Ecological and Economic Services Provided by Birds on Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee Farms

Abstract: Coffee farms can support significant biodiversity, yet intensification of farming practices is degrading agricultural habitats and compromising ecosystem services such as biological pest control. The coffee berry borer (Hypothenemus hampei) is the world's primary coffee pest. Researchers have demonstrated that birds reduce insect abundance on coffee farms but have not documented avian control of the berry borer or quantified avian benefits to crop yield or farm income. We conducted a bird‐exclosure experiment on coffee farms in the Blue Mountains, Jamaica, to measure avian pest control of berry borers, identify potential predator species, associate predator abundance and borer reductions with vegetation complexity, and quantify resulting increases in coffee yield. Coffee plants excluded from foraging birds had significantly higher borer infestation, more borer broods, and greater berry damage than control plants. We identified 17 potential predator species (73% were wintering Neotropical migrants), and 3 primary species composed 67% of migrant detections. Average relative bird abundance and diversity and relative resident predator abundance increased with greater shade‐tree cover. Although migrant predators overall did not respond to vegetation complexity variables, the 3 primary species increased with proximity to noncoffee habitat patches. Lower infestation on control plants was correlated with higher total bird abundance, but not with predator abundance or vegetation complexity. Infestation of fruit was 1–14% lower on control plants, resulting in a greater quantity of saleable fruits that had a market value of US$44–$105/ha in 2005/2006. Landscape heterogeneity in this region may allow mobile predators to provide pest control broadly, despite localized farming intensities. These results provide the first evidence that birds control coffee berry borers and thus increase coffee yield and farm income, a potentially important conservation incentive for producers.     

Sustainability: a Dissent

Abstract:  Broadly conceived and considered in its many usages, sustainability has grave defects as a planning goal, particularly when used by conservationists: it confuses means and ends; it is vague about what is being sustained and who or what is doing the sustaining; it is uninspiring; it is little more than Pinchot-era conservation (and thus ignores the many lessons learned since then); it need not be linked to land, to the land's functioning, or to any ecological science; it need not include a moral component; it is consistent with the view of humans as all-powerful manipulators of the planet; and, in general, it is such a malleable term that its popularity provides only a facade of consensus. When sustainability is defined broadly to include the full range of economic and social aspirations, it poses the particular risk that ecological and biodiversity concerns will be cast aside in favor of more pressing human wants. Given these many defects, the conservation movement should discard the term in favor of a more alluring goal, attentive to nature and its ecological functioning. A sound goal would incorporate and distill the considerable ecological and moral wisdom accumulated since Pinchot's day while giving conservationists the rhetorical tools needed to defend the land against competing pressures. In our view, conservation would be well served by an updated variant of "land health," Aldo Leopold's ecologically grounded goal from the 1940s. Land health as an independent understanding should set the essential terms of how we live and enjoy the earth, providing the framework within which we pursue our many social and economic aims.     

小城镇的生态环境保护

在城镇化不断发展的进程中，小城镇的生态环境日益恶化。分析了小城镇生态环境存在的问题，提出了应采取的生态环境保护规划与对策。     

Concurrency: a system design approach to environmental management and sustainability

The lessons of history indicate that mismanagement of natural resources and the environment often leads to potentially adverse consequences.The increasing interest in economic development,particularly in the developing countries of the world coupled with increasing population pressures and the globalization of economic activity is placing noticeable stresses on the ultimate sustainability of both human and environmental systems.Sustainable development is not a new concept.It has been an area of concern for different elements of society for some time.Yet efforts to understand the implications of sustainable development have not,until recently,been formalized.We have focused singularly on economic development and environmental quality as if they were mutually exclusive.This paper focuses on the concept of concurrency as both a conceptual framework and practicable method of understanding and implementing the ecology and economy of sustainability.     

水污染造成的环境经济损失分析

立足于我国水资源现状，对造成水污染损失的主要影响因素进行分析。探讨适合于我国国情的水污染损失的计算方法。以南方某市为例，计算该市水污染损失，得到了一些有益的结论．给政府部门提供了一个较为准确的损失数据。通过政府的干预或经济法律手段，加大水资源保护管理工作的力度。     

玉溪市中心城区酸雨变化趋势分析

以1991年至2000年实测数据为依据，揭示了玉溪市中心城区10年来酸雨的变化规律及其发展趋势。     

论国家生态安全

国家生态安全是一种全新的现代国家安全观，要重视和维护国家生态安全。     

生态经济论

本文按生态发展历史进程，论述了，论述了生态经济发展的必然性。     

模糊集值统计法在煤矿安全评价指标权值中的应用

应用模糊集值统计的理论 ,对煤矿安全评价中具有随机性和模糊性的指标进行数学分析 ,进一步改进了其权值的确定方法 ,使其更加符合实际情况 ,并对由此得出的权值进行了可靠性分析。通过实例表明 ,该方法克服了经典统计法的不足 ,提高了煤矿安全评价的实用性和科学性     

中质旅游景区开发初探

中质景区是指旅游综合质量中等的景区.开发中质景区可以增加目的地供给、优化旅游目的地结构、分流优质景区客流.以四川雅安碧峰峡景区为例,在分析该类型景区优劣势的基础上,对其在旅游项目设计、资金筹措、客源市场、产品设计、市场营销等方面提出了对策.同时指出,我国中质旅游景区开发中存在着资源价值评价不准确、资源破坏严重等误区,以期在旅游实践中提高中质旅游景区的开发质量.