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Crassostrea nippona has recently been recognized as a preferred alternative to C. gigas in summer due to its firm flesh and high glycogen content. To promote industrial development, the mass selective breeding program was initiated to improve growth performance of C. nippona in 2014. Although a steady genetic gain of approximately 10% for growth traits was achieved in each of the first three generations of the selected strains, little is known about the cumulative genetic progress in desired traits contributed by the selective breeding in the genetic improvement program. In this study, the aquaculture performance of the selected population was comprehensively evaluated by comparing the production performance and reproductive traits of the progeny (WF1 and SF4) from the wild population and the third-generation selected line in commercial farming environments. The results showed that the diameters of eggs from both populations were at similar levels, but the fertilization and hatching rates of the progeny from the selected lines were significantly higher than those of the wild population (P < 0.05). At larval stages, the shell height and cumulative survival rate (CSR) of individuals from SF4 were consistently superior to that of WF1, especially on day 6 post-fertilization, in which CSR of the improved C. nippona was increased by 25.08% compared to that of wild oysters. Meanwhile, a significant 12.10% enhancement in the metamorphosis rate was observed in SF4 when compared with WF1. During the grow-out stage, SF4 displayed distinct advantages in growth performance and survival compared to the wild strain, with 23.19, 33.48, 34.18 and 79.11% improvement in shell height, body weight, CSR and final yield at harvest on day 800, respectively. Meanwhile, relative brood amount (RBA) associated with initial development of offspring was found to be significantly higher in SF4 compared with WF1 (P < 0.05). Remarkably, the gonadal development, sex ratios and biochemical composition of oysters from both populations were at similar levels at final harvest, implying that high-intensity artificial selection had no significant effect on reproductive characteristics and nutritional quality of C. nippona. The encouraging results in the present study suggest that the overall genetic progress contributed by genetic breeding is considerable in the fast-growing strain of C. nippona , and such gains are expected to continue to increase with further selective breeding. • Genetic progress obtained in C. nippona after three-generation mass selection is considerable. • Production performance of improved C. nippona was superior to that of wild individuals. • Survival of improved C. nippona was significantly enhanced, especially at the early larval stage. • Selection for growth had no clear effect on gonad development and nutritional quality of C. nippona. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The contradiction between rural socioeconomic changes and residents' demands for a better life poses challenges for sustainable development. Industrial revitalization is a core issue in promoting rural economic development. Specialized villages, which focus on specific industries and excel in certain areas, are important pathways for increasing farmers' income, promoting industrial prosperity, and advancing agricultural modernization. However, there has been limited research on the spatial distribution and transformation patterns of rural industrial development models. In particular, in the context of rapid rural restructuring, understanding the spatial evolution of specialized villages is important for future rural development. Taking Henan Province—an important agricultural province in China—as a case, this study finds that the spatial evolution of specialized villages can be divided into six stages and three transformations corresponding to time period. The specialized villages show a spatial pattern of center–periphery, spatial agglomeration, and periphery–center development. In line with China's shift from quantitative expansion to qualitative reform, the types of specialized villages gradually diversified, driven by socioeconomic development and human behavioral factors in different periods. Although China's specialized villages show diversified development patterns, there remains a need to identify development patterns that are consistent with different types of villages to achieve high-quality development, fully implement rural revitalization, and provide typical cases for global sustainable development. By summarizing the development patterns of specialized villages, this study helps to accurately determine the value of specialized villages in rural development and to design more targeted paths for the development of rural industries, which is significant for promoting sustainable rural development and enhancing human well-being. • A typical model of rural industrial development is studied - specialized villages. • Evolutionary process was categorised following historical periodisation of China. • Spatial structure has evolved from discrete and isomorphic to diversified network. • Transformation mechanisms under the combined effect of multiple factors is explained. • Differentiated patterns go beyond linear transformation in contemporary China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Numerous large scale land acquisitions have occurred in Angola since partial political and economic liberalization in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and further increased after 2002 and the end of armed conflict. They have occurred in conjunction with the emergence of a range of large state-coordinated agricultural projects, often by foreign contractors, for domestic food, and involving plans for backwards and forwards linkages to agro-processing and manufacturing initiatives. Altogether such land allocations and projects involve several billion dollars and several million hectares. These activities appear to often also involve high-level officials and/or wealthy Angolans and are often interpreted as neo-patrimonialism, state-sanctioned private accumulation, and instances of continuity in extractive institutions. Yet examining specific agrarian transformations illustrates how land and rural poverty in Angola are much more complex than a zero-sum game of elite accumulation of private land concessions. Key are Angola’s geo-historical trajectories of colonialism, war, socialism and liberalization, which the article examines in two concessions in Malanje Province We address the relationships between international enterprises and domestic elites, and the relevance of land dynamics within a long-term political economy perspective on capitalist industrialization and structural transformation in Angola and Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The expression “wage transition” refers to the fact that over the past three decades in almost all developed economies wage increases have leveled off. There has been a widening divergence and decoupling between wages on the one hand and GDP per capita on the other hand. Yet, in China wages and GDP per capita climbed in sync (at least up to now). In the first part of the paper we present comparative statistical evidence which measures the extent of the wage transition effect. In a second part we consider the reasons of this phenomenon, in particular we explain how the transfers of labor from low productivity sectors (such as agriculture) to high productivity sectors (such as manufacturing) are the driver of productivity growth, particularly through their synergetic effects. Although rural flight represents only one of these effects, it is certainly the most visible because of the geographical relocation that it implies; it is also the most well-defined statistically. Moreover, it will be seen that it is a good indicator of the overall productivity and attractiveness of the non-agricultural sector. Because this model accounts fairly well for the observed evolution in industrialized countries, we use it to predict the rate of Chinese economic growth in coming decades. Our forecast for the average annual growth of real wages ranges from 4% to 6% depending on how well China will control offshoring and the development of its healthcare sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Decades of groundwater overexploitation for agriculture and industrial development have resulted in substantial land subsidence in the Rafsanjan plain of southeastern Iran. This work presents the results of an InSAR time series analysis obtained by the exploitation of Envisat, ALOS and Sentinel-1 (S1) SAR data archives between June 2004, and May 2016, to investigate land subsidence in the plain. The InSAR analysis revealed an area of approximately 1000 km 2 within the study area showing subsidence of > 5 cm/year and locally exceeding 30 cm/yr in the last decade. This area of significant subsidence is limited in its spatial extent to the agricultural land and is partly influenced by Quaternary faults. The temporal and areal relationships of subsidence and groundwater level data suggest that a significant part of the observed subsidence in the Rafsanjan region is caused by intense groundwater extraction that has led to widespread compaction within the upper parts of the up to 300 m thick unconsolidated sediments, causing irreversible and inelastic deformation of the aquifer. The average volume storage loss of the aquifer system due to overexploitation is estimated to have been approximately 300 million cubic metre (mcm)/yr over the last decade. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water quality of floodplain lakes in the Yangtze region which supports ca. 450 million people is being severely compromised by nutrient pollution, climate change and dam installation resulting from intensive socio-economic development. However, due to a lack of long-term monitoring data, the onset and causes of ecosystem degradation are unclear. Here, we used chlorophyll and carotenoid pigments in dated sediment cores from six lakes spanning the region to reconstruct changes in algae and cyanobacterial HAB (harmful algal bloom) taxa alongside sedimentary nutrient flux measurements and historical archives. Sedimentary N fluxes are linked to changes in agriculture, while urbanization has had greater influences on P fluxes. Over the last 70 years algal and N 2 -fixing HAB pigments increased markedly in lakes (Luhu, Wanghu) that are strongly influenced by urbanization/industrialization. Algal assemblages in two other lakes (Futou, Honghu) changed gradually and responded primarily to agriculture and associated N fluxes; diazotrophic HAB pigments were absent and the lakes retained macrophyte cover. Local dam installation had no discernible effect on pigment assemblages in three of the four lakes in the past 70 years, but in the two hydrologically-open lakes (Poyang, Dongting), increasing algal production was significantly related to the upstream installation of the Three Gorges Dam (TGD) and to urban/industrial and agricultural stressors. Temperature only influenced phototrophs in the most degraded lakes (Luhu, Wanghu). This spatial and temporal overview identifies that nutrient pollution is the primary regional driver of lake phototrophs, but that diazotrophic HABs are stimulated by P-enriched urban wastewater pollution, and agriculturally-derived N pollution favors non-N 2 -fixing cyanobacteria. Despite negative effects of the Three Gorges project, free connection to the river appears to help mitigate excess HABs in freely connected lakes. Management thus needs to be tailored appropriately to specific lake conditions and palaeolimnology can be valuable in identifying appropriate strategies. • The middle Yangtze lakes have undergone unprecedented increases in algal production during the Anthropocene. • Diazotrophic HABs are stimulated by P-enriched urban wastewater pollution. • Agriculturally-derived N pollution favors non-N 2 -fixing cyanobacteria. • Hydrological connections of lakes with the main channel mitigated against HABs occurrence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past forty years, Brazilian agriculture has rapidly industrialized elevating the country as the world’s first tropical agricultural giant. Much of the credit for this transformation has gone to the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (Embrapa) for their work in the center-west region of the country. This area, known as the Cerrado, industrialized rapidly starting in the early 1970s with the introduction of chemical fertilizers to fix its acidic soils and the development of new seed varieties adapted to the tropics. This paper historicizes the political and social relations behind the industrial transformation of the Cerrado by focusing on the establishment of Embrapa. I argue that US political relations and corporate interests helped to lay the scientific and institutional groundwork for public research in Brazil to ensure long-term industrialization of the Cerrado. The case of Embrapa, and their work in the Cerrado, expands the geographical, political and economic understanding of the deployment of US scientific experts and expertise during the Green Revolution. I show how US and Brazilian scientists, technocrats and investors collaborated in the making of “the Miracle of the Cerrado” in the post-WWII era. This research is based on interviews conducted at Embrapa headquarters and field research sites in Brazil as well as historical archives in both Brazil and the US. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Concern is expressed in the literature that as agriculture industrializes, regionality is lost; and with it, social, economic and environmental benefits. The example of oats in western Washington provides an opportunity to examine forces driving agricultural evolution during the twentieth century and to reflect on whether and to what degree they reveal changes in the extent and nature of regionality in agriculture over time. Research based on historic literature explores five themes which highlight different ways in which the disappearance of the oat crop from western Washington was associated with the decline of regionality in its agriculture. Whereas regionally grown oats as horse feed were once an important energy source for transport and machinery in western Washington, they have been superseded by fossil fuels following mechanization. Oats were eclipsed in importance as livestock and poultry feed by corn and soy, preferred by a professionalized animal feed production industry and better supported by agricultural policy and research. Regional milling operations for food oats have also given way to industrial scale production in national centers. Increased need for farmers to participate in the monetized economy drove them away from the small grains, whose market value has declined as their commoditization progressed. Lastly, the role of oats as an agronomic tool for weed and disease control was undermined by crop protection chemicals. Oats thus exemplify evolution away from regional self sufficiency and towards greater integration with national and global markets by western Washington farmers. While the process was in part compelled by wider developments in agriculture and industry, it was also self-driven: regional farmers and agriculture sector leaders embraced opportunities to grow cash crops and participate in national and global markets from an early stage of western Washington's agricultural history. In a more recent phase of agricultural evolution, social interest in and consumer demand for local and regional agriculture are growing. This phase represents deliberate choice of regionality in the knowledge that it is neither necessary for farmers nor the cheapest possible option for consumers. Reinvented roles for oats are becoming possible in the present context and demonstrate a new and more purposeful approach to regionality which leverages technology and the market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Changes in the natural environment and agricultural systems induced by economic and industrial development, including population dynamics (growth, urbanization, migration), are major causes resulting in the persistence, emergence and re-emergence of infectious diseases in developing countries. In the face of rapid demographic, economic and social transformations, the People's Republic of China (P.R. China) is undergoing unprecedented environmental and agricultural change. We review emerging and re-emerging diseases such as schistosomiasis, dengue, avian influenza, angiostrongyliasis and soil-transmitted helminthiasis that have occurred in P.R. China due to environmental and agricultural change. This commentary highlights the research priorities and the response strategies, namely mitigation and adaptation, undertaken to eliminate the resurgence of those infectious diseases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Digitalisation is promoted by both private and public actors as a way of contributing to the ecologisation of agriculture. However, this idea remains controversial. The debate is all the more crucial, as different ecologisation models exist, and as agriculture is experiencing new levels of industrialisation. In the literature, use of digital technology in agriculture has mainly been approached from a linear perspective of adoption but is rarely linked to ecologisation. In this paper, we aim to define digital use profiles of farmers and explain how they relate to ecologisation models. We distinguish production and information technologies. Based on 98 interviews with crop farmers in Occitanie (France), we show that there is a diversity of digital profiles. Through a mixed-method, we relate these profiles to a set of variables representing ecological and economic transformation in agriculture. It highlights links between some digital profiles and the further industrialisation of agriculture intertwined with weak or symbolic ecologisation. However, some digital uses associate with new forms of ecologisation that are based on input substitution. Digital use does not appear to support stronger ecologisation of farming. This study highlights the risk of a single model of digitalisation that only promotes one type of ecologisation pathway. • A diversity of digital technology use profiles exists. • Some digital uses are linked to the industrialisation of farming models. • Some digital uses are associated with the industrial development of organic farming. • Digital technology for information helps ecologisation changes already underway. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The ideal of the intensification of agriculture has vanished in developed market economies as the outcomes of conventional production have caused growing environmental problems, in particular in areas with a high concentration of livestock. There is also a growing concern notable about animal welfare issues, accompanied by the belief that agricultural production needs to move away from an conventional agriculture towards one that is loosely defined as ‘alternative’. This paper uses the concept of multifunctionality as a lens for describing and explaining the nature of rural change in Germany. I argue that the case study example of the Oldenburger Münsterland illustrates that multifunctionality rates weakly as agricultural practice in production systems dominated by a conventional food regime and – hence – a transition towards diversity and resilience has to occur within conventional agriculture. In spite of the popularity of the idea that areas of intensive livestock farming might have been gradually transformed into emerging alternative economic spaces, the principle of coexistence between ‘productivist’ and ‘non-productivist’ practices poses major challenges. In particular the scarcity of agricultural land hinders the transition into ‘alternative’ food futures in the Oldenburger Münsterland, while the doubts about conventional agriculture and the industrialized food industry rise in an unprecedented way in German society. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Over the last 20 years, the US dairy industry has experienced a significant transformation from small farm operations to an industrialization of the milking process. This transformation has resulted in improvements in process efficiency and product quality. Milking tasks in large-herd parlors are highly-repetitive involving awkward postures and high muscle loads of the upper extremity. Field-based direct measures of physical exposures have been limited in challenging work settings such as dairies. This study evaluated full-shift exposures of posture and motion of the upper extremity among large-herd parlor milkers using wireless inclinometry. Results suggest large-herd parlor workers may be exposed to high exposure levels (posture, movement velocity, repetition, and inadequate rest) associated with the development of shoulder pathology. Compared to other high-risk occupations involving shoulder-intensive work, parlor workers may have higher exposure levels. These findings warrant the need for continued field-based research with larger sample sizes to facilitate the development of cost-effective intervention strategies. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The history of Korean tidal flat management and the process for designating Coastal Wetland Protected Areas (CWPAs) are described. Korean coastal wetlands have a long history of intensive use through reclamation for agricultural and industrial uses in the 20th century. Recently, the management policy is shifting away from intensive use towards the conservation of wetlands. This shift is caused by increasing public awareness of the value of wetlands and strong institutional support from the government. Since the Wetlands Conservation Act was passed in 1999, a total of twelve CWPAs have been designated through both top-down and bottom-up processes. Three designation paths are classified based on the relevant drivers, namely government-driven designations (seven CWPAs), local community driven designations (three CWPAs), and conflict resolution (trade-offs) driven designation (two CWPAs). The lessons learned from the designation of Korean CWPAs is that diversification of designation process could facilitate voluntary participation of local stakeholders and thereby enhance the chance of successful implementation of wise use strategy of tidal flats. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper examines resource uses on the coast of Jiangsu Province, China. It focuses on mudflat development and describes and evaluates the diverse resource uses, such as agriculture, fisheries, tourism and nature reserves, harbors and industrial development, and the salt and the chemical industry, that are found there. Continuous population growth and economic demands have resulted in conflicts between the multiple uses and mudflat protection. It is suggested that more attention should be paid to utilization efficiency and high value-added mudflat products. A conceptual framework is presented to guide mudflat development and suitable uses for each county are suggested to support local livelihoods and maintain healthy ecological processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The sustained increase in the global food demand has favoured the recent expansion of industrial agriculture into neotropical dry forest ecosystems, with resulting changes in their extent and spatial configuration. Based on Landsat satellite images, we analyzed changes in forest cover and landscape configuration over an area of 600 by 100km located in NW Argentina (Tucumán and Salta provinces) in four periods between 1972 and 2007. The study area, one of the most active deforestation frontiers of South American dry forest, was divided into six relatively homogeneous sectors in terms of land property structure and biophysical characteristics. During the study period 1.4 millions hectares of dry forest were cleared. Deforestation started in the 1970s as a result of technological changes and increasing rainfall; continued (with spatial and temporal fluctuations) during the 1980s and 1990s in association to the sustained global demand of soybean, and was accelerated (to ca. 100,000hayear−1) between 2001 and 2007 following the global increase in commodity prices, and the national peso devaluation. We described the landscape structure using eight landscape indices, summarized as one synthesis value: the Euclidian distance across the seven dimensions from a theoretical non-fragmented situation. In areas with soil limitations deforestation resulted in relatively stable, highly fragmented landscapes. In contrast, the sites with regional coarser-scale limitations (rainfall), deforestation produced a less fragmented landscape where agriculture concentrates in sites with high rainfall. Sites with no limitations for agriculture tend to a largely deforested landscape with few small and poorly connected forest patches. The land properties size seems to influence some indices of fragmentation, but the synthetic index of fragmentation suggests an overall convergence of fragmentation patterns towards a similar configuration across different biophysical and land tenure conditions. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: We test the early anthropogenic hypothesis that greenhouse-gas emissions produced by early agricultural activities in recent millennia kept the climate warmer than its natural level and offset an incipient glaciation. We use versions of the NCAR''s Community Climate System Model to investigate the natural climate that might exist today if CO2 and CH4 concentrations had fallen to their average levels reached during previous interglaciations (while ignoring the effects of aerosol changes). The model is run in a coupled atmosphere–slab ocean configuration with fixed land cover in one experiment and interactive vegetation changes in the other. With lowered greenhouse-gas concentrations, global-mean temperature falls by 2.75K under fixed land cover and by 3.0K with vegetation feedbacks included. Of the total global cooling with fixed land cover, 38% (62%) is attributable to early agricultural activities (industrialization), while early agriculture accounts for approximately half of the expanded permanent snow cover area. The large-scale cooling is amplified in polar regions, where mean-annual temperatures fall by up to 9K and sea-ice area more than doubles in the Southern Hemisphere. In high latitudes, boreal forest is replaced by tundra and tundra by polar desert, causing a higher surface albedo that amplifies regional Arctic cooling by up to 2K annually and 5K during spring. The greenhouse cooling in our simulations triggers widespread glacial inception in the Northern Hemisphere, where permanent snow cover expands by 80% (206%) without (with) vegetation feedbacks. The regional pattern of incipient glaciation is strongly influenced by both vegetation feedbacks and atmospheric circulation changes. While these results are fully consistent with the early anthropogenic hypothesis, further simulations with a dynamical ocean, higher spatial resolution, and other models are still needed to investigate the origin of human influence on global climate. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: One of the main indicators of industrialisation in agriculture has been the increase in farm sizes as farms are amalgamated to form larger, more economically efficient units. While the processes of farm amalgamation are relatively well understood, the processes by which large farms may be dispersed are less well understood. In particular, while multiple succession is relatively common in other European countries, in the UK the Common Law rule of primogeniture has meant that multiple succession as a means of land dispersal has rarely been considered. This study uses a sample of 154 historically large farms in the South East of England and traces multiple succession over the last 40 years, making observations on possible impacts on average farm size and the social processes by which farms are divided. Almost one-third of the farms were found to have divided through multiple succession between 1960 and 1999. While the farms surveyed in this study were large and thus theoretically more likely to be able to divide, there was no substantial evidence to support farm size as a limiting factor, suggesting that multiple succession as a process may be more widespread than previously thought. This has consequences for our current understanding of the concentration of agriculture in the UK. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The industrialisation of agriculture in the second half of the last century has been accompanied by an increase in production of organic wastes. Olive mill wastewater (OMW), a by-product of olive oil processing, is one such waste. It is produced in large quantities in the Mediterranean Region, an area that accounts for 95% of the total olive oil production worldwide. In recent years both physicochemical and biological treatment methods for OMW have been employed. Olive mill sludge (OMS), a by-product of the biological treatment methods, poses a major environmental threat, yet little research has been undertaken in its treatment and recycling. The aim of this study was to investigate the potential of using OMS as an additive for the development of construction materials. An attempt was made to solidify (fixate and stabilise) this sludge with cement, mixed with an improver/additive containing a mixture of natural and synthetic zeolites, alkaline elements, and oxides. The results to date appear to be very promising. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The industrialisation and intensification of agriculture over the last 50 years had a negative impact on landscape diversity and habitat values. During the last two decades, farmers have become increasingly engaged in landscape activities, to maintain or create habitats on their property. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between landscape changes in rural areas and farm characteristics. In addition, the results are used to determine if farms with certain farm characteristics or combinations of characteristics can be related to different patterns of landscape changes. The analysis is based on a case study of the landscape activities carried out by 104 farmers between 1990 and 1995 in two parishes in central Jutland, Denmark. A multivariate analysis, consisting of a multiple correspondence analysis (MCA) and cluster analysis, is used to identify groups of farmers with distinct farm characteristics and landscape activities. The results indicate that 57% of the farms in the study area had engaged in landscape activities. Hedgerow planting and removal, and water point digging and cleaning were the most popular activities in terms of number of farmers involved. The planting of Christmas trees and cultivation of permanent grassland covered the largest area. In total, the activities concerned 125 ha or 1.5% of the study area. A parameter to parameter relationship could be identified between some landscape activities and farm characteristics. In particular, forest removal was closely related to intensive arable production while a range of activities were correlated with “hobby” farm characteristics. The results indicate that a range of motives influence farmers’ landscape activities and that more information is needed to understand and model complex decision-making processes. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

WATER systems around the world are under increasing pressure due to demands from continued industrialisation and urbanisation; growing populations; and increasing pressure on agricultural systems. This is driving the early stages of a revolution in the technologies and business models used in the water industry. Desalination is already part of this mix, but could the technologies'' high demand for energy open up a new market for renewable energy technologies? [Copyright &y& Elsevier]