Merging coverage of two increasingly popular and quickly growing food trends, Organic Production and Use of Alternative Crops provides an overview of the basic principles of organic agriculture and highlights its multifunctionality with special emphasis on the conservation of rare crops and their uses. Considering more than 30 disregarded and negle

The CRC Handbook of Alternative Cash Crops describes 128 crop plants that can be grown as alternatives to cultivated crops, such as tobacco, and narcotic crops, such as opium poppy. Material is presented in alphabetical order by genus and species and includes information on ecology, cultivation, harvesting, economics, and biotic factors. This book will be valuable to AID agents, domestic agricultural extension agents, and soil and crop professionals worldwide.

Cover crops slow erosion, improve soil, smother weeds, enhance nutrient and moisture availability, help control many pests and bring a host of other benefits to your farm. At the same time, they can reduce costs, increase profits and even create new sources of income. You¿ll reap dividends on your cover crop investments for years, since their benefits accumulate over the long term. This book will help you find which ones are right for you. Captures farmer and other research results from the past ten years. The authors verified the info. from the 2nd ed., added new results and updated farmer profiles and research data, and added 2 chap. Includes maps and charts, detailed narratives about individual cover crop species, and chap. about aspects of cover cropping.

This book provides case studies on cultivating alternative crops and presents new cropping systems in many regions of the world. It focusses on new emerging research topics aiming to study all aspects of adaptation under several stresses including agricultural, environmental, biological and socioeconomic issues. The book also provides operational and practical solutions for scientists, producers, technology developers and managers to succeed the cultivation of new alternative crops and, consequently, to achieve food security. Many regions in the world are suffering from water scarcity, soil and water salinization and climate change. These conditions make it difficult to achieve food security by cultivating conventional crops. A renaissance of interest for producing alternative crops under water scarcity and water salinization has been, therefore, implemented primarily among small-scale producers, researchers and academics. The use of alternative crops (quinoa, amaranth, legume crops, halophytes, ...etc.) may provide some environmental benefits such as valorization of salt-affected soils, reduced pesticide application, enhanced soil and water quality and promotion of wildlife diversity. This also may provide some economic benefits such as providing the opportunity for producers to take advantage of new markets and premium prices, spreading the economic risk and strengthening local economies and communities. Furthermore, alternative crops are often rich in proteins and minerals, and even some of them are Gluten free (quinoa). This reflects their importance to achieve food security in quantity and quality scale. The year 2013 was exceptional for alternative crops as it was the international year of quinoa celebrated by Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). This reflects the importance of research conducted on quinoa and other alternative crops in many regions of the world.

Alternative crops and cropping systems have importance in whole agricultural sector. As the name suggests, it is an alternative that can currently represent only a small economic importance. On the other hand, in some areas pose a new progressive direction, which has the potential to expand in the future. The goal was to write a book where as many different existing studies as possible could be presented in a single volume, making it easy for the reader to compare methods, results and conclusions. As a result, studies from countries such as South Africa, Zimbabwe, Poland, The Czech Republic, Mexico and Japan have been compiled into one book. I believe that the opportunity to compare results and conclusions from different countries and continents will create a new perspective in alternative crops and cropping systems. I hope that our book will help researchers and students all over the world to attain new and interesting results in the field of alternative crops and cropping systems.