Farming Action: Catchment Reaction
The Effect of Dryland Farming on the Natural Environment
Edited by: J Williams, RA Hook, HL GascoigneProvides a comprehensive technical overview of the relationships between dryland farming systems and catchment land and water quality in Australia.
Dryland farming is a major export earner for many temperate-zone countries, yet it continues to degrade a country's natural resources. Effects are not restricted to the land - changes in water quality can reduce the potential uses of water and bring about catastrophic changes in both freshwater and coastal ecosystems. + Full description
Farming Action: Catchment Reaction provides a comprehensive technical overview of the relationships between dryland farming systems and catchment land and water quality in Australia, and integrates it in a whole system framework. It deals with the issues in terms of people, pointers, processes and prediction as it discusses social aspects of developing and implementing research to improve dryland farming systems in catchment management programs, indicators of catchment health, and the processes which determine the impact of the farming action on the catchment response. It concludes by considering the adequacy of our ability to use this process knowledge in models to predict the effect of dryland farming on catchment condition.
- Short descriptionNews
No longer available in a print edition.
Details
ePDF | January 1998ISBN: 9780643104990
Publisher: CSIRO Publishing
Available from eRetailers
Features
- Examines problems from a variety of perspectives - those of farmers, consultants and scientists
- Provides a comprehensive overview of modelling theory
- Provides indicators enabling both professionals and communities to measure the impact of dryland farming
- Brings together the latest international results
- Applicable to all countries using dryland farming techniques.
Contents
Introduction: perspectives on the problemPeople: client needs and user involvement - a summary
Integrated catchment management - where is it at?
Dryland farming systems for catchment care: natural resource accounting
Dryland farming and catchment care: regional policy in a mathematical programming framework
Technical issues in understanding processes (researching) across scale
Community participation in CSIRO's Dryland Farming Systems program
Managing institutional collaboration in catchment systems research
Evaluation of science-based research and development: a review in the context of integrated catchment management
Strategies for achieving adoption of new technology or alternative management practices
Market research
Environmental indicators of catchment and farm health
Landscape and function - the fundamental causes of land and water degradation
Dryland farming regions and systems of Australia
Land degradation processes and water quality effects: decline in soil structure
Land degradation processes and water quality effects: soil acidification
Land degradation processes and water quality effects: waterlogging and salinisation
Land degradation processes and water quality effects: organic matter, soil and nutrient loss, and chemical residues
Dryland farming, erosion and stream sediments - the problem of catchment scale
The relationship between remnant vegetation and other land resources in dryland agricultural systems