An agricultural researcher is developing methods to reduce the use of chemical p
ID: 3326631 • Letter: A
Question
An agricultural researcher is developing methods to reduce the use of chemical pesticides on the commercial strawberry crop. His approach is to use alternative planting methods, resistant varieties, and beneficial insects to reduce damage and maintain yield rather than using chemical herbicides, fungicides, and insecticides. This applied ecology approach to agriculture is often termed integrated pest management or IPM. The researcher wishes to compare a modified IPM program to traditional IPM and chemical control. In order to control for variables such as microclimate and soil conditions, he plants 3 plots on each of 6 farms. The plots within each farm are matched as closely as possible in terms of soil type, etc., and the agricultural method is randomly assigned to the plots within each farm. Yields are in kilograms of marketable berries per plot. From your analysis of the data, is IPM or modified IPM as good as or better than traditional chemical control in terms of marketable strawberry yield? Was blocking important to this analysis? Explain. For this exercise you can SPSS for your calculations. Interpret in details your results.
Agricultural method
Farm
Chemical control
IPM
Modified IPM
I
71
73
77
II
90
90
92
III
59
70
80
IV
75
80
82
V
65
60
67
V1
82
86
85
Agricultural method
Farm
Chemical control
IPM
Modified IPM
I
71
73
77
II
90
90
92
III
59
70
80
IV
75
80
82
V
65
60
67
V1
82
86
85
Explanation / Answer
Result:
An agricultural researcher is developing methods to reduce the use of chemical pesticides on the commercial strawberry crop. His approach is to use alternative planting methods, resistant varieties, and beneficial insects to reduce damage and maintain yield rather than using chemical herbicides, fungicides, and insecticides. This applied ecology approach to agriculture is often termed integrated pest management or IPM. The researcher wishes to compare a modified IPM program to traditional IPM and chemical control. In order to control for variables such as microclimate and soil conditions, he plants 3 plots on each of 6 farms. The plots within each farm are matched as closely as possible in terms of soil type, etc., and the agricultural method is randomly assigned to the plots within each farm. Yields are in kilograms of marketable berries per plot. From your analysis of the data, is IPM or modified IPM as good as or better than traditional chemical control in terms of marketable strawberry yield? Was blocking important to this analysis? Explain. For this exercise you can SPSS for your calculations. Interpret in details your results.
Dependent Variable: yield
method
Mean
Std. Error
95% Confidence Interval
Lower Bound
Upper Bound
Chemical control
73.667
1.639
70.014
77.319
IPM
76.500
1.639
72.848
80.152
Modified IPM
80.500
1.639
76.848
84.152
Tests of Between-Subjects Effects
Dependent Variable: yield
Source
Type III Sum of Squares
df
Mean Square
F
Sig.
Model
107990.778a
8
13498.847
837.282
.000
farm
1435.111
5
287.022
17.803
.000
method
141.444
2
70.722
4.387
.043
Error
161.222
10
16.122
Total
108152.000
18
a. R Squared = .999 (Adjusted R Squared = .997)
To test the effect of blocking, calculated F=17.803, p=0.000 which is < 0.05 level of significance. Blocking is important to this analysis.
To test the effect of Agricultural method, calculated F=4.387, p=0.043 which is < 0.05 level of significance. There is significant difference in yields between the three Agricultural methods.
Dependent Variable: yield
method
Mean
Std. Error
95% Confidence Interval
Lower Bound
Upper Bound
Chemical control
73.667
1.639
70.014
77.319
IPM
76.500
1.639
72.848
80.152
Modified IPM
80.500
1.639
76.848
84.152
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