Implementing REDD+ (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation): evidence on governance,evaluation and impacts from the REDD-ALERT project

The REDD-ALERT (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation from Alternative Land Uses in the Rainforests of the Tropics) project started in 2009 and finished in 2012, and had the aim of evaluating mechanisms that translate international-level agreements into instruments that would help change the behaviour of land users while minimising adverse repercussions on their livelihoods. Findings showed that some developing tropical countries have recently been through a forest transition, thus shifting from declining to expanding forests at a national scale. However, in most of these (e.g. Vietnam), a significant part of the recent increase in national forest cover is associated with an increase in importation of food and timber products from abroad, representing leakage of carbon stocks across international borders. Avoiding deforestation and restoring forests will require a mixture of regulatory approaches, emerging market-based instruments, suasive options, and hybrid management measures. Policy analysis and modelling work showed the high degree of complexity at local levels and highlighted the need to take this heterogeneity into account—it is unlikely that there will be a one size fits all approach to make Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD+) work. Significant progress was made in the quantification of carbon and greenhouse gas (GHG) fluxes following land-use change in the tropics, contributing to narrower confidence intervals on peat-based emissions and their reporting standards. There are indications that there is only a short and relatively small window of opportunity of making REDD+ work—these included the fact that forest-related emissions as a fraction of total global GHG emissions have been decreasing over time due to the increase in fossil fuel emissions, and that the cost efficiency of REDD+ may be much less than originally thought due to the need to factor in safeguard costs, transaction costs and monitoring costs. Nevertheless, REDD+ has raised global awareness of the world’s forests and the factors affecting them, and future developments should contribute to the emergence of new landscape-based approaches to protecting a wider range of ecosystem services.     

Phylogeny of Collembola based on cuticular compounds:inherent usefulness and limitation of a character type

The phylogeny of Collembola, originally discussed from a morphological point of view, has more recently benefited from novel insights brought by molecular analyses. Both morphological and molecular characters produced a well-resolved phylogenetic hypothesis including all orders, most families, and a large number of genera. However, several conflicting points exist between molecular and morphological data, and new characters are clearly needed to resolve these inconsistencies. In this study the usefulness of a new character type not previously used in the phylogenetic study of Collembola was tested: the epicuticular chemical compounds. Our phylogenetic analysis was based on 380 compounds from 26 Collembola species. The results show good resolution for terminal branches but not for internal nodes. This is probably due to the partial involvement of epicuticular lipids in ecological functions such as water conservation and sexual attraction. Thus, this character type is appropriate for reconstructing phylogenetic relationships among recently diversified groups. Electronic supplementary material  The online version of this article (doi:) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.     

Sustainability experiments in Asia: innovations shaping alternative development pathways?

Global sustainability is increasingly influenced by processes of industrialisation and urbanization in non-OECD countries, especially in Asia. Growth models suggest that developing economies and regions will become first relatively more resource- and pollution-intensive, before converging on more resource-efficient and low-pollution production and consumption patterns expressed in developed countries. Alternative less resource- and pollution-intensive growth models for latecomer countries promise social and economic benefits in the short- and long-term. Drawing on insights from system innovation research on long-run change in socio-technical systems, we discuss the potential role of ‘sustainability experiments’ to generate innovations that will constitute new ‘greener’ growth models. We observe a great number of technology-based initiatives that we characterize as sustainability experiments in East and South Asian countries. These experiments emerge in the context of the growth of new socio-technical regimes in key sectors, including energy, transport, manufacturing, food and the built environment. We set out a conceptual framework for assessing the role of experiments, and for evaluating how they link with and become anchored into alternative more sustainable regimes. In this paper we argue that sustainability experiments represent a significant new source of innovation and capability-formation, linked to global knowledge and technology flows, which could reshape emergent socio-technical regimes and so contribute to alternative development pathways in latecomer countries. We conclude by summarizing the six papers published in this Special Issue.     

Perspectives on social capacity building for natural hazards: outlining an emerging field of research and practice in Europe

Social capacity building for natural hazards is a topic increasingly gaining relevance not only for so-called developing countries but also for European welfare states which are continuously challenged by the social, economic and ecological impacts of natural hazards. Following an outline of recent governance changes with regard to natural hazards, we develop a heuristic model of social capacity building by taking into account a wide range of existing expertise from different fields of research. Particular attention is paid to social vulnerability and its assessment, as well as to risk communication and risk education as specific strategies of social capacity building. We propose to distinguish between interventionist and participatory approaches, thus enabling for a better understanding of existing practices of social capacity building as well as their particular strengths and weaknesses. By way of conclusion, we encourage more research on social capacity building for natural hazards in the European context which at present is highly diverse and, at least in parts, only poorly investigated.     

Probabilistic public health risks associated with pesticides and heavy metal exposure through consumption of common dried fish in coastal regions of Bangladesh

Environmental Science and Pollution Research - The chemical contaminants in dried fish are of great food safety concern and an emerging public health issue in Bangladesh. The aim of this study was...     

Formation of halogenated acetaldehydes, and occurrence in Canadian drinking water

Controlled laboratory chlorination of acetaldehyde (ACD) under typical drinking water conditions (pH 6.7, 7.6 and 8.8, and temperature 4 degrees C and 21 degrees C) revealed that the formation of chloral hydrate (CH), the most common halogenated acetaldehyde (HAs), increased with contact time (0-10 days). However, at increased pH and temperature, CH reached maximum levels and subsequently broke down partially to chloroform and other unidentified compounds. After 10 days contact time, a maximum of 63% (molar) of the initial ACD consumed were converted into CH or chloroform (TCM). Various surveys of drinking water systems indicated that ACD is not the only precursor of CH. A suite of aldehydes (including ACD), and chlorinated disinfection by-products (including TCM and CH) were found in most distribution systems. The levels of bromide in source water impacted speciation of HAs. In addition to CH, brominated and other mixed (Cl/Br) acetaldehydes were detected in most samples; the speciation of HAs and THMs followed comparable trends. Similar to chloroform for trihalomethanes, CH contributed from as low as 5% to up to 60% of the total HAs. The bromine incorporation factors (BIF) in THMs and HAs were shown to increase with increasing bromide ion concentrations in the source water. Brominated THMs are more readily formed than their HA analogues; in fact, BIF values for THMs were 2-3 times higher than for the HAs. It was found that HAs may be as high as THMs in some drinking waters. As a result, the determination of the other target HAs, in addition to CH, is necessary for a better assessment of the pool of disinfection by-products in drinking water.     

Zero-pollution effect and economic development: standard and nested environmental Kuznets curve analyses for West Africa

Environment, Development and Sustainability - The Economic Community of West African States has keyed into the various international agreements that seek to protect the environment and reduce...