Population viability and harvest sustainability for Madagascar lemurs

Subsistence hunting presents a conservation challenge by which biodiversity preservation must be balanced with safeguarding of human livelihoods. Globally, subsistence hunting threatens primate populations, including Madagascar's endemic lemurs. We used population viability analysis to assess the sustainability of lemur hunting in Makira Natural Park, Madagascar. We identified trends in seasonal hunting of 11 Makira lemur species from household interview data, estimated local lemur densities in populations adjacent to focal villages via transect surveys, and quantified extinction vulnerability for these populations based on species-specific demographic parameters and empirically derived hunting rates. We compared stage-based Lefkovitch with periodic Leslie matrices to evaluate the impact of regional dispersal on persistence trajectories and explored the consequences of perturbations to the timing of peak hunting relative to the lemur birth pulse, under assumptions of density-dependent reproductive compensation. Lemur hunting peaked during the fruit-abundant wet season (March–June). Estimated local lemur densities were roughly inverse to body size across our study area. Life-history modeling indicated that hunting most severely threatened the species with the largest bodies (i.e., Hapalemur occidentalis, Avahi laniger, Daubentonia madagascariensis, and Indri indi), characterized by late-age reproductive onsets and long interbirth intervals. In model simulations, lemur dispersal within a regional metapopulation buffered extinction threats when a majority of local sites supported growth rates above the replacement level but drove regional extirpations when most local sites were overharvested. Hunt simulations were most detrimental when timed to overlap lemur births (a reality for D. madagascariensis and I. indri). In sum, Makira lemurs were overharvested. Regional extirpations, which may contribute to broad-scale extinctions, will be likely if current hunting rates persist. Cessation of anthropogenic lemur harvest is a conservation priority, and development programs are needed to help communities switch from wildlife consumption to domestic protein alternatives.     

城市电力供应系统公共安全风险评估体系及应用

城市电力供应系统与城市公共安全关系紧密，文章分析了导致城市电力供应系统故障或事故的主要风险因素、事故类型及其风险程度，建立了城市电力供应系统公共安全风险评估体系。利用建立的风险评估体系，对某市电力供应系统的安全性进行了风险评估，同时验证了该体系在城市电力供应系统风险评估中的良好适用性。     

Plant blindness and the implications for plant conservation

Plant conservation initiatives lag behind and receive considerably less funding than animal conservation projects. We explored a potential reason for this bias: a tendency among humans to neither notice nor value plants in the environment. Experimental research and surveys have demonstrated higher preference for, superior recall of, and better visual detection of animals compared with plants. This bias has been attributed to perceptual factors such as lack of motion by plants and the tendency of plants to visually blend together but also to cultural factors such as a greater focus on animals in formal biological education. In contrast, ethnographic research reveals that many social groups have strong bonds with plants, including nonhierarchical kinship relationships. We argue that plant blindness is common, but not inevitable. If immersed in a plant‐affiliated culture, the individual will experience language and practices that enhance capacity to detect, recall, and value plants, something less likely to occur in zoocentric societies. Therefore, conservation programs can contribute to reducing this bias. We considered strategies that might reduce this bias and encourage plant conservation behavior. Psychological research demonstrates that people are more likely to support conservation of species that have human‐like characteristics and that support for conservation can be increased by encouraging people to practice empathy and anthropomorphism of nonhuman species. We argue that support for plant conservation may be garnered through strategies that promote identification and empathy with plants.     

Bourdieu,environmental NGOs,and Australian climate politics

Environmental nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in Australia have struggled to generate and sustain public concern about climate change. If debates about climate policy can be viewed as sites of contestation between competing actors, Australia’s environmental NGOs have found it difficult to compete against countervailing forces that have sought to shape public attitudes to climate action and the contours of policy responses. While to a significant degree this reflects the power of those forces and the sentiments of the government of the day, there is also a case to be made that some of Australia’s most prominent environmental NGOs have appeared wedded to strategies inconsistent with building or sustaining public support for action or guiding policy responses. How have Australia’s largest environmental NGOs engaged climate politics, and why has this engagement taken that form? Pierre Bourdieu’s political sociology provides unique insight for coming to terms with the multifaceted nature of the constraints, opportunities, and drivers of political action, from the context of climate politics to the forces behind Australian NGOs’ engagement with that politics, and the limits of that engagement. Bourdieu’s work also suggests possible avenues for more effective forms of political communication on climate change in the Australian context.     

The role of digital data entry in participatory environmental monitoring

Many argue that monitoring conducted exclusively by scientists is insufficient to address ongoing environmental challenges. One solution entails the use of mobile digital devices in participatory monitoring (PM) programs. But how digital data entry affects programs with varying levels of stakeholder participation, from nonscientists collecting field data to nonscientists administering every step of a monitoring program, remains unclear. We reviewed the successes, in terms of management interventions and sustainability, of 107 monitoring programs described in the literature (hereafter programs) and compared these with case studies from our PM experiences in Australia, Canada, Ethiopia, Ghana, Greenland, and Vietnam (hereafter cases). Our literature review showed that participatory programs were less likely to use digital devices, and 2 of our 3 more participatory cases were also slow to adopt digital data entry. Programs that were participatory and used digital devices were more likely to report management actions, which was consistent with cases in Ethiopia, Greenland, and Australia. Programs engaging volunteers were more frequently reported as ongoing, but those involving digital data entry were less often sustained when data collectors were volunteers. For the Vietnamese and Canadian cases, sustainability was undermined by a mismatch in stakeholder objectives. In the Ghanaian case, complex field protocols diminished monitoring sustainability. Innovative technologies attract interest, but the foundation of effective participatory adaptive monitoring depends more on collaboratively defined questions, objectives, conceptual models, and monitoring approaches. When this foundation is built through effective partnerships, digital data entry can enable the collection of more data of higher quality. Without this foundation, or when implemented ineffectively or unnecessarily, digital data entry can be an additional expense that distracts from core monitoring objectives and undermines project sustainability. The appropriate role of digital data entry in PM likely depends more on the context in which it is used and less on the technology itself.     

航空装备外场级平均修复时间评估研究

目的探索航空装备部队使用保障阶段维修性指标评估的实施方法。方法构建航空装备外场级平均修复时间评估指标体系,包括评估条件界定、统计准则确定、数据处理方法、评估流程、使用表格等,并结合具体机型进行评价应用。结果该机型飞机整机的累计修复时间为138.5 h,平均修复时间Mct=2.17 h,满足不大于3 h指标要求。结论评估方法系统科学,可为各类装备开展相关维修性评估工作提供方法支持和工程借鉴。     

济南市环境与经济协调发展评价及对策研究

以济南市为研究对象,通过构建环境与经济协调发展指标体系,分析了济南市生态环境和经济发展状况,评价了环境与经济协调发展水平,结果表明:2011年-2014年济南市经济发展呈逐年上升趋势;生态环境质量出现下降态势;环境与经济协调发展水平也出现了明显下滑.根据评价结果,探讨了该市在产业能源结构、机动车控制及农业生产方面存在的问题,由此提出了调整产业结构、优化能源结构、完善机动车管理、加强生态农业建设、建立环境和经济发展综合决策和激励机制等对策.     

飞机每飞行小时直接维修工时评估研究

目的细化军用飞机部队使用保障阶段每飞行小时直接维修工时评估的实施方法。方法界定评估条件、确定数据范围和来源,结合部队信息收集工作实际,通过制定各类表格收集数据并分析加工,最终得出评估结论。结果较客观地反映了某型飞机相关维修性特征。结论评估方法贴近部队工作实际,可操作性强,可为各类装备开展相关维修性评估工作提供借鉴。     

遂宁市主城区环境空气质量现状及原因分析研究

利用遂宁市2017年1月份4个国控环境空气自动监测数据,分析了遂宁市主城区环境空气质量现状,与整个成渝地区和周边城市的空气质量进行了横向比较,并阐述了遂宁市空气质量变化的原因.结果发现遂宁市主城区2017年1月份空气质量指数的范围为32～203,优良率为54.8％,首要污染物为PM2.5,空气质量同比下降了22.8％,环比下降了26.1％,但均显著优于成渝地区和周边城市的平均水平,并从4个方面阐述了空气质量下降的原因.最后,根据遂宁市大气污染现状,提出了4条针对性的防治措施.