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On-Farm Food Loss In Northern And Central California: Results Of Field Survey Measurementsauthor Links Open Overlay Panel, Gregory A. Baker, Leslie C. Gray, Michael J. Harwood, Travis J. Osland, Jean Baptiste C. Tooley Oct 2019

On-Farm Food Loss In Northern And Central California: Results Of Field Survey Measurementsauthor Links Open Overlay Panel, Gregory A. Baker, Leslie C. Gray, Michael J. Harwood, Travis J. Osland, Jean Baptiste C. Tooley

Environmental Studies and Sciences

Prevailing estimates of food loss at the farm level are sparse and often reliant upon grower surveys. A more comprehensive review of food loss at the farm level using field surveys is required to gain an adequate understanding of the depth of this issue. This paper details the results of 123 in-field surveys and 18 in-depth interviews of 20 different, hand-harvested field crops performed largely on midsize to large conventional farms in northern and central California. We also provide estimates of the percentage of fields that go unharvested, commonly known as walk-by fields. The results show that food loss is …


Turning On The Lights: Transcending Energy Poverty Through The Power Of Women Entrepreneurs, Leslie C. Gray, Alaina Boyle, Victoria Yu Jan 2016

Turning On The Lights: Transcending Energy Poverty Through The Power Of Women Entrepreneurs, Leslie C. Gray, Alaina Boyle, Victoria Yu

Miller Center Fellowship

Solar lanterns offer affordable, high-quality lighting in developing countries. A number of organizations, including social enterprises, make solar lanterns available to rural households as an alternative to candles or kerosene lamps. One of the most successful of these organizations is Solar Sister.

Solar Sister, a social enterprise operating in Tanzania, Uganda, and Nigeria, is dedicated to eradicating energy poverty through the economic empowerment of women. In addition to economically empowering its women entrepreneurs, the business model of Solar Sister also cultivates sales networks built on trust in last-mile distribution methods.

While Solar Sister has previously conducted research regarding its many …


Critical Reflections On Experiential Learning For Food Justice, Leslie C. Gray, Joanna Johnson, Nicole Latham, Michelle Tang, Ann Thomas Apr 2012

Critical Reflections On Experiential Learning For Food Justice, Leslie C. Gray, Joanna Johnson, Nicole Latham, Michelle Tang, Ann Thomas

Environmental Studies and Sciences

This essay will reflect on Santa Clara University's (SCU) forays into experiential learning around food justice through the Bronco Urban Gardens (BUG) program. BUG works with urban schools and a community center in San José, California, using a garden-based education approach. This program emerged out of our student garden, The Forge. University student farms and gardens provide opportunities for students to learn how to grow, manage, and market food. At Santa Clara University, our half-acre (0.2 hectare) garden plays that role. However, because of our institution's commitment to social justice and a strong network of community partners, our campus garden …


Darfur: Rainfall And Conflict, Michael Kevane, Leslie C. Gray May 2008

Darfur: Rainfall And Conflict, Michael Kevane, Leslie C. Gray

Economics

Data on rainfall patterns only weakly corroborate the claim that climate change explains the Darfur conflict that began in 2003 and has claimed more than 200,000 lives and displaced more than two million persons. Rainfall in Darfur did not decline significantly in the years prior to the eruption of major conflict in 2003; rainfall exhibited a flat trend in the thirty-years preceding the conflict (1972-2002). The rainfall evidence suggests instead a break around 1971. Rainfall is basically stationary over the pre- and post-1971 sub-periods. The break is larger for the more northerly rainfall stations, and is less noticeable for En …


Cotton Production In Burkina Faso: International Rhetoric Versus Local Realities, Leslie C. Gray Apr 2008

Cotton Production In Burkina Faso: International Rhetoric Versus Local Realities, Leslie C. Gray

Environmental Studies and Sciences

Voices ranging from the editorial page of the New York Times to organizations such as Oxfam and the presidents of Burkina Faso and Mali have argued that U.S. cotton subsidies depress world cotton prices and hurt African farmers. These policies deny West African countries their comparative advantage in cotton, which they can produce more cheaply and with lower environmental impacts than farmers in the United States. Some have gone as far as phrasing this as a national security issue; editorials in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal have suggested that removing subsidies would have a strong auxiliary …


Introduction: Cotton, Globalization, And Poverty In Africa, William G. Moseley, Leslie C. Gray Apr 2008

Introduction: Cotton, Globalization, And Poverty In Africa, William G. Moseley, Leslie C. Gray

Environmental Studies and Sciences

This volume employs a modified commodity chain approach, focusing on the social, economic, and environmental dimensions of cotton production in Africa, and the links between this production and the global market. Individual chapters may examine one or multiple levels in the commodity chain and employ different theoretical approaches, from ethnography, to agroecology, to political ecology, to classic economic analysis. We want to acknowledge, however, that while the commodity chain is an important part of cotton dynamics, it is not the only force at work in African cotton. There are new and interesting developments outside the commodity chain that work for …


Conclusion: Hanging By A Thread: The Future Of Cotton In Africa, Leslie C. Gray, William G. Moseley Apr 2008

Conclusion: Hanging By A Thread: The Future Of Cotton In Africa, Leslie C. Gray, William G. Moseley

Environmental Studies and Sciences

Several broad themes emerge from the chapters in this volume. While declining world prices are a serious issue, the ability of farmers to weather declines in prices is often determined by national and local issues. These include government policy, institutions that provide marketing and supply services, access to resources such as land, labor, and agricultural inputs, and individual decision making. Despite declining world prices, some cotton growing economies have had success with cotton production while others have not fared well. In particular, the failure of cotton institutions in many countries is striking.Whether it comes to managing input distribution, new technologies, …


Land Tenure And Rental In Western Sudan, Michael Kevane, Leslie C. Gray Jan 2008

Land Tenure And Rental In Western Sudan, Michael Kevane, Leslie C. Gray

Economics

This paper reports on aspects of land tenure in western Sudan, especially the nature of tenure insecurity and the functioning of the land rental market. The active land rental market accounted for about one-third of cultivated land. Patterns of land rental transactions, and tests of the importance of insecurity in renting land, where the owner may not be able to reclaim land rented out, do not support the presumption that rental markets perform poorly. The role of the sheikh as administrator of village land, and the claims of large landowners to vast tracts, are, however, important political problems that must …


Diminished Access, Diverted Exclusion: Women And Land Tenure In Sub-Saharan Africa, Michael Kevane, Leslie C. Gray Jan 2008

Diminished Access, Diverted Exclusion: Women And Land Tenure In Sub-Saharan Africa, Michael Kevane, Leslie C. Gray

Economics

Increasing commercialization, population growth and concurrent increases in land value have affected women's land rights in Africa. Most of the literature concentrates on how these changes have led to an erosion of women's rights. This paper examines some of the processes by which women's rights to land are diminishing. First, we examine cases where rights previously utilized have become less important; that is, the incidence of exercising rights has decreased. Second, we investigate how women's rights to land decrease as the public meanings underlying the social interpretation and enforcement of rights are manipulated. Third, we examine women's diminishing access to …


Evolving Tenure Rights And Agricultural Intensification In Southwestern Burkina Faso, Michael Kevane, Leslie C. Gray Jan 2001

Evolving Tenure Rights And Agricultural Intensification In Southwestern Burkina Faso, Michael Kevane, Leslie C. Gray

Economics

Popular and official representations of the environment in Burkina Faso present soils as fragile and potentially subject to catastrophic collapse in fertility. In the cotton growing zone of southwestern Burkina Faso, researchers and policy makers attribute changes in land cover and land quality to population growth. This paper presents evidence questioning the dominant "population-degradation narrative" as applied to Burkina. We find that farmers are intensifying their production systems. While population has led to land scarcity, farmers are responding to both the resulting uncertainty in land rights and reductions in soil quality by intensifying the production process. Investments are used both …


A Woman's Field Is Made At Night: Gendered Land Rights And Norms In Burkina Faso, Michael Kevane, Leslie C. Gray Jan 1999

A Woman's Field Is Made At Night: Gendered Land Rights And Norms In Burkina Faso, Michael Kevane, Leslie C. Gray

Economics

Gendered social norms and institutions are important determinants of agricultural activities in southwestern Burkina Faso. This paper argues that gendered land tenure, in particular, has effects on equity and efficiency. The usual view of women as holders of secondary, or indirect, rights to land must be supplemented by a more nuanced understanding of tenure. Women's rights are in fact considerably more complex than the simple right to fields from their husbands. First, women's rights to property obtained from men may be coupled with other rights and obligations. In many ethnic groups, women have share rights to the harvest of their …


Local Politics In The Time Of Turabi's Revolution: Gender, Class And Ethnicity In Western Sudan, Michael Kevane, Leslie C. Gray Apr 1995

Local Politics In The Time Of Turabi's Revolution: Gender, Class And Ethnicity In Western Sudan, Michael Kevane, Leslie C. Gray

Economics

In one small village in western Sudan local political struggles over power and resources are enmeshed in discursive struggles over representations of gender, ethnicity, class and community. Analysis of two specific conflicts illustrates this point. In one conflict over control of a village grain co-operative some villagers sought to exclude women, West African immigrants and the poor from participating in political decision-making. In a second conflict over a roadside market these same villagers, empowered by the divisive rhetoric and policies of the National Islamic Front regime, again mobilised dominant representations of class, gender and ethnicity in an attempt to prevent …


For Whom Is The Rural Economy Resilient? Initial Effects Of Drought In Western Sudan, Leslie C. Gray, Michael Kevane Jan 1993

For Whom Is The Rural Economy Resilient? Initial Effects Of Drought In Western Sudan, Leslie C. Gray, Michael Kevane

Economics

This discussion piece addresses two recent debates: entitlement theory and the resilience of rural systems. The authors find that in western Sudan entitlement theory provides a specific and useful framework for understanding the nature of the crisis confronting the society. Arguments about the resilience of rural systems, however, need to be more closely examined and will depend on site-specific factors. The rural economy and society of western Sudan were not found to be resilient.