中国生物多样性数据资源现状分析

为查明我国生物多样性数据资源分布、类型、规模和管理的现状,在1996年4月,采用调查表、现场访问和研讨会等方法首次对我国103个国家级机构的生物多样性数据资源进行了调查。结果表明,103个机构共拥有生物多样性数据集160个,从机构分布来看,约70％的数据集分布在专业研究所和大学;从信息类型来看,约69％的数据集是关于物种信息;从数据集形式和建立途径来看,约60％的数据集以数据库、文献集和标本３种形式储存,野外调查是建立数据集的最主要途径;从管理手段来看,全部和部分采用计算机管理的数据集约占46％;从获取途径来看,通过现场、出版物、磁盘或磁带获取的数据集约占78％。最后,通过对调查结果的综合评价,指出目前我国生物多样性数据管理和利用中存在的薄弱环节。     

Artisanal fishing and coastal conservation in West Africa

Artisanal fishing is an activity which has long occupied an important place on the West African coast. In less than 20 years, the increasingly widespread use of motors in fishing boats and cold storage facilities both on board and on land have enabled fishermen to master the constraints of space and time. Furthermore, globalization has created a demand for new products, thus influencing the behaviour of fishermen and consequently the status of some fish, turtle and marine mammal species. Development policies for artisanal fishing do not adequately reflect the importance of these changes. They tend to use inappropriate scales of reference, be it spatially (national borders take precedence over ecosystems) or temporally (the long-term consequences of development plans are seldom considered). Some international conservation organizations are testing promising new approaches to managing resources more sustainably and restoring degraded ecosystems, and their recent experiences can serve as useful examples to others. It is recommended to grant special rights of access to resident fishermen. In defending ‘their’ resources, they will also protect the ecological functions of the area. Close collaboration with administrations and development assistance agencies is needed to assess consequences of political decisions on the use of resources. The important role of marine protected areas as a tool for fishing management should be better documented and strengthened. These areas should not be considered as isolated units but rather as vital parts of a comprehensive system for improved coastal zone management. Consistent with the ecosystem approach, fishermen and their communities, being the main users of coastal resources, should also play a major role in the design and implementation of any fishing management actions.     

Neoliberalism and the making of food politics in Eastern Ontario

Despite their opposition to the dominant agri-food system, alternative agri-food initiatives may unwittingly reproduce central features of neoliberalism. Julie Guthman has been a particularly strong proponent of this view, arguing that food activism and neoliberalism have shaped one another dialectically in California in recent decades. This paper responds to her argument, with a view to distinguishing between what it reveals and what it may conceal about the transformative potential of alternative agri-food initiatives in North America. Drawing on primary research on a variety of community-based food initiatives in Eastern Ontario, Canada, we show how a neoliberal lens does help to illuminate some problematic characteristics of these initiatives, including assumptions about market-based solutions and focus on self-improvement at the expense of state involvement. However, this lens underestimates those aspects of community-based food initiatives that may appear commensurate with neoliberal rationalities but which also push in more progressive directions.     

Correction to: Urban water and food security in this century and beyond: Resource-smart cities and residents

The urban world population will increase from 3 to 8.5 thousand million in the 21st century. Cities become hot spots of both demand for water and global food and for disposed used water and nutrients. Sustainability requires that resource flows through our cities are co-managed and connected to agriculture. Reduced use of harmful chemicals in consumer products facilitates treatment to a quality that allows reuse/recycling of water and nutrients. A solid and liquid waste hierarchy can assist in ordering measures. A novel flexible water balance can guide city infrastructure and keep toilet water separate. New water-saving equipment can substantially reduce water use without losing personal comfort. The combination of these new approaches ascertains access to safe urban water, and that recovered nutrients from cities can substitute half of chemical fertilisers needed in food production. Now, thousands of new cities and suburbs provide unique opportunities to develop resource-smart and sustainable flows.     

A case for urban liveability from below: exploring the politics of water and land access for greater liveability in Kampala,Uganda

ABSTRACT

Improving urban liveability and prosperity is commonly set as a priority in urban development plans and policy around the world. Several annual reports produced by international consulting firms, media, and global agencies rank the liveability of cities based on a set of indicators, to represent the quality of life in these cities. The higher is the ranking, the more liveable is the city. In this paper, we argue that such quantitative approaches to framing and addressing urban liveability challenges leave little room to reflect on people's experiences of this liveability, which cannot be expressed through numbers. To illustrate our argument, we draw on empirical evidence of urban liveability challenges in access to water and land in Kampala, the capital city of Uganda, ranked recently as the most liveable East African city by various global agencies and media outlets. By showing that increasing the number of water connections does not guarantee improved access to water and sanitation in the long run, first, we demonstrate how urban liveability challenges are tightly linked with land-title issues in the city. Second, we highlight the political game-playing between the central government, the opposition, the traditional leadership, and the slum dwellers in governance processes of service delivery. Finally, by arguing that urban liveability can be enhanced by broadening political participation in city development planning, we discuss some of the strategies that can be used by communities to make collective claims towards improving their quality of life and the environment.     

中国入世与长江流域可持续发展

中国入世不仅对中国的社会经济产生深远影响，对长江流域的可持续发展也将产生深刻影响。主要的负面影响是：（1）长江流域的钢铁、汽车、化工、农业等产业将受到国际竞争的巨大挑战；（2）新开放、开发、投资、建设热将对长江流域的生态环境带来新的巨大压力。主要的正面影响是：（1）入世加快了各级政府的职能转变，政府转变职能使长江的保护进入一个历史的新阶段；（2）入世强化了绿色壁垒，绿色壁垒作为一种外的在强制将大大有利于长江生态环境的根本改善；（3）入世使中国进入了新的大开放时代，新的大开放背景将使世界在开发、保护诸方面都关注长江；（4）入世和申奥成功使中国大跨度的调水战略提前实施，中国和世界将进入“以水为核心”配置资源、布局经济的时代，这必将更加凸现长江流域开放、开发的重要性。     

Physical limits to resource access and utilisation and their economic implications in Mediterranean economies

This paper applies Ecological Footprint accounting to Mediterranean countries to track ecological asset balances and investigate the long-term feasibility of fulfilling natural resource and service needs. Our findings are that the Mediterranean region currently uses approximately 2.5 times more natural resources and ecological services than their ecosystems can provide. We argue that when consumption exceeds local availability, countries either resort to depletion of ecological assets or turn to international trade in order to satisfy their demands. Access to outside resources is however limited by (a) the availability of resources on international markets and (b) their affordability. Countries highly dependent on natural resource imports therefore expose their economies to the macroeconomic consequences of price volatility. We find that trade-related effects of natural resource price volatility are significant for Mediterranean economies as a 10% increase in the price of natural resources corresponds with a change in the trade balance between +7% and −2.4% of the GDP. We conclude that, in a world characterised by the existence of physical limits to the availability of global ecological assets, a systemic risk may exist for Mediterranean economies due to the concurrence of (1) ecological asset scarcity, (2) increasing prices and (3) challenging financial situations.     

基于人工神经网络模型的舰船防火设计方法

根据舰船实际和火灾理论,建立了舰船舱室火灾危险性的动静二类4个指标:失火危险性指标、舱室相关度指标、设备使用状态指标和人员状态指标,对舰船各种舱室的火灾危险性进行量化。笔者先给出规范中9类舱室的各指标值,应用笔者所开发的神经网络模型,建立舱室火灾危险性指标值与舱室分隔等级的关系模型,求出舱室防火分隔等级值,降低了对设计者经验的要求。运用开发的模型对某大型舱室进行防火设计,获得的结果与其他方法的结果基本一致,可供舰船防火设计时参考。     

Who owns the Earth? A challenge for the land system science community

ABSTRACT

Reflecting on the 2019 Open Science Meeting of the Global Land Program and on commentaries since, we argue that the time is ripe for the land system science community to fully embrace the thorny issue of land ownership and control. Beyond land governance and institutions, the issue of who actually owns and controls land, and how land holding and rents are distributed across society, is central to the future of sustainability initiatives, biodiversity protection, social justice, climate change mitigation, and long-term food security and sovereignty. By explicitly tracking and visualizing just Who Owns the Earth, the land system science community could provide much-needed data and insights to inform public debate and advance political action in these arenas.     

Econometric modeling of fisheries with complex life histories: Avoiding biological management failures

Economics of the fishery has focused on the wastefulness of common pool resource exploitation. Pure open access fisheries dissipate economic rents and degrade biological stocks. Biologically managed fisheries also dissipate rents but are thought to hold biological stocks at desired levels. We develop and estimate an empirical bioeconomic model of the Gulf of Mexico gag fishery that questions the presumptive success of biological management. Unlike previous bioeconomic life history studies, we provide a way to circumvent calibration problems by embedding our estimation routine directly in the dynamic bioeconomic model. We nest a standard biological management model that accounts for complex life history characteristics of the gag. Biological intuition suggests that a spawning season closure will reduce fishing pressure and increase stocks, and simulations of the biological management model confirm this finding. However, simulations of the empirical bioeconomic model suggest that these intended outcomes of the spawning closure do not materialize. The behavioral response to the closure appears to be so pronounced that it offsets the restriction in allowable fishing days. Our results indicate that failure to account for fishing behavior may play an important role in fishery management failures.