Enhancing Mango Productivity through Sustainable Resource Management

With agricultural demands increasing globally, determining the nature of impacts of different forms of agriculture on biodiversity, especially for threatened vertebrates and habitats, is critical to inform land management. We determined the impacts of converting rock outcrops (a habitat more threatened than rainforests) to orchards and paddy on anurans in the Western Ghats biodiversity hotspot. We sampled 50 belt transects four times across four sites during the rainy season and recorded information on amphibians and their microhabitats. We determined community-level responses using Hill numbers, beta-diversity measures, and non-metric multidimensional scaling, and species-level responses using joint species distribution modelling. Converting rock outcrops to paddy and orchards significantly altered microhabitat availability. Conversion to paddy mostly had community-level impacts, i.e., lowered species richness and more nested communities, whereas conversion to orchards mostly had species-level impacts, i.e., lowered species occurrence, highlighting the differential impacts of different forms of agriculture on amphibians and the need to determine impacts of land-use change on communities and species concurrently. We show that large rock pools are critical microhabitats for anurans as they serve as a refuge and protect anurans from desiccation during dry spells, which may be prolonged by climate change. Since rock outcrop habitats in low elevations are rapidly being converted to orchards, efforts are needed to conserve them in partnership with local communities, the custodians of these habitats. Our findings demonstrate that different forms of agriculture can have divergent impacts on biodiversity, and determining their impacts may require assessments at multiple scales, from species to communities.HIGHLIGHTSOrchard and paddy conversions affect anurans and their microhabitats on rock outcropsConversion to paddy has community-level impacts, i.e., reduced diversityConversion to orchards has species-level impacts, i.e., lowered species occurrenceRock pools, an important habitat for outcrop anurans, must be preserved or createdThere is a need to study species-and community-level impacts simultaneously

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Understanding the Perception of Mango (Mangifera indica) Farmers on the Impact of Climate Change on Mango Farming in Nigeria

Ogunbode,

Esan,

Ayegboyin

et al. 2024

International Journal of Agronomy

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Climate change (CC) scenario is already acknowledged as one of those environmental challenges that threaten every facet of life including mango farming. This study was designed to investigate into mango farmers’ perception of the impacts of climate change (CC) on mango farming. A structured questionnaire was administered among 480 mango farmers across six of the states where mango farming is carried out in Nigeria. Both descriptive and inferential statistical methods were applied in the analysis of the data. From the 418 completed and returned questionnaires analysed, it was found that the male gender dominated the respondents in the survey with a proportion of 68% while 61% use pesticides to control pests and 35% own between 1 and 3 acres of mango farmland. The data were subjected to KMO and Bartlett’s tests, the results of which showed that the data are factorable with p≤0.05. Factor analysis (FA) extracted six (6) out of the fourteen (14) variables analysed which were significant to explain the perceptions of the farmers on the impact of CC on mango farming, namely: (i) change in the volume of mango production; (ii) effect of high temperature; (iii) prolonged dry season; (iv) rainfall pattern; (v) incidence of flooding; and (vi) poor performance of mango seedlings. Further analysis showed the prominence of issues relating to climate change. The implication of these results is that mango farming is also being threatened by CC. Hence, it calls for urgent mitigation actions to salvage this subsector. Farmers need to be adequately supported by stakeholders in their efforts to adapt to the ravaging effects of CC on mango farming through relevant policies and programmes. The work also recommended further investigation on the efficacy of the adaptive methods on mango yields.

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Enhancing Mango Productivity through Sustainable Resource Management

Cited by 4 publications

References 28 publications

Spectroscopy-based chemometrics combined machine learning modeling predicts cashew foliar macro- and micronutrients

Spectroscopy-based chemometrics combined machine learning modeling predicts cashew foliar macro- and micronutrients

Orchards and paddy differentially impact rock outcrop amphibians: Insights from community- and species-level responses

Understanding the Perception of Mango (Mangifera indica) Farmers on the Impact of Climate Change on Mango Farming in Nigeria

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