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Articles 1 - 11 of 11
Full-Text Articles in Entire DC Network
Evaluation Of Agricultural Land Cover Representations On Regional Climate Model Simulations In The Brazilian Cerrado, Stephanie A. Spera, Jonathan M. Winter, Jonathan W. Chipman
Evaluation Of Agricultural Land Cover Representations On Regional Climate Model Simulations In The Brazilian Cerrado, Stephanie A. Spera, Jonathan M. Winter, Jonathan W. Chipman
Geography and the Environment Faculty Publications
Examining interactions between large-scale land cover and land use change and regional climate in areas undergoing dynamic land transformations, like the Brazilian Cerrado, is crucial for understanding tradeoffs between human needs and ecosystem services. Yet regional climate models often do not include accurate land cover data of these complex landscapes. We use National Center for Atmospheric Research’s Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model coupled to the Noah-Multiparameterization (Noah-MP) land surface model to run 10-year climate simulations across Brazil to assess (1) whether an accurate, regionally validated land cover data set with two, new agricultural land cover classifications improves model simulation …
Cattle As Technological Interventions: The Gender Effects Of Water Demand In Dairy Production In Uganda, Elizabeth Ransom, Carmen Bain, Harleen Bal, Natasha Shannon
Cattle As Technological Interventions: The Gender Effects Of Water Demand In Dairy Production In Uganda, Elizabeth Ransom, Carmen Bain, Harleen Bal, Natasha Shannon
Sociology and Anthropology Faculty Publications
Smallholder dairy production dominates the country of Uganda, with over 90% of the national herd owned by smallholders. To reduce hunger, malnutrition, and raise families out of poverty agricultural development, interventions in Uganda have focused on increasing milk production through the introduction of improved dairy cow breeds. Development actors, such as the East Africa Dairy Development (EADD) program in Uganda, see crossbreed dairy cows as a key technological intervention for improving production. Drawing on a multi-method study (spatial analysis, surveys, and qualitative interviews) of dairy smallholders, our paper examines the gendered effects of the introduction of crossbreed dairy cows. To …
Agricultural Intensification Can Preserve The Brazilian Cerrado: Applying Lessons From Mato Grosso And Goia's To Brazil’S Last Agricultural Frontier, Stephanie A. Spera
Agricultural Intensification Can Preserve The Brazilian Cerrado: Applying Lessons From Mato Grosso And Goia's To Brazil’S Last Agricultural Frontier, Stephanie A. Spera
Geography and the Environment Faculty Publications
Food security and climate change are two pressing issues shaping the future of tropical land use. Brazil, home to abundant land that is rich in carbon, water, and biodiversity and often cleared for agropastoral and renewable energy purposes, is the ideal location for studying socioeconomic and environmental trade-offs of land use dynamics. Here, I use recent (2000–2016) land-use land-cover change dynamics in the established agricultural states of Mato Grosso and Goia's to demonstrate how incentivizing intensive agricultural practices and improving degraded pastures may be a means by which Brazil can increase agricultural production while conserving the remainder of the Cerrado. …
Precipitation Drivers Of Cropping Frequency In The Brazilian Cerrado: Evidence And Implications For Decision-Making, Keith R. Spangler, Amanda H. Lynch, Stephanie A. Spera
Precipitation Drivers Of Cropping Frequency In The Brazilian Cerrado: Evidence And Implications For Decision-Making, Keith R. Spangler, Amanda H. Lynch, Stephanie A. Spera
Geography and the Environment Faculty Publications
The Amazon basin has been subjected to unprecedented rates of land-use change over the past several decades, primarily as a result of the expansion of agriculture. Enhanced rain forest conservation efforts toward the end of the twentieth century slowed deforestation of the Amazon but, in turn, increased demand for land repurposing in the adjacent Cerrado (savanna) region, where conservation regulations are less strict. To maintain or increase yields while minimizing the need for additional land, agricultural producers adopted a form of intensification in which two rain-fed crops are planted within a single growing season (double cropping). Using 10 years (August …
Livestock-Livelihood Linkages In Uganda: The Benefits For Women And Rural Households?, Elizabeth Ransom, Carmen Bain, Iim Halimatusa'diyah
Livestock-Livelihood Linkages In Uganda: The Benefits For Women And Rural Households?, Elizabeth Ransom, Carmen Bain, Iim Halimatusa'diyah
Sociology and Anthropology Faculty Publications
Livestock are an important component of rural households and gendered livelihood practices throughout sub-Saharan Africa. Widespread within the development literature is the belief in the livestock ladder, with poorer households often owning small stock and wealthier households owning large stock, with the assumption that poor households can utilize livestock to build their asset base and overtime this would allow poorer households to expand from small stock to large stock, in so doing climb the livestock ladder. There is also an assumption in the literature that women are more likely to oversee small stock. In addition, some well-known agricultural development programs …
Agricultural Science And Technology: Tensions And Contradictions, Leland Glenna, Elizabeth P. Ransom
Agricultural Science And Technology: Tensions And Contradictions, Leland Glenna, Elizabeth P. Ransom
Sociology and Anthropology Faculty Publications
Agricultural science and farm-based technologies have been important forces behind the dramatic rise in agricultural production in the industrial world during the 20th century, as well as in large portions of the developing world (Stanton, 1998). In the United States, mechanisation, improved seeds and breeds, chemical inputs, and other scientifically inspired production technologies and techniques are often credited with productivity gains (Dimitri, Effland & Concklin, 2005). In past decades, agricultural science and technology have contributed to the productivist goals of maximising production while seeking the greatest efficiency from inputs. However, there have always been tensions and contradictions because the distribution …
Branching Out: How Virginia Can Strategically Use Trees To Combat Biodiversity Loss, Taylor Pfeiffer
Branching Out: How Virginia Can Strategically Use Trees To Combat Biodiversity Loss, Taylor Pfeiffer
Environmental Studies Senior Seminar Projects
Biodiversity loss is a particularly concerning effect of climate change because as greenhouse gas emissions increase global temperatures, decreases in the abundance and diversity of species has reduced ecosystem resiliency to these changes (Verchot et al. 2007). Weakened ecosystems and threatened species decrease the environment’s capacity to provide humans with services like safe drinking water, fuel, and protection from natural disasters, just to name a few (US EPA 2013). The agricultural industry plays a unique role in this environmental conversation, as farmland both contributes to climate change and is jeopardized by the negative effects created by the issue in a …
Soybean Development: The Impact Of A Decade Of Agricultural Change On Urban And Economic Growth In Mato Grosso, Brazil, Peter Richards, Heitor Pellegrina, Leah Vanwey, Stephanie A. Spera
Soybean Development: The Impact Of A Decade Of Agricultural Change On Urban And Economic Growth In Mato Grosso, Brazil, Peter Richards, Heitor Pellegrina, Leah Vanwey, Stephanie A. Spera
Geography and the Environment Faculty Publications
In this research we consider the impact of export-driven, soybean agriculture in Mato Grosso on regional economic growth. Here we argue that the soybean sector has served as a motor to the state’s economy by increasing the demand for services, housing, and goods, and by providing a source of investment capital to the non-agricultural sector. Specifically, we show that each square kilometer of soybean production supports 2.5 formal sector jobs outside of agriculture, and the equivalent of approximately 150,000 US in annual, non-agricultural GDP. We also show that annual gains in non-agricultural employment and GDP are closely tied to soybean …
Recent Cropping Frequency, Expansion, And Abandonment In Mato Grosso, Brazil Had Selective Land Characteristics, Stephanie A. Spera, Avery S. Cohn, Leah K. Vanwey, Jack F. Mustard, Bernardo F.T. Rudorff, Marcos Adami
Recent Cropping Frequency, Expansion, And Abandonment In Mato Grosso, Brazil Had Selective Land Characteristics, Stephanie A. Spera, Avery S. Cohn, Leah K. Vanwey, Jack F. Mustard, Bernardo F.T. Rudorff, Marcos Adami
Geography and the Environment Faculty Publications
This letter uses satellite remote sensing to examine patterns of cropland expansion, cropland abandonment, and changing cropping frequency in Mato Grosso, Brazil from 2001 to 2011. During this period, Mato Grosso emerged as a globally important center of agricultural production. In 2001, 3.3 million hectares of mechanized agriculture were cultivated in Mato Grosso, of which 500 000 hectares had two commercial crops per growing season (double cropping). By 2011, Mato Grosso had 5.8 million hectares of mechanized agriculture, of which 2.9 million hectares were double cropped. We found these agricultural changes to be selective with respect to land attributes —significant …
Green Mulch From Invasives Offers Many Benefits, W. John Hayden
Green Mulch From Invasives Offers Many Benefits, W. John Hayden
Biology Faculty Publications
For the past several years, I’ve been clipping leafy branchlets of autumn olive for direct use as green mulch in my vegetable garden. In essence, I clip the shoots into segments ranging from 4 to 10 inches long, gathering the freshly chopped mulch into a wheelbarrow. I like to emphasize the youngest and leafiest stems, but since I am also interested in reducing the exotic plant’s biomass, I also clip woody stems up to a half inch in diameter. I then place the coarse mulch, leaves, young stems, and chopped woody branchlets, around my vegetable plants. I install the fresh …
Be Creative When Controlling Invasive Plant Species, W. John Hayden
Be Creative When Controlling Invasive Plant Species, W. John Hayden
Biology Faculty Publications
We are often told that every cloud has a silver lining, but when it comes to invasive exotic species, it seems that the proverbial silver lining is vanishingly thin. Invasives like kudzu, Japanese honeysuckle, tree-of-heaven, and oh-so-many others, seem ubiquitous, crowding out native plants and altering all manner of ecological interactions. Like a rock tossed in a placid pond, the negative impact of an exotic species can ripple throughout the entire ecological community. Further, populations of invasive plants can be so large and so extensive across the countryside that complete eradication is simply out of the question. The genie is …