Tajikistan, with 93% of its surface area taken up by mountains and 65% of its labor forceemployed in agriculture, is judged to be highly vulnerable to risks, including climate changerisks and food insecurity risks. The article examines a set of land use policies and practices thatcan be used to mitigate the vulnerability of Tajikistan’s large rural population, primarily byincreasing family incomes. Empirical evidence from Tajikistan and other CIS countries suggeststhat families with more land and higher commercialization earn higher incomes and achievehigher well-being.

Wild bees provide vital pollination services for many native and agricultural plant species, yet the landscape conditions needed to support wild bee populations are not well understood or appreciated. We assessed the influence of landscape composition on bee abundance and species richness in apple (Malm spp.) orchards of northeastern Wisconsin during the spring flowering period. A diverse community of bee species occurs in these apple orchards, dominated by wild bees in the families Andrenidae and Halictidae and the honey bee, Apis mellifera L.

Agriculture is the mainstay of rural populations, especially in the developing world. Increasing population and the demand for food, fodder and fuelwood have threatened the sustainability of the land resources. Without understanding farmers' perceptions on land-related issues, sustainable management of land resources is impossible because they have intimate knowledge of their land. Besides technical solutions to land-related problems, socio-economic appraisal also plays an important role for solutions to these problems.

Biodiversity is vital to several important ecosystem services that ensure sustainability of food production. In organic agriculture, land management practices that promote biodiversity and soil quality are emphasized and the goal is to maintain a sustainable agricultural system. Soil quality or soil health is the foundation for all agriculture and natural plant communities and a primary indicator of sustainable land management. Soil quality is affected by farm management and land use decisions.

This paper examines the implications of adopting catchment scale approaches for the sustainable management of land and water systems. Drawing on the findings of an interdisciplinary study examining how farm management practices impact on the loss of faecal indicator organisms (FIOs) and potential pathogens from land to water, the paper argues that the overwhelming focus on integration at the catchment level may risk ignoring the sub-catchment as an equally appropriate unit of hydrological analysis.

To investigate the influence of human activities on limnological characteristics of Lake Victoria, we analyzed inorganic nutrient concentrations, phytoplankton diversity and biomass at three locations with different land use patterns: Mwanza (urban/industrial), Magu (agricultural) and Kayenze (sparsely populated). Mwanza had significantly higher ammonia concentration compared to Kayenze and Magu. At the shoreline stations, significantly higher nitrate concentration was observed at Mwanza compared to Kayenze and Magu.

El experimento se realizó en la costa de Granada (SE España). Se estudiaron la descomposición de
la hojarasca y el reciclado del nitrógeno en cuatro tipos de hojas de frutales de origen subtropical
y tropical: mango (Mangifera indica L.), chirimoyo (Annona cherimola Mill.), níspero (Eriobotrya
japonica Lindl.) y aguacate (Persea americana Mill.), empleando la técnica de las bolsas. El
chirimoyo tuvo las mayores tasas de descomposición de hojarasca, mientras que la de mango

We propose a community-based model of land management for pre-emptive action to reduce the risk of wildfires in small communities situated in forested areas. This proposed approach transfers the responsibility of wildland-urban interface administration to the local community, giving them control in reducing their risks of property damage. A combination of community forest management using local labour and bioenergy power generation mitigates the cost of forest treatment, reduces the local cost of energy and revitalizes the community.

This project was initiated to promote conservation agriculture (CA) in Tanzania so as to improve the food security and rural livelihood of small- and medium-scale farmers through the scaling-up of CA as a sustainable land management (SLM) tool as well as increasing the numbers of SLM-CA farmer field schools (FFS) in communities. The project had two phases from 2004 to 2010. It was funded by a Government of Germany trust fund and implemented by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the Ministry of Agriculture in Tanzania.

The natural soil N supply in volcanic soils (Andisols) can be a significant source of plant-available N for agro-ecosystems. Nevertheless, intensive farming systems in south Chile apply high fertilization rates, which lead to high production costs and involve a risk for adverse ecosystem effects. In order to achieve sustainable land management, a better understanding of the processes that govern soil N availability and loss, and their external drivers, is required.

In the recent past there has been increasing recognition that local knowledge of farmers can yield insight into soil quality. With regard to constraints and possibilities for the production of irrigated rice in the south of Brazil there is no documentation on local soil knowledge. The goals of this study were to answer the following questions: (1) Which soil quality perceptions do rice farmers have? (2) Which soil quality indicators are most important to them?