This article reviews proposals regarding the recent food crisis in the context of a broader, threshold debate on the future of agriculture and food security. While the MDGs have focused on eradicating extreme poverty and hunger, the food crisis pushed the hungry over the one billion mark. There is thus a renewed focus on agricultural development, which pivots on the salience of industrial agric...

This study aims to investigate the concentration levels, pollution characteristics and the associated potential ecological risks of the heavy metals found in dust in the metropolitan area of Beijing, China during the winter. Dust samples were collected at 49 different spatial locations of Beijing's metropolitan area from November 2013 to January 2014, in which the concentration levels of Cd, Cr...

Development of the general ecological model (EM) of the CSSR has been included in the state program for environmental policy the Ecoprogramme of the CSSR at a scale of 1 : 1 000 000 for the entire Czechoslovak territory and at a scale of 1500 000 for the Czech Socialist Republic (CSR) and the Slovak Socialist Republic (SSR). The objective of the first EM stage was to make a survey of spatial di...

The long-term sustainability of modern agriculture is examined in an ecological context. As an aid to defining agriculture, animal agriculture, and sustainable agriculture, a broad overview of the structural and functional aspects of ecosystems is presented. The longterm sustainability of two corn production systems and four beef cattle production systems is then examined relative to energy out...

Water resources are important natural resources for national economic and social development. They are the basic material conditions for human survival and development. This Paper studies rainwater resources from the perspective of urban planning and urban resources development and utilization. It can not only supplement urban water resources to a great extent, but also has multifaceted profoun...

Row-crop agriculture is one of the most extensive and closely coupled natural– human systems and has extraordinary implications for human welfare and environmental well-being. The continued intensification of row-crop agriculture provides food for billions and, for at least the past 50 years, has slowed (but not stopped) the expansion of cropping onto lands valued for conservation and other env...

Thermal infrared remote sensing has become one of the main technology methods used for urban heat island research. When applying urban land surface temperature inversion of the thermal infrared band, problems with intensity level division arise because the method is subjective. However, this method is one of the few that performs heat island intensity level identification. This paper will build...

Chinese ecological agriculture (CEA) is a relatively recent agricultural and rural development approach, which has emerged in light of continuous efforts in exploring sustainable agriculture and rural development in modern China. Based on the discussion of the ecological agricultural concepts and practices in ancient China, as well as the agro-ecological problems that have emerged in modern Chi...