An ecological planning model

In this article a model is proposed that could be used as a basis for ecological planning of natural resources. The role of people as part of the ecosystem is emphasized, and the various factors that should be considered in such planning are discussed. An understanding of ecological planning is dependent on the study of human activities in, and the nature of, natural ecosystems. It also depends on the fact that people are a part of nature, and as a result nature is of value to humans. Realizing the importance of this principle is a prerequisite to studying nature and also for an understanding of the various steps in the ecological planning approach. Realization of these values is often through a series of activities that may result in a negative environmental impact. Nature is described as an interacting group of natural features and processes. In this study both the features and processes are described as natural resources. The use of these natural resources obviously affects them, and if this use is to continue over a long period, both the activity and the resource must be understood if they are to be maintained in a productive state. In order to limit impact and maintain value, a planning aid called zoning is used to assist in the understanding of the processes involved.     

试论油田开发与干旱荒漠区生态功能划分的原则 ──以诺敏戈壁三塘湖油田生态功能区划为例

三塘湖油田生态环境保护指导思想为:"分区保护、分类防治、分级管理"。文章通过分析干旱荒漠区生态功能的划分,根据三塘湖油田开发区生态环境特征、生态系统服务功能、生态环境功能重要性与敏感性的空间分异规律,确定区域生态功能分区,为制定生态环境保护计划、维护区域生态安全、促进社会经济可持续发展提供科学依据。     

A Precautionary Approach to Genetically Modified Organisms: Challenges and Implications for Policy and Science

The commercial introduction of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) has revealed a broad range of views among scientists and other stakeholders on perspectives of genetic engineering (GE) and if and how GMOs should be regulated. Within this controversy, the precautionary principle has become a contentious issue with high support from skeptical groups but resisted by GMO advocates. How to handle lack of scientific understanding and scientific disagreement are core issues within these debates. This article examines some of the key issues affecting precaution as a legal standard and as an approach to the use of science in decision-making processes. It is pointed out that there is a need for reflection over the level of scientific evidence required for applying the precautionary principle as well as who should have the burden of proof when there are uncertainties. Further, an awareness of the broader scientific uncertainties found in GMO risk assessment implies that a precautionary approach must be elaborated: both for acknowledging uncertainties and for identification of scientific responses. Since precaution is an important issue within the sustainable development framework, it is suggested that sustainability can provide a normative standard that can help to reveal the influence and negotiate the importance of the various forms of uncertainty. Wise management of uncertainties and inclusion of normative aspects in risk assessment and management may help to ensure sustainable and socially robust GMO innovations at present and in the future.     

Sustaining Visitor Use in Protected Areas: Future Opportunities in Recreation Ecology Research Based on the USA Experience

Recreation ecology, the study of environmental consequences of outdoor recreation activities and their effective management, is a relatively new field of scientific study having emerged over the last 50 years. During this time, numerous studies have improved our understanding of how use-related, environmental and managerial factors affect ecological conditions and processes. Most studies have focused on vegetation and soil responses to recreation-related trampling on trails and recreation sites using indicators such as percent vegetation cover and exposed mineral soil. This applied approach has and will continue to yield important information for land managers. However, for the field to advance, more attention needs to be given to other ecosystem attributes and to the larger aspects of environmental conservation occurring at landscape scales. This article is an effort at initiating a dialog on needed advances in the field. We begin by reviewing broadly generalizable knowledge of recreation ecology, to separate what is known from research gaps. Then, based on the authors’ perspective of research in the USA and North America, several research directions are suggested as essential for continued progress in this field including theoretical development, broadening scale, integration with other disciplines, and examination of synergistic effects.     

城镇化进程中生态环境管治的国际经验与启示

城镇化发展带来的环境污染问题已成为影响我国城镇化发展质量的重要方面。在新型城镇化建设全面推进和高质量发展要求的背景下,如何解决城镇化建设过程中的城市生态环境问题,优化空间布局,促进区域可持续发展,成为亟需解决的重大问题。本文基于全球视角从总结借鉴国际上主要国家城镇化过程、模式以及在此过程中生态环境保护和改善的经验入手,从科学规划、科技发展、法律制度、公众参与等方面总结国外经验,并从构建空间治理体系、治理环境突出问题、发挥政府主导作用、加大公众参与力度等方面探索构建我国新型城镇体系下生态环境管治的策略方案。     

The use of material flow analysis and the ecological footprint in regional policy-making: application and insights from Northern Ireland

This paper aims to contribute to the ongoing debate on the use of resource accounting tools in regional policy-making. The Northern Limits project applied material flow analysis (MFA) and ecological footprinting (EF) to regional policy-making in Northern Ireland over a number of years. The early phase of the research informed the regions first sustainable development strategy which was published in 2006 with key targets relating to the EF and improving the resource efficiency of the economy. Phase II identified the next steps required to address data availability and quality and the use of MFA and EF in providing a measurement and monitoring framework for the strategy and the development of the strategy implementation plan. The use of MFA and EF in sustainable regional policy-making and the monitoring of its implementation is an ongoing process which has raised a number of research issues which can inform the ongoing application and development of these and other resource accounting tools to within Northern Ireland, provide insights for their use in other regions, and help set out the priorities for research to support this important policy area.     

An agent-based approach to explore the effect of voluntary mechanisms on land use change: A case in rural Queensland,Australia

In rural regions, land use changes (LUC) are often the result of the decision-making of individual farmers. To influence this decision-making, compulsory and voluntary mechanisms are implemented. However, farmers’ decision-making is a heterogeneous process that depends on their ability and willingness to take certain decisions. Discrepancies between farmers’ ability and willingness and the design of voluntary mechanisms occur frequently. This makes it necessary to understand how farmers’ participation in these mechanisms can affect LUC. The aim of this paper was to demonstrate an agent-based approach to analyse and explore how voluntary mechanisms can influence LUC processes in rural regions. This approach was applied to a rural region in Australia, where clearing of native vegetation has occurred for agricultural development. Historical land cover data and semi-structured interviews were used to parameterise an agent-based model. Factors that influence farmers’ ability and willingness to participate in these mechanisms were identified. Three scenarios were simulated with the model to explore how the implementation of different voluntary mechanisms can affect the landscape structure of the region. This paper identifies how the diversity of farmers’ decision-making can influence the landscape structure in the region. The advantages and limitations of an agent-based approach in relation to LUC research and policy are discussed.     

推动生态环境规划数字化转型的研究与思考

生态环境规划在国家生态环境治理体系中发挥了越来越重要的作用。数字化技术是生态环境规划的基础工具,对于提升生态环境规划编制与实施的系统性和科学性发挥重要的作用。本文在回顾生态环境规划相关数字技术发展历程的基础上,指出了未来生态环境规划数字化转型的重要意义和必然趋势,分析了传统生态环境规划存在的一些技术方法落后、与信息化技术融合有待深入、信息化基础建设薄弱等问题和挑战,提出了生态环境规划未来数字化转型的若干建议,包括加强数值模拟、大数据分析、数字空间分析、虚拟现实等数字化技术的应用。     

西部大开发中的新疆生态环境建设

新疆地处祖国西北边陲，其国土面积、资源储备和战略地位都在西部开发中居于重要地位。长期以来，由于人们对自然资源的不合理利用，加之经济发展滞后，使得该地区的生态环境遭到严重破坏，土地沙漠化、水土流失、森林、草场严重退化。正确认识和评价新疆的生态环境现状及其承载力，制定遏制生态环境恶化的有效方法，促进生态系统的良性循环，实现人与自然的和谐统一，是西部大开发中实现新疆经济、社会可持续发展的基础。     

Participation, Process Quality, and Performance of Marine Protected Areas in the Wider Caribbean

Throughout the wider Caribbean, marine protected areas (MPAs) are rapidly gaining momentum as a conservation tool, but management performance of existing MPAs is considered low. To enhance MPA management performance, stakeholders are increasingly being invited to discuss, debate, and develop rules about how people should interact with marine ecosystems. Using social and ecological data from a rapid assessment of 31 MPAs and their associated communities in the wider Caribbean, this study investigates stakeholder participation in MPA planning and management, and how participants' views of process quality relate to MPA performance. Findings indicate that (1) participants tended to be male, resource users, participate in community organizations, and have lived fewer years in the community associated with an MPA than non-participants; (2) simply participating was not associated with perceptions of the social and ecological performance of MPAs, however, perceptions of process quality were positively related to views of performance; and (3) resource users' perceptions of an MPA's ecological performance were likely shaped by a variety of factors. Conservation practitioners should be aware that participatory MPA processes are complex and require careful planning if they are to contribute positively to marine conservation efforts.     

Risk Management of Sediment Stress: A Framework for Sediment Risk Management Research

Research related to the ecological risk management of sediment stress in watersheds is placed under a common conceptual framework in order to help promote the timely advance of decision support methods for aquatic resource managers and watershed-level planning. The proposed risk management research program relies heavily on model development and verification, and should be applied under an adaptive management approach. The framework is centered on using best management practices (BMPs), including eco-restoration. It is designed to encourage the development of numerical representations of the performance of these management options, the integration of this information into sediment transport simulation models that account for uncertainty in both input and output, and would use strategic environmental monitoring to guide sediment-related risk management decisions for mixed land use watersheds. The goal of this project was to provide a sound scientific framework based on recent state of the practice in sediment-related risk assessment and management for research and regulatory activities. As a result, shortcomings in the extant data and measurement and modeling tools were identified that can help determine future research direction. The compilation of information is beneficial to the coordination of related work being conducted within and across entities responsible for managing watershed-scale risks to aquatic ecosystems.     

Developing a spatial framework of common ecological regions for the conterminous United States

In 1996, nine federal agencies with mandates to inventory and manage the nation's land, water, and biological resources signed a memorandum of understanding entitled “Developing a Spatial Framework of Ecological Units of The United States.” This spatial framework is the basis for interagency coordination and collaboration in the development of ecosystem management strategies. One of the objectives in this memorandum is the development of a map of common ecological regions for the conterminous United States. The regions defined in the spatial framework will be areas within which biotic, abiotic, terrestrial, and aquatic capacities and potentials are similar. The agencies agreed to begin by exploring areas of agreement and disagreement in three federal natural-resource spatial frameworks—Major Land Resource Areas of the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Natural Resources Conservation Service, National Hierarchy of Ecological Units of the USDA Forest Service, and Level III Ecoregions of the US Environmental Protection Agency. The explicit intention is that the framework will foster an ecological understanding of the landscape, rather than an understanding based on a single resource, single discipline, or single agency perspective. This paper describes the origin, capabilities, and limitations of three major federal agency frameworks and suggests why a common ecological framework is desirable. The scientific and programmatic benefits of common ecological regions are described, and a proposed process for development of the common framework is presented.     

安徽省沿江地区生态功能分区研究

在"中部崛起"战略和安徽省"沿江开发"战略的指引下,安徽沿江地区得以快速发展。合理划定区域生态功能区,确保经济发展与环境保护相协调具有重要现实意义。以GIS技术为支撑,从自然生态约束分区评价着手,以安徽沿江41个县市为基本单元,选择山地、水网、湿地、水环境容量等指标进行生态功能差异评价,经聚类归并以及兼顾功能区的完整连片,将安徽沿江地区划分为4个一级生态功能区1、4个二级生态功能区。安徽沿江地区生态功能分区对科学有效地管理安徽沿江生态环境,因地制宜地实施保护和治理策略,保证社会经济可持续发展,合理开发安徽沿江地区提供了研究支撑。     

Scientist and Policy-Maker Response Types and Times in Suburban Watersheds

Differences between scientist and policy-maker response types and times, or the “how” and “when” of action, constrain effective water resource management in suburbanizing watersheds. Policy-makers are often rushed to find a single policy that can be applied across an entire, homogeneous, geopolitical region, whereas scientists undertake multiyear research projects to appreciate the complex interactions occurring within heterogeneous catchments. As a result, watershed management is often practiced with science and policy out of synch. Meanwhile, development pressures in suburban watersheds create changes in the social and physical fabric and pose a moving target for science and policy. Recent and anticipated advances in the scientific understanding of urbanized catchment hydrology and pollutant transport suggest that management should become increasingly sensitive to spatial heterogeneities in watershed features, such as soil types, terrain slopes, and seasonal watertable profiles. Toward this end, policy-makers should encourage funding scientific research that characterizes the impacts of these watershed heterogeneities within a geopolitical zoning and development framework.     

中国工业园区生态化发展决策优化方法研究

工业是当前中国经济绿色转型升级的关键行业,而工业园区作为工业集聚化发展的主要载体,工业园区生态化发展是解决资源环境问题、实现经济可持续发展的有效途径。本文关注工业园区生态化发展的中长期发展战略和具体方案,致力于通过仿真模拟的方法提出工业园区生态化发展的方向和优化路径,实现研究方法的创新。研究以3E系统(经济—环境—能源)为基础,综合分析工业园区经济发展与能源环境之间的耦合关系,并结合动态投入产出模型和系统动力学模型构建生态化发展决策模型,通过最优化动态模拟方法开展趋势预测和路径研究。通过辛集工业园区的实证和案例研究,对其生态化发展路径进行深入研究,验证了研究方法的科学性和可靠性,能够为工业园区生态化发展提供实践指导。本文为工业园区生态化发展规划提供新的研究方法,为制定合理有效的工业园区综合战略和实施路径提供科学依据。     

A quest for ecologically based pest management systems

The article presents a holistic approach to studying and applying crop protection in agricultural systems A theoretical framework of integrated pest management (IPM) is presented that allows an understanding of pest population processes on a whole-agroecological-system basis The need for and emergence of holistic research on agroecosystems is discussed, as are the current trends in ecological theory and pest management     

A conceptual model for assessing ecological risk to water quality function of bottomland hardwood forests

Ecological risk assessment provides a methodology for evaluating the threats to ecosystem function associated with environmental perturbations or stressors. This report documents the development of a conceptual model for assessing the ecological risk to the water quality function (WQF) of bottomland hardwood riparian ecosystems (BHRE) in the Tifton-Vidalia upland (TVU) ecoregion of Georgia. Previus research has demonstrated that mature BHRE are essential to maintaining water quality in this portion of the coastal plain. The WQF of these ecosystems is considered an assessment endpoit—an ecosystem function or set of functions that society chooses to value as evidenced by laws, regulations, or common usage. Stressors operate on ecosystems at risk through an exposure scenario to produce ecological effects that are linked to loss of the desired function or assessment end point. The WQF of BHRE is at risk because of the ecological and environmental quality effects of a suite of chemical, physical, and biological stressors. The stressors are related to nonpoint source pollution from adjacent land uses, especially agriculture; the conversion of BHRE to other land uses; and the encroachment of domestic animals into BHRE. Potential chemical, physical, and biological stressors to BHRE are identified, and the methodology for evaluating appropriate exposure scenarios is discussed. Field-scale and watershed-scale measurement end points of most use in assessing the effects of stressors on the WQF are identified and discussed. The product of this study is a conceptual model of how risks to the WQF of BHRE are produced and how the risk and associated uncertainties can be quantified.     

Use of ecological regions in aquatic assessments of ecological condition

Ecological regions are areas of similar climate, landform, soil, potential natural vegetation, hydrology, or other ecologically relevant variables. The makeup of aquatic biological assemblages (e.g., fish, macroinvertebrates, algae, riparian birds, etc.) varies dramatically over the landscape, as do the environmental stresses that affect the condition of those assemblages. Ecoregions delineate areas where similar assemblages are likely to occur and, therefore, where similar expectations can be established. For this reason, ecological regions have proven to be an important tool for use in the process of ecological assessment. This article describes four examples of the use of ecological regions in important aspects of environmental monitoring and assessment: (1) design of monitoring networks; (2) estimating expected conditions (criteria development); (3) reporting of results; (4) setting priorities for future monitoring and restoration. By delineating geographic areas with similar characteristics, ecological regions provide a framework for developing relevant indicators, setting expectations through the use of regional reference sites, establishing ecoregion-specific criteria and/or standards, presenting results, focusing models based on relationships between landscape and surface water metrics, and setting regional priorities for management and restoration. The Environmental Protection Agency and many state environmental departments currently use ecoregions to aid the development of environmental criteria, to illustrate current environmental condition, and to guide efforts to maintain and restore physical, chemical and biological integrity in lakes, streams, and rivers.     

Component modeling for the spatial representation of wildlife movements

This paper has two main objectives: (1) to discuss the basics of component modeling and its conceptual implications in environmental modeling; and (2) based on this discussion, to present a component-based design to support the simulation of wildlife movements. Components are independently developed, ready-to-use software units that can be assembled together to construct a modeling system. The conceptual implications of component modeling for the representation of environmental phenomena are discussed. A comparison is made between these conceptual implications and those of the more familiar object-oriented approach. A component-based design for supporting the simulation of wildlife movements is presented in this paper in order to illustrate how component modeling can be used to support the spatial representation of ecological phenomena and processes.     

Advancing Sustainable Bioenergy: Evolving Stakeholder Interests and the Relevance of Research

The sustainability of future bioenergy production rests on more than continual improvements in its environmental, economic, and social impacts. The emergence of new biomass feedstocks, an expanding array of conversion pathways, and expected increases in overall bioenergy production are connecting diverse technical, social, and policy communities. These stakeholder groups have different—and potentially conflicting—values and cultures, and therefore different goals and decision making processes. Our aim is to discuss the implications of this diversity for bioenergy researchers. The paper begins with a discussion of bioenergy stakeholder groups and their varied interests, and illustrates how this diversity complicates efforts to define and promote “sustainable” bioenergy production. We then discuss what this diversity means for research practice. Researchers, we note, should be aware of stakeholder values, information needs, and the factors affecting stakeholder decision making if the knowledge they generate is to reach its widest potential use. We point out how stakeholder participation in research can increase the relevance of its products, and argue that stakeholder values should inform research questions and the choice of analytical assumptions. Finally, we make the case that additional natural science and technical research alone will not advance sustainable bioenergy production, and that important research gaps relate to understanding stakeholder decision making and the need, from a broader social science perspective, to develop processes to identify and accommodate different value systems. While sustainability requires more than improved scientific and technical understanding, the need to understand stakeholder values and manage diversity presents important research opportunities.