Sistema Regional de Información
en línea para Revistas Científicas de América Latina,
el Caribe, España y Portugal

Background: Bioproducts represent a promising alternative for sustainable agriculture, notable for their ability to stimulate plant growth and development, which positions them as valuable tools in current production systems. Objective: To evaluate the effect of complementary application of EcoMic®, QuitoMax® and CBFERT bioproducts on the productivity and seed quality of cowpea (Vigna unguiculata cv. INIFAT-93). Methodology: The research was conducted in experimental plots at the University of Pinar del Río (Cuba), using a randomized complete block design with four replications. Four treatments were evaluated: 1) 100% chemical fertilization (control); 2) 50% chemical fertilization plus EcoMic®; 3) 50% chemical fertilization plus QuitoMax® + CBFERT; and 4) 50% chemical fertilization plus the combination of all three bioproducts. Atharvest, biological productivity variables, agricultural yield components, and seed quality parameters (biomass and dimensions) were measured. Results: Analyses revealed that bioproduct treatments showed significant results: they enabled a 50% reduction in chemical fertilizer use, increased dry biomass production by 24%, and achieved agricultural yields exceeding 1.2 t ha-1. Regarding seed quality, biomass increased by 20-32% while maintaining dimensional variations below 6% compared to the control treatment. Implications: It is feasible to substantially reduce chemical fertilizer use in cowpea cultivation through complementary application of bioproducts, while maintaining or even improving crop production and quality parameters. Conclusions: Application of 50% chemical fertilization in combination with either EcoMic® or QuitoMax® + CBFERT significantly increased the biological and agricultural productivity of cowpea, ensuring seed quality comparable to that obtained with complete chemical fertilization. These results demonstrate the remarkable potential of these bioproducts for implementing more sustainable and efficient agricultural production systems.

Background: Tomatillo (Physalis ixocarpa) production in Mexico requires the search for sustainable fertilization alternatives. In this regard, biochar helps retain water and mineral nutrients, while arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) enhance the uptake of these nutrients, making them potentially viable strategies to reduce the use of synthetic fertilizers. Objective: To evaluate the application of biochar and the inoculation of AMF on tomatillo growth. Methodology: A completely randomized experiment was designed, evaluating three percentages of biochar in the substrate (0%, 2.5%, and 5% v/v) and three AMF inocula: two native consortia from agricultural soils in Michoacán ("El Huizachal" and "El Limón"), and one commercial AMF composed of Rhizophagus intraradices and Glomus fasciculatum. Nine treatments were generated with eight replications, for a total of 72 experimental units. The dynamics of plant growth were recorded weekly by measuring plant height, number of leaves, and stem diameter. At 60 days after transplanting, the plants were harvested, and the growth parameters as well as microbiological variables were recorded. Results: A significant effect of the evaluated factors was found (p<0.05); biochar at 2.5% and 5% and the commercial AMF promoted stem diameter, aerial fresh weight, and total fresh weight. In the interaction of factors, the combination of commercial AMF with 5% biochar recorded the highest values for leaf area, root dry weight, and total dry weight. On the other hand, the treatment with 2.5% biochar combined with the “El Limón” consortium significantly increased (p<0.05) stem diameter, root and total fresh weight, number of flowers, and root volume and length. The results showed that biochar negatively affected the formation of mycorrhizal symbiosis by reducing AMF colonization and spore number by 72% and 60%, respectively. Implications: The synergy between AMF and biochar depends on the compatibility of the inoculum used and the dose or source of biochar applied. Conclusions: The promotion of tomatillo plant growth depends on the type of mycorrhizal inoculum species and the concentration of biochar in the substrate. This suggests that the use of biochar and arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi can improve plant performance while contributing to more sustainable agricultural practices.

Background: The management of negative interactions between livestock farming and predators is complex because of the multifactorial and dynamic nature of the underlying causes, which include human elements that complicate their management. Previous studies have shown that modifications in livestock management practices can significantly reduce these interactions. Therefore, it is crucial to identify the factors that promote these negative interactions to develop effective management strategies. Objective: To diagnose livestock management practices and their relationship with predators, exploring how these practices influence predation events and farmers' capacity to manage them. Methodology: Interviews and surveys were conducted with livestock farmers to gather information on their socioeconomic characteristics, livestock management practices, and perceived losses. The qualitative approach captured farmers' perceptions and their relationship with predators on their farms, Results: The results suggest that the interactions between livestock farming and predators are influenced by management practices that increase predation events and by farmers' limited capacity to manage them. The location of farms in fragmented landscapes exacerbates this situation, indicating the need to strengthen farmers' capacities. The meaning of the livestock and dependence of ranchers on diverse activities hinder the implementation of new livestock management practices. Implications: The study identifies possible key strategies, such as forage banks, electric fences, and vaccination programs, to reduce predation risks and improve livestock farming sustainability. These strategies should consider the economic and cultural contexts of ranching communities for effective implementation. Conclusion: Ranchers' management decisions are strongly shaped by cultural and traditional factors. Including ranchers in the codesigning of conservation strategies, together with education and capacity-building, is essential for align conservation efforts with their values and needs to ensure long-term success.

Background.  The State of Mexico is located among the main livestock producers in the country. In the southwestern region of the state there are small agricultural production units (SPU) with clear pluri-activity where livestock production does not respond to purely productive purposes, which is why they do not belong to livestock associations, and which have not been studied socioeconomically or productively.  Objective. To determine the socioeconomic characteristics of SPU in three communities in the municipality of Amatepec, State of Mexico. Methodology. 43 SPU holders were interviewed in the upper, middle and lower areas of the municipality. The information was analyzed with a factor analysis using the principal components method and cluster analysis. Results. Three groups were identified: self-consumption (AUT) (54% of the SPU), whose main economic activities were work for third parties and commerce. The livestock group (PEC) (26% of the SPU) had its main activities in cattle production and agricultural production. The agricultural group (AGRO) (30% of the SPU) had livestock and agriculture as their main activities. Implications. The lower availability of land, migration and the lack of generational replacement are factors that cause the disappearance of small production units in rural areas, so new and better government support strategies must be generated to ensure subsistence. and the development of families in rural areas with few resources that allow them to continue with their lives in the rural regions of the country. Conclusion. The small production units studied were characterized by farmers of advance age and low scholarity, migration of the young family members and, low land availability as the main limiting factor for development, which resulted in the practice of diversified agriculture and cattle production with no specialization, therefore family members complement incomes from out of farm activities like unskilled labor, commerce, remittances, and from government subsistence support programs which barely provided enough incomes to subsistence, therefore the continuity of the farm in agriculture and cattle production remains uncertain.

Background: Among dry fruits, Pistachio cultivar is the fourth most important in the world if considering its surface area. Pistachio is the fourth most important nut in the world considering its surface area. It has become an alternative to traditional crops with a growing interest in semi-arid areas of northern Mexico. The limitation for its production and exploitation is its effective chilling hour needs (hours below 7 ºC) before budbreak, which vary between 700 and 1500 chilling hours depending on the cultivar planted. Objective: To evaluate hydrogenated cyanamide as a compensator of effective chilling hours in pistachio cultivar Kerman. Methodology: During the 2023 agricultural season, the following treatments were applied: 2.5, 5 and 7.5% of cyanamide compared to an untreated control (0% of cyanamide) evaluating budbreaking in different dates and fruit yield. Results: The application of hydrogen cyanamide, as a compensator for the lack of chilling, caused a significant advance and increase in pistachio bud break, which depended on the dose used. There were increases of 11 to 75% in the budbreak of cyanamide-treated trees compared to the control trees, from March 9 to 23 (22 to 36 days after application). An advance of 13 to 45 days of 50% budbreak and 12 to 40 days of 75% budbreak of cyanamide-treated trees was observed compared to the control trees. Only the 7.5% dose of cyanamide had a high pistachio yield (662 kg per hectare), which was significantly higher than the control yield. Implications: The study shows that hydrogen cyanamide can be used as a compensator for the lack of chilling in pistachio in regions with warm winter conditions with insufficient accumulation of effective chilling hours, such as the Comarca Lagunera, as well as in the next agricultural seasons in which an increase in temperature is forecast due to global warming. Conclusions: According to the results obtained, the application of hydrogen cyanamide as a chilling compensator increases the bud break and yield of pistachio, depending on the dose used.

Background. Hylocereus undatus is a plant of great economic importance that produces an edible fruit known as Pitahaya or dragon fruit. However, these methods result in a reduced genetic base and low germination rates, in addition to the low germination of seeds, which makes successful cultivation difficult. Objective. To establish an efficient procedure for disinfecting and germinating H. undatus seeds, laying the groundwork for future genetic improvement programs. Methodology. In vitro conditions, cladodes, cotyledons leaves, and stems were used as explants and cultured in MS medium with varying concentrations of ANA and BAP (0.5 mgL-1, 1.0 mgL-1, 1.5 mgL-1, 2.0 mgL-1, 2.5 mgL-1). Results. An 86% germination rate using MS medium without sucrose and a 47% germination rate in MS medium with added sucrose (30 gL-1). In the induction stage of morphogenetic responses, it was observed that the highest proliferation and shoot formation occurred when ANA was added at a concentration of 2.0 mgL-1 in the MS medium. Implications. It is necessary to lay the foundations for future genetic improvement programs aimed at increasing the plant material available to Pitahaya producers in Mexico. Conclusions. The best responses were seen in the cladodes, resulting in a greater number of shoots per explant.

Brown (2022) has recently argued that metaethical expressivists should adopt an interpretationist account of propositional attitudes. Expressivism has traditionally been the view that moral judgments are best understood as desire-like states with a primarily practical function of guiding and producing actions. Most problems for expressivists, however, come from the fact that moral judgments have many belief-like properties: being truth evaluable, epistemically evaluable, embeddable in complex truth-functional constructions, etc. By adopting Brown’s proposal, expressivists would avoid several of these problems since they could claim that moral judgments are just beliefs but of a non-representational variety. In this article, I argue that, while promising, this view has a substantial problem. A crucial element of the rationalising interpretation is that beliefs are governed by a norm of aiming at truth. But contrary to what Brown suggests, deflationist accounts of truth cannot help expressivists explain why moral judgments are also subject to this norm. 

Although Badiou’s thought can only be understood through the systematic connection and implication of the concepts of event, subject, and truth, our reading points to the centrality of the concept of subject. This reading is explained insofar as it is up to the subject, as incorporation and generator of provisional stability in contingency, to judge, name, and therefore make the multiplicity of the event endure. In other words, the primacy of practical reason ultimately organizes thought. The subject is the conceptual operator that problematizes contingency: the distance between lived contingency and thought contingency, or the logical void that substitutes the thing for the idea, through a rupture. Thus understood, in opposition to its characterization by instrumental reason, the subject allows the continuity of processes, since it constitutes the explanation of their marks from a practical point of view.

This article studies the use of the category of freedom by several of the most influential transhumanist thinkers to justify intervening in the human genome for enhancement purposes. Thus, it analyses the principles of morphological freedom and procreative autonomy, the main ways in which the idea of freedom is discussed in this field of study. It also examines the corrections and nuances that transhumanism itself proposes to these principles, since it is difficult to harmonise them with equality or social equity, as well as the arguments presented by bioconservative thinkers who are critical of transhumanism and the genetic manipulation of the human species for its bio-enhancement. The conclusion invites us to take this public debate seriously so that any genetic manipulation in humans carried out with the aim of enhancing the species is subject to democratic control.

This paper develops the idea that, according to Wittgenstein’s Tractatus, assertion is an aspect of the very form of propositions that could be represented by means of a pro-sentence. Then, given the assertive character inherent to propositions, a new formulation of the Frege-Geach problem is suggested. Drawing on a distinction between token-propositions and type-propositions, as well as on the conception of logical constants as operations, I ultimately present a possible Tractarian solution to this version of the Frege-Geach problem.