eChapters

The productivity of agricultural ecosystems depends on the interactions and interdependence of numerous species, such as other plant species, micro-organisms, pollinators, predators of agricultural pests and livestock. Agricultural ecosystems serve as an important habitat for many plant and animal species. Wild species are sometimes used to provide valuable genetic resources, for instance for certain plant breeding. When preserved, these can help to meet future food and livestock production challenges, including adaptation to climate change. Conservation agriculture provides an ample opportunity for the maintenance of agricultural biodiversity. This paper discusses the agricultural development phases, their consequence on the environment and cropping system diversification opportunities in conservation agriculture.

2.1    Definition of Droughts
    
2.2    Types of Droughts
    2.2.1    Meteorological Droughts
    2.2.2    Agricultural Droughts
    2.2.3    Hydrological Droughts
    2.2.4    Socio-economic Droughts
    
2.3    Criteria for Classification of Droughts
    Meteorological Droughts
    Agricultural Droughts
    Hydrological Droughts
    
2.4    Data requirements in Drought Analysis
    
2.5    Drought Indices
    2.5.1    Rainfall-based Indices
    2.5.2    Climate Derivate Based Indices
    2.5.3    Remote Sensing Based Indices
    2.5.4    Processes Based Indicators
    
2.6    Assessment of Drought Prone Regions in India
    
2.7    Indicators for Declaration of  Droughts in India
    2.7.1     Rainfall Deficiency
    2.7.2    Area Under Sowing
    2.7.3    Normalized Difference Vegetation Index
    
2.8    Drought Management Procedures in India
    
2.9    Drought Code adopted by Local Governments
    
2.10    Spatial Variability of Droughts and their Frequency of Occurrence in India
    
2.11    Drought Vulnerability Assessment
    
2.12    Vulnerability of Society to Drought
        
References

Good Practices for Drought Management
    7.1    Drought Planning and Preparedness
    7.1.1    Drought Planning in India
    7.2    Global Experiences in Drought Planning
    7.2.1    USA
    7.2.2    South Africa
    7.2.3    African Nations
    7.2.4    Namibia
    7.2.5    Ethiopia
    7.2.6    Botswana
Drought management plans in Europe
    7.2.7    Spain
    7.2.8    England and Wales
    7.2.9    Portugal
    7.2.10    Australia
    7.2.11    China
    7.2.12    Palestine
    7.2.13    Global Initiatives
    7.3    Drought Preparedness Action Plans in India
    7.3.1    Drought Preparedness Checklist
    7.4    Drought Preparedness Action Plans in Different Countries
    7.4.1    Arizona State in USA
    7.4.2    Texas State in USA
    7.4.3    Italy
    7.4.4    Mediterranean Region
    7.4.5    Pakistan
    7.4.6    Darfur in Sudan
    7.4.7    Bangladesh
    7.5    Indigenous Knowledge for Drought Management
    7.5.1    Astro Meteorological Methods
    7.5.2    Traditional Knowledge in Weather Prediction
     7.5.3    Traditional wisdom in Drought Risk Region (DRR)
        Rajasthan and Bundelkhand region in Uttar Pradesh
    7.5.4    Indigenous technologies for moisture conservation 
        in dry lands of semi-arid regions of India
    7.6    Traditional Wisdom for Drought Management in a few selected countries
    7.7    Role of Weather-based Agro-advisories
    7.7.1    Strategies for dissemination of advisories
    7.7.2    Role of ICAR and AICRPAM on Agromet Services
    7.7.3    Agromet Advisory services through mobile phone
    7.7.4    Status of Agromet Advisory Services in other Countries
    7.8    Value Addition to Agromet Information
    7.8.1    AICRP on Agrometeorology
    7.8.2    Thumb rules for weather-pest/diseases
    7.9    Contingency Crop Planning for Minimizing Risks
    7.9.1    Contingency Crop Planning for Rainfed Regions of India
    7.10    Drought Proofing Mechanisms
    7.10.1    Watershed Development for Drought Management
    7.10.2    Watershed Development in India
    7.10.3    The Success Stories of Watershed as a Drought Proofing Mechanism
    7.10.4    Watershed Policies and Recommendations
    7.10.5    Farm Ponds for Drought Management
    7.10.6    Success Stories of Farm Ponds
    7.11    Rainfed Technologies for the Drought Management in different agro climatic region
    7.12    Farmer’s Awareness on Climate Management
    7.12.1    India
    7.12.2    In other Countries
    7.13    Role of ICT in Climate Risk Management through AAS
    7.13.1    India
    7.13.2    Application of ICT in Providing Advisories in other Countries
    7.14    Integrated Drought Management Strategies through Farming Systems Approach
    7.14.1    Drought Adaptation Strategies in Rajasthan and in Maharashtra
    7.14.2    Improvement and Rural Livelihood
    7.15    Drought Mitigation Measures
    7.15.1    Drought Mitigation Plans
    7.15.2    Soil water Conservation and Recharging of Ground water Methods
    7.15.3    Traditional Water Harvesting and Conservation 
        Techniques
        References

4.1    Approaches for Drought Monitoring
    
4.2    Weather Network System in Different Countries
    
4.3    Drought Monitoring using Climatological, Hydrological and Combination Approaches in Different Countries
    
4.4    International Cooperation in Drought Monitoring
    
4.5    Drought Monitoring Mechanism in India
    
4.6    Early Warning and Decision Support System
    4.6.1    Software for Drought Detection, Monitoring and Early Warning
    4.6.2    Decision Support System for Droughts Developed Outside India
    
4.7    GIS and Drought Monitoring
        
References

2.1    Ecosystem
    2.1.1 Major Components of Ecosystems
    2.1.2 Energy and Matter Flow in Ecosystems
    2.1.3 Various Types of Ecosystems
    
2.2    Biodiversity
    2.2.1 Genetic Diversity
    2.2.2 Species Diversity
    2.2.3 Ecosystem Biodiversity
    2.2.4 Values of Biodiversity
    2.2.5 Threats of Biodiversity
    2.2.6 Endangered and Endemica Species of India
    2.2.7 Biodiversity Conservation

Introduction

In India out of the total 142 million ha of arable land around 67 per cent of them are affected by some form of land degradation due to development of salinity/sodicity or acidification, erosion by water or wind or chemical contamination. Frequent use of tillage operation under conventional cultivation system particularly in rolling terrain is one of the major causes of land degradation through accelerated water and wind erosion. The basic purpose of primary tillage operations are to control weeds, increase the availability of nutrient to plant through accelerated mineralization of organic matter, and to keep the field clean and pulverized for ease of sowing of the next crop. However the bare and pulverized top soil made them vulnerable to accelerated soil loss through runoff and also to erosion loss of soil by wind in drier agro-climatic regions. Besides soil loss, conventional tillage operation breaks the soil aggregates and exposes the soil organic carbon locked inside the aggregates to accelerated microbial degradation and thus results in net loss of organic carbon from the arable ecosystem.

Soil and nutrients are important factors for sustainable crop production in agriculture. Water erosion contributes more than 60% to the area under soil degradation in India. Soil erosion has been a serious threat to sustainable agriculture. However, soil and water conservation measures plays important role in improving the productivity of natural resources. India presently supports 17% of the global population with a geographical area of 329 Mha on merely 2.5% world’s land area and 4% fresh water resources. The net cultivable area in the country is about 140Mha is remaining constant or even squeezing from the pressures of urbanization, industrialization, infrastructure development and to house the ever increasing population. The loss of productive soil is another concern. The loss of fertile top soil by water erosion is estimated to be about 5334 Mt per year with it nearly 8.4 million tonnes (mt) of nutrients was estimated in eroded soil still holds true about in i.e. 2.5 mt nitrogen, 3.3 mt phosphorus and 2.6 mt potassium per hectare is lost due to ill soil and water management practices (Dhruvanarayana and Ram Babu, 1983).

2.1. The Physical environment
    Light
    Soil temperature
    Water dynamics

2.2. Chemical environment
    Production of phytotoxins

2.3. Biological environment
    Trophic dynamics
    Community structure
    Biodiversity

We are living in a world that is in a grim state of environmental disruptions. Callous developmental activities resulting in pollution of all environmental components and gradually culminating in global warming, climate change, and species extinction are responsible for triggering the processes of environmental disruption. Pollution of air, water, and soil is rapidly assuming alarming proportions.

The very processes of socioeconomic development are now posing threat to economic progress as well as to human health. Ominous changes in global climate are posing threat to life on Earth. The irony is that the major cause of environmental disruptions is anthropogenic rather than natural. Human’s materialistic progress and environmental pollution in our contemporary world go hand in hand.

3.1    Air Pollution
    3.1.1 Classification of Air Pollutants
    3.1.2  Properties of Air Pollutants
    3.1.3  Health Effects
    3.1.4 Particulate Pollution Control Equipments
    3.1.5 Gaseous Pollution Control Equipments
    
3.2    Water Pollution
    3.2.1 Causes of Pollution
    3.2.2 Origin of Wastewater
    3.2.3 Waste Water Composition
    3.2.4 Types of Water Pollutants
    3.2.5 Basic Processes of Water Treatment
    
3.3    Land
    
3.4    Marine Pollution
    3.4.1 Sources and Effects of Marine Pollution Toxics
    3.4.2 Control Measures
    
3.5    Noise
    3.5.1 Effects of Noise
    3.5.2 Major Noise Sources
    3.5.3 Noise Control Measures
    
3.6    Thermal Pollution
    3.6.1 Effects of Thermal Pollution
    
3.7     Nuclear Hazards
    3.7.1 Nuclear Weapons
    3.7.2 Types of Nuclear Bursts
    3.7.3 Nuclear Injuries
    3.7.4 Residual Radiation
    
3.8    Nuclear Waste and their Treatment
    
3.9    Solid Waste Management
    3.9.1 Role of Human in Prevention of Pollution
    
3.10    Disaster Management
    3.10.1 Floods
    3.10.2 Earthquake
    3.10.3 Cyclone
    3.10.4 Landslides

Conservation agriculture (CA) has benefits to farmers in overcoming labor shortages associated with other tillage practices. With the introduction mechanized CA practices, farmers are able to finalize planting earlier, and can even free the equipment for service hire to neighbors. These CA equipment can reduce the delays in planting and also benefit neighbors who can hire this equipment and be able to plant within the first planting window, commonly associated with better yield gains. Smallholder farmers can also form groups to mobilize resources for equipment purchase to overcome the equipment cost problem. Local production of CA equipment for the smallholder agricultural sector has been almost non-existent prior to 2005.

The annual milk production in Tamil Nadu during 2009-10 from crossbred cows, non-descript cows and buffaloes were 42.28,7.89 and 7.61 lakh tones, respectively. Tamil Nadu had 59.83 lakhs crossbred female cows in the year 2007 as against 41.47 lakhs in 2003 with an annual growth rate of 9.59 per cent (Anon, 2010). With the increasing crossbred cattle population and average annual production, better management of the high producers becomes a necessity. Production and health of animals depend mostly on environment in which they live. A satisfactory environment for any farm livestock is the one that ensures not only optimal productivity but also meets the health and behavioral needs of the animals. A satisfactory environment is the one that satisfies the following four criteria: thermal comfort, physical comfort, disease control and behavioral satisfaction. The most important environmental interventions done in recent days are those that have been done in housing and other attempts to ameliorate the thermal environment. The effort of the body to maintain a stable internal environment to challenges from widely variable environments was first described by Claude Bernard (1878) and later referred to as homeostasis (Cannon, 1932). An environment in which stressors are minimized would likely be favorable for efficient production of products derived from domestic farm animals and for helping ensure the well-being of those species.

Soil microorganisms are believed to play a major regulatory role in organic carbon dynamics, as key architects in nutrient transformation, and physical engineering of soil structure. The microbial populations of the soil alone encompass an enormous diversity of bacteria, algae, fungi, protozoa, and actinomycetes. Microbial diversity is being regulated by substrate and water availability, temperature, climatic regime and soil structure, which is considered as a transformation agent for soil organic matter and a labile pool of organic and inorganic nutrients. Extensive cultivation with repeated tillage operation often disrupts soil aggregates stability and destroys aggregates carbon and therefore, soil lose their physical properties and nutrient supplying capacity in a long-run.

The demand for agricultural and livestock products is rising and the challenge to feed 8 billion people in 2020 is considerably enormous. Further, it is also hard to imagine meeting 2050-projected demand by raising twice as many poultry, 78% more small ruminants, 58% more cattle and 37% more pigs, without further damaging natural resources (Rivera and Lopez, 2012). Hence, sustainable development based on balance of ecology, economics, norms and values are to be considered at various levels of the scale: between food and farming systems, regions, nations and continents (Zipp, 2003). The food systems encompass activities related to the production, processing, distribution, preparation and consumption of food; and the outcomes of these activities contributing to food security (Fig. 14.1).The interactions between and within bio-geo-physical and human environments influence both the activities and the outcomes.

“Terra”per se is an extraordinarily complex, messy geophysical system with dozens of variables, most of which change in response to one another. The basic proposition behind the science of climate change is also rooted in the floral and faunal cohabiting with the Homo sapiens. Livestock and related fodder cultivation and the green waste generated in a farming enterprise are of extreme significance when we ponder over the climate change. Confusion and complacency reigns the thinking process and planning process related to climate change. Confusion in the sense, that risk communication in this regard is so placid. Complacency, we say due to the lackadaisical attitude of our policy makers. To make it very plain, fodder production sector as well as farm sector will suffer the most in Kerala for want of scientific thinking, planning and execution.

Introduction

Greenhouse gases (GHGs) are the atmospheric trace gases which absorb and emit infra-red radiation and thereby trapping the heat radiated from the earth surface. The commonly known agriculturally important GHGs are carbon dioxide (CO₂), methane (CH₄) and nitrous oxide (N₂O). The major anthropogenic sources of CO₂ emission in atmosphere are biosphere, burning of fossil fuels and land use changes in tropical forests. The atmospheric concentration of CO₂ has increased from 280 parts per million by volume (ppmv) in 1750 to 394 ppmv in 2012 and is currently increasing at the rate of 1.9 ppmv year-1 (NOAA, 2012). Atmospheric CH₄ concentration has increased from about 715 to 1826 parts per billion by volume (ppbv) in 2012 over the same period and is increasing at the rate of 7 ppbv year-1 (IPCC, 2007; EPA, 2013). Similarly, the atmospheric concentration of N₂O has increased from about 270 ppbv in 1750 to 325 ppbv and is increasing at the rate of 0.8 ppbv year-1 (IPCC, 2007; EPA, 2013).

Introduction

Climate change and climatic variability are expected to reduce agricultural productivity and threaten food security of the world, particularly in developing countries. Producing enough food for the increasing population in a background of decreasing resources and a changing climate scenario, is a challenging task. Agriculture, forestry and land use change account for about 30% of greenhouse gases (GHGs) emissions. Therefore, mitigation of GHGs emission while enhancing production is another challenge in agriculture.
 
Conservation agriculture (CA), with the three core inter-linked principles of minimizing mechanical soil disturbance, enhancing organic matter cover on soil and diversification of crops, is a viable option for sustainable agriculture with an effective solution to climate change adaptation and mitigation. The principles can be integrated and applied into most of the rainfed and irrigated production systems including horticulture, agro-forestry, organic farming, rotational farming and integrated crop-livestock systems to strengthen ecological sustainability. Worldwide about 105 Mha land is under CA and the area is increasing. However countries like USA, Brazil, Argentina, Canada and Australia occupy about 90% of the area under CA. The CA, which is advocated as an alternative to the conventional production system for improving productivity and sustainability, is now adopted by many countries and agencies as a lead model for sustainable agricultural intensification.

Heat stress induced by climate change is a serious issue of livestock industries worldwide (Bajagai, 2011). When environmental temperatures move out of the thermo-neutral zone (or comfort zone) animals begins to experience either heat stress or cold stress. Both these stresses require the animals to increase the amount of energy used to maintain the body temperature so that less energy is available for productive processes. Atmospheric temperature, relative humidity, air movement and solar radiation are the major factors that determine the heat load on animal. Thermoregulation is the ability of the animals to maintain their body temperature in cold or hot environments. It consists of behavioural, physiological and anatomical responses that affect energy metabolism. At lower temperature as a physiological adjustment to maintain the body temperature the animal increases the metabolic heat production by increasing the basal metabolic rate and uncoupling of oxidative phosphorylation. Hence the maintenance energy requirement of animals increases in a cold environment, which reduces the amount of energy available for production. From a practical point of view higher temperatures are much more dangerous for producing animals than a cold environment. Temperatures exceeding the higher critical level compromise animal performance not only by changing the energy and nutrient metabolism, but also by upsetting the body homeostasis, with detrimental consequences both for immune competence and for product quality. In general, livestock with high production potential are at greatest risk of heat stress, and require most attention.

5.1    Population Growth
    
5.2    Exponential Growth
    
5.3    Population Explosions
    
5.4    Over Population
    
5.5     The Causes of Rapid Population Growth
    
5.6    Ways and Means to Solve Over Population
    
5.7    Environment and Health
    
5.8    Family Welfare Programme
    
5.9    Human Rights
    
5.10    Child Welfare
    
5.11    Women Welfare

Evidence over the past few decades has conclusively established that significant changes in climate are taking place worldwide as a result of enhanced anthropogenic activities. The fast pace of development and industrialization and indiscriminate destruction of natural environment, more so in the last century, have altered the concentration of atmospheric gases that lead to global warming. The major cause for climate change and global warming has been ascribed to the increased levels of greenhouse gases (GHGs) like carbon dioxide (CO₂), methane (CH₄), nitrous oxide (N₂O), chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) etc. beyond their natural levels due to the uncontrolled activities such as burning of fossil fuels, increased use of refrigerants, and enhanced agricultural related practices.