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| VEGE0019-1 | Case Study in Tropical Crops
- Food-producing and Industrial Crops
- Horticultural production
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| Duration : | Food-producing and Industrial Crops : 21h Th
Horticultural production : 14h Th
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| Number of credits : |
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| Lecturer : | Food-producing and Industrial Crops : Guy Mergeai
Horticultural production : Hugo Magein
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Language(s) of instruction :
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| French language |
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Course contents :
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 | | Food-producing and Industrial Crops |
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| I. Introduction
a. The different aspects of the concept of cropping system under the tropics.
b. Natural factors influencing the performances of the tropical cropping systems.
c. Consequences of the clearing and the cultivation of a plot with ploughing of the soil under the tropics.
d. Main cultivation practices permitting a sustainable management of the tropical cropping systems.
II. Case study of cropping systems representative of semi arid low-, mid-, and highland tropical areas.
III. Case study of cropping systems representative of sub-humid low-, mid-, and highland tropical areas.
IV. Case study of cropping systems representative of humid low-, mid-, and highland tropical areas. |
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Learning outcomes of the course :
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| | Food-producing and Industrial Crops |
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| Presentation of case studies allowing to better understand the factors influencing the management of traditional cropping systems under the tropics (food-producing and industrial crops) and to choose the production practices to implement in order to improve their performances while assuring a sustainable exploitation of the environment.
At the end of the course, the student must be able:
To understand the factors influencing most the sustainability and the performances of the traditional cropping systems of the main agro-ecological zones met under the tropics (Sahelian, Soudanian, Guinean and tropical mountainous zones).
To distinguish the main tropical cropping systems according to their characteristics.
To identify the production practices that are best adapted to improve the performances and assure the sustainability of the traditional cropping systems under the tropics. |
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Mode of delivery (face-to-face ; distance-learning) :
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| | Food-producing and Industrial Crops |
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| Lecture : 6h
Mid-term oral presentation
Case study and individualized coaching |
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Recommended or required readings :
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| | Food-producing and Industrial Crops |
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| Lecture notes.
PDF copy of the slides presented during the lecture.
Crop production in Tropical Africa, ed. DGCI (Bruxelles), Coordonator : R. Raemakers, 1540 pp.
Beets W.C. 1995. Raising and sustaining productivity of smallholder farming systems in the tropics: A handbook of sustainable agricultural development. AgBé Publishing, Alkmaar, Pays-bas.
Norman MJT, Pearson CJ, Searle PGE. 1995. The ecology of tropical food crops. Cambridge Univesity Press. Cambridge, Grande Bretagne. 430 p. |
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Assessment methods and criteria :
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| | Food-producing and Industrial Crops |
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| Evaluation on the basis of a written feed-back presented at the end of the course.
The evaluation criteria are as follows:
- the scientific quality of the document,
- the relevance of the diagnosis carried out in relation to the cropping system analysed,
- the relevance of the improvements proposed, their originality and their feasibility (quantified proposal vs only suggestions),
- quality of the references used (recent? scientific? relevant?),
- the quality of the document (use the standards for a MSc thesis).
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Contacts :
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| | Food-producing and Industrial Crops |
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| Mergeai, Guy (Chargé de cours)
Phytotechnie tropicale et Horticulture
081 62 21 44
mergeai.g@fsagx.ac.be |
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