Floodplain management in London,Ontario, Canada: Assessing implementation of section 28 of the conservation authorities act

An assessment of floodplain regulation by the Upper Thames River Conservation Authority in the City of London for the period 1978–1989 was undertaken. Utilizing a mix of data sources available through the conservation authority office, questionnaires administered to flooplain residents, interviews with relevant government officials, and housing statistics, the study concludes that regulations have been administered in an equitable and efficient manner. However, regulations have had some problems in controlling all development activity and in addressing policy objectives. Problems arise from weaknesses in the Conservation Authorities Act, an ensuing lack of judicial and participating municipal support in prosecuting violations, and inadequate monitoring and enforcement of development activity. Without addressing these issues, the basic problems associated with floodplain management in Ontario will remain.     

Ecotourism,sustainable development,and conservation education: Development of a tour guide training program in Tortuguero,Costa Rica

A tour guide training program was developed for rural communities near Costa Rica's Tortuguero National Park to respond to the impacts of the 24-fold increase in park visitation in the past decade, to involve local communities in resource management, and to provide regional environmental education. The development of the training course involved a survey of scientists and park managers to ascertain resource management needs, priorities for information to be disseminated, and impacts of tourism on the resource base. Current and potential tour guides were surveyed to identify their information needs, solicit their input in the training program, and to determine their knowledge and skills. Written questionnaires were developed and given to 400 tourists to determine their activities and environmental information needs, and hotel owners were censused to examine the economic feasibility of a local guide program. A pilot training course and guide program involving 12 Tortuguero residents demonstrated that a tour guide program: (1) helped mitigate negative tourism impacts on Tortuguero National Park's natural resources, particularly by regulating tourists on the park's 35-km beach used for nesting by endangered sea turtles; (2) provided environmental education to an important segment of the local community not traditionally reached through school or government development projects; (3) provided environmental information to tourists, thus enhancing their visit; and (4) provided local economic benefits through lucrative part-time employment, thereby allowing local people to participate more fully in the tourism system. An extended training course is being planned to provide further environmental education programming and to increase year-round employment opportunities for the tour guides.     

A review of conservation legislation in Nepal: Past progress and future needs

Nepal is considered a leader among developing nations with regard to conservation legislation and programs; it was among the first Asian nations to develop national conservation legislation, sign CITES, and develop a national conservation strategy. We review the history of modern conservation law in Nepal from the Rana period (early 1950s) to the present. The early legislation focused mainly on strict preservation of areas and species; this phase culminated in the National Parks and Wildlife Conservation Act of 1973. Subsequent legislation has evolved more in the direction of an integrated, holistic approach to conservation and is beginning to incorporate the participation of local people; subsequent amendments to the 1973 act allowed greater rights to rural villagers, and the designation of conservation areas in addition to the more strictly defined protected areas (national parks, wildlife reserves, etc.). Our review of conservation legislation suggests that Nepal has had many successes to date; the country has a protected area system covering over 10% of its land area, and many target species are recovering in parks and reserves. There are also some causes of concern, including staff shortages, financial constraints within the Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation, and the fact that there is little legal infrastructure outside of protected areas to enforce conservation laws; further, some aspects of hunting regulations are in need of revision. Primary needs include a comprehensive review of these policies and a nationalized strategy to ameliorate the shortcomings.     

Private land management for biodiversity conservation

As human influences fragment native communities and ecosystems, remaining land must be better managed to conserve many elements of biodiversity. Much of this land is privately held, yet traditional private land-use management practices often further diminish biodiversity by promoting favored or edge-adapted species. Today, private land stewards are increasingly aware of and concerned about biodiversity, but little guidance exists for them to make land-use decisions incorporating principles and knowledge from conservation biology. Consequently, most management strategies are highly subjective. This article addresses that problem by introducing current conservation wisdom to management and use of private lands. The result is a model program for developing land management plans, with the goal of maintaining viable populations and natural distributions of native species and communities from a landscape perspective. The program establishes a protocol for classifying sites according to the importance of their species, communities, and other elements to global and regional biodiversity. These site classifications are based on the management objectives necessary to maintain important elements. Once managers classify a site, the program provides management standards, general stewardship principles, examples of land management strategies, and basic monitoring and evaluation procedures.     

Energy conservation and thermal comfort in a New York city high rise office building

Detailed analysis of an energy conservation program implemented on a 46 story government building is presented. Conservation was achieved by reduced lighting, changes in building operating hours, thermostat settings of 20C (68F) in the winter and 27C (80F) in the summer, and the elimination of air conditioning reheat. As a result, energy consumption in the summer was reduced by 54 percent. A survey of the occupants' thermal comfort and the insulating value of thei r clothing was taken. In the summer 68 percent were comfortable compared with 80 percent in the winter. The insulating value of the clothing worn by the women was consistently less than that of the men; the difference was largest in the summer. Though the temperatures in the occupied spaces were not as cold or as warm as the thermostat settings, the survey indicates that comfort could be improved if occupants dressed more appropriately for the expected thermal environment of the work place.An energy analysis with a building simulation program (NBSLD) was also undertaken. The simulated energy consumption was within 5 percent of the measured values. Additional large savings may be achieved in this and similar buildings through a reduction in the energy cost of transporting air and chilled and hot water around the building for the environmental control systems.     

Assessing representativeness of places for conservation reservation and heritage listing

Problems arising from application of the representative criterion for conservation and natural heritage evaluation are discussed. An ecological basis to this criterion is suggested that focuses on those key environmental factors dominating biotic response. A methodology is proposed that utilizes computer-based methods of establishing and interrogating spatial data bases (geographic information systems), environmental modeling, and numeric analysis. An example is presented illustrating some of the advantages and limitations of classification and dimension reduction techniques in both defining bioenvironments and displaying their spatial distribution. The advantages of this method for representativeness evaluation are that it maximizes the utility of available data, is explicit and repeatable, and enables large areas to be analyzed at relatively fine scales.     

The rise and fall of the nature conservation movement in Japan in relation to some cultural values

The Japanese are traditionally regarded as nature-loving people, living in “harmony” with nature. However, this assumption is difficult to accept when observing the environmental problems in Japan. How can one explain the incongruities? Has the Japanese people's attitude toward nature changed as Japan has modernized? Is the concept of the nature-loving Japanese merely a myth? Is there another reason to explain this contradiction? This study shows political and economic origins of the paradox. The origin of the Japanese traditional idea of nature is fear and reverence of nature based on a primitive religion that developed in a rural subsistence living situation. Aesthetic and spiritual values of nature for cultural, educational, and intellectual entertainment were developed by the ruling class in the seventh century. Japan's first nature conservation movement, imported from the West, developed among the intellectual community and was advocated and promoted by the elite in the Meiji period (1868–1911). However, because deep commitment was lacking, the movement was abused by the military government before World War II. In the early 1970s the nature conservation movement seemed to be on the ascendancy, mainly because it was combined with the antipollution movement claiming the basic rights of survival. The Japanese nature conservation movement is still in the embryonic stage; in the future, the blending of some traditional resource management with the scientific philosophy of nature conservation may help promote the new wave of nature conservation in Japan.     

A review of criteria for evaluating natural areas

Environmental Management - Methods for evaluating natural areas have evolved in the last couple of decades to assess the importance of natural areas for the purposes of land-use planning,...     

Culture and the environment in the Soviet Union

The Soviet Union is one of the most physically and culturally diverse nations on earth. Its natural environment embraces a rich variety of resources and ecosystems, many of which, such as Lake Baikal, are of world significance. Culturally, it is comprised of over a hundred ethnic groups, belonging to eight major language groups and six major religions. However, two cultures are dominant: the Slavic group (which takes in 75% of the USSR population and 80% of its land area) and the Turkic-Islamic peoples who account for the large majority of the remainder. Owing to the highly centralized nature of the country's political-administrative system, however, the effect of culture or ethnic traditions in the resolution of national environmental issues is quite small. Major decisions regarding either specific conservation issues or basic environmental policies are made at the centralized level by ministerial, planning, and Communist Party officials, and are based on pragmatically refined ideological considerations, rather than on regional cultural attitudes. This pragmatic refining of ideological considerations will involve the weighing of specific economic and environmental imperatives, and deciding on appropriate trade-offs. To find cultural expression in environmental management, one would need to look closely at local projects and approaches in the various ethnic regions, particularly the non-Slavic ones.     

湿地资源的功能类型及其开发与保护

简介了湿地的定义及其分类,并全面概括了湿地的功能类型和保护的意义,指出了中国湿地的现状及开发利用中的生态环境问题,并提出相应的保护对策。