The research project focused on studying the effectiveness of placemaking initiatives to promote social, physical and economic improvements. The case of study is the Central Park neighbourhood in Winnipeg, Manitoba, named after its major public space. The research indicated placemaking initiatives were capable of contributing to increasing safety, promoting community development and enhancing opportunities for social interaction. However, the capacity of placemaking to achieve positive improvements is directly determined by the involved stakeholders. The Central Park initiatives were successful due to the emphasis on engaging the residents and neighbourhood organizations. The residents were given the opportunity to meaningfully share their experience and aspirations with external stakeholders. The collaborative approach to placemaking contributed to the development of a sense of ownership. The residents saw their input reflected in the amenities and programming offered in Central Park. The planning profession can benefit from using placemaking practices to engage in comprehensive planning.

The South African poultry industry is a large part of the agricultural industry and a very important contributor to the Agriculture’s Gross Domestic Product. Furthermore, this industry is expanding and very good growth is predicted for the next decade. This growth will take place in the formal as well as the informal segments of the industry. The informal segment holds a lot of potential for suppliers to supply in their growing needs. Due to the fact that broiler feed is seen as a large contributor to the total cost of broiler production, it is considered very important factor. If feed suppliers want to focus on the informal market, they need to understand the differences between commercial farmers and small–scale farmers and specifically the different needs of small–scale farmers. To develop a strategy to utilize the opportunities in the informal market, it is necessary to understand all the factors that influence the purchase behaviour of these farmers. A model of stimulus response is used to define the factors that may influence purchase behaviour. The factors that seemed important from the literature study are market and other stimuli. The market stimuli consist of product, price, promotion and place. The product aspect could further be divided into quality aspects, brand equity, and additional services that accompany the product. Other stimuli that could influence purchase behaviour are economic conditions, special event, climatic condition and the influence of culture. Data was collected by means of a questionnaire. Descriptive statistics and factor analysis were used on the data to determine which factors influence the small–scale farmers’ purchase behaviour. While the Kaiser Meyer Olkin measure, Bartlett’s test of shericity and Cronbach Apha were used to determine if the data is suitable to do a factor analysis on. Factor analysis was done to determine which factors are the most important. The seven significant factors that influence the purchase behaviour of small–scale farmers are: * Value for money and opportunity. * Perceived brand value. * Customer support and service. * Consensus on available quality. * Brand loyalty. * Feed price at the reseller. * Bag size. More research on this topic in a larger geographical area is required. / Thesis (M.B.A.)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2012.

ABSTRACT This thesis studies the background of the largest single farmer organisation in Australia and its role in influencing practice change. The study seeks to address a number of questions starting with: how did a small Western Australian farmer group reach national prominence over a relatively short period and become a major influence on agriculture in Australia? This research uses quantitative and qualitative methods and is informed by a constructionist philosophy. The research process involved five phases. Phase one consisted of examining the possibilities of the research and its value. It also addressed the research problem and questions. Phase two involved a survey of Kondinin Group members and negotiating with the Kondinin Group for access to its database. The survey was faxed to 1501 members in the northern region of Australia and the data from 272 responses was entered and reported. From this, the researcher could validate that the study had merit and the Kondinin Group was making a substantial difference to its members. Phase three revolved around a literature review to see what information was available on the Kondinin Group and other farm organisations. The study also examined how the group related to management and organizational theory, social trends and the body of work on extension and farmer capacity building. Phase four sought to further examine the organisation through interviews with key informants including people from the Kondinin Group and other farm organisations. Phase five of the research involved bringing information and data together to more comprehensively address the research questions and draw conclusions from the study. It also examined the challenges facing the Kondinin Group and lessons that can be drawn for other organisations along with identifying further research that may be worthwhile.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1969. / Typescript. Vita. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references.

O interesse em mostrar os reflexos para a agricultura familiar do Programa Nacional de Produção e Uso de Biodiesel - PNPB, criado em 2005, foi o motivo desta pesquisa. É um estudo quantitativo realizado em uma amostra de 93 agricultores familiares participantes dos projetos de produção de biodiesel já implantados no Estado de Goiás. A escolha dos produtores foi feita aleatoriamente em uma relação de todos os produtores que já tinham passado por um ciclo completo de produção, ou seja, um ano-safra. O levantamento dos dados foi feito através de questionário fechado apresentado aos produtores. Pretendia-se conhecer: se houve aumento de ocupação e renda para os produtores inseridos nos projetos; a forma de inserção desses agricultores familiares no Programa; se a assistência técnica está sendo oferecida aos mesmos, segundo as diretrizes do Programa e uma avaliação do Programa pelos agricultores participantes. Os resultados mostram que uma grande parte dos objetivos do Programa, como a geração de ocupação e renda para a agricultura familiar, está sendo alcançada. O modo de inserção dos produtores no Programa apresenta poucas diferenças dos modelos de integração agricultura-indústria de setores tradicionais. Constatou-se, ainda, que nem todos os agricultores têm acesso à assistência técnica, que é uma das obrigações dos produtores de biodiesel. Os agricultores, ainda, avaliaram o Programa como uma boa política pública para si e para a agricultura familiar de um modo geral. / The interest in show the reflexes to family agriculture of National Program of Biodiesel Production and Use- PNPB, started in 2005, was the motive of this research. It is a quantitative study done in a sample of 93 small farmers included of the projects biodiesel production implanted in State of Goiás. The choice of participants was aleatory from a relation of all farmers that were completed cycle of production, that is, a year of harvest. The raising of data was done through a close questionnaire. This study intended to know: if had increase of jobs and income to producers included in the projects; the way of insertion of families\' producers in the Program; if the technical assistance is been offered to the producers, as the directions of Program and an evaluation of Program by farmers participants. The results show that great part of goals of Program as the generation of jobs and income to the family agriculture is been achieved. The way of insertion of farmers in Program presented few differences from integration models agriculture-industry of traditional sectors. It was established neither that all the farmers have access to technical assistance, that is one of the mandatory of biodiesel producers. The farmers evaluated the Program as a good public policy to them and to the family farmers.

Il s'agit ici de comprendre comment un paysan pourrait avoir du pouvoir sur sa propre activité, sa propre vie. Le Plateau de Millevaches où fleurissent de nombreuses initiatives et alternatives à la société de consommation peut donner certaines pistes. Les paysans sont abordés par le biais d'entretiens non directifs. Le choix quant à sa façon d’être paysan, celui de privilégier une identité de filière, professionnelle, ou bien celui d’affirmer son identité locale est lié à diverses manières de concevoir et d’utiliser le pouvoir. En effet, le pouvoir ne se résume pas à la domination, propres aux relations hiérarchiques dans lesquelles sont plongés les paysans suivant un modèle institutionnel, mais il se compose aussi de l’influence ou de la création qu’utilisent des paysans qui revendiquent leur appartenance locale. A travers le pouvoir, c’est notre liberté et nos choix éthiques de vie qui sont mis ici à l’épreuve. / How a farmer can have some power on his activity, on his life? To find several levels of power used by farmers, I'm travelling the "Plateau de Millevaches"(Limousin, France) where are growing several original initiatives. Farmers are approached by qualitative interviews. Concerning the way of being farmer, there’s a choice: to privilege a sectorial and professional identity, or to affirm a local one; and this choice is link to several way to conceive and use power. Indeed, power is not restricted to domination, proper to hierarchical relations in which farmers, following an institutional model, are plunged, but power also consists in influence or creation, used by farmers who claim their local ownership.Through power, liberty and our ethical choices are challenged

Globalization is eroding the livelihoods of small farmers, a significant and vulnerable class, particularly in the developing world. The cost-price squeeze stemming from trade liberalization places farmers in a race to the bottom that leads to displacement, poverty, and environmental degradation. Scholars and activists have proposed that alternative trade initiatives offer a unique opportunity to reverse this trend by harnessing the power of the markets to reward producers of goods with embedded superior cultural, environmental, and social values. Alternative trade via certification schemes have become a de facto prescription for any location where there is a need to conciliate economic interest with conservation imperatives. Partnerships among commodity production farmers, elite manufacturers and wealthy northern consumers/activists do not necessarily have win-win outcomes. Paradoxically, the partnerships of farmers with external agencies have unexpected results. These partnerships develop into dependent relationships that become unsustainable in the absence of further transfers of capital. The institutions born of these partnerships are fragile. When these fledging institutions fail, farmers are left in the same situation that they were before the partnership, with only minor improvements to show after spending considerable amounts of social and financial capital. I hypothesize that these failures are born out of a belief in a universal understanding of sustainability. A discursive emphasis on consensus, equity and mutual benefit hides the fact that what for consumers it is a matter of choice, for producers is a matter of survival. The growth in consumers’ demand for certified products creates a race for farmers to meet these standards. My findings suggest that this race generates economically perverse effects. First, producers enter into a certification treadmill. Second, the local need for economic sustainability is ignored. Third, commodity based alternative trade schemes increase the exposure of communities to global shocks. I conclude by calling for a careful reassessment of sustainable development projects that promote certification schemes. The designers and implementers of these programs must include farmers’ agenda in the planning of these programs.

The overuse of agrochemicals by arable crop farmers in Guyana is of increasing concern. But the literature reveals a paucity of information concerning the reasons for farmers‟ persistence of this inappropriate practice. No previous study has been conducted using a structured format to reveal the scope or reasons for farmers‟ sustained overuse of these chemicals. This research adopted an original structured-type approach, suitable for unearthing and explaining the reasons for this phenomenon. The study was theoretically and analytically guided by the theory of practices and critical realist theory respectively, to identify the prevalence, intensity and significant factors of farmer‟s pesticide and fertiliser overuse, but more importantly to elucidate reasons for overuse and formulate relevant recommendations. This investigation utilised a mixed methods strategy of complementary quantitative and qualitative techniques; comprising analysis of data from 229 farm unit surveys and 38 farmer and 19 key informant interviews, respectively. Quantitative analysis, conducted via SPSS software using tables and regression, revealed widespread prevalence of both pesticide and fertiliser overuse among farmers. The overuse consisted of high frequencies and concentrations of the chemicals. The study notes the factors which were significantly associated with overuse including farmers‟ age, education level, area cultivated, land tenure status and the „source-type‟ of information they accessed. However, qualitative analysis, utilising a grounded-theory approach with the aid of NVivo software, demonstrated that unlike the suggestions by other studies, the reasons for farmers‟ overuse were not the single factors which showed statistical significance for overuse practices. On the contrary, this study revealed original findings, which indicated that the reasons for farmers‟ overuse practices were embedded within an intricate network of contingent, support and contextual factors. These explained both the instigation and continuance of agrochemical overuse by farmers. Overall the findings emphasise the need for policy redress, especially regarding the mandate and conduct of farmer-training regarding chemical use, and the regulatory enforcement of appropriate agrochemical use. Understanding the reasons for farmers‟ inappropriate practices revealed new insight into the interpretation of these practices; as consequences of policy deficiency instead of farmer delinquency. Thus, the implications provided to address this problem of farmers‟ agrochemical overuse presented a new orientation to the type of suggestions previously suggested in other studies. The proposals indicated by this study for a targeted resolution of overuse in arable farmers of Guyana are more policy-oriented than farmer-targeted, since this study revealed that farmers‟ overuse behaviour is largely a response to policy-influenced support and contextual factors.

This study looked at 19 years of Bureau of Labor Statistics Census of Fatality data for the purpose of describing occupational homicide and suicide for farmers and agriculture workers. The study found homicide rates for farmers and agriculture workers were lower than rates for total occupations for 14 years, while suicide rates for farmers and agriculture workers were consistently higher than total occupations. Significant regional variations in homicide and suicide patterns were identified. Finally, this study confirmed prior research in that males were most commonly victims of both occupational homicide and suicide when compared to females, while both male and female farmers and agriculture workers were most likely victims of homicide by firearms.

Maize is a staple crop and underpins food security for Zambia. Maize productivity in Zambia is almost half the potential due to low uptake of conservation agricultural practices. This study tests the hypothesis of the trade-offs between agriculture productivity and long-term ecosystem services (ES) provision among maize farmers practising conventional agriculture on the one hand, and those practising conservation agriculture on the other hand, in Kafue district, Zambia. In addition, challenges which affect conservation agriculture uptake are assessed. Besides these challenges, the study notes that adoption of a new technology is also influenced by its efficiency, and therefore technical efficiency scores were estimated using the Stochastic Frontier Approach (SFA) to compare efficiency levels of the two agricultural systems. Kafue was purposefully selected as it is among the first districts where conservation agriculture was introduced. Through purposive and random sampling, the households surveyed were split into two distinct groups namely conservation agriculture (CA) farmers (treatment group) and conventional agriculture (CV) farmers (control group). The analysis significantly shows that farmers practicing CA have more knowledge than CV farmers about the capacity of conservation agriculture to reduce soil erosion, increase soil fertility, retain nutrients, mitigate pests and weeds and increase crop yield. However, both farming groups knew that CA helps conserve soils and that soil maintenance is important for food production. On the other hand, significantly, CV farmers knew more than CA farmers that CV reduces crop yield and increases soil erosion. On the other hand, CV farmers expressed a higher level of willingness to adopt CA practices than CA farmers who are unwilling to expand their area under CA. The study further shows that at least 55% of farmers practicing CA find inadequate labour to be the main challenge faced in CA. It appears that a policy that improves the farmers' knowledge on CA would help improve the uptake of CA. CA farmers were significantly more knowledgeable than CV farmers about the detrimental effects of CV, such as increasing air and water pollution, thus raising the need for training among CV farmers with emphasis on the effects of their farming system on the environment which affect the supply of ecosystem services. Efficiency is also a means of improving productivity hence the Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA) was employed to estimate technical efficiency levels in maize production. Using SFA, the study found that the technical efficiency of maize among CV farmers is 71.3% on average while that of CA farmers is 57.9% on average. Moreover, the study found that there was a significant difference (t=3.9854, P=0.0002) in the technical efficiency scores of the both CV and CA farmers. Nevertheless, the study also found that 77% of output variation among CA farmers can be explained by variation in technical efficiency. However, 33.4 % of total maize output can be explained by variation in technical efficiency among CV farmers. This means that CA farmers have a higher potential to increase their current output than CV farmers. Finally there was no significant difference in fertiliser usage between CA and CV farmers (t=1.3825, P=0.1700). Further, from SFA fertiliser responsiveness to maize output showed that a 1% increase in the use of synthetic fertiliser leads to 0.678% and 0% increase in maize output per hectare for CA and CV respectively at both 1% and 10% level of significance at the expense of water and air quality. Therefore, it can be concluded that there is a higher trade-off between maize production and water and air quality under conventional than under conservation agriculture. / Dissertation (MSc (Agric))--University of Pretoria, 2016. / Agricultural Economics, Extension and Rural Development / MSc (Agric) / Unrestricted