On measuring sustainable development indicators

Sustainable development, as proposed by the Brundtland Report, requires carefully managed change to improve environmental and economic conditions as well as the quality of life for all people. Some of the problems involved in this demanding challenge faced by individuals, local communities, nations and the international community are discussed. In particular, nine indicators of sustainable development—gleaned from economic, socioeconomic and environmental studies—are critically reviewed. It is argued that a programme of detailed theoretical and empirical research is needed to develop a series of measures or indicators of sustainable development for strategic decision making and detailed environmental management.     

Natural resource management in national parks: a management assessment of a Natura 2000 wetlands site in Kotychi-Strofylia,southern Greece

In Europe, the establishment of the Natura 2000 network is one of the main actions that has been undertaken to contribute to the maintenance of biodiversity. However, the management system of sites included in the network is under question. The aim of this study was to assess the natural resource management applied to the National Park of the wetlands Kotychi-Strofylia, southern Greece, an important site belonging to the European ecological network Natura 2000, and the Ramsar convention. The methodological approach applied follows the general framework of International Unit for Nature Conservation/World Committee for Protected Areas (IUCN/WCPA) for the evaluation of protected areas, and it was based on field monitoring data with a view of providing information in achieving the stated management objectives. Two levels of indicators were used: the first concerned the evaluation of the management process and the second the evaluation of the management outputs and outcomes. The assessment of the natural resources management in the National Park showed that the management of the area is oriented towards biodiversity conservation and lies within the scope of the habitat directive and the ecological network Natura 2000. The framework applied and the methodological approach followed in this study appear to provide a useful basis for designing and conducting management evaluation. The indicators used at local scale can be integrated at regional- and national-scale projects of management evaluation, and, at the same time, the evaluation results can help local managers to improve management by taking the appropriate management measures. The analytical hierarchical conceptual flow suggested seems to be considered as an essential tool for evaluating natural resource management.     

Assessing aquaculture sustainability: a comparative methodology

Little work dealing with the evaluation of aquaculture system sustainability has so far been undertaken on a global and comparative basis. Moreover, such work is mostly based on very unbalanced approaches in terms of the dimensions of sustainable development that are taken into account. The approach adopted in this article is designed to encompass all the dimensions of sustainability including the institutional one (governance). The taking into account of this latter, in particular, together with the role played by aquaculture in sustainability at the territorial level gives the approach its original and innovative nature. The process of establishing the checklist of sustainability indicators in aquaculture relies on a hierarchical nesting approach which makes it possible to link indicators with general sustainability criteria and principles. At once multidisciplinary and participatory, the approach compares several countries with highly differentiated types of aquaculture system. An original finding from this work is that the technically most intensive farming model scores better than more extensive systems, which might have been thought to be closer to natural systems in their environmental dimension and therefore intuitively more ‘sustainable’. This result suggests relating sustainability outcomes to the level of control and of devolved responsibilities.     

生态居住小区评价指标体系的不确定性研究

针对目前我国生态居住小区构建评价指标体系时面临的种种不确定性问题,分析其产生的原因,确立了以弹性原则为主的评价指标体系构建原则,提出了一套建立符合我国国情的、定性与定量结合的、考虑不确定性的评价指标体系的方法.并结合实际设计项目,在温岭市生态居住小区详细规划中,按照弹性、层次性以及可操作性原则,采用AHP法,得出一个三层次的包括生态住宅、生态景观、生态技术、基础设施和社区管理、生态文化5大系统和24个指标项的生态居住区评价指标体系,并对各项指标及其权重进行量化,最后通过多因子叠加得到对整个生态居住小区的综合评价结果.     

A multi-scale approach to modelling spatial and dynamic ecological patterns for reservoir's water quality management

With growing levels of urbanization and agriculture throughout the world, it is increasingly important that both research and management efforts take into account the effects of this widespread landscape alteration and its consequences for natural systems. Freshwater ecosystems, namely reservoirs, are particularly sensitive to land use changes. In this context, modelling can be very useful, for decision support, as an investigative tool to forecast the outcome of various scenarios, to guide current management in order to meet future targets and to develop integrated frameworks for management accordingly to the Water Framework Directive (WFD). The present paper examined the applicability of a holistic Stochastic-Dynamic Methodology (StDM), coupled with a Cellular Automata (CA) model, in capturing how expected changes at land use level will alter the ecological status of lentic ecosystems, namely at physicochemical and biological levels. The methodology was applied to Portuguese reservoirs located in the Douro's basin and illustrated with a series of stochastic-dynamic and spatial outputs taking into account expected scenarios regarding land use changes. Overall, the simulation results are encouraging since they seem to demonstrate the tool reliability in capturing the stochastic environmental dynamics of the selected metrics facing spatial explicit scenarios. The ultimate goal was to couple monitoring assessment and the described modelling techniques to ease management and decision making regarding the practical implementation of the WFD, both at the scale of the reservoir body and at the scale of the respective river watershed dynamics.     

Comparative assessment of sustainable development in South American countries on the basis of the Sustainable Society Index

This study reports an overview of the economic, social and environmental performance of the main South American countries (SAC) as measured by the Sustainable Society Index. This is a well-known composite indicator, composed of 21 indicators, grouped in seven categories, covering environmental, social and economic wellbeing dimensions. Thirteen European countries recently incorporated into the European Union (NEUC) are considered as a reference. The study covers the period 2006–2016. The South American Region features significant natural resources and plays an important role in the global economy. However, there is concern about the long-term sustainability of social and economic development, given the high rate of economic growth based on the production of low added-value primary products. Sustainable development requires reasonable balance between economic, social and environmental performance, as well as a sustained and balanced increase in performance associated with those fundamental dimensions. Moreover, it is important to agree on minimum performance levels for all performance indicators, taking into account particular social, economic and environmental realities. SAC feature a clear imbalance in some categories affecting the economic, social and environmental wellbeing dimensions, showing either stagnation or significant decrease in recent years. It can be concluded that in the light of findings reported here, South American countries are far from being on the pathway towards sustainable development.     

Using conservation science to advance corporate biodiversity accountability

Biodiversity declines threaten the sustainability of global economies and societies. Acknowledging this, businesses are beginning to make commitments to account for and mitigate their influence on biodiversity and report this in sustainability reports. We assessed the top 100 of the 2016 Fortune 500 Global companies' (the Fortune 100) sustainability reports to gauge the current state of corporate biodiversity accountability. Almost half (49) of the Fortune 100 mentioned biodiversity in reports, and 31 made clear biodiversity commitments, of which only 5 were specific, measureable, and time bound. A variety of biodiversity-related activities were disclosed (e.g., managing impacts, restoring biodiversity, and investing in biodiversity), but only 9 companies provided quantitative indicators to verify the magnitude of their activities (e.g., area of habitat restored). No companies reported quantitative biodiversity outcomes, making it difficult to determine whether business actions were of sufficient magnitude to address impacts and were achieving positive outcomes for nature. Conservation science can advance approaches to corporate biodiversity accountability by helping businesses make science-based biodiversity commitments, develop meaningful indicators, and select more targeted activities to address business impacts. With the biodiversity policy super year of 2020 rapidly approaching, now is the time for conservation scientists to engage with and support businesses in playing a critical role in setting the new agenda for a sustainable future for the planet with biodiversity at its heart.     

Incorporating basic needs to reconcile poverty and ecosystem services

Conservation managers frequently face the challenge of protecting and sustaining biodiversity without producing detrimental outcomes for (often poor) human populations that depend on ecosystem services for their well-being. However, mutually beneficial solutions are often elusive and can mask trade-offs and negative outcomes for people. To deal with such trade-offs, ecological and social thresholds need to be identified to determine the acceptable solution space for conservation. Although human well-being as a concept has recently gained prominence, conservationists still lack tools to evaluate how their actions affect it in a given context. We applied the theory of human needs to conservation by building on an extensive historical application of need approaches in international development. In an innovative participatory method that included focus groups and household surveys, we evaluated how human needs are met based on locally relevant thresholds. We then established connections between human needs and ecosystem services through key-informant focus groups. We applied our method in coastal East Africa to identify households that would not be able to meet their basic needs and to uncover the role of ecosystem services in meeting these. This enabled us to identify how benefits derived from the environment were contributing to meeting basic needs and to consider potential repercussions that could arise through changes to ecosystem service provision. We suggest our approach can help conservationists and planners balance poverty alleviation and biodiversity protection and ensure conservation measures do not, at the very least, cause serious harm to individuals. We further argue it can be used as a basis for monitoring the impacts of conservation on multidimensional poverty.     

基于农户视角的粮食主产县耕地健康评价与诊断--以湖南省湘阴县为例

耕地健康关乎国家粮食安全。依据PSR理论模型构建耕地健康评价指标体系,利用湖南省岳阳市湘阴县农户调查数据,运用层次分析法、TOPSIS法和障碍度模型评价了该县耕地健康状况并诊断其障碍因子。结果表明:湘阴县耕地健康综合指数为0.488,耕地健康等级为中度亚健康;耕地健康压力指数、状态指数和响应指数依次分别为0.597、0.526和0.418;轮作休耕、种植绿肥、单位播种面积有机肥施用量、粮食单产、耕作层厚度、单位播种面积化肥施用量、灌溉保证率是制约湘阴县耕地健康的主要障碍因子。     

Conceptualizing and incorporating social sustainability in the business world

One of the most important challenges faced by business managers today is the integration of sustainability into their core functions. The contemporary enterprise is forced to leap forward from the mere adoption of green practices toward rethinking, redesigning, and redeveloping business practices in a more sustainable way. Most of the initiatives in this attempt have so far emphasized primarily the economic and environmental aspects of sustainable development and overlooked the social dimension of sustainability. As more organizations commit to sustainability, there is an increasing concern to incorporate social sustainability throughout their business operations. To conceptualize and integrate the notion, some organizations use preexisting indicators to demonstrate the value and impact of sustainability, while others look beyond the measurement of impacts by constructing their own system of indicators. This paper draws on a comprehensive literature review to determine a broadly acceptable framework of social sustainability indicators to be conceptualized and integrated into the business world. Findings suggest that economic and environmental sustainability can be driven together with core social factors including fairness and equality, poverty, health, education, delinquencies, demography, culture, and employee engagement within an organization. These results offer insight into the emerging phenomenon of formulating sustainable business strategies for organizations based on social indicators to attain the ultimate sustainable outcomes. This study is among the first to identify social sustainability indicators from societal and corporate perspectives. It offers a comprehensive social sustainability framework that may be adopted by organizations in the business world.