Qualitative Stakeholder Analysis for the Development of Sustainable Monitoring Systems for Farm Animal Welfare

Continued concern for animal welfare may be alleviated when welfare would be monitored on farms. Monitoring can be characterized as an information system where various stakeholders periodically exchange relevant information. Stakeholders include producers, consumers, retailers, the government, scientists, and others. Valuating animal welfare in the animal-product market chain is regarded as a key challenge to further improve the welfare of farm animals and information on the welfare of animals must, therefore, be assessed objectively, for instance, through monitoring. Interviews with Dutch stakeholder representatives were conducted to identify their perceptions about the monitoring of animal welfare. Stakeholder perceptions were characterized in relation to the specific perspectives of each stakeholder. While producers tend to perceive welfare from a production point of view, consumers will use visual images derived from traditional farming and from the animals natural environments. Scientists perceptions of animal welfare are affected by the need to measure welfare with quantifiable parameters. Retailers and governments (policy makers) have views of welfare that are derived from their relationships with producers, consumers, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and scientists. All interviewed stakeholder representatives stated that animal welfare is important. They varied in the extent to which they weighted economic considerations relative to concern for the animals welfare. Many stakeholders emphasized the importance of communication in making a monitoring system work. Overall, the perspectives for the development of a sustainable monitoring system that substantially improves farm animal welfare were assessed as being poor in the short term. However, a reliable system could be initiated under certain conditions, such as integrated chains and with influential and motivated stakeholders. A scheme is described with attention points for the development of sustainable monitoring systems for farm animal welfare in the long term.     

吉林省西部草原资源的开发与利用

草原是吉林省西部最重要的植被类型，是区域自然资源比较优势的集中体现。长期以来，由于对草原掠夺式开发利用，导致草原严重退化，环境恶化，成为本区可持续发展的制约因素。摆脱吉林省西部生态灾难，大兴草业是最佳的战略选择。应用草地农业生态学原理，实施草业工程，通过草地畜牧业，饲料业，草坪业，草原旅游业的系统开发，是实现吉林省西部可持续发展的必由之路。     

中国北方草原雪灾的致灾机制探讨

北方草原雪灾是天灾 ,更是一种人祸。受拉尼娜事件影响的异常气候固然是致灾的客观原因 ,但是不合理的人类经济活动 ,如超载放牧、耕地过垦、滥挖草药、滥用水资源等社会经济压力 ,超过了草原生态阈限 ,使脆弱的草原生态平衡遭到严重破坏 ;粗放经营 ,草原基础设施落后 ,也使草原生态系统抵御灾害的能力降低 ;草原公有、牲畜私有之间的所有制相位差是激发牧民掠夺式利用草原资源的最根本原因。为了追求私人经济利益的最大化 ,放牧者往往置公共草原的承载能力于不顾 ,严重恶化的草原生态环境也许正是“公共物品悲剧”的真实写照。     

The Idea of “Ethical Accounting” for a Livestock Farm

This paper presents the idea of a decision-support system for a livestock farm, called “ethical accounting”, to be used as an extension of traditional cost accounting. “Ethical accounting” seeks to make available to the farmer information about how his decisions affect the interests of farm animals, consumers and future generations. Furthermore, “ethical accounting” involves value-based planning. Thus, the farmer should base his choice of production plan on reflections as to his fundamental objectives, and he should make his final decision only after having seriously considered the various consequences for the affected parties. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

What's wrong with animalby-products?

Without looking beyond the conditions under which laying hens typically live in the contemporary U.S. egg industry, we can understand why the production and consumption of factory farmed eggs could be judged immoral. However, the question, What (if anything) is wrong with animal by-products? cannot always be adequately answered by looking at the conditions under which animals live out their productive lives. For the dairy industry looks benign in those terms, but if we look beyond the conditions under which milk cows live, we can better understand some animal rights activists' reasons for objecting to dairy products. The contemporary U.S. dairy industry requires a slaughter industry between one-seventh and one-third the size of the contemporary beef industry. Today, beef slaughter is vastly more humane than poultry slaughter, but if today's beef slaughter industry is judged emmoral, the contemporary dairy industry should be judged similarly immoral, because the two are wedded. This is the deep reason for moral suspicion of the dairy industry.     

Effects of Management of Domestic Dogs and Recreation on Carnivores in Protected Areas in Northern California

Abstract: In developed countries dogs (Canis lupus familiaris) are permitted to accompany human visitors to many protected areas (e.g., >96% of protected lands in California, U.S.A.), and protected‐area management often focuses on regulating dogs due to concerns about predation, competition, or transmission of disease and conflicts with human visitors. In 2004 and 2005, we investigated whether carnivore species richness and abundance were associated with management of domestic dogs and recreational visitation in protected areas in northern California. We surveyed for mammalian carnivores and human visitors in 21 recreation areas in which dogs were allowed offleash or onleash or were excluded, and we compared our observations in the recreation areas with observations in seven reference sites that were not open to the public. Carnivore abundance and species richness did not differ among the three types of recreation areas, but native carnivore species richness was 1.7 times greater (p < 0.01) and the relative abundances of native coyotes (Canis latrans) and bobcats (Lynx rufus) were over four times greater (p < 0.01) in the reference sites. Abundances of bobcats and all carnivores declined as the number of visitors increased. The policy on domestic dogs did not appear to affect species richness and abundance of mammalian carnivores. But the number of dogs we observed was strongly associated with human visitation (R²= 0.54), so the key factors associated with recreational effects on carnivores appear to be the presence and number of human visitors to protected areas.     

Research Training for Releasable Animals

Abstract:  Restrictions on training potentially releasable animals such as those undergoing rehabilitation care or wild-caught captives have limited our understanding of sensory processes, cognition, and physiology important for conservation of species. It is common practice among several U.S. federal agencies to limit training of animals available for release. The behavioral argument justifying this practice is that training habituates subjects to people and conditions them to associate people with rewards such as food; habituation to and positive associations with people will lead animals into dangerous situations after their release. If under special circumstances research training is permitted, all trained behaviors must be extinguished before release because behaviors will transfer to the natural setting. Research on animal learning and memory indicates that these may not be accurate scenarios. A review of the literature on habituation, classical and instrumental conditioning, and compound conditioning suggests that learning within a research setting does not add to learning that already occurs in procedures associated with basic feeding and care. In fact, animals probably learn less about people in a training setting. Furthermore, context-specific effects on memory limit behavior transfer from captive to natural settings. Extinction is strongly susceptible to context effects, which suggests that extinction does not effectively transfer to the postrelease setting. Counterintuitively, extinction of responses to experimental stimuli under some circumstances may enhance undesirable learning about humans. Under those circumstances in which isolation from human contact is difficult or undesirable, behavioral research can present an ideal format for minimizing learning about humans and provide biological information important for conservation.     

清初“摊丁入亩”政策对环境的影响

清初“摊丁入亩”政策对清社会经济的恢复发展确实起到了促进作用,但同时对环境也构成了巨大威胁,引发了地表植被遭严重玻坏、自然灾害频繁、珍稀野生动植物大量灭绝等一系列环境问题。剖璞见玉,对今有史鉴作用。     

Variation in Population Parameters: Adaptation to Toxic Environmental Factors

Some mechanisms of adaptation of natural populations to toxic environmental factors are discussed. The dandelion and hole-nesting birds are used as examples for demonstrating that an increase in the variation of reproductive parameters upon chemical environmental pollution favors the survival of those individuals in the populations that are better adapted to changes in the climate and other environmental conditions. The increased variation in reproductive parameters may promote the elimination of less fit individuals from populations. The ensuing energy loss is the cost of maintaining the population size in the chemically degraded environment.     

黄土高原半干旱区土壤呼吸对土地利用变化的响应

明确土地利用方式变化条件下引起土壤呼吸差异性的因素,对预测黄土区退耕还草条件下土壤碳循环变化有重要意义。基于建立于1984 年的长期定位试验,于2011 年3 月至2012年12 月,利用Li-8100 系统(Li-COR,Lincoln,NE,USA)监测了退耕还草(苜蓿)处理和农田(冬小麦)土壤呼吸季节变化以及土壤表层(0~5 cm)温度和含水量,研究了土地利用变化下土壤呼吸变化特征及其与土壤温度、水分以及有机碳特性之间的关系。结果发现,退耕27 a 来(自1984年麦地转化为苜蓿地),土壤呼吸速率苜蓿地(3.55 μmol·m^-2·s^-1)达小麦地(1.36 μmol·m^-2·s^-1)的2.61 倍,累积呼吸量苜蓿地(981 g·m^-2)达小麦(357 g·m^-2)的2.75 倍。土壤呼吸温度敏感系数(Q₁₀)苜蓿地较小麦地2011 年提高24.5%,2012 年提高2.4%。苜蓿地SOC含量(10.5 g·kg^-1)较小麦地(6.5 g·kg^-1)提高61.5%,微生物量碳(204 mg·kg^-1)较小麦地(152 mg·kg^-1)提高34%,0~5 cm土壤水分含量同期高于小麦地,但二者土壤温度差异不显著。土壤水分、SOC、微生物量碳等是造成二者呼吸差异的因素。