Over the past one hundred years, there has been an increasing globalization and industrialization of the food systems. As a result, the distance between the production and the consumption of food has increased, both in time and space and in the minds of people. There is also an increasing concern for the environmental effects of industrial farming and the long distance transportation of food. Sustainable agriculture and efforts to build more sustainable food systems has emerged in opposition to the global food market. The definitions of sustainability usually include environmental, social and economical aspects. To build more localized food systems is seen as one way towards increased sustainability.

It is important for today?s Farmers to minimize the costs for crop establishment, because of decreased prices and support from the EU. Farmers, who plow in autumn on heavy clay soil, often do some kind of tillage in autumn to get better soil structure before spring seeding. This is especially important when growing small seed crop, e.g. sugar beet and oil plants.

Cattle production systems are changing to bigger intensified systems with larger numbers of animals per farm and more free range systems while at the same time employing fewer people. Aversive handling has been known to affect cattle production negatively for many years, but lately scientists have started to focus more on what positive effects gentle handling and positive human-cattle interactions may have on beef and dairy production. Fear can cause high stress in production animals and this can contribute to not only reduced production within beef and dairy cattle, but also increased risks for accidents and decreased animal welfare. Therefore, by reducing the fear cattle experience of humans, it could be possible to increase production, decrease accidents and increase the welfare of the animals. Reducing the animals fear and stress can be done by simple means, such as walking and talking calmly around the cattle, associating humans to positive feelings (such as feed) and stroking the cattle?s body regions associated with social grooming.

Major changes within the agricultural politics today have forced the dairy production to scaleup, in order to compete on a global market. This has resulted in a reduction in the number ofsmaller dairy farms in Sweden, from about 40000 to just over 4000 over the last 30 years. Thepurpose of this study Svenska mjölkbönder, snart ett minne blott? ? Markbygdensmjölkbönder i tankar om mjölkproduktionens nuvarande situation och framtidsutsikter, is topresent the opinions of dairy Farmers in Sweden, regarding the Swedish dairy industry and therelation to their own dairy production. A secondary purpose is to problematize how theconsequences of pastures and cultural landscapes influences human society as dairy farms andgrazing animals are becoming fewer.

The aim of this bachelor´s thesis ist to analyze the idea progress in the party programs in the swedish Centre-party during the time 1910-1959. The progress in the party program is compared with the evolution of society during the same period.The bachelor´s aim is also to analyze how each new program is described in newspapers, two newspapers were chosen to make the comparison; Arbetet (a social-democratic newspaper), and Skånska Dagbladet (a centre-party newspaper). The result shows that the party in the beginning was conservative and against both capitalism and socialism. The start of the party was a reaction against the new electionsystem which was introduced in Sweden in 1909.The party took a clear standpoint for the Swedish Farmers, but after 1933, they were standing for the whole countryside. In the 1940´s and the 1950´s the party became more like a social liberal party rather than an agrarian party only for the Farmers.The party programs are not given much space in the two newspapers.

To turn the dairy heifers out on pasture is the most natural way for the cattle to get feed. At the same time it is cheap and if it is right treated a feed of high nutritive value. The problem today is to get dairy heifers to grow enough when they are grazing at natural pasture for the entire summer. Therefore, the opinions differ whether pasture is a resource or a problem. The increasing interest of pasture production is due to the fact that you can receive grants for preserving valuable natural assets and cultural landscape elements in the pasture land. A high grazing pressure is necessary to preserve an open landscape and a great variety of species. In the same time the heifers have to supply their nutritive needs in order to grow and be large enough to show heat and be pregnant in right time to calve with a sufficient body size and at an economically right age. This paper includes a literature review on natural pasture, pasture production, and growth of dairy heifers together with own interviews with dairy Farmers about their point of view to the pasture husbandry on the farms, how they plan for pasture, look after natural pasture, treatment areas and take care of the calves and heifers. The results indicate that the time it takes and the demanded work are the biggest factors to how and why the Farmers do as they do..

This essay discusses the Laholm?s bay and its eutrofication problems. The question of issue is: Have the efforts to limit the eutrofication in the Laholm?s bay been effective? What is the local actor?s opinion whether the measures have been effective or not? What efforts have been made to prevent the leakage of nutrients from fields and forestland? The Laholm's bay is located in the south part of the Swedish west coast. The problem was noticed in the 1960´s by local fishermen that experienced a lack of catch.

In today?s genetic evaluation of Swedish beef cattle, mainly traits that are directly related to productivity are measured. However, other traits, such as temperament and mature cow weight affect the economy of the farmer, as well as the welfare of the animals. This thesis evaluates possible ways of measuring new traits, with focus on temperament and mature weight of suckler cows. The goal is to examine the possible benefits of including these traits in the Swedish breeding scheme.

The Yara N-Tester is a handheld chlorophyll meter which can be used in several different crops as an aid to determine if there is a need of complementary fertilization with nitrogen (N) or not. If the crop requires more N the N-Tester will recommend an amount in kg per ha. The possibility to assess the need of N depends on the strong relation that exists between chlorophyll- and N-concentration in the leaves of plants. In the multiannual trial series ?Nitrogen to winter wheat at different soil conditions? measurements with the N-Tester was carried out at flag leaf emergence (GS 37). In this work the result of measurements, the NTesters ability to estimate the need of N in winter wheat, will be presented for the years 2008-2011.

Among the Indigenous cattle breeds in Indonesia, the Bali cattle is the most preferred by small Farmers. The Bali cattle is a beef breed, and is considered to have several advantageous characteristics and to be well adapted to the country?s harsh environmental tropical conditions with drought and rain. The main aim of this project was to phenotype of Bali cattle from different locations in order to identify and document diversity within the Bali cattle breed based on their observable characteristics, to compare cattle from different areas and production systems to see the effect of management on phenotype. In this study, 107 cows and bulls of the breed Bali cattle, from Kalimantan, Sumatra, Lombok and Bali were phenotyped.

Wooded pastures are common in the agricultural landscape in Sweden, often rich in naturaland cultural values. It is not a well confined biotope but consist of a semi-open landscapewith a complex pattern and wide variation of tree and shrub coverage. The values in thewooded pastures have been created through a long history of management.One major threat to wooded pastures is ceasing management. Yearly and intensive grazinghas been demanded for several years in order to receive economical support. At the sametime trees and bushes have often been regarded as vegetal invasion.

I have chosen to work with drag hose system and try to find an alternative to spread manure with a usually tank system, see if you can make a profit and what advantage and disadvantage the system has. The purpose whith the project has been to try to make a system that can spread manure at better occasions than Farmers do today and above everything make a financial addition. Today it is just a heavy work and takes a lot of time. I have counted on investment costs and carefully examined what equipment you need. I have not the technical details in my project, I have just tried to understand how it is to spread manure with drag hose system today. What is drag hose system? You put a hose in your manuretank, connect it to a pump that is driven by a traktor or stationary engine. You place a hose that reach the field were you are going to spread.

The agricultural sector is characterized by larger crop farms and more extensive livestockproduction. The efficiency improvement is partly a result from a stronger competition in theglobal market. The agricultural products need to be produced at a lower cost than competitorsin order to survive as a farmer. The solution is larger firms that benefit from economies ofscale. This brings large investments that create a greater need for leverage and closer relationto the credit agency.

In a time when milk producing farm businesses face decline in profitability it is of great importance to examine how the situation can be improved. This thesis is a study off efficiency in milk producing farm businesses represented by Swedish, Dutch and German farms. The aim of this study is to investigate whether any differences exist between companies in these countries. Moreover, the study includes a mapping of a number of factors that determine how efficient milk production can be managed. This mapping is based on a literature review on prior efficiency studies followed by qualitative interviews with milk production advisors as well as a questionnaire sent out to dairy Farmers in Sweden.

The production of oilseed rape is an important issue in Sweden and those who never have grown oilseed rape (OSR) are now willing to try. It is always a risk to grow oilseed rape, specially winter OSR, because of outwintering. This risk increases as you go north and therefore establishment and autumn growth is very important. These are some of the reasons that I have chosen to write about the establishment of winter oilseed rape in Middle Sweden. There are many factors that influence the outcome of the establishment, e. g.