Concentration of heavy metals (Pb-Cd-Cr) was determined, that’s most polluted environment and rivers in fourteen varieties of vegetables throughout two growing seasons (2013-2014  &2014-2015), belonging to the three groups of vegetables (leaves and tuber and fruits), and using atomic absorption device, where the samples were collected from six different locations in Hama, and close to the course of the Orontes River, which vary different in irrigation operations and source of irrigation water.   Results of this study showed that no significant difference (P> 0.05) between the types of vegetable groups in the content of heavy elements at each locations seposatly. But it clearly showed the presence of very high significant differences (P <0.0001) in the contents of vegetables from heavy elements collected from sites, this effect is due to irrigation water. Also, the average concentration of cadmium was higher than the global natural concentrations in accordance with similar studies, the average lead, and chromium were lower than the averages of similar vegetables from other countries.

The study aimed basically at identifying the determinants of agricultural modernization in Siwa oasis through: identifying the level of agricultural modernization in the study area, determining the correlation between the level of farmer’s agricultural modernization and some of the studied variables, identifying the effects of the studied independent variables on the level of respondent farmers’ agricultural modernization and identifying the most important problems facing the agricultural modernization efforts in the study area and suggestions  to solve them from the perspective of respondent farmers. The study was conducted in Siwa oasis, Matrouh governorate on a random sample of farmers located in the area. Data were collected through personal interviews using a questionnaire. The statistical analyzing tools used in the study were: Pearson’s correlation coefficient, Chi square test, Cramer’s coefficient, stepwise multiple regression in addition to frequencies, percentages, arithmetic mean, standard deviation and alpha coefficient. The findings showed that about 18.2% of respondent farmers had a low level of agricultural modernization, 48.2% of them had a moderate level and about 33.6% of respondent farmers had a high level of agricultural modernization. The findings showed also that there was a positive significant relationship at the probability level of 0.01 between the level of respondent farmers’ agricultural modernization and the following variables: family size, farm holding size, organizations’ membership, geographic openness, utilization of extension information sources, the level of ambition and social affiliation. There was also a negative significant relationship at the probability level of 0.01 between the level of respondent farmers’ agricultural modernization and farmers’ ages. Finally, there were four independent variables contributes in explaining the total variance of the level of respondent farmers’ agricultural modernization, these variables were: educational level, family size, organizations’ membership and farm holding size.

In a comprehensive study, soil   surface (0-60cm) and subsurface (60-120cm) samples, (industrial- wastewater and wells water samples beside of plant samples (forest and wild shrubs) were collected from Almarawea’ah area, Al-houdiadah governorate. The objective of the study was to evaluate the environmental impact of wastewater that flow from food factory. The water is used for irrigating a silty loam soil and plants grown thereon which were evergreen trees (wind breaks) since 25 and 5 years ago (the first and second stages, respectively). Also, the analysis of chemical, physical, biological and microbial indicators was done. Obtained results showed that soil salinity was increased three times but sodium adsorption was increased 10 times as a result of using wastewater for irrigating the evergreen trees since 15 years ago where the EC and SAR were 0.115mS\cm and 1.3, respectively in the non-treated soil as compared with the treated one which were 0.37 mS\cm and 12.5 for EC and SAR, respectively. There was no significant impact for soil depth 0-60 and 60-120cm as well as for years of applications (5 and 25 years) on all the evaluated properties. However, organic matter, nitrogen, phosphorus, and iron contents in treated soil were slightly increased with no significant differences. On the contrary, potassium and manganese were significantly increased at 0.05 level as compared to non-treated one. Regarding to the plant analysis the obtained data showed that no significant differences between the concentration of the studied elements (N, P, K, Fe, and Mn) in leaves of trees (their local names are Muraimerah and Damas) and shrubs (Thomam and Abad). However, zinc concentration was high in shrub plants (2350.5 ppm) compared to trees (103.5 ppm) which indicated that shrub plants can collecte high levels of zinc ( zinc hyperaccumulatorplant). For water, comparison of samples collected from ground water wells (near and far) and wastewater samples collected morning and evening, the results indicated that using factory wastewater for irrigating trees to be used as wind breaks was suitable way to prevent expected environmental contamination and transmission of those contaminants to the ground water

The objective of this research is to estimate price (direct and cross) and expenditure elasticities for major food commodities in Egypt. The food commodities are divided into six sub-models depending on the homogeneity within each group of commodities and the data availability quantities consumed and the corresponding retail prices for each individual item. Some commodities are aggregated in groups such as other beans, other vegetables, fruits(1), fruits(2) and oils.  The Linear Almost  Ideal  Demand  System  (LAIDS)  model  is  applied  in  estimating  a  system  of demand equations for each group of food commodities. To avoid the invalid inference and spurious regression problems that may be created by non-stationary data series, the Fully Modified Least Squares (FMLS) estimator is utilized.  The demand parameters satisfy the Engel aggregation, cournot aggregation, homogeneity and symmetry conditions.  The results indicate that expenditure elasticities of the majority of food commodities/groups are less than the unity except fot the fruits2 (1.110), indicating necessity effects. This can be also interpreted as following the increasing of consumptions of these commodities is strongly connected with increasing of all income levels. The results also show that the own price elasticities for food commodities/groups are inelastic. For fruits 2, its inelastic own price elasticity still indicates that it tends to be very sensitive to price changes. The relative high cross price elasticities in all sub-models illustrate the strong substitute or complementary effects of the price change of one commodity one quantities consumed from other commodities in the same sub-models. Therefore, structural implications from the estimated elasticities are important. The estimated own and cross price and expenditure elasticities must be analyzed during the economic reform for better understanding all economic changes affecting prices as well as consumption and expenditures.

This research aims to evaluate the competitiveness of rice exports during the period of (2002- 2013) using the market share index, the relative stability of exports coefficient, competitive price and market penetration coefficient to know causes of declining market shares for exports of Egyptian rice in the key markets and to suggest some methods to develop the Egyptian export policy for rice to increase competitiveness and improve export performance in the foreign markets. The results indicated that about 67.45% of the average amount of Egyptian rice exports is concentrated in five countries namely: Syria, Turkey, Libya, Jordan and the Sudan and about 32.55% is concentrated in Saudi Arabia, Belgium, Romania, the United States, Lebanon, Britain, the United Arab of Emirates, Kenya, Italy and other countries. Also, the results cleared a comparative advantage for Egyptian exports of rice in the world market. It was shown that each of the quantity, value and export price of rice is characterized by instability. The Egyptian rice has a competitive price advantage in India, Australia, Italy, the United States, China and Pakistan. The results showed that the penetration coefficient of the Egyptian exports of rice during the study period (2002- 2013) increases in the markets of the Sudan, Romania, Syria, Libya, Jordan and Lebanon. The study recommends the expansion of Egyptian rice to the markets of Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Kenya which is considered one of the promising markets. Establishing a system to follow up the export markets and gather accurate and immediate information about those markets and make it available in an easy and accessible way for the producers and exporters to identify the export opportunities and directing the production to the markets which receive a great amount of the Egyptian rice crop. Studying the competitive conditions of the Egyptian rice inside its main markets in order to increase the amount of exports.

Application of urea to agricultural soil may pollute the air environment due to ammonia (NH3) volatilization. Zeolite, Humate, biocher and biofertilizer may be used to control N losses resulting from urea transformation to NH3. A laboratory soil incubation experiment was conducted to determine the effects of zeolite, K-humate, biocher and biofertilizer on controlling NH3 losses out of applied urea. Calcareous soil sample from El-Nobaria area, Beheira Governorate was treated with different amendments and incubated under laboratory condition for 13 weeks. Results obtained showed that soil treated with urea in the presence of different amendments significantly reduced NH3 release from urea as compared to the control. During the first 80 days of the incubation ammonia losses were highest in control compared to soil treated with the different amendments. Biocher treatment showed the highest effect in reducing ammonia volatilization from calcareous soil. Therefore, treating calcareous soil with biocher and biofertilizer can decrease were losses as ammonia and increase nitrogen availability in soil, and hence reduces air pollution by ammonia.

North Sinai farming community is facing many challenges such as increasing drought and salinity in water and soil, poor quality soils, a long hot summer with high solar radiation; in addition to poor experience of settled farmers and local Bedouins in improving traditional agriculture and animal productivity under saline conditions. The main objective of the study is to establish the efficiency of resource use in millet production among smallholder farmers in North Sinai region. Using a multi-stage random sampling procedure in selecting farmers interviewed. A structured questionnaire was administered to 60 smallholder farmers selected for analysis; the farmers were divided into two groups based on ownership and use of animals on the farm, and used a model to evaluate efficiency of the two groups. In this model, a Cobb-Douglas production function was fitted for the cross- sectional data generated from the survey. The ratio of marginal value product (MVP) to marginal factor cost (MFC) for all inputs was found to be greater than unity among all groups of farmers implying under-utilization of resources. Millet farmers were found to experience increasing returns to scale, meaning use of additional inputs in millet production would result in higher yields. The null hypothesis, which stated that smallholder farmers in North Sinai region are not allocating their farm resources efficiently in millet production, was tested and rejected at 5% level of significance. It was therefore concluded that millet farmers in North Sinai region were sub-optimally allocating resources in their production system.

Wheat is considered one of the main grain crop that human is depend in his diet all over the world. It is a strategic crop globally and locally in Egypt. The problem of the research refers to the gap between local wheat production and consumption. This gap forced the country to import wheat and thus represent a burden on the Egyptian balance of trade. It is the objective of the present paper is therefore to investigate ways to alleviate the deficit of wheat production and gap. The study assess wheat area, production and productivity during the period 1995-2013 particularly in the desert governorates. The study estimates wheat gap during the above period by about 67.14 million ton. Safe efficiency is therefore was put as 54.1%. Losses of wheat were put as about 1017 about 14.2% in the country as a whole.  The study estimates that wheat production in Matrooh and New Valley governorate is expected to be about 173.56 and 277.8 thousand ton respectively. The study suggests that measures should be taken to decrease losses of wheat during harvesting and marketing. New storage facilities should be established. The study recommends that special concern should be given to wheat cultivation in desert governorate by encouraging former to grow wheat by covering good wheat price to encourage formers

The tomato leaf miner, Tuta absoluta (Meyrick) (Lepidoptera: Gelechiidae) is an invasive pest, that caused a significant damage to the tomato crop in the Middle East area. It infests Solanaceae plants especially tomato, Lycopersicon esculuntum Mill. To find parasitoids and predators for biological control of this pest, samples of tomato leaves infested with T. absoluta were collected from Qualiobya and Giza Governorates. Three genera of hymenopterous parasitoids, Diglyphus sp. (Eulophidae), Elasmus spp. (Elasmidae) and Telenomus sp. (Scelionidae) are the first record in Egypt. The predator bug, Nesidiocoris tenuis Reuter (Heteroptera: Miridae) was also recorded. T. absoluta showed two peaks of 30.3 and 25.0 leaf mines/10 leaflets on 7th and 28th of May, 2013, respectively. N. tenuis also recorded two peaks of 58.8 and 73.3 nymphs and adults/plant on the same previous dates, respectively. N. tenuis was mass reared to evaluate the predatory efficiency of nymph and adult stages on T. absoluta eggs. The nymph, adult male and female consumed 113.3, 81.5 and 125.3 eggs of T. absoluta, respectively. The 4th nymphal instar devoured the highest number (30.6 eggs), while the 1st nymphal instar ate the lowest (7eggs). Therefore, N. tenuis was highly effective in controlling T. absoluta eggs under laboratory conditions.

This study was conducted to estimates the Malmquist productivity indices using the data envelopment analysis (DEA) for 165 countries over 8 regions and classified across 8 groups based on agricultural gross production value during the study period (1980-2007). The total factor productivity including and measure the efforts in the resource allocation, modernization, the technological change, and catch-up efforts in the agriculture sector in any country. While, Malmquist TFP index measures total factor productivity change between two data points by calculating the ratio of the distance function of each data point relative to a common technology. The data used in this study was drawn from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. This paper also estimated the technical efficiency, technical efficiency change and technical change for countries in each group and for all those countries as one group.