters on reporting statistical results, communicating science to non-scientific audiences and electronic publishing. In addition, the original chapters have all been rewritten to reflect current developments and to make the content more complete and easily comprehensible.
Download or read book Farmer First Revisited written by Ian Scoones and published by Practical Action Publishing. This book was released on 2009 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Agriculture is an urgent global priority and farmers find themselves in the front line of some of the world's most pressing issues- climate change, globalization and food security. Twenty years ago, the Farmer First workshop held at the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, UK, launched a movement to encourage farmer participation in agricultural research and development (R & D), responding to farmers' needs in complex, diverse, risk-prone environments, and promoting sustainable livelihoods and agriculture. Since that time, methodological, institutional and policy experiments have unfolded around the world. Farmer First Revisited returns to the debates about farmer participation in agricultural R & D and looks to the future.The book presents a range of experiences that highlight the importance of going beyond a focus on the farm to a wider innovation system, including market interactions as well as the wider institutional and policy environment. If, however, farmers are really to be put first, a politics of demand is required in order to shape the direction of these innovative systems.
Download or read book An Adventure in Applied Science written by Robert Flint Chandler and published by Int. Rice Res. Inst.. This book was released on 1992 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The New Peasantries written by Jan Douwe van der Ploeg and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-06-13 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When first published in 2008, The New Peasantries revolutionized our ways of thinking of what constitutes the peasantry and repeasantization. It showed how a new era of empire and globalization was creating new forms of peasantry. This new edition is thoroughly revised, with a reorganization of chapters and several new chapters added. It includes a new chapter on China, based on the author's extensive fieldwork there, and much more information on Brazil. It integrates and critically reviews the many publications on peasants, peasantries and peasant modes of agricultural production published in recent years. The theoretical discussion is enriched with more attention to the seminal work of Chayanov. Greater attention is also paid to the construction of new markets – a theme that will remain a major issue in the coming decade. It combines and integrates different bodies of literature: the rich traditions of peasant studies, development and rural sociology, neo-institutional economics and debates on empire and globalization. The original book has been used in several international postgraduate courses. The experience and feedback thus obtained has been used to simplify the structure of the book and make it more accessible as a textbook for students.
Download or read book Peasant Poverty and Persistence in the Twenty First Century written by Julio Boltvinik and published by Zed Books Ltd.. This book was released on 2016-08-15 with total page 246 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Peasants are a majority of the world’s poor. Despite this, there has been little effort to bridge the fields of peasant and poverty studies. Peasant Poverty and Persistence in the Twenty-first Century provides a much-needed critical perspective linking three central questions: Why has peasantry, unlike other areas of non-capitalist production, persisted? Why are the vast majority of peasants poor? And how are these two questions related? Interweaving contributions from various disciplines, the book provides a range of responses, offering new theoretical, historical and policy perspectives on this peasant 'world drama'. Scholars from both South and North argue that, in order to find the policy paths required to overcome peasants’ misery, we need a seismic transformation in social thought, to which they make important contributions. They are convinced that we must build upon the peasant economy’s advantages over agricultural capitalism in meeting the challenges of feeding the growing world population while sustaining the environment. Structured to encourage debate among authors and mutual learning, Peasant Poverty and Persistence takes the reader on an intellectual journey toward understanding the peasantry.
