This handbook of locally based agricultural practices brings together the best of science and farmer experimentation, vividly illustrating the enormous diversity of shifting cultivation systems as well as the power of human ingenuity. Environmentalists have tended to disparage shifting cultivation (sometimes called 'swidden cultivation' or 'slash-and-burn agriculture') as unsustainable due to its supposed role in deforestation and land degradation. However, a growing body of evidence indicates that such indigenous practices, as they have evolved over time, can be highly adaptive to land and ecology. In contrast, 'scientific' agricultural solutions imposed from outside can be far more damaging to the environment. Moreover, these external solutions often fail to recognize the extent to which an agricultural system supports a way of life along with a society's food needs. They do not recognize the degree to which the sustainability of a culture is intimately associated with the sustainability and continuity of its agricultural system. Unprecedented in ambition and scope, Voices from the Forest focuses on successful agricultural strategies of upland farmers. More than 100 scholars from 19 countries--including agricultural economists, ecologists, and anthropologists--collaborated in the analysis of different fallow management typologies, working in conjunction with hundreds of indigenous farmers of different cultures and a broad range of climates, crops, and soil conditions. By sharing this knowledge--and combining it with new scientific and technical advances--the authors hope to make indigenous practices and experience more widely accessible and better understood, not only by researchers and development practitioners, but by other communities of farmers around the world.

This volume contains a glossary on terms and terminologies used in the rattan sector. The glossary is structured according to the following major sections: rattan resources (biology, management, plantations, harvesting); rattan as a raw material (transport, storage, grading and post-harvest handling, rattan trade); rattan processing (for local artisanal uses; for industrial level furniture manufacturing); and rattan trade in raw, furniture and other products. In order to give special emphasis to the emerging rattan sector in Africa, a separate compilation of terms specifically focusing on those used in Africa is added.

The Industrial Revolution 4.0 will not only cause job losses, but will also create new workspaces that may not exist today. It also needs to be considered by accountants in government because the processes of budget planning, budget execution, and financial reporting have used a large number of information systems. In the era of the Industrial Revolution 4.0, the changes will be faster, marked by the emergence of such systems as supercomputers, smart robots, cloud computing, big data systems, genetic engineering and the development of neurotechnology that allows humans to optimize brain function further. Industrial Revolution 4.0 will disrupt the accounting profession. This proceedings provides selected papers/research on government accounting, accountability and integrity public sector accounting, financial accounting, accounting information system, auditing and assurance, corporate sustainability, forensic and management accounting, public and corporate finance, taxation and customs, open innovation in public sector accounting. The proceedings provide details beyond what is possible to be included in an oral presentation and constitute a concise but timely medium for the dissemination of recent research results. It will be invaluable to professionals and academics in the field of accounting, finance and the public sector to get an understanding of recent research.

Agroforestry in Sustainable Agricultural Systems examines the environmental and social conditions that affect the roles and performance of trees in field- and forest-based agricultural production systems. Various types of ecological settings for agroforestry are analyzed within temperate and tropical regions. The roles of soil, water, light, nutrient and pest management in mixed, annual, woody perennial and livestock systems are discussed. Important new case studies from around the world offer innovative strategies that have been used successfully in raising forests and tree products on a sustainable basis for commercial harvesting and for providing other environmental services in land conservation and watershed management.

Examining the development of alternative crops, this volume covers topics which include genetic engineering and tissue culture techniques, and marketing potential utility of new crops.