Crop yield is the result of complex interaction among factors of soil, atmosphere, plant genotype, and management practices adopted. These complex interactions of crop with various factors and of factors among themselves make the crop yield modeling a difficult task. Several methods of crop yield forecasting have been developed ranging from purely statistical to agro-meteorological to empirical...

accurate estimation of crop evapotranspiration (etc) plays an important role in improving the water useefficiency (wue) and water management. due to the presence of different types of coatings plant in large areas, the accurate calculation of the water requirements by conventional methods is elusive or impossible. remote sensing methods are becoming attractive to estimate crop evapotranspiratio...

In South Africa during the past four decades considerable research has taken place on the nutrient requirements of sugarcane. Consequently marked changes have occurred in patterns of fertilizer use. The value of N, P and K fertil~zers for cane production is reviewed using field experimental data. Correlations established between soil and leaf analysis and crop responses to various nutrients are...

Rainfed farming is a dominant agricultural system in Tigray, Ethiopia. However, rainfall characterized by short duration, intense and erratic subjected to late-onset early cessation, suggesting pressing need for Supplemental Irrigation (SI) fill the crop water demand. Understanding effects of SI during late-onset, or both, along with their underlying causes, critical knowledge gap globally. Alt...

Rainfed agriculture occupies 68% of India’s cultivated area and supports 40% of the human and 60% of the livestock population. It produces 445 of the food requirement, thus has and will continue to play a critical role in India’s food security. However, aberrant behaviour of monsoon rainfall, eroded and degraded soils with multiple nutrient and water deficiencies, declining ground water table a...

Assessment of management-induced changes in soil quality is important to sustaining high crop yield. A large diversity of cultivated soils necessitate identification development of an appropriate soil quality index (SQI) based on relative soil properties and crop yield. Whereas numerous attempts have been made to estimate SQI for major soils across the World, there is no standard method establi...

Standard nutritional advice for irrigated sugarcane in South Africa and Swaziland is based on soil sample analysis and threshold values that have been determined experimentally over many years with surface-applied fertilisers. Fertilisers are normally applied in solid form during the early stages of crop development and watered in by the next irrigation cycle. The increasing popularity of subsu...

Crop straw gasification technologies are the most promising biomass gasification technologies and have great potential to be further developed in China. However, the commercialization development of gasification technology in China is slow. In this paper, the technical reliability and practicability of crop straw gasification technologies, the economic feasibility of gas supply stations, the ec...

This paper describes the specification of requirements and the functionality, of a novel agricultural mechanisation system based on small smart machines. It separates the current mechanisation methods from the original plant requirements and in doing so allows a new specification to develop based on agronomic, economic and environmental needs that can lead to a more sustainable production syste...