Serving the Common Interest in U.S. Forest Policy: A Case Study of the Healthy Forests Restoration Act

In the United States, the common interest often is conceived as a by-product of the pluralist, interest-group-driven democratic process. Special interests dominate in many political arenas. Consequently, we have lost the language, vocabulary, and ability to talk about the common interest. The way to reverse this trend is to develop and practice with new tools that allow us to articulate what we mean by the common interest in specific contexts. In this article, we leveraged the literature on procedural, substantive, and pragmatic decision making to illustrate how they work together to demonstrate whether and how the common interest was served in three case studies of Healthy Forests Restoration Act implementation on the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest in Arizona. In two of the cases we found that the common interest was mostly served, while in the third case it was not. Our results raise questions about the ability of procedural criteria or substantive criteria alone to determine effectiveness in decision making. When evaluated together they provide a more complete understanding of how the common interest is or is not served.

The alignment of agricultural and nature conservation policies in the European Union

Europe is a region of relatively high population density and productive agriculture subject to substantial government intervention under the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). Many habitats and species of high conservation interest have been created by the maintenance of agricultural practices over long periods. These practices are often no longer profitable, and nature conservation initiatives require government support to cover the cost for them to be continued. The CAP has been reformed both to reduce production of agricultural commodities at costs in excess of world prices and to establish incentives for landholders to adopt voluntary conservation measures. A separate nature conservation policy has established an extensive series of protected sites (Natura 2000) that has, as yet, failed to halt the loss of biodiversity. Additional broader scale approaches have been advocated for conservation in the wider landscape matrix, including the alignment of agricultural and nature conservation policies, which remains a challenge. Possibilities for alignment include further shifting of funds from general support for farmers toward targeted payments for biodiversity goals at larger scales and adoption of an ecosystem approach. The European response to the competing demands for land resources may offer lessons globally as demands on rural land increase.     

监测中几个异常问题的剖析

介绍了在对氯化氢、二氧化硫、六价铬等项目在现场及常规分析中遇到的一些几个异常问题,并对其进行了逐一分析,提出了相应的合理化建议.     

Modeling the Effects of Limiting the Number of Visitors on Failure Rates of Seabird Nests

Abstract:  Most attempts to manage disturbance by visitors to nature reserves concentrate on limiting visitor access in some way, which is often unpopular with both visitors and managers. In a few nature reserves the daily numbers of visitors are limited, an action that need not necessarily reduce the total number of visitors. As a test of the assumptions that underlie this management practice, we examined the relationship between daily visitor numbers and daily failure rates of nests in two species of seabirds. Daily failure rates for Black-legged Kittiwakes ( Rissa tridactyla ) were weakly correlated with daily visitor numbers but indicated that capping daily visitor numbers slightly reduced overall breeding success. This was not the case for Common Murres ( Uria aalge ), where failure rate declined seasonally but was not significantly correlated with visitor numbers. For some species, it appears that capping daily visitor numbers may have small conservation costs.     

总大肠菌群测定中如何避免出现不定值

现行的环境监测分析方法与有关技术规范中总大肠菌群检数表里所列的几个不定值(“<”或“>”)给区域环境综合分析与评价工作带来一定的困难.为了避免在实测数据中出现不定值,实验分析人员应充分了解待检水样的环境因素以便确定合适的分析方法.对污染较重的水样要适当提高稀释倍数直至出现阴性反应.能否选择出正确的稀释度是实验成败的关键.     

The Effects of Discussion of Familiar or Non-Familiar Information on Opinions of Anthropogenic Climate Change

ABSTRACT

The study found that encountering new information in an online chat rather than information that participants already knew and were familiar with was more likely to reduce support for the view that climate change is due to anthropogenic causes, even though the majority of the presented information supported anthropogenic causes. Participants reported feeling more competent and knowledgeable about the topic and felt less ostracized from others in the chat when participants were already familiar with information others discussed than when information discussed by others in the chat was new information. However, they viewed other chat members as more competent and knowledgeable when those others mentioned new information. Results are discussed within knowledge deficit model of science communication and the bias for common information.     

Property rights and grassland degradation: a study of the Xilingol pasture, Inner Mongolia, China

The semi-private property rights arrangement called the Household Production Responsibility System (HPRS) was started in the early 1980s in Xilingol pasture of Inner Mongolia (China), and stimulated the development of stockbreeding. The grassland has been degrading severely with increasing numbers of livestock. Based on a historical review of property rights regimes in Inner Mongolia and empirical surveys in Xilingol pasture during 2001-2003, this paper assesses the implementation of HPRS and its impacts on incomes of households as well as the environmental impact on the grassland. It was found that HPRS does not mitigate the "Tragedy of the Commons", instead it has exacerbated the situation. It was also found that co-management of grassland and livestock among a few households presents a sustainable use of grassland to develop livestock breeding. We conclude with the recommendation that small-scale collective property rights systems should be encouraged in Xilingol pasture of Inner Mongolia.     

Community action for environmental restoration: a case study on collective social capital in India

In southern India, tens of thousands of village-level irrigation systems (‘tanks’ and feeder channels) are in disrepair. This paper analyses the results of a local NGO effort that focused on awareness-raising and advice to bring about self-sustained community action for irrigation system restoration. After designing a model structure that contains both motivational and capacity (social capital) factors, it is found that (pre-existing) collective social capital, as measured through five simple indicators, strongly correlates with success of the NGO strategy. The intensity of the NGO’s effort shows a negative correlation with success, however. The discussion focuses on issues of social capital definition and measurement and the practical implications of the concept for environmental action, especially the difference between using existing social capital for environmental management versus the construction of social capital as a basis for later self-sustained environmental work. Readers should send their comments on this paper to BhaskarNath@aol.com within 3 months of publication of this issue.     

Should the redstart Phoenicurus phoenicurus accept or reject cuckoo Cuculus canorus eggs?

Hole-nesting habits of redstarts Phoenicurus phoenicurus make laying difficult for parasitic cuckoo Cuculus canorus females and eviction of host eggs difficult for the cuckoo hatchling, causing fitness costs of cuckoo parasitism to be lower than those reported for open nesting hosts. Redstarts have recognition problems when confronted with real cuckoo eggs showing a perfect mimicry with their own eggs since they never eject when parasitized with perfect mimetic cuckoo eggs but instead desert the nest. Here we use a cost-benefit model to assess the effects of parasitism costs and the probability of being parasitized to estimate the reproductive success of redstarts when accepting or rejecting in the presence or absence of parasitism. Baseline data for model calculations come from this and a previous study on a cuckoo parasitized redstart population in Finland. When desertion implies a loss of 50%, we found that below a threshold value of 20% parasitism redstarts should accept cuckoo eggs since the costs of rejection exceed the benefits, whereas above this threshold they should reject. Interestingly, as the cost of desertion increases the threshold value, it should pay the redstart to reject increasingly at an exponential rate. Our field observations on natural parasitism and experiments with artificial cuckoo eggs confirmed the predictions from the model when hatching failures of the cuckoo were taken into account. Therefore, the low cost imposed by cuckoo parasitism in the system, and the presumably high cost of desertion as a response to parasitism favours acceptance over rejection for a wide range of parasitism pressures. This finding could explain the low rejection rate of real cuckoo eggs found in the redstart despite the presumably long history of a coevolutionary relationship with the cuckoo in Finland.     

Potential Effects of Direct Transfer Payments on Farmland Habitat Diversity in a Marginal European Landscape

Farmland habitat diversity in marginal European landscapes changed significantly in the past decades. Further changes toward homogenization are expected, particularly in the course of European agricultural policy. Based on three alternative transfer payment schemes, we modeled spatially explicit potential effects on the farmland habitat diversity in a marginal European landscape. We defined (1) a scenario with direct transfer payments coupled to production, (2) a scenario with direct transfer payments decoupled from production, and (3) a scenario phasing out all direct transfer payments. We characterized habitat diversity with three indices: habitat richness, evenness, and rarity. The habitat pattern in 1995 served as reference for comparison. All scenarios predicted a general trend of homogenization of the farmland habitat pattern, yet to a differing extent. Transfer payments coupled to production (Scenario 1) favored the abandonment of agricultural production, particularly in low-productive areas and arable land use in more productive areas. Habitat richness and habitat evenness had intermediate values in this scenario. Decoupling transfer payments from production (Scenario 2) supported grassland as most profitable farming system. This led to a grassland-dominated landscape with low values of all habitat diversity indices. Phasing out transfer payments (Scenario 3) resulted in complete abandonment or afforestation of agricultural land and extremely low values in all habitat diversity indices. Scenario results indicate that transfer payments may prevent cessation of agricultural production, but may not counteract homogenization in marginal landscapes. Conserving high farmland habitat diversity in such landscapes may require support schemes, e.g., Pillar Two of EU Common Agricultural Policy.