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Special Issue "Renewable Agriculture" Quicklinks Special Issue Editors Published Papers Special Issue Information Keywords Planned Papers A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 October 2009) Special Issue Editor Guest Editor Dr. Stephen S. Jones Director, Northwestern Research and Extension Center, Washington State University, Mount Vernon, Washington 98273, USA E-Mail: joness@wsu.edu Published Papers Click here to see a list of 19 papers that have been published in this special issue. Special Issue Information Dear Colleagues, For centuries the perceived need for an immediate and dramatic increase in agricultural production has been a theme throughout the developed world. But only very recently, and with less urgency, has society recognized the need for the true sustainability of agricultural production. For long-term sustainability, agriculture must have the capacity for renewal. Even the most basic forms of agriculture require an input of energy, this in essence is what defines the system as agricultural. Starting with human and animal labor, energy inputs have developed into an industrial system using fertilizers, water, seed, pest control, and other products often brought in from off the farm. While these products may increase production, for the most part they are non-renewable, require vast amounts of fuel to produce and transport, are costly, and may harm the native organisms and environment. Additionally, most seed in industrial agriculture is non-renewable due to legal and genetic mechanisms that make it problematic for farmers to save and replant what they have grown on their farms. Is a renewable agriculture with a high level of productivity possible? What research is underway to test the robustness of current systems when measured against a standard of true long-term sustainability? Stephen S. Jones, Ph. D. Guest Editor   Submission Information All papers should be submitted to

Search About CSDi CSDi is firmly committed to proven, results-based solutions to end suffering and poverty. Our goal is to spread these solutions across the globe through our in-depth field guides and interactive online workshops. Work with us and become the solution. We've trained development professionals... in 103 countries who have developed course projects... impacting over 100,000 people. ~ What our students are saying: I really appreciate the time you have taken to go through correcting assignments.... I am very confident that all your labours are producing lots of learning and stimulation for your students. MATT, IRELAND Facebook Like Box Upcoming Courses ¡Cursos Nuevos en Español! May 17 - July 11 101: From the Ground Up May 17 - July 11 341: Community Based Adaptation to Climate Change May 17 - July 11 Adaptación Basado en la Comunidad-CBA May 17 - July 11 Upcoming Online Development Courses May 2011 Community Based Adaptation: 300 Hands-On Field Activities Donate CSDi, a 501c3, relies on your generous donations for our work, training individuals to be the solution in communities across the globe. News Newsletter: March Newsletter: Project Sustainability: Put the Community in Charge. Field Project of the Month: Rainwater Harvesting: Mexico City Google Translate Translate This Website Powered by Google Tradutor iLearning Experience Student Testimonials International Partnerships Learning Environment Student Field Projects Example Assignment: Kenya Student Countries, Organizations, Project Challenges HANDS-ON FIELD ACTIVITIES FOR COMMUNITY-BASED ADAPTATION Module OL 340: Community-Based Adaptation to Climate Change Posted by Tim Magee CSDi is pleased to present a compilation of Community Based Adaptation Field Activities-complete with links to source materials and technical information-compiled from case studies & from projects developed by CSDi field partners & online students. We encourage you to submit activities: Onl

Tragedy of the Commons by Garrett Hardin About the Author Search CEE Home | CEE | 2nd edition | Tragedy of the Commons In 1974 the general public got a graphic illustration of the "tragedy of the commons" in satellite photos of the earth. Pictures of northern Africa showed an irregular dark patch 390 square miles in area. Ground-level investigation revealed a fenced area inside of which there was plenty of grass. Outside, the ground cover had been devastated. The explanation was simple. The fenced area was private property, subdivided into five portions. Each year the owners moved their animals to a new section. Fallow periods of four years gave the pastures time to recover from the grazing. The owners did this because they had an incentive to take care of their land. But no one owned the land outside the ranch. It was open to nomads and their herds. Though knowing nothing of Karl Marx, the herdsmen followed his famous advice of 1875: "To each according to his needs." Their needs were uncontrolled and grew with the increase in the number of animals. But supply was governed by nature and decreased drastically during the drought of the early 1970s. The herds exceeded the natural "carrying capacity" of their environment, soil was compacted and eroded, and "weedy" plants, unfit for cattle consumption, replaced good plants. Many cattle died, and so did humans. The rational explanation for such ruin was given more than 170 years ago. In 1832 William Forster Lloyd, a political economist at Oxford University, looking at the recurring devastation of common (i.e., not privately owned) pastures in England, asked: "Why are the cattle on a common so puny and stunted? Why is the common itself so bare-worn, and cropped so differently from the adjoining inclosures?" Lloyd's answer assumed that each human exploiter of the common was guided by self-interest. At the point when the carrying capacity of the commons was fully reached, a herdsman might ask himsel

Abstracts for papers and proposals for sessions (no more than 500 words) will be considered by the conference Scientific Committee. For sessions an overview and 3-4 abstracts should be proposed, and a session chair identified. Both, paper abstracts and session proposals should be submitted to it-apn2010@ivm.vu.nl by 15 October 2010. The conference Scientific Committee will provide decisions on selected papers and sessions by the 30 October 2010. Those invited to present will be asked to provide short papers by 15 December 2010. These will be made available on the conference website: http://umconference.um.edu.my/it-apn2011 prior to the meeting. Authors of accepted papers will be invited to make 15 minute presentations at the conference. Guidelines for Fullpaper Submission The full papers should be up to 8000 words and include title, authors names and affiliations incl. address, telephone and email, abstract, main text and references. Pls number your pages. Figures and tables should be part of the text and not a separate file. We do not define font, spacing or format - just be reasonable by avoiding extremes. The full papers should rather be submitted as pdfs for better protection but of course word files will also be accepted. Papers Accepted for Presentation 012 The development of biofuel in Indonesia from diffusion and stakeholder interactions - Joni Jupesta   014 Niche management policy to increase the market share of Alternative Fuel Vehicles : A system dynamics model of the policy effect - Tae-Hyeong Kwon   015 Enhancing Sustained Adoption of Innovations: The Case of Bio-nitrogen Fertilizer in the Philippines - Linda Penalba   016 Enabling poverty relevant bio-fertilizer bio-innovation systems - lessons from India - Sunita Sungar   017 Ethical Market: Ethnographic Encounter with Global Market, CML patients, and Glivec in South Korea - Eun Jeong Ma   018 Surge of high-input vegetable production in northern Thailand: Is the innovation pro-poor and gende

Modern societies face several structural problems such as transport congestion and greenhouse gas emissions due to the widespread use of fossil fuels. To address these important societal problems and achieve sustainability in the broad sense, major transformations are required, but this poses an enormous challenge given the complexity of the processes involved. Such transformations are called 'transitions' or 'system innovations' and involve changes in a variety of elements, including technology, regulation, user practices and markets, cultural meaning and infrastructure. This book considers two main questions: how do system innovations or transitions come about and how can they be influenced by different actors, in particular by governments. The authors identify the theories which can be used to conceptualise the dynamics of system innovations and discuss the weaknesses in these theories. They also look at the lessons which can be learned from historical examples of transitions, and highlight the instruments and policy tools which can be used to stimulate future system innovations towards sustainability. The expert contributors address these questions using insights from a variety of different disciplines including innovation studies, evolutionary economics, the sociology of technology, environmental analysis and governance studies. The book concludes with an extensive summary of the results and practical suggestions for future research. This important new volume offers an interdisciplinary assessment of how and why system innovations occur. It will engage and inform academics and researchers interested in transitions towards sustainability, and will also be highly relevant for policymakers concerned with environmental issues, structural change and radical innovation.

Food fears: from industrial to sustainable food systems Alison Blay-Palmer 0 Resenhas Ashgate Publishing, Ltd., 2008 - 185 páginas The industrial food system of the West is increasingly perceived as problematic. The physical, social and intellectual distance between consumers and their food stems from a food system that privileges quantity and efficiency over quality, with an underlying assumption that food is a commodity, rather than a source of nourishment and pleasure.In the wake of various food and health scares, there is a growing demand from consumers to change the food they eat, which in turn acts as a catalyst for the industry to adapt and for alternative systems to evolve. Drawing on a wealth of empirical research into mainstream and alternative North American food systems, this book argues that sustainable, grass roots, local food systems offer a template for meaningful individual activism as a way to bring about change from the bottom up, while at the same time creating pressure for policy changes at all levels of government. This movement signals a shift away from market economy principles and reflects a desire to embody social and ecological values as the foundation for future growth.

Call for Abstracts The Management of the Guarani Aquifer System: An Example of Cooperation 21-23 September 2011, São Paulo Deadline for Abstracts: 30 April 2011 -------------------------------------------------------------------- In August 2010 Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay, countries that share the Guarani Aquifer System (GAS), signed a new agreement for the management of this complex system. The four countries are now involved in the ratification process and in the negotiations of instititutional aspects, including discussions regarding an annex to the Agreement on arbitration procedures.  Against this background, the management of the GAS can benefit from a debate about the steps that have been taken until now, and about the challenges that lay ahead. The conference "The Management of the Guarani Aquifer System: An Example of Cooperation" provides this opportunity and the organisers invite researchers, consultants and water management experts to submit an abstract for one of the three sessions of the conference: (1)  An assessment of the scientific knowledge on the GAS (2) Current use and protection of the Guarani Aquifer System (3) The GAS and regional cooperation The conference contributes to the UNESCO ISARM (Internationally Shared Aquifers Resource Management) Programme (http://www.isarm.net/) Initiative and is supported by the Associacao Brasileira de Aguas Subterraneas, the Associacao Brasilerira de Recursos Hidricos, the Sociedade Brasileira de Geologia de Engenharia and the Sociedade Brasileira de Geologia. Organising Committee: Ricardo Hirata, Centro de Pesquisas de Água Subterrânea - Instituto de Geociências da Universidade de São Paulo (CEPAS - IGc/USP)Geroncio Rocha, Secretaria do Meio Ambiente do Estado de São PauloFrancesco Sindico, University of Surrey, Guildford, United Kingdom For further information on the conference, including how to submit an abstract, please see http://www.igc.usp.br/index.php?id=446 or refer to the

Following up on recent debates about sectoral systems of innovation and production, the paper introduces a heuristic framework for analyzing and explaining distinct patterns of technology-based sectoral change. The concept is based on two interrelated influencing factors. The first is the sectoral-specific transformative capacity of new technologies themselves, that is, their substantial or incremental impact on socioeconomic and institutional change in a given sectoral system. The second is the sectoral adaptability of socioeconomic structures, institutions, and actors confronted with the opportunities presented by new technologies. The first factor-the sectoral transformative capacity of new technologies-enables us to identify the technology-based pressure to change and adjust the structural, institutional, and organizational architectures of the sectoral system. The second, complementary factor-sectoral adaptability-helps us to discern the distinct social patterns of anticipating and adopting this technology-based pressure. The specific interplay between the two influencing factors creates distinguishable modes of sectoral transformation, ranging from anticipative and smooth adjustments to reactive and crisis-ridden patterns of change. Even processes of radical sectoral change continue over longer periods of mismatch and are characterized by numerous and mostly gradual organizational, structural and institutional transformations. Article Outline 1. Technology-based socioeconomic and institutional change: starting points 2. Sociotechnical systems and periods of mismatch 3. New technologies and their transformative capacity 3.1. Specification I: endogenous vs. exogenous technology 3.2. Specification II: low vs. high transformative capacity 4. New technologies and sectoral adaptability 4.1. Specification I: low adaptability 4.2. Specification II: high adaptability 4.2.1. High intensity of innovation and market competition 4.2.2. Transformation-supporting in

Over the past decade there has been a dramatic increase in the quantity and quality of research focused on the processes through which technological capabilities are acquired by countries significantly behind the economic frontier, and the institutions that effectively support the catching up process. This book is a splendid contribution to this literature. The concept of a "sectoral innovation system" is well suited for framing studies of these kinds of questions, and serves well to unify the many interesting empirical studies in the book. Some of those studies are success stories, others of less successful cases. Readers new to this body of research will find this book a great introduction. All readers will learn a lot from it about what is required for and involved in economic development.' Richard R. Nelson, Columbia Earth Institute, US and University of Manchester, UK This book examines in detail the features and dynamics of sectoral systems of innovation and production in developing countries. Processes of rapid growth are usually associated with specific sectors such as automobiles, electronics or software, as well as with the transformation of traditional sectors such as agriculture and food. The book shows, however, that the variations across all these sectors in terms of structure and dynamics is so great that a full understanding of these differences is necessary if innovation is to be encouraged and growth sustained. The expert contributors promote this understanding by drawing upon empirical evidence from a wide range of sectoral systems, from traditional to high technology, and across a number of countries. They explore how these systems change and evolve, highlighting policy lessons to be drawn from the analysis. Case studies include the Brazilian aeronautical, pulp and paper industries, the Korean machine tool sector, motorbike manufacture in Thailand and Vietnam, pharmaceuticals and telecommunication equipment in India, ICT in Taiwan, the biofuels s

Globalization and Markets GLOBALIZATION AND MARKETS Background Research Program Major Projects Research Tools Donors Collaborators Contact Us LATEST PUBLICATIONS Discussion Papers April 2010 Rethinking the global food crisis Discussion Papers January 2010 Is SAFTA trade creating or trade diverting? December 2009 Foreign exchange rationing, wheat markets and food security in Ethiopia PREVNEXT DIVISION Markets, Trade and Institutions RESEARCH AREAS Doha Round IFPRI PROJECTS BY COUNTRY AND BENEFICIARY Source: flickr (Curt Carnemark / World Bank) Seaport at Sunrise. China, The overall objective of the globalization and markets research program is to support the adoption of policies for more efficient functioning of the global food, nutrition, and agricultural system. A better-functioning global system will enhance inclusion of low income countries and improve food and nutrition security of poor people. The research program emphasizes issues of global agricultural trade negotiations; regional trade; linkages between globalization and domestic policies as they affect resource allocations and poverty alleviation; the impact of developed-country policies on developing-country food security; and pro-poor policies along the entire food chain, given the growing importance of consumers and retail industries as food system drivers. The historical consequences of trade liberalization are becoming increasingly important in less developed countries. A better understanding of this is critical for further reforms in the domestic and global trading system.

Role of institutions in rural policies and agricultural markets / edited by Guido van Huylenbroeck, Wim Verbeke, Ludwig Lauwers, Volume 2003 European Association of Agricultural Economists. Seminar, Guido van Huylenbroeck, Wim Verbeke, Ludwig Lauwers 0 Resenhas Emerald Group Publishing, 2004 - 461 páginas The agri-food sector is continuously confronted with major challenges. It is a complex sector in the economy because of its important societal implications and embeddedness within a broader rural system. Furthermore, the agricultural sector is a multi-agent sector with a complex chain of inputs, intermediates, outputs and markets that are highly regulated. Multi-agency and strong government regulation result in a complex institutional system. The aim of this book is to bring a selected state-of-the-art of the conceptual and empirical New Institutional Economics-inspired research by European agricultural economists. Besides the social environment, the two main components of the institutional environment are policies and markets. The title of this book tries to capture the main subjects. For a farmer, as an economic producing actor and social agent, his environment comprises of politics, markets and rurality, of which the first is seeking to get more ordering in the two others. Furthermore, the term rural in the title tries to capture, both in policies and markets, the usual agricultural activities as well as the new ones which are more oriented to the rural social system. This book focuses on the three main areas of interest in institutions: policy implementation, market and supply chain organisation and management of rural resources and rural systems. The chapters are covering insights on the significance of institutions on transaction costs, policy analysis, policy reform, market and chain dynamics, input markets, agri-environmental policies, social capital and bottom-up approaches.

This book explores the economic impact of supermarkets on food supply chains in developing countries, with particular emphasis on the generation/displacement of employment, the (re)-distribution of benefits along the food chain and the role of government is attracting, facilitating and regulating the growth of supermarkets in South America, Africa and Asia. Aimed primarily at academics but will appeal to practitioners in developing countries, civil servants, policy-makers and NGOs. The internationalization of food retailing and manufacturing that has swept through the agri-food system in industrialised countries is now moving into middle- and low-income countries with large rural populations, causing significant institutional changes that affect small producer agriculture and the livelihoods of rural communities the world over. Farmers and policy-makers are struggling to keep up with the wave of new demands being made on their supply chains by food manufacturers and retailers. In the process, new questions and challenges are arising: Can small-scale farmers organize to meet the demands of corporate giants? Should governments liberalize Foreign Direct Investment in the retail sector and expose numerous small shops to competition from multinationals? Can distribution systems be adapted to make markets work better for the poor? This book offers a contemporary look at what happens when the modernisation of food supply chains comes face to face with the livelihoods of rural and poor people. The authors are drawn from eighteen countries participating in the 'Regoverning Markets' programme, which aims to not only improve our understanding of the way modernization and re-structuring of food supply chains is affecting food production and distribution systems, but also identify best-practice in involving small-scale producers in supermarket supply chains, and ascertain the barriers to inclusion which need to be removed. Contents: Part One The Economic and Policy Context: The

rom regional systems of innovation to regions as innovation policy spaces Elvira Uyarra, Kieron Flanagan Received 7 April 2009; in revised form 14 January 2010 Abstract. The regional systems of innovation concept is well established in academic and practitioner discourses about innovation and economic development. As with the innovation systems approach more generally, the use of the concept has expanded significantly from its initial analytical purpose and has been extensively used to inform policy making. We identify a number of dangers associated with the use of regional systems of innovation as a normative concept which both overstates and at the same time underemphasises the roles regions play as policy-making and implementation spaces. These issues are explored in the paper with an illustration of the North West region of England

The International Breeder's Rights System and Crop Plant Innovation John H. Barton 1 1 Professor of law at Stanford Law School, Stanford, California 94305 Legal arrangements governing a plant breeder's intellectual property rights to his inventions are likely to affect the future of crop research. Such systems, although controversial, are probably currently desirable for the developed world. The new genetic technologies may change this judgment, and certainly require redefinition of the lines between plant patents and regular patents. Several safeguards, present in the United States breeder's rights law, should be applied more broadly. A new safeguard-of ensuring that material be entered into germplasm banks-should be applied everywhere. For the developing world, the desirability of a plant patent system is much less clear; new agreements may be desirable to ensure the free flow and collection of germplasm.

Private-Public Interactions in Agrobiotechnology: Appropriate Roles and Rules of Conduct The Agricultural Knowledge System: Appropriate Roles and Interactions for the Public and Private Sectors N. Kalaitzandonakes Public/Private Alliances G. Rausser Are Research Alliances between State Agricultural Experiment Stations Incompatible with the Original Purpose of these Institutions? D.A. Holt & J.B. Bullock Partnerships between Public and Private: The Experience of the Cooperative Research Center for Plant Science in Australia C. Buller & W. Taylor The Changing Agricultural Research Environment: What Does it Mean for Public-Private Innovation? C. Klotz-Ingram & K. Day-Rubenstein Exploring the Public's Role in Agricultural Biotechnology Research S. Sonka & S. Pueppke Public Science, Biotechnology, and the Industrial Organization of Agrofood Systems S. Wolf & D. Zilberman Balancing Basic, Genetic Enhancement and Cultivar Development Research in an Evolving US Plant Germplasm System G. Traxler Public and Private Collaboration on Plant Biotechnology in China C.E. Pray Biotechnology and Agriculture: A Skeptical Perspective V.W. Ruttan

Geoffrey M. Hodgson and Thorbjørn Knudsen answer a few questions about this month's new hot paper in the field of Economics & Business. From *>>January 2008 Field: Economics & Business Article Title: Why we need a generalized Darwinism, and why generalized Darwinism is not enough Authors: Hodgson, GM;Knudsen, T Journal: J ECON BEHAV ORGAN Volume: 61 Issue: 1 Page: 1-19 Year: SEP 2006 * Malting House,1 Burton End, Wickham CB1 6SD, Cambs, England. * Univ Hertfordshire, Sch Business, Hatfield AL10 9AB, Herts, England. * Univ So Denmark, Dept Mkt, DK-5230 Odense M, Denmark.   Why do you think your paper is highly cited? "This paper argues that there exists no alternative to the core Darwinian principles of variation, selection, and inheritance to explain the evolution of such systems.." There is now a large and growing interest in the relevance of core Darwinian principles for the analysis of social and economic evolution.   Does it describe a new discovery, methodology, or synthesis of knowledge? The novelty in the paper lies in its use of recent work in evolutionary theory and the philosophy of science to clarify and apply core Darwinian evolutionary ideas.   Would you summarize the significance of your paper in layman's terms? It is a foremost and up-to-date account of why Darwinian principles are relevant for the social as well as the natural sciences. This paper argues that there exists no alternative to the core Darwinian principles of variation, selection, and inheritance to explain the evolution of such systems. Neither the actual existence of human intentionality nor the hypothetical possibility of Lamarckian acquired character inheritance offers a barrier to the use of Darwinian principles. On the contrary, Darwinism is always required to complete the explanation. However, while Darwinian principles are always necessary to explain complex evolving population systems they are never sufficient on their own.   How did you bec

THE ECONOMICS OF INNOVATION AND PRODUCTIVITY This research focuses on the development of an integrated framework for understanding the dynamics of the generation, dissemination and exploitation of technological knowledge and its effects on the growth of companies, regions and countries. It involves the use of different methodological designs, ranging from network analysis to econometrics and clinical case studies, to accommodate the variety of issues under scrutiny and to combine theoretical contributions and supporting empirical analyses. It includes several principal research lines: * Knowledge structure and productivity growth * Generation and exploitation of technological change: Market value and total factor productivity * Biased technological change and total factor productivity based on country and regional European evidence. . The topics explored within this line of research include: 1. Microeconomic analysis of the relationships between firm performance and human capital and technological knowledge. 2. Investigation of the relationships between education, scientific and technological knowledge, and regional economic growth. 3. Analysis of country and industry level productivity differentials among the industrialized countries and between industrialized and developing countries. It is hoped that this research will result in an organic heuristic structure that explains the complex and composite nature of the economic transformations in advanced countries. Recent publications Antonelli, C. and Calderini, M., 2008, 'The governance of knowledge compositeness and technological performance: The case of the automotive industry in Europe', Economics of Innovation and New Technology (17) 23-41. Antonelli, C., 2008, 'The new economics of the university: A knowledge governance approach', Journal of Technology Transfer, (33): 1-22. Antonelli, C., 2008, Localized Technological Change. Towards the Economis of Complexity, London: Routledge. Antonelli C. and T

Donovan Campbell and Clinton Beckford Article: Negotiating Uncertainty: Jamaican Small Farmers' Adaptation and Coping Strategies, Before and After Hurricanes-A Case Study of Hurricane Dean Sustainability 2009, 1(4), 1366-1387; doi:10.3390/su1041366 Received: 29 October 2009 / Accepted: 10 December 2009 / Published: 16 December 2009 Show/Hide Abstract | Download PDF Full-text (1801 KB) (This article belongs to the Special Issue Renewable Agriculture) Philip H. Howard Article: Visualizing Consolidation in the Global Seed Industry: 1996-2008 Sustainability 2009, 1(4), 1266-1287; doi:10.3390/su1041266 Received: 28 October 2009 / Accepted: 4 December 2009 / Published: 8 December 2009 Show/Hide Abstract | Download PDF Full-text (933 KB) (This article belongs to the Special Issue Renewable Agriculture) Hossein Mousazadeh, Alireza Keyhani, Hossein Mobli, Ugo Bardi and Toufic El Asmar Article: Sustainability in Agricultural Mechanization: Assessment of a Combined Photovoltaic and Electric Multipurpose System for Farmers Sustainability 2009, 1(4), 1042-1068; doi:10.3390/su1041042 Received: 9 September 2009 / Accepted: 6 November 2009 / Published: 17 November 2009 Show/Hide Abstract | Download PDF Full-text (910 KB) (This article belongs to the Special Issue Renewable Agriculture) Madhu Subedi, Trevor J. Hocking, Michael A. Fullen, Alison R. McCrea and Eleanor Milne Article: Lessons from Participatory Evaluation of Cropping Practices in Yunnan Province, China: Overview of the Effectiveness of Technologies and Issues Related to Technology Adoption Sustainability 2009, 1(3), 628-661; doi:10.3390/su1030628 Received: 9 August 2009 / Accepted: 9 September 2009 / Published: 16 September 2009 Show/Hide Abstract | Download PDF Full-text (195 KB) (This article belongs to the Special Issue Renewable Agriculture) Travis A. Smith, Biing-Hwan Lin and Chung L. Huang Article: Growth and Development in the U.S. Retail Organic Food Sector Sustainability 2009, 1(3), 573-591

Tadeusz W. Patzek Article: A Probabilistic Analysis of the Switchgrass Ethanol Cycle Sustainability 2010, 2(10), 3158-3194; doi:10.3390/su2103158 Received: 24 August 2010; in revised form: 26 September 2010 / Accepted: 29 September 2010 / Published: 30 September 2010 Show/Hide Abstract | Download PDF Full-text (857 KB) (This article belongs to the Special Issue Renewable Agriculture) Crystal Snyder and Dean Spaner Review: The Sustainability of Organic Grain Production on the Canadian Prairies-A Review Sustainability 2010, 2(4), 1016-1034; doi:10.3390/su2041016 Received: 2 March 2010; in revised form: 29 March 2010 / Accepted: 12 April 2010 / Published: 14 April 2010 Show/Hide Abstract | Download PDF Full-text (215 KB) (This article belongs to the Special Issue Renewable Agriculture) Masakazu Komatsuzaki and M. Faiz Syuaib Article: Comparison of the Farming System and Carbon Sequestration between Conventional and Organic Rice Production in West Java, Indonesia Sustainability 2010, 2(3), 833-843; doi:10.3390/su2030833 Received: 1 February 2010; in revised form: 20 February 2010 / Accepted: 1 March 2010 / Published: 22 March 2010 Show/Hide Abstract | Download PDF Full-text (719 KB) (This article belongs to the Special Issue Renewable Agriculture) David Conner, Kathryn Colasanti, R. Brent Ross and Susan B. Smalley Article: Locally Grown Foods and Farmers Markets: Consumer Attitudes and Behaviors Sustainability 2010, 2(3), 742-756; doi:10.3390/su2030742 Received: 9 February 2010; in revised form: 4 March 2010 / Accepted: 10 March 2010 / Published: 12 March 2010 Show/Hide Abstract | Download PDF Full-text (301 KB) (This article belongs to the Special Issue Renewable Agriculture) Hossein Shabanali Fami, Javad Ghasemi, Rahil Malekipoor, Parinaz Rashidi, Saeede Nazari and Arezoo Mirzaee Article: Renewable Energy Use in Smallholder Farming Systems: A Case Study in Tafresh Township of Iran Sustainability 2010, 2(3), 702-716; doi:10.3390/su2030702 Received: 28

The slowdown of growth in Western industrialized nations in the last twenty years, along with the rise of Japan as a major economic and technological power (and enhanced technical sophistication of Taiwan, Korea, and other NICs) has led to what the authors believe to be a "techno-nationalism." This combines a strong belief that technological capabilities of a nation's firms are a key source of their competitive process, with a belief that these capabilities are in a sense national, and can be built by national action. This book is about these national systems of technical innovation. The heart of the work contains studies of seventeen countries--from large market-oriented industrialized ones to several smaller high income ones, including a number of newly industrialized states as well. Clearly written, this work highlights institutions and mechanisms which support technical innovation, showing similarities, differences, and their sources across nations, making this work accessible to students as well as the scholars of innovation.