Professional self-determination is an important issue for anyone in the course of a lifetime. The dynamic nature of modern social and economic circumstances makes the issue even more topical. It determines the necessity to improve the career development support system currently existing in the field of education, where various specialists, by purposeful and systematic cooperation, help students in setting their career goals, understating the changeable working environment, seeing various alternatives and making deliberate career decisions. The career support is important as it helps learners choose a suitable professional sphere, profession and educational institution for continuation of their self-improvement upon acquiring of general secondary education. The aim of the research is to provide a scientific basis for topicality of career guidance implementation in school educational environment in order to promote the students’ professional self-determination. In Latvia, a number of career development guidance systems, including counselling and student career support methods and forms are being created and approbated in the educational environment, focusing on the career support curriculum and principles, which would ensure a purposeful implementation of students’ professional self-determination at schools.

In educational strategy papers, it is determined that entrepreneurial development should be implemented already in schools. Various methods and approaches can be used for the development. The majority of entrepreneurial competences are developed at the university – subjects devoted to the development of entrepreneurship are included in the study programs. Environment of the university is very friendly to this – not only because of activities devoted to entrepreneurship occurring in the academic environment, plenty seminars and trainings, but also because of the students’ personal maturity and motivation. Scholars actively raise the following questions: how to develop entrepreneurial competences effectively? Which methods are the most applicable? What kind of innovative methods are the most necessary? 104 students, who tried simulation traineeship of entrepreneurial development, were questioned in order to analyse the impact of methods and the change in entrepreneurial competences. The research was carried out in the Faculty of Economics and Management of Aleksandras Stulginskis University. The participants of the research were involved in the business simulation, where they had an opportunity to estimate themselves and improve their backgrounds, abilities and skills. Methods promoting and developing creativity were applied in simulation business enterprises; however, not all methods had worked. The methods of graphic representation were used by the minority and they were not considered to be very effective. The aim of the research was to determine entrepreneurial competences and innovative educational methods theoretically and to test empirically the development of entrepreneurial competences via simulation method.

With the growing demand for e-learning, as well with the striving for excellence, everyone worldwide is encouraged to improve and ensure the quality of e-learning. Quality assurance requires a supportive environment. The purpose of this paper is to propose procedures for evaluating and controlling the quality of e-learning materials. The article reflects on the approach, which is often mentioned in the field of quality assurance, procedures that characterize the processes, helps to sort them, track their progress sequence and identify those responsible. Clearly, the quality of online learning has many dimensions, but this article deals only with the part that relates to the quality of e-learning materials. In January 2018, experts from European Distance Education Secondary School, Riga Distance Education Secondary School and Riga 1st Distance Education Secondary School were interviewed. The questionnaire included questions about the quality assessment of the study materials. Based on the findings of scientific research literature and taking into account the good practice, procedures for the quality control of electronic learning materials were created. The article offers four procedures that include the use of a web-based checklist developed by the author. Activities of procedures can be divided into areas of responsibility that deal with developers of the material, methodological commission, material evaluators and IT administrator. Distance learning program implementers can use the proposed procedures in the process of making and monitoring electronic learning materials. In addition, the checklist helps to identify important conditions and requirements that affect the quality of the study material.

Dairy cow production is an important livestock activity in the highlands of Madagascar and specifically in the Vakinankaratra region. Despite the increase of global milk production over the last decades, cow productivity remains low due to both quantity and quality feed constraints. Elephant grass and Italian ryegrass are the most cultivated forage grass, during the wet and warm season and the dry and cool season, respectively. An experiment under field conditions was carried out to evaluate the ability of the satellite-derived normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) to develop a tool for estimating biomass yields of Elephant grass and Italian ryegrass. Results showed moderate to strong but significant relationship between plant height and biomass yield (R² = 0.64 to 0.92), between NDVI and biomass yield (R² = 0.52 to 0.73) and between NDVI and plant height (R² = 0.61 to 0.74) of Elephant grass and Italian ryegrass, respectively. These results suggest that NDVI has potential to provide a tool for dynamic monitoring and management of pastureland forage production. (Résumé d'auteur)

Wheat (Triticum) is one of the three most important field crops used for food in the world, as well as in Latvia. The two-factorial trial was conducted at the Research and Study farm ‘Pēterlauki’, Latvia, with the aim to find out the effect of soil tillage and crop rotation on winter wheat grain yield formation. Two soil tillage systems (conventional and reduced), and three crop rotations with different winter wheat (Triticum aestivum) proportion in it (100, 67 and 25%) and different fore-crops (wheat, oilseed rape (Brassica napus ssp. oleifera), faba bean (Vicia faba)) were used. Long-term trial was started in 2009, however, the data from 2016/2017, 2017/2018 and 2018/2019 growing seasons was used for this report. The highest average wheat yield was harvested in 2017 (7.17 t haE−1), and it was significantly (p is less than 0.001) higher than yields in 2018 and 2019 (on average 6.18 t haE−1 and 5.68 t haE−1, respectively). Crop rotation with winter wheat proportion 25%, in which faba bean was wheat fore-crop, showed the highest average grain yield (7.35 t haE−1), but the lowest yield was obtained in rotation with 100% wheat proportion (on average 5.52 t haE−1). Crop rotation scheme had a significant influence on the yield (p is less than 0.001) and 1000 grain weight (p is less than 0.001). Forecrop influenced the yield (p is less than 0.001), number of spikes per 1 square m (p is less than 0.001), and number of grain per spike (p=0.008) significantly. Soil tillage did not affect the studied parameters importantly. Conditions of the trial year affected all parameters significantly.

Breeding work on Ribes species has been started at the National University of Life and Environmental Sciences of Ukraine in Kyiv since 1984 by Petro Sherenhovyj. The breeding programme has been focused on fruit quality, yield, resistance to diseases and pests, as well as on adaptive responses to environmental conditions. As a result of the long-term work, 18 new cultivars were included in the State Register of Plant Varieties of Ukraine in 1999– 2016. The aim of this paper is to describe these varieties: 10 blackcurrant (‘Dochka Vorskly’, ‘Hovtva’, ‘Pam`yati Leonida Mykhalevskoho’, ‘Universytetska’, ‘Aspirantska’, ‘Didorivska’, ‘Poltava 584’, ‘Petrivska’, ‘Yuvileina Sherenhovoho’, and ‘Leleka’), 5 redcurrant (‘Kyianochka’, ‘Poliana Holosiivska’, ‘Buzhanska’, ‘Malva’, and ‘Olha’), 1 whitecurrant (‘Lebidka’), and 2 gooseberry (‘Vasylko’, and ‘Tikych’). The varieties described give farmers and scientists the best knowledge about these cultivars with good level of commercial traits, suitable for dissemination in Ukraine.

Drainage ensures flow of water and access of oxygen to the roots of the trees. Therefore, melioration systems have been established in a third of the forest area of Latvia, and for the most part highly productive stands can be observed in these areas. Water flow in these systems is often stopped by beaver dams. The aim of our case study was to assess the impact of ditch reconstruction on the increment of the coniferous trees. Increment cores were collected from 169 trees at a distance up to 45 m from the ditch in the drainage system that was reconstructed 8 years prior. Drainage system reconstruction reversed the trend of declining radial increment for both Scots pine and Norway spruce; however, the influence of this measure over an 8 year period was statistically significant, notable (55%) and positive only for Norway spruce, growing closest to the edge of the ditch. Other growth limiting factors need to be considered and tackled to ensure the highest effect of the investment in drainage system reconstruction, including choice of the tree species, stand density, age, and availability of nutrients.

The aim of the study is to clarify the compliance of machinery information systems used by Latvian logging service providers with the requirements of the Forest Machine Data and Communications Standard StanForD 2010. For determining the number of logging machines and structure registered in Latvia, data from the State Technical Control Agency of Latvia (VTUA) has been used. This dataset includes 2094 registered machinery units from which 1663 units recorded as harvesters and forwarders are distributed for data processing. Using the national AS Latvian State Forests (LSF) database, where 541 machinery units have been recorded, of which 239 harvesters and 302 forwarders, it is determined what and how many machines already use the standard StanForD 2010, how many machines can implement it and which machines are not suitable for the implementation of StanForD 2010. The study showed that the VTUA register does not fully reflect the true quantity of harvesting machines in Latvia and does not provide information about the use of machines. The LSF data provide reliable information on the possibilities of using StanForD 2010 in harvesters in national forests. From the harvesters working in the country’s forests, 52% of the machines use the StanForD 2010 standard. Work should be continued to clarify the possible use of the standard in the machines working in private forests. Similarly, work should be continued with dealers of harvesting machines to identify models for which it is possible to adjust the StanForD 2010 standard and what the cost of adapting the indicative information systems is.