Improving inferences about private land conservation by accounting for incomplete reporting

Private lands provide key habitat for imperiled species and are core components of function protectected area networks; yet, their incorporation into national and regional conservation planning has been challenging. Identifying locations where private landowners are likely to participate in conservation initiatives can help avoid conflict and clarify trade-offs between ecological benefits and sociopolitical costs. Empirical, spatially explicit assessment of the factors associated with conservation on private land is an emerging tool for identifying future conservation opportunities. However, most data on private land conservation are voluntarily reported and incomplete, which complicates these assessments. We used a novel application of occupancy models to analyze the occurrence of conservation easements on private land. We compared multiple formulations of occupancy models with a logistic regression model to predict the locations of conservation easements based on a spatially explicit social–ecological systems framework. We combined a simulation experiment with a case study of easement data in Idaho and Montana (United States) to illustrate the utility of the occupancy framework for modeling conservation on private land. Occupancy models that explicitly accounted for variation in reporting produced estimates of predictors that were substantially less biased than estimates produced by logistic regression under all simulated conditions. Occupancy models produced estimates for the 6 predictors we evaluated in our case study that were larger in magnitude, but less certain than those produced by logistic regression. These results suggest that occupancy models result in qualitatively different inferences regarding the effects of predictors on conservation easement occurrence than logistic regression and highlight the importance of integrating variable and incomplete reporting of participation in empirical analysis of conservation initiatives. Failure to do so can lead to emphasizing the wrong social, institutional, and environmental factors that enable conservation and underestimating conservation opportunities in landscapes where social norms or institutional constraints inhibit reporting.     

薄膜扩散梯度技术在重金属生物有效态监测中的应用

重金属生物有效性是评估重金属元素迁移性、生物可利用性和生态影响的关键参数。薄膜扩散梯度技术(DGT)是一种原位被动采样技术,因其具有原位富集性、形态选择性,可提供被监测物质在监测时间段内的平均浓度等优点,可作为生物对重金属摄取的模拟替代物对环境介质中重金属的生物可利用度进行预测,已被广泛应用于环境介质中重金属生物有效性的测定。研究主要介绍了DGT技术的原理、组成和特点,评述了其近年来在水体、土壤、沉积物中重金属生物有效态应用方面的新进展,提出了DGT技术未来要提高抗生物污染能力及寻找可与DGT技术联用的相关技术的观点。     

磺胺氯哒嗪在海水中的间接光降解

以有色溶解有机物(CDOM)作为主要光敏剂研究磺胺氯哒嗪(SCP)间接光降解行为和机理,分析CDOM组成、盐度和pH值对SCP间接光降解的影响.SCP间接光降解速率随CDOM浓度升高而逐渐加快.CDOM产生的光化学反应活性中间体对SCP间接光降解的贡献率不同,其中³CDOM^*起主要作用,对SCP间接光降解的贡献率高达77.94%.所用CDOM由4种荧光组分组成,包含3种外源腐殖质(C1,C2,C3)和1种内源腐殖质(C4), SCP间接光降解去除率和³CDOM^*浓度分别与荧光组分的相关性大小顺序均为C3>C2>C4>C1.其中C3和C2与[³CDOM^*]具有较高线性相关性(R²>0.97),是³CDOM^*的主要贡献者.盐度和pH值对SCP间接光降解的影响作用显著.在盐度为15‰时,SCP的间接光降解速率最大.在低盐度范围(0~15‰)内,离子强度效应对间接光降解的促进作用大于无机阴离子带来的抑制作用,使得间接光降解速率随着盐度的升高而加快.溶液pH=(5.00±0.10)时,SCP的间接光降解速率最大.SCP的间接光降解速率随着溶液pH值的升高而减慢,中性和碱性环境不利于SCP的间接光降解.     

Emerging applications of green coconut: A promising lignocellulosic biomass

Waste accumulation is a grave concern and becoming a transboundary challenge for environment. During Covid-19 pandemic, diverse type of waste were collected due to different practices employed in order to fight back the transmission rate of the virus. Covid-19 was proved to be capricious catastrophe of this 20th century and even not completely eradicated from the world. The havoc created by this imperceptible quick witted, pleomorphic deadly virus can't be ignored. Though a number of vaccines have been developed by the scientists but there is a fear of getting this virus again in our life. Medical studies prove that immunity drinks will help to reduce its reoccurrences. Coconut water is widely used among all drinks available globally. Its massive consumption created an incalculable pile of green coconut shells around the different corners of the world. This practice generating enormous problem of space acquisition for the environment. Both the environment and public health will benefit from an evaluation of quantity of coconut waste that is being thrown and its potential to generate value added products. With this context, present article has been planned to study different aspects like, coconut waste generation, its biological properties and environmental hazards associated with its accumulation. Additionally, this review illustrates, green technologies for production of different value added products from coconut waste.     

Preserving Wilderness or Protecting Homelands? Intersections and Divergences in Activist Discourses About Mining in Ontario’s Far North

Northern Ontario’s Ring of Fire/Wawangajing controversy constitutes a complex site of debate about the risks and benefits of mining in an area of major ecological significance that is also the ancestral territory of nine First Nation communities. This paper investigates the rhetorical alignments and divergences in public calls by Matawa First Nations tribal council and the Ontario Wildlands League for stronger environmental assessment of mining projects than that favoured by the Canadian government. Tracing the terminologies each group uses to describe the affected region and its inhabitants in its activist rhetoric about EA offers insight into the contingent, shifting ways in which wilderness advocacy and Indigenous justice discourses may speak together yet distinctly within contemporary environmental-natural resource disputes.     

Mainstreaming human and large carnivore coexistence through institutional collaboration

Achieving coexistence between large carnivores and humans in human-dominated landscapes (HDLs) is a key challenge for societies globally. This challenge cannot be adequately met with the current sectoral approaches to HDL governance and an academic community largely dominated by disciplinary sectors. Academia (universities and other research institutions and organizations) should take a more active role in embracing societal challenges around conservation of large carnivores in HDLs by facilitating cross-sectoral cooperation to mainstream coexistence of humans and large carnivores. Drawing on lessons from populated regions of Europe, Asia, and South America with substantial densities of large carnivores, we suggest academia should better embrace the principles and methods of sustainability sciences and create institutional spaces for the implementation of transdisciplinary curricula and projects; reflect on research approaches (i.e., disciplinary, interdisciplinary, or transdisciplinary) they apply and how their outcomes could aid leveraging institutional transformations for mainstreaming; and engage with various institutions and stakeholder groups to create novel institutional structures that can respond to multiple challenges of HDL management and human–large carnivore coexistence. Success in mainstreaming this coexistence in HDL will rest on the ability to think and act cooperatively. Such a conservation achievement, if realized, stands to have far-reaching benefits for people and biodiversity.     

浅谈县级环境监测质量管理工作现状及对策

当前环保系统垂直改革稳步推进,县级环境监测质量管理工作也迎来新的机遇与挑战。从县级环境监测站质量管理工作现状着手,分析新形势下存在质量管理体系有效性缺乏、现场监测过程质量管理薄弱、质量管理意识尚待提高等问题。提出,应从加强体系建设、提高现场监测水平、强化考核培训力度等方面改进县级环境监测质量管理工作水平。     

“Hey Friend,Buy Green”: Social Media Use to Influence Eco-Purchasing Involvement

This study addresses the use of message carriers to convey corporate social responsibility information to promote eco-purchasing involvement. The work tests various media formats transmitted via social media. The effects of corporate vs. peer communication in a corporate social responsibility campaign in stimulating self-reported eco-purchasing involvement are indicated. The research varies communication dimensions of a fictional corporate social responsibility campaign sent through social media. Multiple media formats; new release; article; and advertisement were tested, as was the inclusion of social media persuasive sentiment. The analysis of source/format combinations and source/format/sentiment combinations found statistically significant differences for consumer-to-consumer communication in stimulating eco-purchasing involvement in certain circumstances. This research suggests an emerging role for the consumer communicator as a content co-creator and validates the effective use of articles and news releases instead of advertising on social media, yielding managerial and scholarly implications.     

Fishing‐gear restrictions and biomass gains for coral reef fishes in marine protected areas

Considerable empirical evidence supports recovery of reef fish populations with fishery closures. In countries where full exclusion of people from fishing may be perceived as inequitable, fishing‐gear restrictions on nonselective and destructive gears may offer socially relevant management alternatives to build recovery of fish biomass. Even so, few researchers have statistically compared the responses of tropical reef fisheries to alternative management strategies. We tested for the effects of fishery closures and fishing gear restrictions on tropical reef fish biomass at the community and family level. We conducted 1,396 underwater surveys at 617 unique sites across a spatial hierarchy within 22 global marine ecoregions that represented 5 realms. We compared total biomass across local fish assemblages and among 20 families of reef fishes inside marine protected areas (MPAs) with different fishing restrictions: no‐take, hook‐and‐line fishing only, several fishing gears allowed, and sites open to all fishing gears. We included a further category representing remote sites, where fishing pressure is low. As expected, full fishery closures, (i.e., no‐take zones) most benefited community‐ and family‐level fish biomass in comparison with restrictions on fishing gears and openly fished sites. Although biomass responses to fishery closures were highly variable across families, some fishery targets (e.g., Carcharhinidae and Lutjanidae) responded positively to multiple restrictions on fishing gears (i.e., where gears other than hook and line were not permitted). Remoteness also positively affected the response of community‐level fish biomass and many fish families. Our findings provide strong support for the role of fishing restrictions in building recovery of fish biomass and indicate important interactions among fishing‐gear types that affect biomass of a diverse set of reef fish families.     

Microtargeting for conservation

Widespread human action and behavior change is needed to achieve many conservation goals. Doing so at the requisite scale and pace will require the efficient delivery of outreach campaigns. Conservation gains will be greatest when efforts are directed toward places of high conservation value (or need) and tailored to critical actors. Recent strategic conservation planning has relied primarily on spatial assessments of biophysical attributes, largely ignoring the human dimensions. Elsewhere, marketers, political campaigns, and others use microtargeting—predictive analytics of big data—to identify people most likely to respond positively to particular messages or interventions. Conservationists have not yet widely capitalized on these techniques. To investigate the effectiveness of microtargeting to improve conservation, we developed a propensity model to predict restoration behavior among 203,645 private landowners in a 5,200,000 ha study area in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed (U.S.A.). To isolate the additional value microtargeting may offer beyond geospatial prioritization, we analyzed a new high-resolution land-cover data set and cadastral data to identify private owners of riparian areas needing restoration. Subsequently, we developed and evaluated a restoration propensity model based on a database of landowners who had conducted restoration in the past and those who had not (n = 4978). Model validation in a parallel database (n = 4989) showed owners with the highest scorers for propensity to conduct restoration (i.e., top decile) were over twice as likely as average landowners to have conducted restoration (135%). These results demonstrate that microtargeting techniques can dramatically increase the efficiency and efficacy of conservation programs, above and beyond the advances offered by biophysical prioritizations alone, as well as facilitate more robust research of many social–ecological systems.