Although advances in remote sensing have enhanced mapping and monitoring of irrigated areas, producing accurate cropping information through satellite image classification remains elusive due to the complexity of landscapes, changes in reflectance of different land-covers, the remote sensing data selected, and image processing methods used, among others. This study extracted agricultural fields in the former homelands of Venda and Gazankulu in Limpopo Province, South Africa.

The research on inventory of some gully erosion sites in central Cross River State, Southeastern Nigeria was carried out in 2002. The objectives of the research were to identify spectacular gullies in the area (Yakkur, Obubra and Ikom Local Government Areas); determine the dimensions, causes and the land use affected.Gullies identified in Yakurr were located at Njelekoko, Ugbekuma, Ajere and Lekpankom. In Obubra area they were at Ofukpa and Etapeh, while in Ikom they were located at Water Board road, Cameroon street and Abakpa.

Paper removed for revision at request of author - 09/20/07.

Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a robust tool often used for eco-design. It allows the assessment of environmental impacts, at a global scale, accounting for all stage of a product life cycle, “from cradle to grave”. There is a methodological gap in this method to account for occupation and transformation impacts in marine ecosystems due to human activities. The task accomplished during this PhD is the development of a methodological framework for a new impact category in LCA to overcome this lack: the sea use. The general framework for sea use had to be defined.

Research on the sustainable use of the soil as the main agricultural resource employing different field crop rotations and tillage systems was started in 2009. The influence of new technologies on sustainable output of agricultural raw materials used for safe and good quality food and feed production was studied at the Latvia University of Agriculture, Study and Research Farm “Peterlauki” where long-term field experimental plots were established specially for this purpose. Complex investigation of the soils at the experimental plots was performed.

Agricultural sectors play a key role in the economics of climate change. Land as an input to agricultural production is one of the most important links between economy and the biosphere, representing a direct projection of human action on the natural environment. Agricultural management practices and cropping patterns have a vast effect on biogeochemical cycles, freshwater availability and soil quality. Agriculture also plays an important role in emitting and storing greenhouse gases.

The results of studying the process of spontaneous renewal of meadow vegetable associations on the lands taken out of plough-land are given. The self-renewal of zonal grassy associations on the former plough-lands is found out to be a syngenesis process, complex and rather long-term and dynamic in space and time, which consists of a series of determinant temporal stages of evolution of phytocenoses.

The presence of trees in the farms is typically considered a good practice in water shed  management. Therefore, it was examined the voluntary adoption of land uses considered more compatible with the water ecosystem service (shade coffee and woodland) in the region of Trifinio (located in Honduras and Guatemala), where there is not given any incentives or payment for this environmental service. It was observed low adoption of these land uses on small farms.