The Conservation Status and Conservation Strategy of Picea neoveitchii

Abstract

Picea neoveitchii is an endemic species in China. It had been listed as an endangered species in red data books. It scatters in several locations of south slope of the Qinling Mountain of China. Upon reviewing the related literature, discussing with leading scholars on gymnosperm, ecology and plant conservation, the field survey was carried out in four locations. There are eleven mature individuals and two seedlings surviving in its natural habitats. With the survey of quadrat method in four locations, related community index were calculated such as relative important value (RIV), species richness, similarity index, diversity index and evenness index etc. The community could be sorted and characterized as three groups based on the community parameters. The analysis of vegetation table elucidates that Picea neoveitchii is a dominant species with low grouping rate in most surveyed sites.

The RAPD analysis shows target species has intraspecific genetic variability. The estimation of Shannon's phenotypic diversity index (Ho) also explains the difference of genetic variations of different locations.

Due to the lack of enough knowledge and professional guide of conservation biological perspective, Picea neoveitchii had been clear-cut for timber production. The extent of occurrence and area of occupancy declined rapidly from 1950s to 1990s. According to the Conservation Category guideline proposed by the World Conservation Union, the conservation status of Picea neoveitchii was reevaluated as Critically Endangered (CR) B2b C2a D. Upon research in areas of ecology, molecular biology, cluster analysis of environmental parameters, a practical conservation strategy is recommended in this research.     

Toward Water Conservation Society: the Connotation and Assessment Indication System

Abstract

Water saving and developing water conservation society are the two key strategies both for wise water allocation and sustainable utilization. The paper analyses the connotation of water saving and water conservation society. Essentially, water saving means freeing up water from non-beneficial uses and providing it to some more productive uses. Basic principles for setting indicator are presented by providing efficient use of water, considering social issues and ecological protection. An integrated assessing water saving system aiming at more sustainable and efficient consumption is given considering unbalanced social and economic development in regions and basins. The hierarchy Indicator system provides qualified tools to the practice of water conservation and evaluates the value for water conservation society construction.     

Growth and potential reproduction of <Emphasis Type="Italic">Poa crymophila</Emphasis> in response to season precipitation shortage in the Eastern Tibetan Plateau,China

The growing season in 2006 existed a quite less precipitation than previous years in the eastern of Tibetan Plateau, China. In order to explore the response strategies of the grass to drought year, the variations of growth and potential reproduction of Poa crymophila between rich (2005) and poor rainfall year (2006) were studied. Reproductive shoot biomass, above- and below-ground biomass pronounced decreased in the poor rainfall year, but the ratio of above-/below-ground biomass and vegetative shoot biomass increased. Carbon content in inflorescence increased significantly in 2006, but decreased significantly in root. Nitrogen contents and the C/N ratios in plant components were not significantly different. Sexual reproduction in 2005 and 2006 was not different. Season precipitation shortage could result in the higher mortality of vernal budding shoots or tillers. The results suggested that P. crymophila response to poor rainfall year (drought) by a smaller plant body, allocating more proportional biomass to above-ground, altering more carbon to inflorescence, and altering its reproductive way to sexual.     

Perceived Collective Efficacy and Trust in Government Influence Public Engagement with Climate Change-Related Water Conservation Policies

Water insecurity, induced or intensified due to climate change, has emerged as a key policy challenge in poor and developing countries such as India. Drawing on social cognitive theory, this paper examines the role of perceived collective efficacy—people's shared beliefs about their group's capabilities to accomplish collective tasks—and trust in government as factors influencing Indians' engagement with government water conservation policies. Using a national survey of Indians (N = 4031), we found that individuals with high levels of perceived collective efficacy and trust in government are more likely to support government water conservation policies. Moreover, for individuals with low trust in government, higher collective efficacy is associated with greater policy support. Perceived collective efficacy is also associated with activist behaviours, while distrust is not. Increasing collective efficacy beliefs, for example through mass media channels and targeted campaigns, could help increase citizens' engagement with climate change adaptation policies.     

Using Visual Impact Metaphors to Stimulate Environmentally Friendly Behavior: The Roles of Response Efficacy and Evaluative Persuasion Knowledge

ABSTRACT

Although people often are aware of the importance of adopting environmentally friendly lifestyles, they might be reluctant to do so as they believe that their actions do not make a difference (i.e. low response efficacy). Furthermore, they might experience reactance (e.g. negative attitudes) towards environmental messages that encourage them to adopt an environmentally friendly lifestyle. Therefore we experimentally tested whether it is possible to stimulate people to adopt an environmentally friendly lifestyle (i.e. recycle more clothing) by using visual impact metaphors that convey the message that old clothes deserve a new life. The findings show that a message in the form of a visual impact metaphor (vs. no visual impact metaphor) results in more positive attitudes towards recycling and stronger recycling intentions. This effect was mediated by two different underlying mechanisms: Response efficacy and more positive attitudes towards the persuasive attempt (i.e. positive evaluative persuasion knowledge).     

Effects of drought stress on leaf gas exchange and chlorophyll fluorescence of Glycyrrhiza uralensis

Leaf gas exchange and chlorophyll fluorescence of Glycyrrhiza uralensis Fisch at two water supplies (equivalent to 240 mm for present precipitation and to 120 mm for future decreasing precipitation) were compared. There was a midday depression in net photosynthetic rate (P _N) for either treatment, but stomatal limitation was dominant for present precipitation treatment and non-stomatal limitation for the drought treatment. Compared with present precipitation treatment, P _N, stomatal conductance (g _s) and transpiration rate (E) were always lower at drought stress, but stomatal limitation value (L _s) and water use efficiency (WUE) were higher in the morning. The decrease in carboxylation efficiency (CE), apparent quantum yield (AQY), light-saturated photosynthetic rate and maximal photochemical efficiency of photosystem 2 (PS 2) (F _v/F _m) suggested that rubisco activity reduced and PS 2 partially inactivated during the day under drought. However, part of this inactivation of PS 2 might be alleviated due to increased thermal dissipation under drought.     

Farm-level assessment of CO2 and N2O emissions in Lower Saxony and comparison of implementation potentials for mitigation measures in Germany and England

Greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions from agricultural farming practice contribute significantly to European GHG inventories. For example, CO₂ is emitted when grassland is converted to cropland or when peatlands are drained and cultivated. N₂O emissions result from fertilization. Enabling farmers to reduce their GHG emissions requires sufficient information about its pressure–impact relations as well as incentives, such as regulations and funding, that support climate-friendly agricultural management. This paper discusses potentials to improve the supply of information on: farm-specific climate services or impacts, present policy incentives in Germany and England that support climate-friendly farm management and related adaptation requirements. Tools which have been developed for a farm environmental management software (to be added after review because of potential identification) are presented. These tools assess CO₂ emissions from grassland conversion to cropland and peatland cultivation, as well as N₂O emissions from nitrogen fertilization. As input data, the CO₂ tool requires a classification of soil types according to soil organic carbon storage. The input data based on soil profile samples was compared with reference data from the literature. The N₂O tool relies on farm data concerning fertilization. These tools were tested on three farms in order to determine their viability with respect to the availability of required data and the differentiation of results, which determines how well site-specific conservation measures can be identified. Assessing CO₂ retention function of grassland conservation to cropland on the test farms leads to spatially differentiated results (~100 to ~900 potentially mitigated t CO₂ ha^?1). Assessed N₂O emissions varied from 0.41 to 1.1 t CO₂eq. ha^?1 a^?1. The proposed methods support policies that promote a more differentiated funding of climate conservation measures. Conservation measures and areas can be selected so that they will have the greatest mitigation effects. However, even though present policy instruments in Germany and England, such as Cross Compliance and agri-environmental measures, have the potential to reduce agricultural GHG, they do not appear to guide measures effectively or site-specifically. In order to close this gap, agri-environmental measures with the potential to support climate protection should be spatially optimized. Additionally, the wetland restoration measures which are most effective in reducing GHG emissions should be included in funding schemes.     

Socioeconomic study and economic value of living fossil,Lingula sp.in mangrove ecosystem in Trat Province,Thailand

This paper is the first recorded economic value of living fossil,an evaluation of the basic economic value of Lingula,based on the direct utilization of households for food and sale.Twenty-one local fishermen who collected Lingula in Trat Province were focused on by using interview questionnaires.The animal habitats are influenced by the encroachers’age,gender and harvest method.The total economic value in 2011 was around two million baht.Those who possess fishing gear and have more money can have greater access to the product The local communities in Nong Khunsong sub-district are successful in collecting the Lingula and in doing local business.The market channel analysis is conducted at local,provincial and national levels and short market chains are demonstrated in the form of a wholesale market in the Lingula trade.This represents significant consumption by the local communities.The study further recommends sustainable conservation and management efforts at a local scale.     

Social preferences towards ecosystem services provided by cloud forests in the neotropics: implications for conservation strategies

Despite the importance of neotropical cloud forests as providers of ecosystem services to society, they are one of the most threatened ecosystems in the world. We analysed the importance of three cloud forest reserves in central Colombia as providers of ecosystem services, as well as the social support to conservation actions in these ecosystems through willingness to pay (WTP) and willingness to give up time (WTT) estimates. Our results highlight the high commitment of all users of the cloud forest areas towards the conservation of the ecosystem services provided by these strategic ecosystems. We found that the most important perceived ecosystem services were water supply and habitat maintenance for species. Our findings also suggest that the respondents’ ecological knowledge (measured as the awareness of the ecosystem services supplied by cloud forests) was an important factor in determining both WTP and WTT for conserving cloud forests. Moreover, our results indicate that WTT should be a viable technique to explore individual preferences of different stakeholders towards conservation activities in cloud forests. Based on our results, we propose a conservation strategy of cloud forests that considers different users’ socio-economic and environmental characteristics, in which both experimental and experiential knowledge should be incorporated in order to promote collective action.     

Mobilizing Artists: Green Patriot Posters,Visual Metaphors,and Climate Change Activism

This essay examines the Canary Project's Green Patriot Posters campaign as activist art that collectively comments on the cultural coherence of our current relations to the environment, particularly in terms of global warming, sustainability, and the concept of linear economic growth. Aspiring to bring together artists under the eco-activist umbrella, the Canary Project relies on an old WWII-inspired frame with a narrow premise of that period's conservation efforts. Within this framework, a range of visual designs question, subvert, and promote continued economic growth and an ontology that “more” equals “better.” An analysis of the up–down orientational metaphors underscores a typology of these valuations and reveals one way to assess implications of such artistic efforts. That is, artistic expressions adapt and play with the contingent nature of metaphors, offering elaborations, extensions, and alternatives on basic structural elements and, hence, remark on how we orient ourselves and productively imagine being of/in the world anew.     

Three Dimensions of Social Media Messaging Success by Environmental NGOs

Studies show that NGOs persist in using social media to impart unidirectional messages rather than taking advantage of the participatory nature of networked media. Fear of a loss of message control may be at the heart of NGOs’ desire to keep social media messages on track. The current study examines the success of an environmental NGO in keeping its social media messages under control using quantitative content analysis of an NGO-promoted hashtag, #climatemarch, during a United Nations conference on climate change in 2015. Three dimensions of social media message success – volume, topic/valence, and participants – are proposed.     

It is Always Dry Here: Examining Perceptions about Drought and Climate Change in the Southern High Plains

ABSTRACT

Drought is defined, experienced, and communicated about in multiple ways. This case study examines individual definitions of drought (timing, impacts, and severity) and attitudes about climate change. Household surveys (n?=?120) were conducted in Cimarron County, Oklahoma and Union County, New Mexico using a stratified random sampling method to select farmers, ranchers, and town residents. Information about drought is primarily communicated between neighbors, friends, and family, as well as media and local governing agencies. Residents perceive the recent drought to be the worst drought on record, regardless of previous drought experiences. Residents reported widespread drought-related impacts on agriculture, environment, and society. Most residents see drought as cyclical and driven by natural causes, rather than human causes. We recommend adaptive drought communication engage more fully with identity, place, and history. Climate information should be presented in a relevant manner to diverse agricultural stakeholders with differing attitudes about climate change, management, and climate information.     

Evolution of electronic waste toxicity: Trends in innovation and regulation

Rapid innovation in printed circuit board, and the uncertainties surrounding quantification of the human and environmental health impacts of e-waste disposal have made it difficult to confirm the influence of evolving e-waste management strategies and regulatory policies on materials. To assess these influences, we analyzed hazardous chemicals in a market-representative set of Waste printed circuit boards (WPCBs, 1996–2010). We used standard leaching tests to characterize hazard potential and USEtox® to project impacts on human health and ecosystem. The results demonstrate that command-and-control regulations have had minimal impacts on WPCBs composition and toxicity risks; whereas technological innovation may have been influenced more by resource conservation, including a declining trend in the use of precious metals such as gold. WPCBs remain classified as hazardous under U.S. and California laws because of excessive toxic metals. Lead poses the most significant risk for cancers; zinc for non-cancer diseases; copper had the largest potential impact on ecosystem quality. Among organics, acenaphthylene, the largest risk for cancers; naphthalene for non-cancer diseases; pyrene has the highest potential for ecotoxicological impacts. These findings support the need for stronger enforcement of international policies and technology innovation to implement the strategy of design-for-the-environment and to encourage recovery, recycling, and reuse of WPCBs.     

Developing and applying a soil erosion model in a data-poor context to an island in the rural Philippines

Soil erosion in many parts of the developing world poses a threat to rural livelihoods, to the sustainbility of the agricultural sector, and to the environment. Most erosion prediction models are mechanistic and unsuited to quantify the severity of soil erosion in a data-limited developing world context. The model developed in this paper for Negros Island, in the central Philippines, is based on the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation, but contains important innovations such as the movement of eroded soil over the landscape, simulating deposition on lower slopes and in waterways. It also includes a term describing farmer strategies to reduce soil erosion, which are typically ignored in erosion prediction models. A two-sample t-test found that model-predicted sediment loading values were not significantly different from field-measured sediment loading values when corrected for watershed size (P = 0.857). The model predicts an annual loss of 2.7 million cubic meters of sediment to waterways such that by 2050 more than 416,000 ha of agricultural land will be rendered unproductive due to erosion. Farmer behavior conserves soil, but on the steepest slopes soil conservation practices are not adequate to prevent erosion. Of two proposed strategies to control soil erosion in the rural Philippines, the model suggests that a complete switch to tree crops would conserve more soil than universal terrace adoption. However, even under these conservation scenarios, erosion threatens the areal extent of upland agriculture on Negros, and hence the sustainability of the island’s food supply.

Questioning Community Based Coral Reef Management Systems: Case Study of Awig-Awig in Gili Indah, Indonesia

Issues and complexities arising when the fisheries and marine tourism sectors have stakes in an institution governing the coral reefs ecosystem called awig-awig are discussed, awig-awig is a colloquialism meaning ‘a local rule’. The community-based management system is commonly recognized as a better approach to governing resources, however, the success of awig-awig in the study area is questionable. Awig-awig fails to deal with the conflict of interest among stakeholders in coastal resource appropriation, despite the community being relatively culturally homogenous. The benefits of awig-awig are biased in favor of the tourism as opposed to fisheries, leading to the fishers’ resistance of awig-awig. There are critical factors to this weakness: a crisis of legitimacy within community, socio-economic inequality among actors involved in such system, high intervention from external agencies, and the institutional conflict over conservation policy. In addition, awig-awig reduces community spirit as it is perceived as not being attached to any customary law or traditional norms. Group cohesion is challenged and there is no common understanding of the problem or alternatives strategies.     

Residents’ Attitudes Towards Tourism in a Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems Pilot Site: a Case Study in China

Abstract

Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems (GIAHS) is a wide program to promote the conservation and adaptive management of such systems and their associated landscapes, biodiversity, knowledge systems and cultures. Rice-Fish Systems (RFS) in Longxian village of China, as a traditional agricultural system, was selected as one of the five pilot sites of GIAHS in 2005. Researchers have paid more attention to the dynamic conservation and adaptive management of RFS because it is under severe threats from global development challenges. Tourism is suggested to be brought into the RFS conservation program as an alternative industry. This paper presents a comparative study of residents in three types of farm household in Longxian, seeking attitudes to the RFS conservation and tourism development and ways in which such information may guide future strategies. Results show residents, belonging to the household type in which most family members are abroad, have the most positive attitudes to RFS conservation and tourism development; while residents, as other household type in which less than 50% of family members are abroad, are the least sensitive group in these three household types, due to the motivation of moving abroad weakening their enthusiasm to participate in the local activities. Implications are discussed in the context of how resident attitudes will affect the future management of GIAHS conservation and tourism development, and then measures are put forward to foster tourism cooperation and multistakeholders process establishment.     

Chemical Composition of the Leaves of Plants with Different Ecological Strategies from the Boreal Zone

The content of main chemical components (total nitrogen and carbon, soluble and polymeric sugars, organic acids, and mineral substances) were studied in the leaves of 73 boreal plant species with different types of Grime–Ramenskii strategies. The type of ecological strategy was demonstrated to be related to the chemical composition of the leaf, with the substances studied falling into two groups. The concentrations of the substances belonging to the first group (nitrogen, organic acids, and mineral substances) were minimum in stress-tolerant and maximum in ruderal species. With respect to the type of strategy, these concentrations increased in the following series: S C R. Conversely, the concentrations of the substances of the second group (carbon and soluble sugars) decreased in this series. The nitrogen concentration and the carbon-to-nitrogen concentration ratio in leaves may be used for identifying the types of strategies.