Thar region of Rajasthan, with its varied characteristics in culture, economies, the environment, governance and religion, is home to semi-urban and urban agriculture that seems to have originated in the Fertile Crescent of the homeland of the first farmers. Arid lands and deserts make up a large part of Rajasthan. Two-thirds of the state is desert or dry-lands. Half the state’s population is f...

New vegetation in barren areas offers possibilities for sequestering carbon in the soil. Arid and semi-arid areas (ASAs) are candidates for new vegetation. The possibility of agriculture in ASAs is reviewed, revealing the potential for cultivation by covering the surface with a layer of organic fibres. This layer collects more water from humidity in the air than does the uncovered mineral surfa...

Water storage depletion is a worsening hydrological problem that limits agricultural production in especially arid/semi-arid regions across the globe. Quantifying water storage dynamics is critical for developing water resources management strategies that are sustainable and protective of the environment. This study uses GRACE (Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment), GLDAS (Global Land Data A...

1.1 Prevalence of abiotic stresses in SAT agriculture The semi-arid tropics (SAT) include parts of 48 countries in the developing world: in most of India, locations in south east Asia, a swathe across sub-Saharan Africa, much of southern and eastern Africa, and a few locations in Latin America (Fig 1). Semi-arid tropical regions are characterized by unpredictable weather, long dry seasons, inco...

Optimizing water management in agriculture is of crucial importance, especially arid and semi-arid regions where the existing shortage exacerbated by human activities climate change [...]

Biogeochemical factors contributing to enhanced carbon storage following afforestation of a semi-arid shrubland J. M. Grünzweig, I. Gelfand, and D. Yakir Robert H. Smith Institute of Plant Sciences and Genetics in Agriculture, Faculty of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Quality Sciences, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Rehovot 76100, Israel Department of Environmental Sciences and Energ...

Small−holder farming in semi−arid areas is being forced to change to compensate for the needs of more people living under conditions of increasingly variable rainfall. As more land is used for agriculture, rangeland areas are reduced, so limiting the availability of animal fodder. The length of fallow periods where soil fertility may be restored is also reduced. This has forced herders and farm...

G. Dahal*†, R. Ortiz, A. Tenkouano, J. d’A. Hughes, G. Thottappilly, D. Vuylsteke and B. E. L. Lockhart International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), Oyo Road, PMB 5320, Ibadan, Nigeria (International mailing address c/o L. W. Lambourn & Co., Carolyn House, 26 Dingwall Road, Croydon CR9 3EE, UK); Department of Plant Pathology, University of Minnesota, St Paul, MN 55108, USA; and Inter...