Climate change adaptation in the ski industry

Regardless of the success of climate change mitigation efforts, the international community has concluded that societies around the world will need to adapt to some magnitude of climate change in the 21st century. While some economic sectors (e.g., agriculture, water resources and construction) have been actively engaged in climate change adaptation research for years, adaptation has received scant consideration within the tourism-recreation industry. This is particularly the case for adaptation by tourism operators (supply-side). One exception where progress on supply-side climate adaptation has been made is the ski industry. This paper provides a brief overview of the literature on the implications of climate change for the international ski industry and how adaptation by ski area operators has been treated within these studies. This is followed by an inventory of climate adaptation practices currently used by ski industry stakeholders, including the historical development of certain key adaptations and constraints to wider use. The characteristics of ski areas with higher adaptive capacity are identified. Considering the highly competitive nature of the ski industry and the generally low climate change risk appraisal within the industry, climate change adaptation is anticipated to remain individualistic and reactive for some time. With only a few exceptions, the existing climate change literature on winter tourism has not considered the wide range of adaptation options identified in this paper and has likely overestimated potential damages. An important task for future studies is to develop methodologies to incorporate adaptation so that a more accurate understanding of the vulnerability of the international ski industry can be ascertained.     

Numerous experiments for the impact of warming climate on the phenology and grain yield of winter wheat

Based on the environmental and crop data at Zhenjiang City, in Jiangsu Province, middle east of China, the growing process of winter wheat was simulated by CERES-Wheat model assuming the daily average temperature is 1℃ to 2℃ higher than at the present, which are mostly possible for the change of climate because of enrichment of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. The simulation results show that warming climate can promote development rate and shorten phenological stages of wheat, and the grain yield will be higher than present. Its impact on the kernel weight and grains per square meter were different for the plantings of various sowing dates. The results of this study suggest that substantial changes in agricultural production and management practices are needed to respond to the climatic changes expected to take place in China.     

环厦门海域水色变化的多光谱多时相遥感分析

采用基于影像光谱信息建立的水质遥感模型对环厦门海域1989～2003年间的水色变化进行了分析.通过对水体及其所含物质的物理光学性质分析,水质遥感模型的建立可以不依赖于和卫星同步的水质采样数据建立水质遥感.这使得遥感对水色分析的应用更容易,而且还可以利用大量卫星存档数据来进行水质的历史变化分析.使用基于可见光和近红外波段反射率创建的模型研究了离水信号和水中物质(悬浮物和浮游植物)的关系.提出了一套可用于Landsat TM/ETM 和SPOT 5影像的水专题处理流程,并用于揭示所研究海域中悬浮物和叶绿素浓度的时空变化规律.研究表明,利用基于影像光谱的水质遥感模型,可以快速有效地揭示长时间范围内水色的时空变化.总的看来,环厦门海域的悬浮物浓度在所研究的时期内,有显著的增加,叶绿素的浓度在局部也有明显的升高.最明显的是,高悬浮物浓度的海域面积所占的比例从1989年的0.2%上升到2003年的10.2%.综合分析表明,九龙江河口所带来的巨量悬浮物是该海域最主要的陆源排海物和污染源,过度的水产养殖是另一个主要的污染因子.     

气候对河南省小麦产量的影响及其变化研究

河南省位于亚热带与温带的气候过渡带 ,小麦产量对气候变化非常敏感 ,气候对小麦产量影响的南北过渡性很明显。文中用正交多项式的方法分离小麦产量 ;用积分回归的方法分析气候对小麦产量的影响。在此基础上 ,首先根据降水量、温度和日照时数对小麦产量影响的区域分布 ,分别把河南省分为4个降水量影响区、4个温度影响区、5个日照影响区 ;然后 ,采用滑动积分回归的方法 ,分别分析了亚热带和温带3个影响因子对小麦产量影响的变化 ;最后 ,讨论了未来气候变化的可能影响。     

Soil carbon pool in China and its global significance

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Factor Biases and Promoting Sustainable Development: Adaptation to Drought in the Senegal River Basin

The ongoing drought in the Sahel region of West Africa highlights the vulnerability of food-producing systems to climate change and variability. Adaptation to climate should therefore increase the sustainability of agriculture under a long-term drought. Progress towards sustainability and adaptation in the the Senegal River Basin is hampered by an existing set of social and ecological relationships that define the control over the means of production and how people interact with their environment. These relationships are sensitive to the technological inputs and the administration of food production, or the factor bias in the different policy alternatives for rural development. One option is based on state-controlled, irrigated plantations to provide rice (Oryza) for the capital, Dakar. This policy emphasizes a top-down management approach, mechanized agriculture and a reliance on external inputs which strengthens the relationships introduced during the colonial period. A time series decomposition of the annual flow in the Senegal River at Bakel in Senegal suggests that water resources availability has been substantially curtailed since 1960, and a review of the water resources budget or availability in the basin suggests that this policy's food production system is not sustainable under the current climate of the basin. Under these conditions, this program is exacerbating existing problems of landscape degradation and desertification, which increases rural poverty. A natural resource management policy offers two adaptation strategies that favour decentralized management and a reduction of external inputs. The first alternative, “Les Perimetres Irrigués”, emphasizes village-scale irrigation, low water consumption cereal crops and traditional socio-political structures. The second alternative emphasizes farm-level irrigation and agro-forestry projects to redress the primary effects of desertification.     

四川人地关系日趋紧张的原因及对策

本文分四个阶段分析了四川人地关系的变化情况及人地关系的现状；以量化的方式重点分析了四川人地关系变化的原因；简要分析了人地关系的变化给农业生产所带来的影响；针对人地关系变化的主要原因,提出了缓解人地矛盾的对策。本文的重点是对四川人地关系变化原因,尤其是近期人地关系变化原因的分析,其目的是让人们认识近期四川人地关系变化的主要原因,以对症下药,采取有效的措施,缓解四川的人地矛盾。     

Options for baselines of the clean development mechanism

The Kyoto Protocol created the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) to allow industrial countries to reach part of their greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction through projects in developing countries. To calculate the achieved emission reduction a reference scenario has to be developed – the baseline. Despite efforts to develop realistic baselines, a certain degree of uncertainty regarding actual reductions will be inevitable. It is therefore necessary to compare the costs (including transaction costs) of developing a baseline against the informational benefit it can be expected to produce. While project-related baselines are already being applied, the proponents of country-related baselines have still to show the applicability of their approach for the CDM. The possibility of quantifying indirect effects and considering market distortions and subsidies through aggregation in the country-related baselines is weighed up by the manipulability and uncertainty of the assumptions required in such a baseline. Thus project-specific baselines are recommended. In cases of severely distorted markets undergoing liberalization or subsidy phase-out, a country-related baseline can be helpful. Sectoral or programme baselines would be suited to large-scale energy and sequestration projects. Moreover it has to be considered whether emission reductions are generally achieved in the context of relocation or done in the context of global emitting capacity expansion.     

泸沽湖沉积物α纤维素的提取及其稳定碳同位素研究初探

湖泊沉积是环境气候变化的敏感指示器 ,在沉积过程中有机大分子α纤维素不易发生降解 ,其碳链上的C、H、O原子也不会与外界发生交换 ,故沉积物α纤维素的碳同位素能真实地反映原始环境信息。湖泊沉积物中的α纤维素含量少 ,笔者经过反复条件试验 ,得出了从湖泊沉积物提取α纤维素的简便可行的方法。泸沽湖是云贵高原上一半封闭湖泊 ,湖区人为活动干扰较微弱 ,该湖对环境变化敏感。笔者提取了泸沽湖沉积物柱的α纤维素 ,并研究了其碳同位素 ,结果表明 ,α纤维素碳同位素灵敏、精确地反映了该湖一百年来的环境信息 :泸沽湖沉积物有机质以内生为主 ;气候变化趋势为冷—暖—冷—暖。     

The Dynamics of Rural Vulnerability to Global Change: The Case of southern Africa

Research on the agricultural impacts of global change frequently emphasizesthe physical and socioeconomic impacts of climate change, yet globalchanges associated with the internationalization of economic activity mayalso have significant impacts on food systems. Together, climate change andglobalization are exposing farmers to new and unfamiliar conditions.Although some farmers may be in a position to take advantage of thesechanges, many more are facing increased vulnerability, particularly in thedeveloping world. This paper considers the dynamics of agriculturalvulnerability to global change through the example of southern Africa. Wedemonstrate that the combination of global and national economic changesis altering the context under which southern African farmers cope withclimate variability and adapt to long-term change. We find that farmers whoformerly had difficulty adapting to climatic variability may become lessvulnerable to drought-related food shortages as the result of tradeliberalization. At the same time, however, removal of national credit andsubsidies may constrain or limit adaptation strategies of other farmers,leaving them more vulnerable to climate variability and change.