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Archive December 1998

Intensive animal production - see Viewpoint and Spotlight
With this, our fourth issue of Agriculture 21 Magazine, we highlight the increasing intensification of the world's livestock production. In our first Viewpoint column, Brian Hursey and Jan Slingenbergh, of FAO's Animal Health Service, see "concentrated, landless production systems" as not only a threat to the environment, but a key factor in the marginalization of subsistence-level livestock keepers in developing countries (see Viewpoint: Livestock and human needs). Their views are supported by a report on animal production trends in Asia and the Pacific, featured this month in Spotlight. There, the increasing "urbanization" of production - influenced by urban demand, market access and support infrastructure - mirrors a decline in the traditional rural sector, which is constrained by low technology uptake, poor market facilities and infrastructure, and small economies of scale. Yet the modern, capital-intensive sector "generates little employment, poses great environmental risks, and creates a number of new challenges to human and veterinary public health" - see Spotlight: Livestock issues in Asia


Rinderpest campaign intensifies

FAO's Global Rinderpest Eradication Programme (GREP) is preparing an intensive campaign to eliminate remaining pockets of rinderpest ("cattle plague") in East Africa, and in West and South Asia, within the next five years. The campaign, which follows mass immunization of livestock over the past decade, is the latest step toward GREP's objective of eradicating the deadly livestock disease by the year 2010. Monitoring, combined with molecular characterization of virus strains, indicates that the disease is now limited to a small number of foci in Somalia, Sudan, Pakistan and Yemen. Endemic foci are also suspected - but not confirmed - in Saudi Arabia and Turkey. In addition, some 10 neighbouring countries are considered at immediate risk. "In all other areas, GREP is calling for vaccination to cease as a means of verifying that rinderpest has been eliminated," says Mark Rweyemamu, of AG's Emergency Prevention System (EMPRES) against transboundary animal diseases. "Therefore, persistence of these residual foci pose a grave risk to the world cattle and buffalo population." Intensive vaccination will be used to eliminate infection from affected herds and protect particularly vulnerable populations at high risk of disease spread.


Spotlight   Gabion structures bend, but don't break

AG's Water Resources, Development and Management Service (AGLW) is promoting the use of "gabions" - modular steel wire-mesh cages filled with stones - for building low-cost, long-lasting hydraulic structures in developing countries. Subjected to alternating tension and compression, the intrinsic flexibility of a gabion cage enables it to bend rather than break, thereby preventing loss of structural efficiency. Being a deformable structure, it adapts to small earth movements and, in the process, will remains structurally sound. AGLW has long experience with gabions in many developing countries, including Botswana, Ethiopia, Niger, China, Viet Nam and Haiti, where water development and irrigation projects have all made use of imported or locally-made gabion baskets. AGLW is preparing a set of practical guidelines for field engineers on the design and building of hydraulic structures using gabions. For more details, see Spotlight: Gabions in water development.


Toward regulations on herbicide resistant crops

The benefits and risks of herbicide-resistant crops (HRCs) were discussed at a technical consultation organized by FAO's Plant Production and Protection Division (AGP) in Rome in November. Attended by scientists from Europe and the USA, the meeting aimed at producing recommendations on regulations to govern the introduction of HRCs in developing countries. FAO has taken a pro-active role in debate over the crops, which include introduced genes that render them tolerant to higher rates of specific herbicides. AGP observes that while HRCs fit well in agricultural systems based on extensive use of monoculture, mechanization and agrochemicals, their use also raises a series of socio-economic and environmental issues: the risk indiscriminate use of herbicides on other crops, farmer dependence on specific seed-herbicide packages, development of resistance in weed species, and disincentives to integrated, biological weed management. FAO's recommendations on HRCs are being finalized this month.


Web database on agricultural engineering

Our Agricultural engineering branch (AGSE) has published on the World Wide Web an interactive International Directory of Agricultural Engineering Institutions. It contains information on more than 640 institutions involved in agricultural engineering worldwide, with search options including geographic region or country, keyword (from "animal husbandry" to "water engineering"), by name or by specific text strings. Where available, hyperlinks are provided to institutions' Web home pages or to their e-mail post boxes. The database, which is available now in English, French and Spanish, was developed jointly by AGSE and International Commission of Agricultural Engineering (CIGR). Institutions working in the area of agricultural engineering that have not been included in the database should contact agse-mail@fao.org.


Spotlight   Benefits of fermentation

Fermentation is one of the world's oldest food preservation techniques and is still commonly used in rural areas of many developing countries. There is rising concern, however, that many types of fermented food will be displaced as economies develop, and that the knowledge base of their production will be lost. Further, a better understanding of fermentation technologies is needed in order to improve the safety, yields, quality and marketability of fermented food products. To answer these concerns, FAO's Agro-Industries and Post-Harvest Management Service (AGSI) is publishing a study on fermented fruits and vegetables, and plans others on fermented cereals, grain legumes, seeds and nuts. AGSI will also sponsor with the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT) a symposium on small-scale food fermentation in developing countries as part of the IFT's 1999 annual meeting. More details in Spotlight: Small-scale fermentation


Nuclear techniques measure root nitrogen

Until now, estimating a plant's root biomass and nutrient content has been a tedious task: you dig up the roots and separate them from the soil with a sieve. A nuclear-based technique promises make the job much easier - and give more accurate results. Using foliar labelling with 15N (a radioactive nitrogen isotope) plus improved soil sampling procedures, scientists have found that below-ground plant-derived nitrogen has been previously underestimated by as much as 50%. Foliar labelling was one several advances in nuclear techniques for soil, water and nutrient management discussed at an FAO/IAEA workshop in Montpellier, France recently. Others included the use of natural variations in the distribution of the stable isotope 13C for studying the dynamics of carbon in the soil-plant system, and the use of the fallout radionuclide Cesium 137 to determine rates and patterns of soil redistribution at watershed level. An international research network, co-ordinated by the Joint FAO/IAEA Division, is refining and standardizing 137Cs methodologies (get details).


New director for Land and Water Development Division

Hans W. Wolter, of Germany, has been appointed Director of the FAO Land and Water Development Division (AGL). Mr Wolter, who joined FAO in 1994 as Chief of AGL's Water Resources, Development and Management Service, holds a degree in civil engineering from the Technical University of Hannover, where he also obtained his Ph.D. with a thesis on analytical optimization models in water resource planning. Mr Wolter has been a lecturer at the German Development Institute, a technical adviser at the German Bank for Reconstruction, and senior adviser on irrigation and rural development with the Jordan Valley Authority in Jordan. In 1984, he was appointed head of the Irrigated Agriculture Section of the German Agency for Technical Cooperation (GTZ). In 1991, he joined the World Bank in Washington as Task Manager of the International Program on Technology Research in Irrigation and Drainage (IPTRID). Mr Wolter is a member of the Steering Committee of the Global Water Partnership and of the International Commission on Irrigation and Drainage's Committee on Policies and Strategies.


Livestock disease threats in Africa, Asia

Our Emergency Prevention System (EMPRES) against transboundary animal diseases reports worrying outbreaks of Foot-and-Mouth disease (FMD) in the Transcaucasus and Rift Valley Fever in West Africa. Animal health authorities in the Russian Republic investigating an outbreak of FMD in Armenia in July have identified an FMD virus strain very similar to A/Iran 96, a new type responsible for 13 outbreaks in Turkey this year. FAO and the European Commission for the Control of Foot-and-Mouth Disease are preparing with Russia, the Office international des épizooties (OIE) and the European Commission a concerted programme to prevent the spread of the disease in the region. Meanwhile, the Institut Pasteur in Dakar, Senegal, has confirmed human cases of Rift Valley Fever - a viral disease that affects both people and animals - in Mauritania. The last confirmed outbreak in Mauritania caused the deaths of some 200 people. FAO fears livestock movements could extend the disease to Senegal and Mali, where cattle appear "highly receptive" to the virus.


New guidelines on pesticides

AG has released two new publications on pesticide management and application. Its Plant Production and Protection Division (AGP) has sent for printing the fifth edition of the Manual on the development and use of FAO specifications for plant protection products. The new edition includes a new procedure, adopted in October by FAO's Group of Experts on Pesticide Specifications, that expands significantly requirements for the development of the specifications and sets new globally applicable trade standards for those pesticides that have undergone the specification procedure's evaluation process. Meanwhile, the Agricultural Support Systems Division (AGS) has published the English version of FAO standards for agricultural pesticide sprayers, a two-volume set of guidelines covering equipment quality control and use, and sprayer specifications and test procedures. The guidelines are available on-line here.

We wish all our readers a happy and prosperous 1999!

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