Closing the Incentive Gap: The Role of Public and Private Actors in Governing Indonesia's Tuna Fisheries

Indonesia is one of the world's largest tuna producing countries, yet regulatory oversight remains weak and management is poor. Incentive-based approaches are a way to improve state-based resource management, but they often require strong government regulation. In this paper, we use principal–agent theory and the notion of the ‘incentive gap’ to explore how incentives could be brought to bear in Indonesia through a combination of private and public actors. With a shared fish stock like tuna, we argue that a double principal–agent problem emerges, where information, asymmetries between various players complicate management. We focus on the problems of adverse selection and moral hazard in three different tuna fisheries in Indonesia to identify the nature of the incentive gap, and comment on the mix of public and private actors currently engaged in tuna fishery governance towards reducing the gap. The double principal–agent problem is a useful yet underutilized framework to understand the dynamics of shared stocks management. In this first application to a developing country fishery, we conclude that information asymmetries cannot be overcome without the involvement of private actors, who are increasingly becoming important in aligning regional and global objectives with those of fishers themselves.     

Rebuilding and strengthening health systems and providing basic health services in fragile states

The international community has compelling humanitarian, political, security and economic reasons to engage in rebuilding and strengthening health systems in fragile states. Improvements in health services and systems help to strengthen civil society and to restore legitimacy to governments. Effective engagement with fragile states to inform the design of health programmes and selection of interventions depends on donor coordination and an understanding of health system challenges. Planning requires consideration of allocation (services to be delivered), production (organisation of services), distribution (beneficiaries of services) and financing. The criteria for selecting interventions are: their impact on major health problems; effectiveness; the possibility of scale-up; equity; and sustainability. There are various options for financing and models of engagement, but support should always combine short-term relief with longer-term development. Stakeholders should aim not only to save lives and protect health but also to bolster nations' ability to deliver good-quality services in the long run.     

Fractionating dead reckoning: role of the compass,odometer, logbook,and home base establishment in spatial orientation

Rats use multiple sources of information to maintain spatial orientation. Although previous work has focused on rats’ use of environmental cues, a growing number of studies have demonstrated that rats also use self-movement cues to organize navigation. This review examines the extent that kinematic analysis of naturally occurring behavior has provided insight into processes that mediate dead-reckoning-based navigation. This work supports a role for separate systems in processing self-movement cues that converge on the hippocampus. The compass system is involved in deriving directional information from self-movement cues; whereas, the odometer system is involved in deriving distance information from self-movement cues. The hippocampus functions similar to a logbook in that outward path unique information from the compass and odometer is used to derive the direction and distance of a path to the point at which movement was initiated. Finally, home base establishment may function to reset this system after each excursion and anchor environmental cues to self-movement cues. The combination of natural behaviors and kinematic analysis has proven to be a robust paradigm to investigate the neural basis of spatial orientation.     

Sighting characteristics and photo-identification of Cuvier’s beaked whales (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Ziphius cavirostris</Emphasis>) near San Clemente Island,California: a key area for beaked whales and the military?

The relationship between beaked whales and certain anthropogenic sounds remains poorly understood and of great interest. Although Cuvier’s beaked whales (Ziphius cavirostris) are widely distributed, little is known of their behavior and population structure throughout much of their range. We conducted a series of five combined visual-acoustic marine mammal surveys from 2006 to 2008 in the southern San Nicolas Basin, a site of frequent naval activity off the southern California coast, west of San Clemente Island. The study area was defined by a 1,800 km² array of 88 bottom-mounted hydrophones at depths up to 1,850 m. The array was used to vector visual observers toward vocalizing marine mammal species. Thirty-seven groups of Cuvier’s beaked whales were encountered during the study period. The overall encounter rate was one group for every 21.0 h of survey effort, and was as high as one group per 10.2 h of effort during the October 2007 survey. Whales were encountered in the deepest portion of the study area, at a mean bottom depth of 1,580 m (SD 138). The average group size was 3.8 individuals (SD 2.4), which was higher than has been reported from other studies of this species. Twenty-four groups were observed over multiple surfacings (median = 4 surfacings, range 2–15). The mean encounter duration of extended sightings was 104 min (SD 98, range 12–466 min) and the mean distance moved over the course of sightings was 1.66 km (SD 1.56, range 0.08–6.65 km). Temporal surfacing patterns during extended encounters were similar to dive behavior described from Cuvier’s beaked whales carrying time-depth recording tags. Seventy-eight photographic identifications were made of 58 unique individuals, for an overall resighting rate of 0.26. Whales were sighted on up to 4 days, with duration from first to last sighting spanning 2–79 days. For those whales sighted on subsequent days, the mean distance between subsequent sightings was 8.6 km (SD 7.9). Individuals resighted over 2–3 days were usually in association with previous group members. Approximately one-third of groups contained more than one adult male, and many of the repeated associations involved adult males. These observations suggest the basin west of San Clemente Island may be an important region for Cuvier’s beaked whales, and also one which affords an unusual opportunity to collect detailed data on this species. Given its status as an active military range, it can also provide the ability to monitor the behavior of individuals in the presence of naval sonar, a critical step in the management of this and other beaked whale populations worldwide.     

Varying responses of northeastern North American amphibians to the chytrid pathogen Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis

Chytridiomycosis, caused by Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd), is widespread among amphibians in northeastern North America. It is unknown, however, whether Bd has the potential to cause extensive amphibian mortalities in northeastern North America as have occurred elsewhere. In the laboratory, we exposed seven common northeastern North American amphibian species to Bd to assess the likelihood of population-level effects from the disease. We exposed larval wood frogs (Lithobates sylvaticus) and postmetamorphic frogs of six other species to two different strains of Bd, a northeastern strain (JEL404) and a strain that caused die-offs of amphibians in Panama (JEL423), under ideal in vitro growth conditions for Bd. Exposed American toads (Anaxyrus americanus) all died; thus, this species may be the most likely to die from Bd-caused disease in the wild. Both Bd strains were associated with mortalities of wood frogs, although half the metamorphs survived. The Bd strain from Panama killed metamorphic green frogs (L. clamitans), whereas the northeastern strain did not, which means novel strains of Bd may lead to death even when local strains may not. No mortality was observed in four species (bullfrogs [L. catesbeianus], northern leopard frogs [L. pipiens], spring peepers [Pseudacris crucifer], and blue-spotted salamanders [Ambystoma laterale]) and in some individuals of green frogs and wood frogs that we exposed. This finding suggests these six species may be Bd vectors. Our results show that systematic exposures of amphibian species to Bd in the laboratory may be a good first step in the identification of species susceptible to Bd-caused declines and in directing regional conservation efforts aimed at susceptible species.     

Mapping bundles of ecosystem services reveals distinct types of multifunctionality within a Swedish landscape

Ecosystem services (ES) is a valuable concept to be used in the planning and management of social–ecological landscapes. However, the understanding of the determinant factors affecting the interaction between services in the form of synergies or trade-offs is still limited. We assessed the production of 16 ES across 62 municipalities in the Norrström drainage basin in Sweden. We combined GIS data with publically available information for quantifying and mapping the distribution of services. Additionally, we calculated the diversity of ES for each municipality and used correlations and k-means clustering analyses to assess the existence of ES bundles. We found five distinct types of bundles of ES spatially agglomerated in the landscape that could be explained by regional social and ecological gradients. Human-dominated landscapes were highly multifunctional in our study area and urban densely populated areas were hotspots of cultural services.     

Impact of the increased adoption of prenatal cfDNA screening on non-profit patient advocacy organizations in the United States

The ‘Stakeholder Perspectives on Noninvasive Prenatal Genetic Screening’ Symposium was held in conjunction with the 2015 annual meeting of the International Society for Prenatal Diagnosis. During the day-long meeting, a panel of patient advocacy group (PAG) representatives discussed concerns and challenges raised by prenatal cell-free DNA (cfDNA) screening, which has resulted in larger demands upon PAGs from concerned patients receiving prenatal cfDNA screening results. Prominent concerns included confusion about the accuracy of cfDNA screening and a lack of patient education resources about genetic conditions included in cfDNA screens. Some of the challenges faced by PAGs included funding limitations, lack of consistently implemented standards of care and oversight, diverse perspectives among PAGs and questions about neutrality, and lack of access to training and genetic counselors. PAG representatives also put forward suggestions for addressing these challenges, including improving educational and PAG funding and increasing collaboration between PAGs and the medical community. © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Spatial and temporal variations and mobile source emissions of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in Quito, Ecuador

Motor vehicles are a major source of air pollution in Quito, Ecuador; however, little work has been done to characterize spatial and temporal variations in traffic-related pollutants, or to measure pollutants in vehicle emissions. We measured PAH continuously for one year at two residential sites in Quito, and PAH and traffic patterns for one week near a busy roadway. Morning rush-hour traffic and temperature inversions caused daily PAH maxima between 06:00 and 08:00. SO₂, NO_x, CO, and PM_2.5 behaved similarly. At the residential sites PAH levels during inversions were 2-3-fold higher than during the afternoon, and 10-16-fold higher than 02:00-03:00 when levels were lowest. In contrast, at the near-roadway site, PAH concentrations were 3-6-fold higher than at the residential sites, and the effects of inversions were less pronounced. Cars and buses accounted for >95% of PAH at the near-roadway site. Near-roadway PAH concentrations were comparable to other polluted cities.