This study aims to explore and quantify systematic similarities and differences between four major global cropping systems products: the dataset of monthly irrigated and rainfed crop areas around the year 2000 (MIRCA2000), the spatial production allocation model (SPAM), the global agroecological zone (GAEZ) dataset, and the M3 dataset developed by Monfreda, Ramankutty, and Foley.

This study assesses whether the recent public and private efforts to improve farmers’ access to mechanical power in Ghana have had the intended effects on the country’s agricultural sector. Using panel survey data, this paper analyses the drivers of farm mechanization and its net impacts on cropland expansion and farming system intensification in northern Ghana. Several factors explain the use and use intensity of agricultural mechanization, including landholding size, total labor and fertilizer use per hectare, chemical use, and amount of land left fallow.

The Vision of the present cross-sectoral Forestry Strategy 2020 (FS2020) establishes that by 2020, the Government of the Lao PDR envisages a sizeable, vigorous and robust forestry sector continuing in its role as one of the leading sectors advancing national socio-economic development. A sector in which scientifically-managed natural production forests generate timber and non-timber products at sustainable levels with village participation, under supervision and technical support from well-staffed, well-trained local and national government units.

These provisions lay down amendments and addenda to the Nitrates Action Programme Regulations. New definitions are inserted in regulation 2 (livestock unit, deep litter system). The addenda concern exemptions for units of bovines, swine, ovines, caprines and rabbits, as well as production units of layer hens and broilers managed by a single farmer having an animal population equivalent or lower than the animal populations listed in Schedule IV (but in any case less than three livestock units).

The overall aim of the present Forest and Wildlife Policy is the conservation and sustainable development of forest and wildlife resources for the maintenance of environmental stability and continuous flow of optimum benefits from the socio-cultural and economic goods and services that the forest environment provides to the present and future generations whilst fulfilling Ghana’s commitments under international agreements and conventions.

The overall aim of the present Forestry Development Master Plan is to provide a basis for achieving sustainable utilization and development of forest and wildlife resources, modernization of the timber industry and conservation of the environment, and thereby ensure realization of the objectives of the Forest and Wildlife Policy. At the same time, the various proposals have had to take account of the need to improve the state of the environment, the complexities of land tenure and the importance of appropriate and efficient land use.

The Goal of the present cross-sectoral National Forest Plan (NFP) is formulated as follows: “An integrated forest sector that achieves sustainable increases in economic, social and environmental benefits from forests and trees by all the people of Uganda, especially the poor and vulnerable”.The objectives of the NFP are: 1) To raise the incomes and quality of life of poor people through forestry developments, targeting sustainable livelihoods amongst small-scale, mainly rural stakeholders, with strategies based on-farm, in natural forests or off-farm; 2) To increase economic productivity an