FOOD AND HERBAL CROP PRODUCTION TECHNOLOGY (PDT 482/3) - (Elective)

This multi-author book covers all aspects of cassava biology, breeding, production, crop protection and utilization. The first section of the book is on the origins, distribution and economic importance of cassava, and includes chapters on cassava in South America and the Caribbean, Africa, and Asia and the Pacific. Three chapters in the second section cover botany and physiology, agronomy and cropping systems, and mineral nutrition and fertilization. The section on genetics and crop improvement includes chapters on breeding, genetic resources and conservation, and cassava biotechnology. A crop protection section has chapters on arthropod pests, virus diseases, and bacterial, fungal and nematode diseases. The final two chapters are concerned with utilization, storage and processing of cassava.

Our perceptions and conceptions regarding the roles and importance of maize to ancient economies is largely a product of scientific research on the plant itself, developed for the most part out of botanical research, and its recent role as one of the most important economic staples in the world. Anthropological research in the early part of the last century based largely upon the historical particularistic approach of the Boasian tradition provided the first evidence that challenged the assumptions about the economic importance of maize to sociocultural developments for scholars of prehistory. Subsequent ethnobotanic and archaeological studies showed that the role of maize among Native American cultures was much more complex than just as a food staple.In Maize Cobs and Cultures, John Staller provides a survey of the ethnohistory and the scientific, botanical and biological research of maize, complemented by reviews on the ethnobotanic, interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary methodologies.

In the last four decades of the twentieth century the use of sweetpotato was diversified beyond their classification as subsistence, food security, and famine-relief crop. In developing countries they serve both as human food and for feeding livestock. In Western countries they appeal to health conscious consumers because of their nutritional aspects. The sweetpotato is very high in nutritive value, and merits wider use on this account alone. The book has 2 parts. A general one giving up-to-date information on the history, botany, cultivars, genetic engineering, propagation, diseases and pests, nutritional data and marketing; and a second part presenting data on sweetpotato growing practices in different areas of the world. The information should be useful to researchers, practitioners and crop administrators in different countries.