This study investigated the effects of Brevibacillus laterosporus and live yeast (LY) on rumen fermentation, nutrient digestibility and microbial protein synthesis. The basal diet was a total mixed ration formulated to fulfil the minimum nutrient requirement of early lactating 600 kg Holstein cow producing 40kg of milk with 3.5 % fat and 3.3 % protein using CPM-dairy software (NRC, 2001). Treatments were: T1 (Control: basal diet with no additive), T2 (Basal diet + Brevibacillus laterosporus), T3 (Basal diet + Live yeast), and T4 (Basal diet + Brevibacillus laterosporus + Live yeast). In situ degradation, in vitro batch fermentation were performed. Data obtained were subjected to analysis of variance (ANOVA) using PROC GLM (SAS Institute, 2009). The effective dry matter (DM) degradability evaluated at low (0.02) and medium (0.05) ruminal passage rate (ED1 and ED2) were higher (p<0.05) in T1 compared to T2 and T3, but did not differ (p>0.05) between T2, T3 and T4, and between T1 and T4. When evaluated at fast passage rate (0.08) the effective DM degradability (ED3) was higher (p<0.05) in T1 compared to T3 and T4, but did not differ (p>0.05) between T1 and T2. The difference in ammonia nitrogen production was observed only between T1 and T2, and was higher (p<0.05) in T1. The total VFA’s concentration was higher (p<0.05) in T3 compared to the control. All additives decreased the molar percentage of acetate (P<0.05). The concentration of acetate was lower (p<0.05) in T3 and T4 compared to control. Propionate concentration was higher (p<0.05) in T3 and T4 compared to other treatments and lower (p<0.05) in the control compared to the rest of treatments. Butyrate concentration was higher (p<0.05) in T2 and T4 compared to the rest of the treatments, and lower (p<0.05) in T3 than other treatments. The microbial protein synthesis measured as purine derivate done on residues was higher (p<0.05) for T3 compared to T1 and T2, but did not differ between T1, T2 and T4, and between T3 and T4. These results showed that the two additives have different individual effects on DM and CP degradability, but also associative effects in some fermentation parameters such as propionate production. / Agriculture, Animal Health and Human Ecology / M. Sc. (Agriculture)

Die Nutzung von Biomasse als Nahrungs- und Futtermittel sowie als Rohstoff geht mit einem erheblichen Eingriff in biochemische Kreisläufe einher. Die Nutztierhaltung beansprucht dabei den Großteil der ökonomisch genutzten Phytomasse und dominiert Stoffströme in der Landwirtschaft. Während bereits der gegenwärtige ökologische Fußabdruck von tierischen Erzeugnissen Anlass zur Sorge bietet, wird die globale Nachfrage nach Fleisch, Milch und Eiern im Zuge von Bevölkerungswachstum und steigenden Einkommen voraussichtlich weiter zunehmen. Die vorliegende Arbeit untersucht die wechselseitigen Zusammenhänge zwischen Tierhaltung und Umwelt im Kontext globaler Wandlungsprozesse und adressiert Unsicherheiten auch in Bezug auf gegenwärtige Umweltauswirkungen. Im Rahmen der Dissertation wurde das räumlich explizite ökonomische Landnutzungsmodell MAgPIE (Model of Agricultural Production and its Impact on the Environment) um eine detaillierte Darstellung des Nutztiersektors erweitert. Die Modellsimulationen unterstreichen das Potenzial, sowohl durch eine Änderung der Ernährungsgewohnheiten als auch der Produktionsweise von tierischen Erzeugnissen landwirtschaftliche Stoffströme und Landnutzung deutlich zu beeinflussen sowie Stickstoffverluste und Emissionen von klimaschädlichen Gasen zu verändern. Moderate Produktivitätssteigerungen können Waldökosysteme bewahren und Kohlenstoffemissionen vermeiden, führen allerdings auch zu Zielkonflikten zwischen dem Schutz aquatischer und terrestrischer Ökosysteme sowie zwischen Stickstoff- und Kohlenstoffverlusten. Zudem ziehen ehrgeizige Produktivitätssteigerungen großflächige Umwandlungen von Weide- zu Ackerland und damit eine Verringerung von Bodenkohlenstoffbeständen auf landwirtschaftlichen Flächen nach sich. Ein reduzierter Konsum tierischer Produkte in wohlhabenden Regionen trägt maßgeblich zum Erhalt der Wälder, der Vermeidung von Treibhausgasemissionen und der Verringerung des landwirtschaftlichen Wasserverbrauchs bei. / Human appropriation of biomass as food, feed and raw material interferes with key biochemical cycles. Livestock is at the epicentre of agricultural material flows and resource use, utilising the majority of the economically used plant biomass, substantially amplifying the agricultural nitrogen cycle, contributing to greenhouse gas emissions and water use, and dominating human use of land. While already today’s environmental footprint of livestock gives cause for concern, demand for meat, milk and eggs is expected to continue growing, driven by population growth, increasing incomes, and urbanization. Between the poles of current environmental externalities and the magnitude of the expected growth of the livestock sector, this thesis explores interactions between animal agriculture and the environment in the context of broad-scale developments such as globalization, technological innovation, rising food demand, and climate change and addresses gaps in our knowledge about current environmental impacts of livestock. For this aim, the spatially explicit economic land use model MAgPIE (Model of Agricultural Production and its Impact on the Environment) was extended by a detailed representation of animal agriculture. Model simulations demonstrate the large demand- and supply-side potential inherent in livestock production to transform biomass flows in agriculture and alter environmental externalities of food production. While moderate productivity gains in the livestock sector can reduce deforestation and emissions from land use change, trade-offs emerge between aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems, and between nitrogen and carbon losses. Moreover, ambitious productivity increases trigger large-scale pasture-to-cropland conversion that involves depletion of soil carbon stocks on agricultural land. A reduced consumption of livestock products in affluent regions considerably mitigates deforestation, carbon emissions and agricultural water consumption.

From the Proceedings of the 1974 Meetings of the Arizona Section - American Water Resources Assn. and the Hydrology Section - Arizona Academy of Science - April 19-20, 1974, Flagstaff, Arizona / The operational aspects of land use planning, to be effective, must be tied to a well defined planning process. The framework for this process includes a set of main components which are important in solving land use planning problems. These components are linked together in a design related to the basic concepts of decision analysis which has been oriented to natural resource problems. Detailed description can be added to the .process framework to tailor it to a specific problem, study area, or study level. Some of the major components in the framework are an objectives and goals spectrum, problem formulation, physical characterization of the land, social and economic demands analysis, identification of management alternatives and specific activities, simulation of resource response, allocation of resources, visual quality analysis, transportation system analysis, and a data management system. This process framework is d »sinned to he dynamic, user oriented, and compatible with the type of problems encountered in land use planning.

From the Proceedings of the 1977 Meetings of the Arizona Section - American Water Resources Assn. and the Hydrology Section - Arizona Academy of Science - April 15-16, 1977, Las Vegas, Nevada / With the advent of ever -increasing energy needs, large-scale surface mining has gained new impetus, and there is much concern about reclaiming the mine spoils to bring about beneficial land uses. This paper presents a decision making algorithm labeled PROTRADE, and a case study of the Black Mesa region in Northern Arizona. PROTRADE considers a set of objective functions, a set of physical constraints, articulates the preferences of the decision maker in a progressive manner, and generates a set of alternative solutions. The decision maker is then able to trade level of achievement, for each objective function, against the probability of achieving that level.

No description available.

The term aggregation refers to overdispersion and both are used interchangeably in this thesis. In addressing the problem of prevalence of infectious parasite species faced by most rural livestock farmers, we model the distribution of faecal egg counts of 15 parasite species (13 internal parasites and 2 ticks) common in sheep and goats. Aggregation and excess zeroes is addressed through the use of generalised linear models. The abundance of each species was modelled using six different distributions: the Poisson, negative binomial (NB), zero-inflated Poisson (ZIP), zero-inflated negative binomial (ZINB), zero-altered Poisson (ZAP) and zero-altered negative binomial (ZANB) and their fit was later compared. Excess zero models (ZIP, ZINB, ZAP and ZANB) were found to be a better fit compared to standard count models (Poisson and negative binomial) in all 15 cases. We further investigated how distributional assumption a↵ects aggregation and zero inflation. Aggregation and zero inflation (measured by the dispersion parameter k and the zero inflation probability) were found to vary greatly with distributional assumption; this in turn changed the fixed-effects structure. Serial autocorrelation between adjacent observations was later taken into account by fitting observation driven time series models to the data. Simultaneously taking into account autocorrelation, overdispersion and zero inflation proved to be successful as zero inflated autoregressive models performed better than zero inflated models in most cases. Apart from contribution to the knowledge of science, predictability of parasite burden will help farmers with effective disease management interventions. Researchers confronted with the task of analysing count data with excess zeroes can use the findings of this illustrative study as a guideline irrespective of their research discipline. Statistical methods from model selection, quantifying of zero inflation through to accounting for serial autocorrelation are described and illustrated. / Statistics / M.Sc. (Statistics)

The aim of this research was to identify the impacts and adaptation options of climate variability and change on agricultural crop production in Vhembe District Municipality. The study will contribute to the expansion of existing literature on climate change impacts on agricultural sector. The following two main objectives were formulated for the purpose of this study:  To determine the level of awareness of small-scale maize farmers about climate change impacts and threats in Vhembe District Municipality (VDM),  To compare the level of production scales between the farmers who are aware and the farmers who are not aware of climate change impacts and its threats. The study area was the Vhembe District Municipality; a representative sample of 150 farmers (aged 18 – 65+ years, 46 percent males and 54 percent females) participated in the study. Vhembe District Municipality is one of poorest municipalities in Limpopo due to lack of infrastructure development, and as a result of that, there is an increase of socio-economic problems such as food prices increase, unemployment, scarcity of food, and lack of local markets. The study further covers the municipality’s farming enterprises, systems, categories, infrastructure as well as other constraints that may be facing the emerging farmer in the District. The study highlighted the lack of climate change information, reduction of livestock production and crop yields of the farmers in the Vhembe District. The literature studies show climate variability and change adaptation strategies such as planting different varieties, crop diversification, different planting dates and shortening of growing periods. This study draws on lessons learned, experiences, and other existing research on climate change impact and adaptation across the globe. It was concluded during the research that change in climate was already perceived by farmers in the Vhembe District and the study also presented perceived adaptation strategies used by farmers in the Vhembe District. The study concludes that there is lack of local market, and low level of farmers’ awareness about the impact of climate change on the crop production in the Vhembe district. This low level of awareness translates into a low level of crop production which results in increased socio-economic problems, low income, increased unemployment, increased crops diseases and reduced crop yields. / Environmental Sciences / M. Sc. (Environmental Management)

This study investigated the education and training needs for municipal employees in order to inform an education and training strategy that would address environmental management challenges in Makana local municipality in Grahamstown, Eastern Cape province. The research was conducted as a qualitative case study that made use of questionnaires, document analysis, focus group discussions and interviews as instruments for data generation. Samples of respondents were selected from Makana Municipality employees in top and middle management positions, professionals/technicians and workers, including elected councillors. The study was contextualised through establishing environmental management issues in Makana municipality; establishing organisational needs; development of a learner profile; and through a review of policies and recent trends in adult education. The study established that the Makana Municipality employees are most concerned with the following issues: sanitation; solid waste management; livestock management and fire management. These issues require primary environmental competences among all council employees (top and middle management, professionals and technicians, workers and councillors who work on part-time basis). The educational implications needed to respond to these issues also require an understanding of legislation. The study also established that technical education and training which includes planning, project management, and financial and budgeting competences are necessary amongst the management and professionals. These competences may enable them to develop capacity in environmental management. This study further established the need for social education which includes competences such as communication and social justice. These competences should be developed amongst members of the same group as they need to involve the community in management of the environment. This should enable the municipality to create job opportunities and help change negative attitudes.

South Africa and other developing countries are grappling with high levels of poverty as a result of slow to negligible rural development. Irrigation development is one essential component that can be used to address the challenges faced by smallholder farmers in rural areas. In the President‟s “State of the Nation Address” in 2011, the President of South Africa outlined measures to reduce hunger and poverty in communal areas through enhanced government‟s expenditures in rural infrastructure developments, especially for such amenities as irrigation and roads, with a view to promoting food security. The broad objective of this study is to assess livelihood strategies and opportunities with regard to farming in Qamata area of Intsika Yethu Local Municipality. The stratified random sampling method was applied in order to choose a sample of 70 household that were interviewed by means of semi-structured questionnaires. Out of these, 53 belonged to the irrigation project and 17 farmers were non-irrigation farmers. The results show that women play an active role in agriculture. The Multiple Regression model was used to assess the relative importance of different livelihood strategies adopted by both irrigation and non-irrigation farmers in improving household food security and welfare in Qamata. More specifically, the study assessed the impact of different livelihood strategies on production of butternut, goats, maize and poultry (Chicken) in Qamata. The results show increased agricultural production, crop diversification and higher incomes from irrigation farming as compared to dry land farming. Irrigation farming has enabled many households to diversify their sources of income and therefore include activities and enterprises that contribute to enhanced household welfare. The study showed that household size is crucial in crop production, followed by gender of the household head. The government and research institutes need to come up with programmes to train people on ways to produce crop and livestock products more efficiently.

The study focussed on the research question namely: “How will the introduction of new ecological taxes impact the South African agricultural sector?” To answer the question, eight international eco-taxes were selected and further investigated. The nature and history of each eco-tax was examined. The effects or expected effects (where implementation have not yet taken place) of the eco-taxes on the agricultural sectors of the foreign countries, were then considered. The study continued by considering the possible impact on South African agriculture, should these taxes be implemented in South Africa. This was accomplished by extrapolating the foreign effects previously investigated. Mindful of findings, recommendations were then made of what eco-taxes could be implemented which will not impede South African agriculture. It was concluded that the British Climate Change Levy and Climate Change Agreement scheme, Australian Carbon Farming Initiative and Swedish meat consumption tax could be considered for implementation. / Financial Accounting / M. Phil (Accounting Science)