Rollover protective structures (ROPS) are an effective engineering control known to prevent tractor overturn deaths, the leading cause of occupational fatalities for farmers and farm workers in the U.S. However, the use of ROPS is known to vary greatly from farm to farm. A national sample of 11,458 farm operators from the 2004 Occupational Injury Surveillance of Production Agriculture (OISPA) s...

Soil microorganisms are important for climate regulation as well as for plant nutrition. In agricultural soils the microorganisms are affected by management choices, like which type of tillage that is used. Moldboard plowing, the most common tillage practice, increases mineralization which leads to soil organic carbon (SOC) loss, and may thus reduce soil quality. Conservation tillage practices ...

To determine the effects of straw incorporation on soil nutrients, enzyme activity, and aggregates in tobacco fields, we conducted experiments with different amounts of wheat and maize straw in Zhucheng area of southeast Shandong province for three years (2010–2012). In the final year of experiment (2012), straw incorporation increased soil organic carbon (SOC) and related parameters, and impro...

Four types of soil (red, yellow, cinnamon, and paddy soil) from China were used to conduct experiments in pots to study the influence of humic acid (humic acid (HA) and fulvic acid (FA)) on the accumulation of lead (Pb) and cadmium (Cd) in tobacco leaves. In non-polluted soils, the tobacco leaf uptake of Cd was dramatically influenced by the total soil metal concentration and soil properties, w...

This paper examines the impacts of off-farm employment on irrigation water efficiency (IWE) with a set of household level data collected in Hebei Province in North China. A major finding is that households with higher shares of laborers working off-farm locally seem to achieve higher IWEs. The effect of local off-farm employment is greater among those households that have made more efforts to u...

A stochastic distance function frontier was estimated using data from a national survey of organic farmers to evaluate the effect of farm-specific attributes on efficiency. Farm-specific and regional variables that shift efficiency were incorporated into the multioutput distance function, including organic farming experience, use of soil-improving inputs, and farmer involvement in research. Par...

Soil loss is not limited to change from forest or woodland to other land uses/covers. It may occur when there is agricultural land-use/cover modification or conversion. Soil loss may influence loss of carbon from the soil, hence implication on greenhouse gas emission. Changing land use could be considered actually or potentially successful in adapting to climate change, or may be considered mal...

Soil erosion and declining productivity resulting in low farm income have been the major constraints to the sustainability of the commercial vegetable production systems in cultivated uplands of the Philippines. Steep slopes, favorable climate, high fertilizer and pesticide application rates characterizes these production systems. Sustainability of upland vegetable production system and soil co...