Quantifying the connections—linkages between land-use and water in the Kathmandu Valley,Nepal

Land development without thoughtful water supply planning can lead to unsustainability. In practice, management of our lands and waters is often unintegrated. We present new land-use, ecological stream health, water quality, and streamflow data from nine perennial watersheds in the Kathmandu Valley, Nepal, in the 2016 monsoon (i.e., August and September) and 2017 pre-monsoon (i.e., April and May) periods. Our goal was to improve understanding of the longitudinal linkages between land-use and water. At a total of 38 locations, the Rapid Stream Assessment (RSA) protocol was used to characterize stream ecology, basic water quality parameters were collected with a handheld WTW multi-parameter meter, and stream flow was measured with a SonTek FlowTracker Acoustic Doppler Velocimeter. A pixel-based supervised classification method was used to create a 30-m gridded land use coverage from a Landsat 8 image scene captured in the fall of 2015. Our results indicated that land-use had a statistically significant impact on water quality, with built land-uses (high and low) having the greatest influence. Upstream locations of six of the nine watersheds investigated had near natural status (i.e., river quality class (RQC) 1) and water could be used for all purposes (after standard treatments as required). However, downstream RSA measurements for all nine watersheds had RQC 5 (i.e., most highly impaired). Generally, water quality deteriorated from monsoon 2016 to pre-monsoon 2017. Our findings reinforce the importance of integrated land and water management and highlight the urgency of addressing waste management issues in the Kathmandu Valley.     

Framing the relationship between people and nature in the context of European conservation

A key controversy in conservation is the framing of the relationship between people and nature. The extent to which the realms of nature and human culture are viewed as separate (dualistic view) or integrated is often discussed in the social sciences. To explore how this relationship is represented in the practice of conservation in Europe, we considered examples of cultural landscapes, wildlife (red deer, reindeer, horses), and protected area management. We found little support, for a dualistic worldview, where people and nature are regarded as separate in the traditional practice of conservation in Europe. The borders between nature and culture, wild and domestic, public land and private land, and between protected areas and the wider landscape were blurred and dynamic. The institutionalized (in practice and legislation) view is of an interactive mutualistic system in which humans and nature share the whole landscape. However, more dualistic ideals, such as wilderness and rewilding that are challenging established practices are expanding. In the context of modern day Europe, wilderness conservation and rewilding are not valid for the whole landscape, although it is possible to integrate some areas of low‐intervention management into a wider matrix. A precondition for success is to recognize and plan for a plurality of values concerning the most valid approaches to conservation and to plan for this plurality at the landscape scale.     

Farmers' perceptions of constraints to plantain production in Ghana

SUMMARY

Plantain (Musa AAB), a primary food crop in Ghana, is a key component in sustainable agricultural systems in high rainfall zones. Recently, there has been a substantial yield decline and reduction in plantation life. To elucidate the context in which intervention strategies should be developed, a Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) was conducted at five villages in the major plantain-producing belt of Ghana. The importance of plantain as a preferred food was confirmed, although farmers tended to sell plantain for cash income, using cheaper, less preferred alternatives for home consumption. Farmers identified decreasing soil fertility, the high cost of labour for weeding, pests and diseases, lack of good quality planting material and marketing-related issues as the major production constraints. Due to declining productivity in less fertile regions, plantain has been replaced with other food crops such as cassava and maize. Farmers overestimated the importance of insect pests but were unaware of the extensive damage that could be caused by nematodes and the foliar disease, black sigatoka. They observed, however, that pest damage is more severe when soil fertility is poor. Clearly, integrated pest management is likely to be most effective when practiced within the context of cropping systems management; sustainable strategies that are being developed for resource-limited plantain farmers in Ghana are discussed.     

Typologies of collaborative governance for scaling nature-based solutions in two strategic South African river systems

Scaled up planning and implementation of nature-based solutions requires better understanding of broad characteristics (typologies) of the current governance and financing landscape, collaborative approaches amidst local complexities, and factors of scalability. An inventory was compiled of water-related ecological infrastructure intervention projects in two river systems in South Africa, incorporating actor, environmental, social, and financial dimensions and benefits. Qualitative participatory analysis revealed eight typologies. Post-hoc classification analysis determined similarities and/or unique characteristics of seven quantitative typologies. Key characterising factors included the complexity/size of financial flows, complexity of partnership/governance arrangements, mandates/goals of actors, type of ecological infrastructure, trade-offs in investment in ecological/built infrastructure, and the model used for social benefits. Identified scalable typologies offer structures suited to increased investment, with other typologies offering specialised local value. A range of ecological infrastructure intervention typologies with differing biophysical and socioeconomic outcomes provide choices for investors with specific goals, and benefits to landscape actors.Supplementary InformationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s13280-021-01531-z.     

Catalytic NOx reduction with simultaneous dioxin and furan oxidation

The engineering, construction, performance and running costs of a catalytic flue gas cleaning component in the low dust area of a municipal waste incinerator is discussed. For this purpose, the case study of a Flemish incineration plant is presented, covering the history, the design procedure of the catalyst, relevant process data and the financial aspects. A reliable PCDD/F-destruction by means of oxidation by the catalyst to typical values of 0.001 ng TEQ/Nm3 has been demonstrated. At the same time, NOx- and CO-emissions are reduced by 90% and 20% to about 50 mg/Nm3 and below 10 mg/Nm3, respectively.     

Verteilungskoeffizienten chlorierter Kohlenwasserstoffe zwischen Muskulatur und Leber bei Fischen

Zusammenfassung  Lipidbezogene Verteilungskoeffizienten (KL_M/L) zwischen Muskelkonzentrationen-(C_ML) und Leberkonzentrationen (C_LL) zweier Friedfischarten Brassen (Abramis brama) und Aalmutter (Zoarces viviparus) ergeben theoriekonform (KL_M/L=C_ML/C_LL=1) nominale Werte um 1 für persistente (hochchlorierte PCB) und Werte über 1 für metabolisierbare lipophile Umweltchemikalien wie chlorierte Cyclohexane oder DDT.      

Transport and Immobilization of 2,4,6 15N-Trinitrotoluene in Soil Microcosms Subjected to Long Term Incubation Under Aerobic Conditions

¹⁵N-labeling and solid-state ¹³C and ¹⁵N nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy was applied to study the immobilization of 2,4,6 trinitrotoluene (TNT) into soil organic matter (SOM). Uncontaminated soil from the Ap horizon of a Luvisol was mixed with ¹⁵N-TNT (enrichment: 99 atm%) and laid over an unspiked layer of the same material. The latter covered soil from the Bt horizon. The microcosms were aerobically incubated under laboratory conditions for up to 11 months. After 1 week, within the total microcosm approximately 90% of the added ¹⁵N (¹⁵N_add) were recovered, mostly in the top layer (87%). After 11 months, this amount decreased to 71%, indicating losses due to denitration or transamination. Within two months, half of ¹⁵N_add had been immobilized in the residues not extractable with organic solvents and water. The amount of the sequestered ¹⁵N_add remained fairly constant until the end of the experiment pointing towards a high stability of TNT-SOM associates. Solid-state ¹⁵N NMR revealed their formation by covalent binding, most tentatively as amides. Complete reduction of TNT to triaminotoluene (TAT) was not prerequisite. The most pronounced downwards movement of ¹⁵N-TNT occurred during the first two months. The major part of it, however, experienced quick immobilization, leaving approximately 10% of ¹⁵N_add recovered in the leachate at the end of the experiment. Calculations indicated contributions of inorganic ¹⁵N_add. Approximately 25% of its organic ¹⁵N_add originated from condensed N, suggesting that in soils the transport of partly reduced TNT is in close association with the organic matter of the soil solution to which they are covalently bound.