Conservation Agriculture : A Management System That Maintains A Soil Cover Through Surface Retention Of Crop Residues With No

“Erosion occurs when the soil lacks protective vegetative cover”. (Pimentel, Kounang, 1998) “Soil erosion reduces the productivity of the land by loss of water, soil, organic matter, nutrients, biota, and depth of soil.” (Pimentel, Kounang, 1998) With no conservation methods in place in certain places like: no contour farming, no cover crop, no terraces, no water ways, and tillage on steep hills is asking for a loss of productivity from the land. The effects on the land that non-conservation methods have is horrible. “Its effects are pervasive, and its damages are long lasting. (Pimentel and others 1995a)” (Pimentel, Kounang, 1998) Soil loss is a bigger factor then most people think. For an example an comparison of how much soil is actually lost in certain environments: “On sloping agricultural land under tropical rainfall, as much as 400t/ha/yr of soil is lost (Pimentel unpublished report,1990).”(Pimentel, Kounang, 1998) “Under arid conditions with relatively strong winds, as much as 5600t/ha/yr of soil has been reported lost (Gupta and Raina 1996).” (Pimentel, Kounang, 1998) Soil loss is a huge factor when conservation practices are not put into place. “According to some investigators, approximately 75 billion tons a fertile soil are lost annually from the world’s agricultural systems (Myers 1993).” (Pimentel, Kounang, 1998) Soil loss is a huge factor and many different things can be done to help slow it,

The findings of this study may further contribute to the body of knowledge which may serve as bases for further research.

A. the literature review provided articles that were relevant and a number of relevant studies and theories were described throughout the study.

The following terms are provided with definition to increase the reader’s understanding of this study.

"This literature review will use a selection of available documents on the topic, which contain information, ideas, data and evidence written from a particular standpoint to fulfill certain aims or express certain views on the nature of the topic and how it is to be investigated, and the effective evaluation of these documents in relation to the research being proposed."

o Review of related literature: In what ways does the literature review support the need for this study?

The authors have listed three literature reviews in the article. Two of them were from the nineties and one was from the year 1979. Even though the studies were relevant to the problem and explain a review of the problem and the need for study, they are not up to date. The summary of the literature review is not good enough to get a deeper knowledge about the literature. The authors should have done more elaborated explanation of the evidences of the problem in the literature.

A total of 35 sources were used throughout the article. Of the 35 sources, 27 of them were written in the last 10 years, which

The purpose of this review is to narrate and provide the details of published academic studies about the

First, before addressing the difference between conservation tillage and the conventional method, I’ll talk about some background introduction on what exactly the conventional

Agriculture is improving all the time. From pushing around dirt to changing microscopic organisms, there are many different beliefs in the way things should be done. A more recent discovery is how planting small crops in the off-season benefit the normal crops. These crops can be turnips, radishes, rye, and many more. These plants are called cover crop, and while some people think they are not useful, I conducted an interview with Bob Rikli to find out what opinion he had on it. The three main points that I focused on were, how much the cover crop benefits the yields by, whether or not it is worth the cost, and how much can it help the environment.

which new research in the area has been produced, a systematic investigation of how the field

Since the time immemorial agricultural production has been primarily outdoors. Agri-horticulture is primarily climate and weather dependent. Environment is the most determinate factor in horticultural crop production. Protected cultivation facilitates control over environmental variables which other wise drastically affect production and productivity of horticultural crops. Protected cultivation has considerably contributed for better understanding of environmental factors and inputs required for improving crop productivity. It is a unique and specialized form of agriculture. Different devices or technologies viz., windbreaks, irrigation, soil mulches etc. as well as structures viz., greenhouses, tunnels, row covers may be used to grow crops

Agriculture in the United States has changed dramatically over the centuries. Since the 1960’s large commercial farms have been leading in sales. As a direct result of their success we, as a society, have access to affordable food. However, the success of large farms has lead to many negative impacts such as increased usage of resources and decreased diversity in crop fields. This begs the question, what can be done to reduce the negative impacts of large farms. One solution growing in popularity is sustainable agriculture. The idea of sustainable agriculture is to create farms that need little to no outside help from irrigation, pesticides, or fertilizers. Sustainability can be achieved in many way through

Protected cultivation is the concept of growing potential crops in the modified natural environment for ensuring optimum growth of the crop plants without any or least stress and hence offers great scope to harness this potential of growing the high value crops by achieving independence of climate and weather, and to grow these crops during off -season and in marginal environments. Globally, there is a need to increase productivity and quality of the produce to meet the demand of ever increasing quality and health conscious consumers. Hence, a breakthrough in production technology of high value crops such as, vegetables that integrates market driven safe foods/ products driven quality parameters with the production system by ensuring vertical growth in the productivity.