Agricultural assessment, methods

Life Cycle Assessment method - Tool for Evaluation of Greenhouse Gases Emissions from Agriculture... 

The above extractants for phosphate have been mainly developed for conventional agriculture. Some methods have been developed for assessment of soils managed on the organic system, which will be discussed in a separate chapter. 

Sessions 19 and 20 were held in a series, the former representing the second part and focusing on issues of risk assessment methods, use of the results for risk management decisions and to communicate with the public. E. D. Caldas (Univ. of Brasilia, Brazil) presented the new JMPR methods for estimating consumer exposures and examples of the impact of better data. Y.-B. He (Ministry of Agriculture, China) presented methods used by China to estimate exposure and to... 

To cover a wider spectrum of potential environmental impacts, several indicators from different impact assessment methods were employed, as implemented in Simapro v8.0.2 global warming potential over 100 years (GWPioo) (IPCC, 2006), renewable and nonrenewable cumulative energy demand (CED) [v 1.08] (Hischier et al., 2010), ecotoxicity [USEtox vl.03] (Rosenbaum et al., 2008), agricultural land occupation (ALO) and freshwater eutrophication (EE) [ReCIPe v.1.09] (Goedkoop et al., 2013). 

In ReCiPe assessment methods, three types of ecotoxicity are considered including terrestrial, freshwater and marine ecotoxicity. Terrestrial ecotoxicity is dominated by pesticide emissions to agriculture soil as well as the use of both sulphuric acid and steam during the conversion process. Marine ecotoxicity is fully dominated by emissions of heavy metals and sulphuric acid, largely to air. In the case of the GTE diesel conversion process presented in this paper, the characterization results shows... 

The detection and analysis, including quantification, of cyanobacterial toxins are essential for monitoring their occurrence in natural and controlled waters used for agricultural purposes, potable supplies, recreation and aquaculture. Risk assessment of the cyanobacterial toxins for the protection of human and animal health, and fundamental research, are also dependent on efficient methods of detection and analysis. In this article we discuss the methods developed and used to detect and analyse cyanobacterial toxins in bloom and scum material, water and animal/clinical specimens, and the progress being made in the risk assessment of the toxins. 

Based on the patch method to assess worker or re-entry exposure, researchers have developed a database, which may be used to estimate exposure. Each patch from an individual in a study can be entered into the database separately, the residue data from patches from various body areas can be summed to yield a whole-body exposure number, and the data may be sorted as to worker tasks, equipment used, protective clothing worn, formulation types and other parameters. This is the basis for the currently used Pesticide Handlers Data Base (PHED), which was developed through a joint effort in the 1980s of CropLife America [formerly known as American Crop Protection Association (ACPA) and National Agricultural Chemicals Association (NACA)], the Environmental Protection Agency (ERA) and Health Canada. " The PHED is discussed in detail in another article in this book. 

Busscher N, Kahl J, Huber M, Andersen J O, Mergardt G, Doesburg P, Paulsen M, Kretschmer S, de Weerd A and Meier-Ploeger A (2004), Validation and Standardization of the Biocrystallization Method Development of a Complementary Test to Assess Qualitative Features of Agricultural and Food Products, Triangle report Nr. 1, University Kassel, Louis Bolk Instituut and Biodynamic Research Association Denmark. 

Weibel, F.P, Sadikov, A. and Bigler, C. (2005). First results with the gas discharge visualisation (GDV) method (Kirlian photography) to assess the inner quality of apples , 1st Scientific FQH Conference, FQH, Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL), CH-5070 Frick, Switzerland, p. 77. 

The response of vertebrates to olfactory stimulation is affected by previous experience but behaviour can be specifically affected by odours (pheromones) (4). The olfactory system has been shown to detect specific components within complex mixtures and analytical chemistry techniques have been used to identify these active components (5). We have assessed the application of these methods to the problems of agricultural odours in an attempt to develop techniques applicable to both slurries and air samples. The identification of the odorous components might allow specific treatment methods to be developed. In addition, the designation of a range of indicator compounds might be useful in practice for monitoring abatement of odour nuisances. 

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