Preface

The whole world needs agriculture because agriculture does not only feed the entire human race but also produces fibre for clothing, feed for livestock and bio-energy. In the developing world agriculture contributes significantly to the gross domestic product, leads the way in reducing poverty and accounts for the lion's share of employment opportunities especially for women. Agriculture also has one of the highest potentials for reducing carbon emissions and helping vulnerable people adapt to climate change.

The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations and the World Bank have indicated that:


These figures by the FAO and the World Bank indicate that without agriculture, the world economy would not be what it has been and what it is today.

For agriculture to continuously contribute to food security, environmental sustainability and economic opportunities by driving the rural and national economic development with well targeted investments, it is imperative that the research and development agenda which is based on the science behind agriculture must be pursued vigorously. It is in this context that this book, Agricultural Science has been written with multiple authors compiling some important state-of-the art contributions on the subject in recent years.

The contributions of chapters in the book are divided into seven sections: Crop Improvement, Crop Production, Crop Response to Water and Nutrients, Crop Response to Temperature, Crop Protection, Agriculture and Human Health, and Animal Nutrition. The sections vary in the number of chapters which was largely due to the number of authors who contributed chapters to publish the book. The chapters in each section and in the book in general vary in scope and the way they attempt to

#### XII Preface

manipulate resources and variables to improve on productivity and also to link agricultural landscape to recreation and therefore human health, albeit remotely.

I acknowledge the authors for willingly contributing their chapters without which we could not have published this book. I am equally grateful to Ms Jana Sertic, the Publishing Process Manager for the able assistance she provided and to the Information Technology Department for providing the requisite framework that greatly enhanced the work of putting together the chapters in the book. The Technical Editors deserve commendation for preparing the online publication and print versions of the book.

Finally, I owe a debt of gratitude to the Scientific Board of the INTECH OPEN ACCESS PUBLISHER for the trust reposed in me to edit this book. I am most grateful to be of service to the scientific community.

> **Dr. Godwin Aflakpui**  Rector, Wa Polytechnic, Wa, Upper West Region, Ghana, West Africa
