Nuclear and isotopic techniques help the fight against land degradation
Land degradation is the result of a number of largely human-induced factors, such as poor soil and water management practices, deforestation, overgrazing, improper crop rotation and unsustainable land use. In turn, these can significantly affect soil fertility, resulting in diminished crop yields and food insecurity. Traditional methods of modelling and monitoring soil erosion usually require…
Author of the month blog: The Animal Trade, Clive Phillips
About four years ago, I started to get concerned that the full impact of expansion and intensification of the animal production industries worldwide was not understood, by those in power, by scientists and definitely not by the public. The relatively rapid introduction of intensive farming systems over the last fifty years, and their widespread adoption…
Tree–crop interactions: agroforestry in a changing climate
Twenty years after the first edition of the standard book on tree–crop interactions, edited by Peter Huxley and Chin Ong, we now have a second edition. The second edition has explicit attention to climate change, with chapters on microclimate effects and consequences for the various terms of the water balance. The primary strength of the…
Four new bee species described in Australia – many more remain unidentified
By Miroslav Djuric, DVM, CAB International, Wallingford, UK. Bee specialists from South Australia have described four new native bees. Three of these bee species have been described as having narrow faces and very long mouths, allowing them to feed on slender flowers found on the emu bush, a hardy native of the Australian desert environment,…
COP21: Major climate deal agreed in Paris
A landmark agreement to limit global temperature rises to below 2 °C has been announced After two intensive weeks of debate the 21st Conference of the Parties (COP21) drew to a close on 12th December with a new climate deal on the table. The ambitious global agreement commits the 195 participating parties to hold…
Tackling climate change and agriculture at COP21 – a look at the landscape approach
By Dr Trevor Nicholls, CEO, CABI At COP21 last week, the world’s leaders agreed on a way forward to manage climate change. Limiting global warming to less than two percent was undoubtedly a landmark decision and, for the first time, there was unanimous recognition that humans impact the climate and that humans must do something about…
What is a sustainable diet? – a vision from the FENS conference
Climate change may be on everyone’s lips, but we are only just beginning to see how our diets might need to change to help prevent it and deal with the challenges of a growing population. I heard more about the question of sustainable diets at a series of sessions at the FENS conference on nutrition…
Farming tropical insects to feed the world in 2050
Farming edible insects to provide protein for people and in animal feed is seen as a way to meet food demands of the world’s population in 2050. Dr Sarah Beynon, an entomologist, was a guest on BBC radio 4 programme Midweek[18th November 2015] & fellow guests were invited to try cricket flour cookies and mealworm burgers. She is on a mission to both educate the UK public on the importance of insects (including wasps and spiders) and to provide sustainable food by farming tropical insects. CABI’s role in ProteINSECT, the EU project trialling insect protein in animal feed, is highlighted.
Ambitious landscape restoration target may be within reach
In September 2011, at a high-level meeting of world leaders, the Bonn Challenge was launched, with an ambitious goal to restore 150 million hectares of the world’s degraded and deforested land by 2020. This target was recently supplemented by the New York Declaration on Forests, which added an further 200 million hectares to be restored…
New report reveals the true cost of land degradation
Why we need to value our ecosystem services A recent report The Value of Land: Prosperous lands and positive rewards through sustainable land management published 15th September by the Economics of Land Degradation Initiative (ELD) estimates the value of ecosystem services lost worldwide due to land degradation at a staggering US $6.3 trillion to $10.6 trillion…