scholarly journals Reflections on collectively working toward sustainability: indicators for indicators!

2003 ◽  
Vol 43 (3) ◽  
pp. 223 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. M. Freebairn ◽  
C. A. King
Keyword(s):  
Production Efficiency ◽  
Nutrient Balance ◽  
Sustainability Indicators ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Participatory Learning ◽  
Erosion Hazard ◽  
General Overview ◽  
Salinity Hazard ◽  
Indicator Development

A variety of indicators have been developed and applied by farmers and scientists for the northern cereal belt. A general overview is presented of 'What are we trying to monitor?' followed by some example concepts; erosion hazard, salinity hazard, nutrient balance, production efficiency and participatory learning. These examples illustrate the complexity of indicator application and their dependence on context, purpose and scale. Emphasis is given to providing a rationale for developing indicators that focus on 'soft' system status (e.g. behaviour) as well as 'hard' system status. The propositions put forward are that indicators need to be integrated with the development of improved management systems, and that land managers (and community) as a collective, are key to this process. Some frequently asked questions about indicator development and application are responded to. Some 'Indicators for Indicators' that we have found useful in aiding indicator development, particularly in participatory fora are presented.

Milk Production Efficiency as Dependent on the Scale of Production and Cow Management Systems on Dairy Farms

2007 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 50-60 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marek Wroński ◽  
Marek Cichocki ◽  
Katarzyna Borkowska ◽  
Jan Redmer
Keyword(s):  
Milk Production ◽  
Production Efficiency ◽  
Dairy Farms ◽  
Management Systems

Where, and how, do monitoring and sustainability indicators fit into environmental management systems?

2003 ◽  
Vol 43 (3) ◽  
pp. 307 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. Carruthers ◽  
G. Tinning
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Management ◽  
Resource Management ◽  
Farm Management ◽  
Sustainability Indicators ◽  
Iso 14001 ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Environmental Management Systems ◽  
Market Place ◽  
Diverse Range ◽  
Past Experiences

Despite the availability of numerous 'sustainability indicators' (as defined by researchers and resource-management agency staff), many farmers do not routinely use these indicators for monitoring and measurement of their everyday farm management. Farmers' past experiences with such indicators have often been through their use by researchers (trying to evaluate effects of management or quantify resource condition changes) or other external bodies (usually regulatory agencies endeavouring to regulate environmental impacts). Such experiences have added little or nothing to on-farm management. Rather, farmers often rely on a diverse range of personally relevant indicators to assess the performance of their farm business. Such indicators may not be recognised by others as indicative of sustainability. The process used in environmental management systems (EMS) implementation is predicated on the need for information to flow back to the manager to assist their management choices. In this way, the indicators of most use are those that the manager can determine and utilise. This paper describes the connection between environmental management systems, monitoring and indicators, and the importance of these linkages to the efficient and sustainable management of natural resources. It discusses a collaborative project between in New South Wales and Queensland grain farmers, and NSW Agriculture, to develop generic EMS guidelines based on the international standard for EMS, ISO 14001. While there are numerous recommended sustainability indicators, research with these farmers has found that it is more critical to determine which issues are of importance to the farmers and identify potential indicators they will utilise, rather than to recommend a prescribed suite of indicators. In some cases, these indicators may be of a larger-scale than just their property.Different users of resource-management information will require different indicators. The use of the EMS process provides structure and guidance in determining which of the plethora of indicators might be applicable, while allowing farmers to maximise benefits in the market place or the community. Resource-management agencies and customers may require a different suite of indicators. The use of EMS assists in streamlining all these demands, while keeping the focus on the management approaches required to achieve the greatest benefit for the manager.

scholarly journals Changes in land-use and their impact on erosion rates and overland flow generation in the Maghreb region

2005 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 163-180 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. O.A. Coelho ◽  
A. J.D. Ferreira ◽  
A. Laouina ◽  
A.-K. Boulet ◽  
M. Chaker ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
Soil Erosion ◽  
Land Management ◽  
Overland Flow ◽  
Animal Husbandry ◽  
Rainfall Simulation ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Simulation Experiments ◽  
Erosion Hazard ◽  
Erosion Rates

The ongoing intensification of grazing as well as the replacement of traditional land management systems in the Maghreb has brought to the forefront the fundamental role of land-use in determining soil erosion hazard. This paper reports on erosion rates and soil hydrological characteristics of a variety of land uses in Morocco and Tunisia. The results were obtained through rainfall simulation experiments carried out in the field using a portable simulator, following the design of CERDÀ et al. (1997). Traditional land management systems - typically involving a combination of agriculture, animal husbandry and forestry - produced the least amounts of overland flow and the lowest soil erosion rates. Over-exploitation of these systems apparently has only minor hydrological and erosional impacts. Heavily grazed, degraded "maquis" shrublands, on the other hand, produced considerable amounts of overland flow. At the plot scale of the rainfall simulation experiments (0.24 m2), the corresponding sediment loads are rather insignificant. Nevertheless, slopes where "maquis" shrublands (which generally have very compacted soils) occur upslope from more erodible soils may present a major erosion hazard.

scholarly journals Effect of management systems, practices, flock size, and age group on the growth performance of chicks from local chickens’ farmers

2021 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-5
Author(s):  
Kelvin Ngongolo ◽  
Andrew Chota
Keyword(s):  
Growth Performance ◽  
Management System ◽  
Production Efficiency ◽  
Management Practices ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Flock Size ◽  
Local Chicken ◽  
Water Provision ◽  
Local Farmers ◽  
Local Chickens

The improved growth performance of chicks determines the production efficiency of chicken to local chicken farmers. Little has been done to understand the contribution of management systems and practices to the growth performance of chicks from farmers who are involved in rearing local chickens in Dodoma. We focused on assessing how the growth performance of chicks (length and weight) from local chicken farmers is affected by management systems (Free range and semi-intensive systems), management practices such as water provision, supplement feeding, regular cleaning, flock size, and size of banda (hut) used to raise chickens. Data were collected for 8 rounds within 2 months (once per week) from 5 farmers in three wards: Nkuhungu (n=2), Mbwanga (n=2), and Mtube (n=1). In each round, data were collected from 10 chicks per farmer (n=400 chicks for all 8 rounds and 5 farmers). Kruskal Wallis was used to determine the variation in growth performance while generalized linear model was used to assess the effect of flock size, management system on the growth performance of chicks. Growth performance was significantly increased and affected by age (P less than 0.05). The management system significantly contributed to the growth performance of the chicks (P less then 0.001). In addition, the small size of the banda (hut) with large flock size reduced the growth performance of chicks due to increased competition in terms of space, supplements, water supplied, feed provided, and treatment (P less than 0.05). In raising local chicken, local farmers need to be concerned in applying management practices such as supplement feeding, treatment, flock size and size of huts.

scholarly journals Sustainability indicators of the Brazil nut tree management

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-13
Author(s):  
Fernanda Lopes da Fonseca ◽  
Oscar José Rover ◽  
Lucia Helena de Oliveira Wadt ◽  
Cleisa Brasil da Cunha Cartaxo
Keyword(s):  
Fruit Production ◽  
Sustainability Indicators ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Product Management ◽  
Social Dimensions ◽  
Brazil Nut ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
System Sustainability ◽  
Traditional Activity

Brazil nut tree (Bertholletia excelsa Bonpl) management, is a traditional activity that plays a key role in the economy of forestbased Amazon communities and in the conservation of forests. Nevertheless, some threats and critical points related to sustainability indicate to the need for establishment of monitoring procedures that can assist in the management of this natural resource. The overall aim of the research was to evaluate the MESMIS method as a tool to support the participatory definition of sustainability indicators to monitor Brazil nut management, and the viability of Brazil nut harvest over time. For that, we carried out a case study in the Porvir Community, RESEX Chico Mendes, Acre State (Brazil), aiming to integrate the perceptions of Brazil nut harvesters, researchers, managers, and technicians to define the indicators. The result was the generation of 18 strategic indicators to assess sustainability in the environmental, technical-economic and social dimensions. Assessment parameters, representing conditions that must be achieved for system sustainability, were collectively defined for each indicator. The main critical values attributed in the evaluation of the indicators are related to Brazil nut commercialization to intermediaries and oscillation in the annual fruit production. The use of the MESMIS method was considered appropriate to the studied context and can be recommended to similar non-timber forest product management systems.

scholarly journals Effectiveness of strategic management systems for organizational and economic security of agricultural enterprises

2019 ◽  
pp. 94-99
Author(s):  
Rafal Andrzej Lizut
Keyword(s):  
Strategic Management ◽  
Production Efficiency ◽  
High Sensitivity ◽  
Economic Security ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Impact Factors ◽  
Agricultural Enterprises ◽  
Methodological Problems ◽  
Enterprise Security ◽  
Market Relations

The article deals with the constituents and components of the strategic management systems for the organizational and economic security of agricultural enterprises, as well as outlines the main factors influencing the improvement of their functioning in different conditions. It is proved that in the current conditions of market relations development, more attention is paid to the components of organizational and economic security along with situational problems of political, social, economic and legal nature. The necessity of forming a reasonable set of indicators and indexes for assessing and analyzing the effectiveness of organizational and economic security of agrarian enterprises is determined, which depends on the assessment of the real security situation of agribusiness entities, determining their level of management and monitoring capabilities. It is identified that there are some drawbacks in the development in the existing universal formalized approach to the analysis of organizational and economic security of agribusiness entities, and there is no corresponding system with a clearly defined list of quantitative indicators and indexes. At the same time, it is proved that there are certain methodological problems of analyzing its state and forecasting the dynamics of its level of development for the future. Therefore, the study proposes to use indicators that will determine the existing real enterprise data changes in the level of organizational and economic security, which is manifested through indicators (financial sustainability, profitability of production, efficiency, competitiveness of products, market share, etc.). As a result, the indicators will have certain properties. First, they will form a system in which they interact and perform their indicative function only under this condition. Secondly, they will have high sensitivity and are signals of threats arising from changes in the organizational and economic situation in agribusinesses. Third, they will be clearly formalized, will reflect threats and challenges in quantitative form. Keywords: enterprise security, organizational and economic security, system of safety indicators, impact factors, performance indicators, agribusiness, enterprise.

scholarly journals Integrated Management System and Corporate Risk Management

TEM Journal ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 1686-1693
Author(s):  
Naqib Daneshjo ◽  
Peter Malega ◽  
Jakub Kóňa ◽  
Barbara Barilová
Keyword(s):  
Production Efficiency ◽  
Business Processes ◽  
Integrated Management ◽  
Integrated System ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Increase Production Efficiency ◽  
Corporate Risk Management ◽  
Main Motive ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Integration Of Management Systems

The main motive for the integration of management systems should be to increase production efficiency by reducing losses due to overlapping resources of individual management systems running in parallel. In addition, by integrating, organisations can ensure the definition of unambiguous responsibilities and prevent problems at process interfaces as well as conflicting goals of individual management systems. The integration of management systems into one comprehensive and the implementation of an integrated system into the overall management of the organization would help to more effectively manage the risks associated with their business processes, resources and thus ensure prevention of these risks.

Technical Issues in Implementing ERP Systems

2011 ◽  
pp. 105-137
Author(s):  
Chetan Sankar ◽  
Karl-Heinz Rau
Keyword(s):  
Relational Database ◽  
Database Management ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Erp Systems ◽  
General Overview ◽  
Single Instance ◽  
Technical Issues ◽  
Relational Database Management ◽  
Relational Database Management Systems ◽  
Technical Terms

• Understand the fundamentals of relational database management systems • Be able to define technical terms such as single instance and normalization • Be aware of how database considerations impact ERP implementations • Have a general overview of the technical issues in implementing ERP systems • Become familiar with implementation issues and strategies for ERP systems

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