Ecosystems provide humans with services that include benefits from food, fresh water, climate regulation, and socio-economic assets. The Mesopotamian marshlands are among the largest wetlands in the Middle East and they provide various benefits. However, ecosystem services of the Marshlands are consistently undervalued in national economic analysis and decision making. This study focusses on the Central Marshes, the first National Park in Iraq, and is the first attempt at valuing a series of ecosystem services from a valuable natural ecosystem in Iraq. We adopted the Toolkit for Ecosystem Services Site-Based Assessment (TESSA) for the determination of biophysical and economic values of services at the site level. Data on key ecosystem services (as determined by 30 interviews with residents of the Marshes) included the trading of fish, harvested plants, water buffalo milk, and fodder were collected across six months in 2014. We valued the ecosystem services within the CM (40,000 ha) over a 6-month period to have a total value of 860,078.23 USD. This estimated total value was the sum of 86,637.25 USD from harvested plants, 551,334.80 USD from trading fish, 167, 303.70 USD from trading water buffalo milk, and 54,804.00 USD from trading fodder. The average income per individual in Iraq in 2014 was 6720 USD (World Bank data - https://data.worldbank.org/country/iraq): thus, the CM provided an average salary for 256 people. Our results provided greater understanding of the ecosystem services contributed by the Central Marshes and has highlighted the crucial role of nature in supporting sustainable well-being for humans living in the area. In addition, the results can be used to enhance local policy, to aid management plans of the National park, and to estimate lost and damage that could result from impact of climate change on the area.
Previous studies in Euro-American countries have shown that patients with chronic hepatitis C virus infection have increased levels of neuropsychiatric symptoms. While chronic hepatitis C virus infection has been reported in Arab countries such as Iraq, there is little studies about the neuropsychological burden associated with chronic hepatitis C among patients in the Arab region. The aim of the current study was to measure the prevalence and level of severity of depression, anxiety and stress among a sample of chronic hepatitis C patients in AL-Najaf province /Iraq. The current study was cross-sectional study carried out on (110) already diagnosed chronic viral hepatitis C patients who attended the Gastroenterology and Hepatology
... Show MoreExperiment was conducted in Baghdad, three factor were used in this research included Two types of Plows included moldboard and disk plows which represented the main plot, Three forward speeds of the tillage was the second factor included 1.85, 3.75 and 5.62 km / h which represented sup plot , and Three levels of Soil Moisture was third factor included 21, 18 and 14 % in all of Vertical and Lateral Plowing Deviation, Practical and specific productivity, actual time for plowing one donam and appearance (goodness) of Tillage represented by the number of clods > 10 cm in silt clay loam soil with depth 22 cm were studied. the experiment was used Split – split plot design under randomized complete block design with three replications and Le
... Show MoreThe research dealt with the analysis of the relations between the GDP of the agricultural sector in Iraq, oil prices, the exchange rate and the GDP both on the short term and long term. The research adopted data analysis for the period from 1980-2019 using the ARDL model. the results indicate the existence of long-term relationships between oil prices and the prices of each agricultural commodity at a significance level of 5%. Also, oil prices have a negative consequence on agricultural production in Iraq, and the Iraqi economy is a rentier economy that depends mainly on oil as a source of income and budget financing.
Salmonellosis in poultry is one of the most significant bacterial infections causing mortality, reduced production, and serious economic losses. This study aimed to study the molecular diversity among Salmonella isolates and investigate the epidemiological spread of these bacteria in broiler and layer chicken flocks in five different farms in Karbala, Iraq, using random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) polymerase chain reaction (PCR). In total, 217 cloac a swabs were collected from the farms, out of which 129 and 88 swabs were taken from broiler and layer chickens. The samples were screened by PCR for S. enterica subsp. enterica using primers specific for the invA gene. Afterward, RAPD-PCR with uniplex or multiplex octamer primers was appli
... Show MoreThe ciliate species isolated from midgut and hindgut of Rough-tailed gecko Cyrtopodion scabrum (Heyden, 1827), identified as Nyctotherus hardwickii was collected from many regions of Baghdad, Iraq. The current study deals with a description and comparison of the morphology and morphometric characters of this species for the first time in Iraq.
A total of 13 samples of domestic cat Felis cattus (Linnaeus, 1758 ) and 9 samples of wild cat Felis chaus furax (de Winton, 1898) of the Felidae Family were trapped and examined to detect the hard ticks. The areas of the collection were: Baghdad, Al-Rashidiya, Tharthar, Nahrawan, AL-Mahmoudiya (middle of Iraq) and AL-Haretha (south of Iraq), Mosul (north of Iraq). The results of the current study revealed that four species belong to two genera of hard ticks: Haemaphysalis sp. (Koch, 1844), Rhipicephalus turanicus (Morel, 1969), Rhipicephalus sanguineus (Neumann, 1904) and Rhipicephalus appendiculatus (Santos, 1955). The rates and the density of infestation were discussed. The current study aimed to clarify the infestation differe
... Show MoreA total of sixty raw milk samples were collected from (street vendors and shops) from Baghdad city, Iraq. The samples were inoculated into peptone water and, then, subcultured onto MacConkey agar and Blood agar. Identification of isolates was confirmed by microscopic examination, cultural characteristic, biochemical tests, Vitek (VITEK®2 system), and Biolog GN substrate reactions followed by 16S rRNA and specific genes sequencing. Of 60 raw cow’s milk samples, Providencia spp. were identified only in 4 samples (6.67%) and P. rettgeri was the most common, 2/4 (50%), followed by P. stuartii and P. vermicola, 1/4 (25%). Antimicrobial susceptibility tests were conducted against ten antibiotics by the disc diffusion method. All Provid
... Show MoreA total of 72 individuals of genus Pristina were sorted from aquatic plant, Ceratophyllum demersum L., and filamentous algae collected from three sites on Tigris River at Baghdad including: Al-Sarafiya area (S1), Al- Jadiriyah area (S2), and Al- Za´afaraniya area (S3). Four species were identified including P. longiseta, P. aequiseta, P. proboscidea and P. foreli, with percentags of 51.7 , 36.4, 1.1, and 10.5 % respectively. The first two species found in all sites , while , P. proboscidea found only in S1 and P. foreli only in S2.