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Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a global public health threat responsible for 700,000 deaths per year worldwide. There is scientific evidence of the causal relationship between antimicrobial use (AMU) along the food chain and AMR. Improving AMU in livestock is therefore a key component in the fight against AMR. To improve AMU in livestock, there is no one-size-fits-all solution and strategies must be context-adapted and socially acceptable for actors in order to increase AMU sustainability. AMU decision-making is based on an interdependent set of economic, behavioral, ethical, and cultural factors that need to be assessed to advise on the potential impacts of measures. We hypothesized that a participatory strategic planning approach may increase the plausibility and the efficacy of the strategies formulated by facilitating the dialogue between actors of diverse backgrounds, stimulating innovative thinking and constant considerations of contextual factors, actors and impacts. We adapted and applied the ImpresS ex ante approach (IMPact in reSearch in the South, https://impress-impact-recherche.cirad.fr/) within a Living Lab engaging actors from the French pig and poultry sectors in co-creation of innovative strategies towards improved AMU. We conducted semi-structured interviews and participatory workshops between April 2021 and March 2022. The results describe 1) an initial diagnosis of the current AMU situation in the pig and poultry sectors in France; 2) a common vision of the future to which participants would like to contribute through the intervention; 3) an identification of the current problems opposed to this vision of the future; 4) a defined scope of the intervention; 5) a typology of actors protagonist or impacted by those issues and 6) outcome maps to solve a priority problem related to indicators and monitoring. This study provides recommendations for decision-makers on plausible and innovative strategies to sustainably improve AMU in pig and poultry sectors in France and evidence of the benefits of participatory strategic planning approaches.

Source Agritrop Cirad (https://agritrop.cirad.fr/608335/)

In a changing context, farmers adapt their cropping systems and, in this respect, the response time of the soil-crop system (changes in the soil resources and in the grapevine vegetative or reproductive development) has to be considered to maintain its agronomic performances. This is particularly true for perennial crops such as grapevine. This paper aims to analyse the short- and long-term effects of changes in soil surface management on grapevine performances. Avineyard in which bare soil inter-rows had been compared with a tall fescue intercrop since 2002 had each of these treatments split into two in 2007, with half of the intercrop being ploughed in and half of the bare soil being sown with fescue, resulting in four treatments whose effects were studied in 2008–2009. Grapevine growth, yield formation and grape quality were assessed. After intercrop destruction, grapevine vegetative growth was enhanced by the mineralization of organic matter from the first year, whereas after intercrop introduction, the competition for soil resources affected growth only in the second year. The grape yield depended on the number of bunches, elaborated the year before. One year after the change in soil surface management, the ranking of yield was as follows: permanent intercrop < intercrop destroyed < intercrop introduced < bare soil. The second year, this ranking altered (still in relation to the number of bunches) to: intercrop introduced < permanent intercrop < bare soil=intercrop destroyed. This study shows that the response times of the processes of grapevine vegetative growth and yield formation to a change in the cropping system vary from one to two years, and therefore, have to be considered carefully to manage the cropping system well.

Many documents have been published and webinars held on the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on food security at international levels, which tend to blur our understanding of actual dynamics on the ground. Based on a network of researchers from Cirad and its partners in a wide diversity of countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, this paper attempts to take stock of what is happening in the food and agriculture sector. The information provided allow for a more nuanced analysis when compared to international organizations' reports. While lockdown and social distancing measures have only mildly affected world trade and production of staple food, some perishable products have been wasted, unable to reach markets. The crisis emphasizes the disconnection between food production and trade and the dire situation of many poor consumers, in cities, holding informal jobs, who have been hit very hard. The crisis should help imagining short- and long-term measures to support food systems resilience along an integrated approach and adaptation strategies already developed.

Osteopontin (OPN) is a multifunctional protein involved in hepatic steatosis, inflammation, fibrosis and cancer progression. However, its role in hepatic injury induced by ischemia–reperfusion (I–R) has not yet been investigated. We show here that hepatic warm ischemia for 45 min followed by reperfusion for 4 h induced the upregulation of the hepatic and systemic level of OPN in mice. Plasma aspartate aminotransferase and alanine aminotransferase levels were strongly increased in Opn −/− mice compared with wild-type (Wt) mice after I–R, and histological analysis of the liver revealed a significantly higher incidence of necrosis of hepatocytes. In addition, the expression levels of inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS), tumor necrosis factor- α (TNF α ), interleukin 6 (IL6) and interferon- γ were strongly upregulated in Opn −/− mice versus Wt mice after I–R. One explanation for these responses could be the vulnerability of the OPN-deficient hepatocyte. Indeed, the downregulation of OPN in primary and AML12 hepatocytes decreased cell viability in the basal state and sensitized AML12 hepatocytes to cell death induced by oxygen–glucose deprivation and TNF α . Further, the downregulation of OPN in AML12 hepatocytes caused a strong decrease in the expression of anti-apoptotic Bcl2 and in the ATP level. The hepatic expression of Bcl2 also decreased in Opn −/− mice versus Wt mice livers after I–R. Another explanation could be the regulation of the macrophage activity by OPN. In RAW macrophages, the downregulation of OPN enhanced iNOS expression in the basal state and sensitized macrophages to inflammatory signals, as evaluated by the upregulation of iNOS, TNF α and IL6 in response to lipopolysaccharide. In conclusion, OPN partially protects from hepatic injury and inflammation induced in this experimental model of liver I–R. This could be due to its ability to partially prevent death of hepatocytes and to limit the production of toxic iNOS-derived NO by macrophages.

Seed size is a critical factor that can impact the regeneration process of plant populations. The objective of this study is to identify optimal seeds for the cultivation of two overexploited native forest species in Côte d’Ivoire, namely Khaya senegalensis (Desr.) A.Juss., 1830 and Parkia biglobosa (Jacq.) R.BR. ex G. Don, 1830. A total of 1080 seeds per species were evaluated for germination and seedling vigour in two distinct environments (dry and humid) in Côte d’Ivoire. The results demonstrated that, for Khaya senegalensis, larger seeds exhibited higher germination rates, whereas for Parkia biglobosa, smaller and medium-sized seeds showed better germination performance. However, regardless of species and study site, larger seeds consistently produced more vigorous seedlings. In this case, pretreatment tests on large seeds of Parkia biglobosa can potentially enhance their germination performance. Large seeds, ranging from 0.25–0.37 g in Khaya senegalensis and 0.2–0.32 g in Parkia biglobosa, appear to be the most suitable and best candidates for high-quality, high-performance seeds to optimise the cultivation of these species in Côte d’Ivoire. Distributing such seeds to farmers can contribute to the success of reforestation and agroforestry programs involving these target species in Côte d’Ivoire. These findings contribute to the sustainable management of the target species and can serve as a basis for restructuring forest regeneration policies in Côte d’Ivoire.

Plant diversification using cover crops may promote natural regulation of agricultural pests by supporting alternative prey that enable the increase of arthropod predator densities. However, the changes in the specific composition of predator diet induced by cover cropping are poorly understood. Here, we hypothesized that the cover crop can significantly alter the diet of predators in agroecosystems. The cover crop Brachiaria decumbens is increasingly used in banana plantations to control weeds and improve physical soil properties. In this paper, we used a DNA metabarcoding approach for the molecular analysis of the gut contents of predators (based on mini-COI) to identify 1) the DNA sequences of their prey, 2) the predators of Cosmopolites sordidus (a major pest of banana crops), and 3) the difference in the specific composition of predator diets between a bare soil plot (BSP) and a cover cropped plot (CCP) in a banana plantation. The earwig Euborellia caraibea, the carpenter ant Camponotus sexguttatus, and the fire ant Solenopsis geminata were found to contain C. sordidus DNA at frequencies ranging from 1 to 7%. While the frequencies of predators positive for C. sordidus DNA did not significantly differ between BSP and CCP, the frequency at which E. caraibea was positive for Diptera was 26% in BSP and 80% in CCP; the frequency at which C. sexguttatus was positive for Jalysus spinosus was 14% in BSP and 0% in CCP; and the frequency at which S. geminata was positive for Polytus mellerborgi was 21% in BSP and 3% in CCP. E. caraibea, C. sexguttatus and S. geminata were identified as possible biological agents for the regulation of C. sordidus. The detection of the diet changes of these predators when a cover crop is planted indicates the possible negative effects on pest regulation if predators switch to forage on alternative prey.

Deep learning techniques and computer vision systems offer effective fruit counting solutions for farm yield estimation. However, the performance of these solutions drops when identifying different cultivars of the same fruit species. This study clarified the differences between mango fruit detection and mango cultivar identification. An original double-threshold-based classification method for fruit cultivar identification, with estimation of the misidentification rate was proposed in order to significantly increase the performance of a specialised mango fruit detection method known as Faster R-CNN. This method was applied on images of mango trees of three cultivars taken in Senegalese orchards of different existing cropping systems, with varying tree features, planting patterns and acquisition contexts. Analysis of the results focused on the contributions of fruit detection errors and fruit cultivar confusion to the overall error of the network for fruit counts by cultivar class. The shift from fruit detection to cultivar identification resulted in a drop in the average prediction rate from 92 to 68%. With its explicitly independent fruit detection and cultivar identification steps, the double-threshold-based classification method increased the prediction rate to 86%, with a maximum identification error of 0.05%. This setting also led to relative equality between the recall and the precision of each cultivar class, making the network well suited for fruit counting by cultivar class. This work opened new perspectives for decision support tools for fruit growers that could provide more appropriate yield estimates per cultivar.

An accurate estimation of parasitism rates and diversity of parasitoids of crop insect pests is a prerequisite for exploring processes leading to efficient natural biocontrol. Traditional methods such as rearing have been often limited by taxonomic identification, insect mortality and intensive work, but the advent of high-throughput sequencing (HTS) techniques, such as DNA metabarcoding, is increasingly seen as a reliable and powerful alternative approach. Little has been done to explore the benefits of such an approach for estimating parasitism rates and parasitoid diversity in an agricultural context. In this study, we compared the composition of parasitoid species and parasitism rates between rearing and DNA metabarcoding of host eggs and larvae of the millet head miner, Heliocheilus albipunctella De Joannis (Lepidoptera, Noctuidae), collected from millet fields in Senegal. We first assessed the detection threshold for the main ten endoparasitoids, by sequencing PCR products obtained from artificial dilution gradients of the parasitoid DNAs in the host moth. We then assessed the potential of DNA metabarcoding for diagnosing parasitism rates in samples collected from the field. Under controlled conditions, our results showed that relatively small quantities of parasitoid DNA (0.07 ng) were successfully detected within an eight-fold larger quantity of host DNA. Parasitoid diversity and parasitism rate estimates were always higher for DNA metabarcoding than for host rearing. Furthermore, metabarcoding detected multi-parasitism, cryptic parasitoid species and differences in parasitism rates between two different sampling sites. Metabarcoding shows promise for gaining a clearer understanding of the importance and complexity of host-parasitoid interactions in agro-ecosystems, with a view to improving pest biocontrol strategies.

Understanding of ecological interactions is necessary for the application of biological control. Banana is the second most produced fruit worldwide and the banana weevil (Cosmopolites sordidus) is the most important pest of banana and plantain. Its biological control remains challenging because of the robustness and cryptic behaviour of the adult and the hidden development of larval stages. Researchers therefore tend to favour conservation biological control of this pest. The commonly used methods for measuring the effects of natural enemies on the regulation of this pest focus on invertebrates and may underestimate the role of vertebrates on biological control. Using cameras, we recorded the predation of sentinel adult weevils in banana plots in La Réunion island that differed in weevil infestation levels and in animal biodiversity. To facilitate image analysis, we used background subtraction to isolate moving parts of image sequences and thus detect predators and predation events. Our cameras recorded only vertebrates as predators of adult banana weevils. The most important predator appeared to be the Asian shrew (Suncus murinus), which was responsible for 67% of the predation events. Other predators included the house mouse (Mus musculus), the oriental garden lizard (Calotes versicolor), and the guttural toad (Sclerophrys gutturalis). The exact time of predation events were determined from the images metadata. It was thus possible to identify predator foraging periods that coincided with activity of adult weevils. Our results confirm that images provide useful information for biological and ecological studies. Along with other recent studies, our results suggest that the role of vertebrates in biological control may be underestimated. Based on these results, we advocate for several management implications such as the installation of hedges, grasslands, and ponds to favour these vertebrate predators of the banana weevil, possibly also favouring other vertebrate and invertebrate natural enemies.