agriculture

"Plants require at least 16 s for normal growth and for completion of their life cycle. Those used in the largest amounts, , and oxygen, are non-mineral elements supplied by air and water. The other 13 elements are taken up by plants only in mineral form from the soil or must be added as s. Plants need relatively large amounts of , , and . These nutrients are referred to as primary nutrients, and are the ones most frequently supplied to plants in fertilizers. The three secondary elements, , , and , are required in smaller amounts than the primary nutrients. Calcium and magnesium are usually supplied with liming materials, and sulfur with fertilizer materials. Contaminants in also supply 10 to 20 pounds of nitrogen and sulfur per acre each year, depending on local air quality. The micronutrients consist of seven essential elements: , , , iron, , , and . These elements occur in very small amounts in both soils and plants, but their role is equally as important as the primary or secondary nutrients. A deficiency of one or more of the micronutrients can lead to severe depression in growth, yield, and crop quality. Some soils do not contain sufficient amounts of these nutrients to meet the plant's requirements for rapid growth and good production. In such cases, supplemental micronutrient applications in the form of commercial fertilizers or must be made."

"Attention is again called to the fact that the is the original source of 98½% per cent of the materials found in the green plant; the carbohydrates, fats and being composed of elements supplied in the form of water and gas. These substances are furnished free of cost in humid climates, the supply being practically beyond control, and their use by the plant results in no impoverishment of the land. The subject of practical importance to the farmer is the supply of the other 1½% per cent of the plant, consisting of nitrogen and the ash elements which are derived directly from the solid particles of the soil. It has been shown that seven of these elements are essential to plant growth. Experience has proved that only three of these elements (i.e. , and ) are likely to become exhausted, or, in other words, that nothing is gained by adding to the soil any of the other elements of . This is due to the fact that the plant uses nitrogen, phosphoric acid and potash in rather larger quantities than the other elements, and that they exist in smaller quantities in the ground, and not because they are any more essential to vegetation. Occasionally soils are found that are actually deficient in , but in most cases lime is present in sufficient abundance for the growth of the plant."

"Many tropical soils are poor in inorganic nutrients and rely on the recycling of nutrients from soil organic matter to maintain fertility. In undisturbed such nutrients are recycled via the ... ; , meanwhile, depends on the mineralization of organic nutrients from the plant remains ... or on (short-lived) inputs from ash ... . This dependence on organic nutrients in tropical soils has the result that tests of soil quality which only give isolated measures of inorganic nutrient status are unreliable ... , and that the effects of fertilization can be inconsistent because of leaching or fixation of inorganic nutrients. Here we attempt to quantify the role of organic matter in sustaining the fertility of soils from three different climate zones. We estimate rates of from ecological measurements and , and determine its relation to the and nutrient budgets. We find that agriculture without supplementary fertilization was economical for 65 years on temperate and for six years in a tropical semi-arid . An extremely nutrient-poor Amazonian soil showed no potential for agriculture beyond the three-year lifespan of the forest litter mat, once biological nutrient cycles were interrupted by slash-burning. These observations suggest that quantification of organic-matter cycling may provide an important guide to the agricultural potential of soils."

"When most physicians are asked about the realm of biosecurity, they often are able to discuss the subject in broad strokes that include concepts such as bioterrorism, , and s. However, the restriction of knowledge of biosecurity solely to these components does not make the concept adequately concrete; consequently, biosecurity remains a floating abstraction with no firm tie to reality, constraining the ability of physicians to fully converse with government policy makers and the public on this vital national security matter. Biosecurity in the Global Age: Biological Weapons, Public Health, and the Rule of Law, by internationally renowned law professors and David Fidler, provides an opportunity to develop a robust understanding of biosecurity and its role in national and international policy."

"A leaflet drops through your letter box advising on ways to avoid contracting and spreading . Your bag is searched as you enter a country on the start of your holiday — and there's a fine of $200 for an undeclared apple. You drive across a disinfectant mat on a visit to a local farm. You call the council for advice on the spreading from your neighbour's garden. You switch to eating after reading about the role of industrial farming in the production of risk. You shudder as you remember the smell of . In many different ways you may have encountered events, practices, procedures, narratives and knowledges contained within the complex issue of ‘biosecurity’."

"The secure and continuous production of and are key to U.S. national security. The introduction of foreign-origin or emerging animal, plant, and human diseases by intentional acts of , terrorism, , or criminal activity can lead to severe consequences for domestic and international s, the economic security of the agricultural community, and food security, and the credibility of responsible state and federal agencies. Early public, animal, plant health, law enforcement, and intelligence assessments and investigations of suspected or confirmed intentional threats are critical additions to existing interagency prevention, response, and management protocols. Forensic microbiology, a multidisciplinary science, is essential to the nation's readiness for responding to a potentially criminal, intentional, or otherwise nefarious incident in the agricultural sector (plant or animal), and of eventual supporting attribution and the prosecution of the perpetrators."

"In a strict sense, biosecurity involves issues dealing directly with s and s, such as prevention of emergence, loss, accidents, theft, or use, and remediation after pathogenic damage. It addresses procedures and practices to help ensure that s and relevant sensitive information remain secure and out of the hands of terrorists. But we have to be practical. We inevitably pay a price for security."

"there is still a need for more investment in handling post-harvest losses since farmers harvested when there were heavy rains."

"We managed to supply agro-inputs-seeds and fertilisers to about 850,000 farmers and also trained them on good agricultural practices during the two seasons. Maize production has drastically increased. We also measured the impact on farmers under our programme. We realised that the farmers generated Rwf138 billion in profits."

"We know that trees help generate rainfall, but we want farmers to see various benefits from them, including providing poles for planting beans, fertilizing the soil, and more."

"Farmers need maize drying, storage, and milling infrastructure which we are helping them to get in collaboration with partners as part of value addition to the produce. We have a programme called ‘Tubura Harvest’ where we collect farmers’ harvests and link farmers to markets. We help farmers to also measure the moisture of maize to avoid Aflatoxin and increase their quality."

"diversity in leadership results in inclusive decision-making, which directly correlates to better organizational performance"

"Remembering is honoring their lives and their dreams of a sustainable future and a peaceful nation. Remembering is the legacy we leave to our youth, educating them on the true history so that Genocide will never happen again. Unity is the foundation of a new Rwanda, which enables us to rise up and work together to build the Nation."

"they are also working with the Government of Rwanda, the private sector, and other stakeholders to prepare 2025 Agriculture Season A and B."

"Under our farmer-facing program, we supplied agricultural input to more than 850, 000 farmers and trained them on good agricultural practices, which significantly increased the farmers’ harvest."

"By investing in robust seed systems and providing access to quality seedlings, we are empowering them to restore degraded land, enhance biodiversity, and improve their livelihoods."

"Through 1,841 three nursery entrepreneurs, we distributed 20 million agroforestry trees to more than 766,000 farmers to continue addressing climate change-related challenges."

"Those beekeepers who are also engaged in general farming or who specialize in one or two farm crops are usually too busy elsewhere to give the bees the necessary attention at the time when they most require it and consequently few of this class of beekeepers rise to the ranks of the specialists. This is not so true of amateur beekeepers, since some of the many occupations which they follow usually permit the time and study necessary to the making of the proficient beekeeper."

"Appreciating the role that bees and their products have played in requires a cultural immersion. The honey bee can be found in many of the earlier examples of Egyptian writing. During the , shortly after the construction of the and the , we find carved reliefs showing that the Egyptians had already mastered the art of beekeeping and were processing honey (Kritsky 2010)."

"Owning bees that look after themselves and keeping bees according to modern methods are widely different practices. Bees have been kept by man in various ways for centuries, but in the United States the science of beekeeping began when the hive with movable frames was patented on October 5, 1852, by , who has been called the father of modern beekeeping."

"Bees were collected from natural nests for use in beekeeping in parts of Western Europe, as in other regions. Records from legal proceedings in various parts of Luxembourg between 1459 and 1738 (Poos, 1978) show that wild colonies were much sought, and that a substantial value was placed on them in law. For instance in 1663 a colony was classed with a calf or a young partridge, which was worth twice as much as a piglet, lamb or kid. It seems that from 1459 onwards, and probably before, the bees were wanted (to populate hives ...) rather than honey or , and that by the mid-1400s had largely been superseded by hive beekeeping in Luxembourg."

"The earliest home of men in this great arena of Western Asia is a borderland between the desert and the mountains, a kind of cultivable fringe of the desert, a fertile crescent having the mountains on one side and the desert on the other."

"Western Asia may be roughly divided into three belts of country, the Mountains or high Table-lands, the Fertile Lands, and the Desert. Of these three, the first and last have been ceaseless in their pressure on the second, and the history of Western Asia is largely the story of the actions and reactions on each other of the peoples from the mountains of the north, and from the southern Desert, in the effort to occupy and to hold the Fertile Lands between them. This central belt stretches in a crescent (Breasted, Ancient Times, c. iv, gives it the name of the ' Fertile Crescent ') from the border of Egypt, north and north-eastwards through Palestine and the Lebanon to the Euphrates, then eastwards to the Tigris, and then southwards through the n plain to the head of the . Assyria occupies about the centre of the crescent, Babylonia its eastern wing, while its western wing includes Syria and Palestine, and is produced into the Nile valley to the edge of the African deserts. Round this crescent ran the main roads from Mesopotamia to Egypt, which trade or aggression was bound to follow."

"The Fertile Crescent has always been in close touch with other parts of the Middle East: Turkey, Iran, the , and Egypt. Indeed the ties binding it to each of those subregions have usually been stronger and more numerous than those between any other two. With the Arabian peninsula there was, first of all, the blood tie. For millennia, the Fertile Crescent has been periodically replenished by waves of peoples and tribes migrating from the desert and settling in the steppes or sown areas of Syria and Iraq. In addition, the beduin tribes, following their camel pastures and the availability of water, travel each year hundreds of miles between their winter quarters in the peninsula and their summer abodes in the crescent. The nomads and semi nomads supplied the settled areas of Syria and Iraq with camels, the essential means of transport in the Middle East; with fine horses, used for ceremony and war, and with various animal products such as goat and camel hair."

"The Fertile Crescent is considered the first of at least seven centers of agriculture origin in the world (Smith 1998). Barley, along with (Tritium spp.), (Pisum sativum L.), (Lens culinaris L.), goat (Capra aegagrus hircus), sheep (Ovis aries), and cow (Bos taurus), set the stage for the evolution of agriculture in the Near East, which eventually spread to North Africa, further east and north in Asia, and to Europe (Smith 1998)."

"The names of the ancient cities in the fertile crescent ring out the beginning of the known history of mankind: , , Babylon, , , and many others, where not only agriculture, but pottery and music, and writing, were born, and geometry came to regulate land ownership, and arithmetic, perhaps to calculate taxation."

"My vegetable Love should grow Vaster than Empires, and more slow."

"Peas and beans are as dank here as a dog, and that is the next way to give poor jades the bots."

"Hence! I am qualmish at the smell of leek."

"See dying vegetables life sustain, See life dissolving vegetate again; All forms that perish other forms supply; (By turns we catch the vital breath and die.)"

"They sowed the duller vegetables first, and a pleasant feeling of righteous fatigue stole over them as they addressed themselves to the peas."

"And now, folks, get a load of what our cameraman found in Ecuador. Vegetables on vacation! You've only seen this kind of thing after a party, but down in sunny Ecuador they see it any time—and no hangover to follow! Monster plants on the march! Say, now, that's given me a big idea! Maybe if we can educate our potatoes right we can fix it so they'll walk right into the pot."

"There was nothing "natural" about monoculture. It was a consequence of imperialist requirements and machinations, extending into areas that were politically independent in name. Monoculture was a characteristic of regions falling under imperialist domination. Certain countries in Latin America such as Costa Rica and Guatemala were forced by United States capitalist firms to concentrate so heavily on growing bananas that they were contemptuously known as “banana republics.” In Africa, this concentration on one or two cash crops for sale abroad had many harmful effects. Sometimes, cash crops were grown to the exclusion of staple foods—thus causing famines. For instance, in Gambia rice farming was popular before the colonial era, but so much of the best land was transferred to groundnuts that rice had to be imported on a large scale to try to counter the fact that famine was becoming endemic. In Asante, concentration on cocoa raised fears of famine in a region previously famous for yams and other foodstuff. Yet the threat of famine was a small disadvantage compared to the extreme vulnerability and insecurity of monoculture. When the crop was affected by internal factors such as disease, that amounted to an overwhelming disaster, as in the case of Gold Coast cocoa when it was hit by swollen-shoot disease in the 1940s. Besides, at all times, the price fluctuations (which were externally controlled) left the African producer helpless in the face of capitalist maneuvers."

"Every farming people have a staple food, plus a variety of other supplements. Historians, agronomists, and botanists have all contributed to showing the great variety of such foods within the pre-colonial African economy. There were numerous crops which were domesticated within the African continent, there were several wild food species (notably fruits), and Africans had shown no conservatism in adopting useful food plants of Asian or American origin. Diversified agriculture was within the African tradition. Monoculture was a colonialist invention."

"Monoculture is the single most powerful simplification of modern agriculture, the key move in reconfiguring nature as a machine, yet nothing else in agriculture is so poorly fitted to the way nature seems to work. Very simply, a vast field of identical plants will always be exquisitely vulnerable to insects, weeds, and disease—to all the vicissitudes of nature. Monoculture is at the root of virtually every problem that bedevils the modern farmer, and from which virtually every agricultural product is designed to deliver him."

"The usage of macroalgae in traditional food and was recorded in early Neolithic data of ten thousand years back. Being naturally enriched in key nutrients and in various health-promoting compounds, they are traditionally consumed in many Asian countries like China, Indonesia, Philippine, South Korea, North Korea, Japan and Malaysia for centuries. Recently, they have attained more reputation in western countries. Seaweeds promising candidates for the design of functional foods have become key foods in current nutritional practices (vegetarian, vegans, health-foods, etc.) and are increasingly widely consumed in the USA, South American and European countries. Global demands for seaweeds has been growing together with increases in usage beyond former traditional applications. According to statistics of the most cultivated seaweed taxa, three were used mainly for extraction: ' spp. and ' for s, and ' spp. for ; ', ', ' spp. and ' were the most important in human food usage. The main producing countries were China, Indonesia and the Philippines."

"Seaweed aquaculture, the fastest-growing component of global food production, offers a slate of opportunities to mitigate, and adapt to . Seaweed farms release carbon that may be buried in sediments or exported to the deep sea, therefore acting as a . The crop can also be used, in total or in part, for production, with a potential CO2 mitigation capacity, in terms of avoided emissions from fossil fuels, of about 1,500 tons CO2 km−2 year−1. Seaweed aquaculture can also help reduce the emissions from agriculture, by improving soil quality substituting synthetic fertilizer and when included in cattle fed, lowering methane emissions from cattle."

"An is a nonparasitic plant that dwells on another plant and has been well studied in terrestrial plants. However, in the , these epiphytes thrive on algal thallus for their support and growth, and their infestation has a prime economic impediment in commercial cultivation. They usually belong to various groups, namely, bacteria, fungi, algae, ascidians, bryozoans, sponges, protozoa, molluscs, crustaceans, and other marine sessile organisms. The seaweed farming industry is currently growing at ca. 9% per annum, with global production of 31.2 million wet tons worth US$ 11.7 billion. The first report of an epiphytic outbreak in commercial farms of Kappaphycus in the 1970s caught the attention of several researchers on this devastating epiphyte which causes retarded growth and significant loss of stocking biomass, ultimately leading to the production of inferior quality of raw material. High-density planting in commercial farms is often responsible for recurring epiphytic infestations."

"As long as there are slaughterhouses there will be battlefields."

"They had chains which they fastened about the leg of the nearest hog, and the other end of the chain they hooked into one of the rings upon the wheel. So, as the wheel turned, a hog was suddenly jerked off his feet and borne aloft. At the same instant the car was assailed by a most terrifying shriek; the visitors started in alarm, the women turned pale and shrank back. The shriek was followed by another, louder and yet more agonizing—for once started upon that journey, the hog never came back; at the top of the wheel he was shunted off upon a trolley, and went sailing down the room. And meantime another was swung up, and then another, and another, until there was a double line of them, each dangling by a foot and kicking in frenzy—and squealing. The uproar was appalling, perilous to the eardrums; one feared there was too much sound for the room to hold—that the walls must give way or the ceiling crack. There were high squeals and low squeals, grunts, and wails of agony; there would come a momentary lull, and then a fresh outburst, louder than ever, surging up to a deafening climax. It was too much for some of the visitors—the men would look at each other, laughing nervously, and the women would stand with hands clenched, and the blood rushing to their faces, and the tears starting in their eyes."

"Again and again workers told me that they are under tremendous pressure not to report injuries. The annual bonuses of plant foremen and supervisors are often based in part on the injury rate of their workers. Instead of creating a safer workplace, these bonus schemes encourage slaughterhouse managers to make sure that accidents and injuries go unreported. Missing fingers, broken bones, deep lacerations and amputated limbs are difficult to conceal from authorities. But the dramatic and catastrophic injuries in a slaughterhouse are greatly outnumbered by less visible, though no less debilitating, ailments: torn muscles, slipped discs, pinched nerves."

"One could not stand and watch very long without becoming philosophical, without beginning to deal in symbols and similes, and to hear the hog squeal of the universe. Was it permitted to believe that there was nowhere upon the earth, or above the earth, a heaven for hogs, where they were requited for all this suffering? Each one of these hogs was a separate creature. Some were white hogs, some were black; some were brown, some were spotted; some were old, some young; some were long and lean, some were monstrous. And each of them had an individuality of his own, a will of his own, a hope and a heart's desire; each was full of self-confidence, of self-importance, and a sense of dignity. And trusting and strong in faith he had gone about his business, the while a black shadow hung over him and a horrid Fate waited in his pathway. Now suddenly it had swooped upon him, and had seized him by the leg. Relentless, remorseless, it was; all his protests, his screams, were nothing to it—it did its cruel will with him, as if his wishes, his feelings, had simply no existence at all; it cut his throat and watched him gasp out his life."

"I had wished to visit a slaughter-house, in order to see with my own eyes the reality of the question raised when vegetarianism is discussed. But at first I felt ashamed to do so, as one is always ashamed of going to look at suffering which one knows is about to take place, but which one cannot avert; and so I kept putting off my visit. But a little while ago I met on the road a butcher … He is not yet an experienced butcher, and his duty is to stab with a knife. I asked him whether he did not feel sorry for the animals that he killed. He gave me the usual answer: 'Why should I feel sorry? It is necessary.' But when I told him that eating flesh is not necessary, but is only a luxury, he agreed; and then he admitted that he was sorry for the animals."

"Nature is cruel, but we don't have to be. I wouldn't want to have my guts ripped out by a lion. I'd much rather die in a slaughterhouse, if it was done right."

"Thousands—millions and billions—of animals are killed for food. That is very sad. We human beings can live without meat, especially in our modern world. We have a great variety of vegetables and other supplementary foods, so we have the capacity and the responsibility to save billions of lives. I have seen many individuals. and groups promoting animal rights and following a vegetarian diet. This is excellent. Certain killing is purely a "luxury." … But perhaps the saddest is factory farming. The poor animals there really suffer. … We must support those who are attempting to reduce that kind of unfair treatment. An Indian friend told me that his young daughter has been arguing with him that it is better to serve one cow to ten people than to serve chicken or other small animals, since more lives would be involved. In the Indian tradition, beef is always avoided, but I think there is some logic to her argument. Shrimp, for example, are very small. For one plate, many lives must be sacrificed. To me, this is not at all delicious. I find it really awful, and I think it is better to avoid these things. If your body needs meat, it may be better to eat bigger animals. Eventually you may be able to eliminate the need for meat. I think that our basic nature as human beings is to be vegetarian—making every effort not to harm other living beings. If we apply our intelligence, we can create a sound, nutritional program. It is very dangerous to ignore the suffering of any sentient being."

"Those working in slaughterhouses, for example, are often underpaid and overworked, lack insurance, and are required to use dangerous equipment without adequate training. Turnover and rates of injury for jobs in animal industries are among the highest in the United States. Slaughterhouse employees are almost always poor, they are often immigrants, and they are inevitably viewed by their employers as expendable. Moreover, if we would not like to kill pigs, hens, or cattle all day long, then we should not make food choices that require others to do so. Our dietary choices determine where others work. Will our poorest laborers work in fields of green or in buildings of blood? Fieldwork is difficult, but I worked in the fields as a child, and I am very glad that I never worked in a slaughterhouse."

"One time I took my knife and sliced off the end of a hog's nose, just like a piece of salami. The hog went crazy for a few seconds. Then it sat there looking kind of stupid. So I took a handful of salt and rubbed it on the wound. Now that hog really went nuts. It was my way of taking out frustration. Another time, there was a live hog in the pit. It hadn't done anything wrong, wasn't even running around. It was just alive. I took a three-foot chunk of pipe and I literally beat that hog to death. It was like I started hitting the hog and I couldn't stop. And when I finally did stop, I'd expended all this energy and frustration, and I'm thinking what in God's sweet name did I do. (Quoting a slaughterhouse worker)"

"Bernard Shaw says that as long as men torture and slay animals and eat their flesh we shall have war. I think all sane, thinking people must be of his opinion. The children of my school were all vegetarians, and grew strong and beautiful on a vegetable and fruit diet. Sometimes during the war when I heard the cries of the wounded I thought of the cries of the animals in the slaughterhouse, and I felt that, as we torture these poor defenceless creatures, so the gods torture us. Who loves this horrible thing called war? Probably the meat-eaters, having killed, feel the need to kill—kill birds, animals—the tender stricken deer—hunt foxes. The butcher with his bloody apron incites bloodshed, murder. Why not? From cutting the throat of a young calf to cutting the throat of our brothers and sisters is but a step. While we are ourselves the living graves of murdered animals, how can we expect any ideal conditions on the earth?"

"The assembly line, the foundation of modern capitalism, came from perfecting methods to slice up animals while—and this is the important part—preventing them from resisting. And once capitalists figured out how to turn animals into component parts (just a leg, just a throat, just a head), they realized they could do the same thing to human workers (just a hand, just an arm, just a cutting motion). Ideas of how to prevent human resistance came from first figuring out how to prevent animal resistance."

"You have just dined, and, however scrupulously the slaughter-house is concealed in the graceful distance of miles, there is complicity."