CIGR Newsletter No 29

PUBLICATIONS

Proceedings of the XIIth World Congress of CIGR

The Proceedings of the XlIth World Congress of CIGR, which was held in Milan, Italy on 29 August - 1 September 1994 are now available from CIGR's General Secretariat. The Proceedings contain 2 volumes and 1830 pp. Price is $ US 150.00 for industrialised countries and $ US 100.00 for developing countries. Pre-paid orders, preferably through our bank account:

Bank: Gemeentekrediet / Credit Communal SWIFT-address: GKGCBEBB AccountNo: 068-2060813-75 of CIGR General Secretariat, Merelbeke, Belgium Ref.: Proceedings CIGR 1994.

Journal of Agricultural Safety and Health

The American Society of Agricultural Engineers has just launched a new refereed, quarterly journal designed to iden- tify and discuss issues related to agricultural safety and health worldwide. The JASH will address issues such as:

Further information on this new journal can be obtained from: ASAE,2950 Niles Road, St. Joseph, MI 49085-9659, USA Fax.: +1 616 429 3852.

An Engineering Textbook for Students in Agriculture and Horticulture

Nowadays, good textbooks on most major subjects which make up Agricultural Engineering can usually be found. However what about a textbook for students majoring in Agriculture or Horticulture, who are doing perhaps only one paper in Engineering as part of their course? Often these students have a relatively poor science background, yet most Agricultural Engineering textbooks assume at least a basic understanding of physics principles.

A book published in 1990 attempts to deal with this problem. Published in New Zealand, the book gives a broad overview of Agricultural Engineering, starting from basic physical principles, and moving into a series of specific topics which give a broad overview of the subject. The book, Agricultural and Horticultural Engineering, contains worked examples of problems, as well as a set of questions which can be used as assignments.

Chapters include an overview of the Engineering approach to problems, surveying, basic mechanics and physics presented in a novel fashion using the idea of equations as simplified models of the real world (which in the end is all they are, of course), workshop methods, a major section on water supplies which includes trickle irrigation systems, a good section on basic electronics with an inevitably dated section on com- puters, followed by some solid chapters on power systems, buildings, fencing, milking machines, post-harvest systems, and the environment. At a first glance the absence of farm machinery and tractors as specific topics seems a major over- sight: however the author argues that that these topics are well covered elsewhere (which is indisputable). Inclusion of these topics would presumably double the size of the book, which at 500 pages is already a substantial document.

The presentation of the book is generally good, although one or two of the illustrations are poorly reproduced. Fortunately thes~ot limit the comprehensibility of the text which is ~vell written and clear, according to students who have used the book already. It is not very well publicised, which is part of the reason for this review.

At US $ 40.00 the book is a very reasonable purchase, and will solve the problem of a textbook for those first year Agricultural students majoring in areas other than Engineering. Agricultural and Horticultural Engineering: Principles, Mo- dels, Systems, Techniques. by CJ Studman, Butterworths, Wellington, New Zealand,1990.500 pp ISBN 0 409 604690.

Review by the author, September 1994.

Dr CJ Studman is Senior Lecturer at the Department of Agri- cultural Engineering of Massey University, New Zealand and a long time member of CIGR. He is currently member of the Board of Section VI of CIGR viz. Processing. He can be reached at the following address:

Dr. CJ Studman, Massey University, Faculty of Agricultural and Horticultural Sciences, Dept. Agricultural Engineering, Private Bag 11222, Palmerston North, New Zealand. Fax.: +64 635 05 640

(Editor)

UNEVOC INFO

UNEVOC, The International Project on Technical and Voca- tional Education is a project of the United Nations Educational and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). Its purpose is to contribute to the development and improvement of technical and vocational education in Member States. Based on a de- cision taken at the 26th session of the General Conference of UNESCO in 1991, UNEVOC was launched in 1992.

Programme areas:

The Government of the Federal Republic of Germany offered to host an Implementation Unit in Berlin.

UNEVOC INFO is a publication of the UNESCO and is prepared and disseminated by ths Section for Technical and Vocational Education, Place de Fontenoy, F-75732 Paris 07 SP, France. Issue No 1 discusses:

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