Anchote (Coccinia abyssinica) is an indigenous tuber crop of the Ethiopian Highlands. It is popular in the western Oromia Region of the country. Apart from food, the crop is also used in traditional medicine. Anchote tubers possess two variations in its tissue colour, red and white. In this study, a small market survey and a nutritional comparison of red and white anchote were conducted. White tissue anchote seems to be more popular, due to its soft texture and ease of cooking. However, the red variant was considered ...

Sea buckthorn (Hippophae rhamnoides L.) is a dioecious, wind-pollinated shrub growing in Eurasia including the Karakoram Mountains of Pakistan (Gilgit-Baltistan territory). Contrary to the situation in other countries, in Pakistan this species is heavily underutilized. Moreover, a striking diversity of berry colors and shapes in Pakistan raises the question: which varieties might be more suitable for different national and international markets? Therefore, both morphological and genetic diversity of sea buckthorn ...

3D point cloud analysis of imagery collected by unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) has been shown to be a valuable tool for estimation of crop phenotypic traits, such as plant height, in several species. Spatial information about these phenotypic traits can be used to derive information about other important crop characteristics, like fresh biomass yield, which could not be derived directly from the point clouds. Previous approaches have often only considered single date measurements using a single point cloud derived ...

Various research fields, like organic agricultural research, are dedicated to solving real-world problems and contributing to sustainable development. Therefore, systems research and the application of interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary approaches are increasingly endorsed. However, research performance depends not only on self-conception, but also on framework conditions of the scientific system, which are not always of benefit to such research fields. Recently, science and its framework conditions have been ...

Sports fields provide a recreation space for citizens, but also generate grass biomass, which is cut weekly during the main seasons and therefore could be used in energy generation (combustion or anaerobic digestion). To evaluate the technical suitability of the grass cuttings, silage was produced from four sports fields during one vegetation period and investigated for relevant properties. Potential methane yield was determined with batch tests. Mean methane yield was 291.86 lN·kg−1 VSadded (VS, volatile solid). ...

An accurate estimation of biomass is needed to understand the spatio-temporal changes of forage resources in pasture ecosystems and to support grazing management decisions. A timely evaluation of biomass is challenging, as it requires efficient means such as technical sensing methods to assess numerous data and create continuous maps. In order to calibrate ultrasonic and spectral sensors, a field experiment with heterogeneous pastures continuously stocked by cows at three grazing intensities was conducted. Sensor ...

Insect specimens of adult beetles and larvae of 7–9 and 9–10 mm length, respectively were collected from infested dry cassava at two locations from multiple stores in southern Ethiopia. The specimens were identified as Heterobostrychus brunneus (Murray, 1867) commonly known as boxwood borer and auger beetle. The study presents a current record of H. brunneus in Ethiopia, particularly in the context of infesting food products. Additionally, a wide geographical distribution of the pest was reviewed and presented in ...

Vast amounts of leaf litter have to be disposed of by city administrations. This biomass has the potential for energy conversion, but contamination with pollutants can adversely affect this usage. We investigated leaf litter samples from the city of Kassel by analyzing their heavy metal and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) concentrations. Leaf samples were indeed contaminated with heavy metals and PAHs and contamination was influenced by provenience and collection technique. A simple cleaning system of washing ...

Increasing food production to feed its rapidly growing population is a major policy goal of Pakistan. The production of traditional staples such as rice (Oryza sativa L.) and bread wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) has been intensified in many regions, but not in remote, drought-ridden areas. In these arid, marginal environments dates and their by-products are an option to complement staples given their high nutritive value and storability. To fill knowledge gaps about the role of date palm in the household (HH) ...

Urbanisation is a global trend rapidly transforming the biophysical and socioeconomic structures of metropolitan areas. To better understand (and perhaps control) these processes, more interdisciplinary research must be dedicated to the rural–urban interface. This also calls for a common reference system describing intermediate stages along a rural–urban gradient. The present paper constructs a simple index of urbanisation for villages in the Greater Bangalore Area, using GIS analysis of satellite images, and combining ...