Path forward: Emerging issues and challenges

The NIOSH Construction Program worked with industry stakeholders to develop a National Occupational Safety and Health Construction Agenda to target future research and activities. The Program and its partners are also cognizant that new developments can emerge over time and that research can play an important role in helping to understand and address these emerging issues. Examples of emerging issues relevant to construction safety and health are described. These include: (a) climate change and energy considerations; (b) green construction developments and opportunities; (c) new materials; (d) changes in industry structure and practice; (e) workforce developments and disparities; (f) injury underreporting and cost and risk shifting; and (g) increased interest in addressing root causes. Responding to emerging issues while maintaining a focus on fundamental longstanding issues represents an ongoing challenge for researchers and industry organizations. Additional research to understand the diffusion and adoption of research by the industry is also needed. Research accomplished to date provides a strong foundation for addressing future industry needs and trends.     

The medicinal and aromatic plants business of Uttarakhand: A mini review of challenges and directions for future research

The medicinal and aromatic plants resources of Uttarakhand, India offer significant opportunities of employment and livelihood for rural communities and contribute a large share in the medicinal and aromatic plants trade of India. With the growing trade of medicinal and aromatic plants resources in the global market, the medicinal and aromatic plants business of Uttarakhand is also continuously growing in terms of trade volume, value and market reach. But, considering the ecological importance as well as unregulated exploitations of these resources, the growing business activities in this sector appear incompatible to the sustainability agenda. Through a mini review, this study assesses the medicinal and aromatic plants sector of Uttarakhand and identifies key challenges that seem incompatible for resource and business sustainability and offers some prospective research directions essential for identifying pragmatic solutions to support sustainability in the sector. This review identifies nine key challenges to sustainability in Uttarakhandʼs medicinal and aromatic plants sector. It is therefore pertinent that future research focus on the prevailing challenges of the medicinal and aromatic plants sector of Uttarakhand to develop strategies for sustainable business prospects.     

Contrasting the core beliefs regarding the effective implementation of wind power. An international study of stakeholder perspectives

This paper analyses patterns in beliefs about the implementation of wind power as part of a geographical comparison of onshore wind power developments in the Netherlands, North-Rhine Westphalia and England. Q methodology is applied, in order to systematically compare the patterns in stakeholder views on the institutional conditions and changes in the domains of energy policy, spatial planning and environmental policy. Three factors represent support for wind power implementation from fundamentally different perspectives. The fourth perspective is critical opposed to wind power developments as well as critical to the manner in which wind projects are proposed, planned and implemented. These four perspectives exist across the geographical cases; however, some perspectives are prominent in one case and marginal in another. This relates to different legacies and varying implementation achievements in the three cases. The analysis shows that an approach that focuses on implementing as much wind power as possible, relying on technocratic reasoning and hierarchical policies is in practice the least successful, whereas collaborative perspectives with more emphasis on local issues and less on the interests of the conventional energy sector were particularly dominant in the most successful case, North-Rhine Westphalia.     

变革中的中国水资源管理

水资源短缺是世界面临的共同危机,是制约国民经济健康稳定发展的重要“瓶颈”,水资源的可持续利用已经成为经济社会可持续发展的基础性、战略性问题.缓解水资源供需矛盾的关键是加强水资源的管理.文章回顾了中国水资源管理制度的发展演变历程:只管工程的非正式水资源管理、行政命令为主的正式制度萌芽、取水许可管理和基于水权的正规制度管理等四个阶段.尽管在确立以流域管理和区域管理相结合的综合管理体制,建立以水量分配、取水许可、水资源论证为主要内容的水权管理制度和以全成本核算为原则的水价管理制度等方面成绩显著,水资源管理中仍存在水资源权属不清、水环境权得不到保障等问题.今后中国水资源改革,首先应继续深化水权改革,推动水权明晰化,建立水权交易制度;其次,健全水环境权的法律法制规范,提供相关的法律保障;最后,完善部门间的合作协调机制,真正实现对水的协同管理.     

Benefits and Challenges of Urban Green Spaces

The aim of this paper is to illustrate the benefits,and challenges towards providing multifunctional urban green spaces.The results are based on critical analysis of study findings from different cities in Europe,America and to a lesser extent in Asia.Inner-city green spaces are especially important for improving air quality through uptake of pollutant gases and particulates which are responsible for respiratory infections.Due to their amenity and aesthetics,green spaces increase property value.To ensure multifunctional role of urban a green space is achieved,in particular the social and psychological role,certain standards of quantity,quality and distribution within the urban area should be adequately established.Green spaces need to be uniformly distributed throughout the city area,although each does not need to be extremely large but should be large enough to accommodate the city population.     

从意愿到行动:中国地方环保局的机构能力研究

越来越多的研究将中国的环境问题归因于执法不严.但是,很少有人探索环保机构能力和环境管制以及执法之间的关系.在前人对国家能力研究的基础上,发展了一套指标体系对中国地方环保局的机构能力进行评价,并分析了环保机构能力和污染物减排之间的关系.研究表明:具有较好人力资本(而不是预算更多)的地方环保局能够更好地从事环境监管工作,地方环保局的机构能力提升对污染物减排产生显著正面效果;另外,严格的环境监管却不一定会改善环境状况.那些工业治理环境能力强的地区通常工业较发达,污染物排放量大,抵消了环保局监管执法所产生的正面收益.由此可见,要缩小环境法律法规规定的目标和环境现状之间的差距,仅靠监管手段创新和增强地方环保局的机构能力是不够的,中国还需要努力开展全社会监管环境的制度建设.     

对环境监测系统体制改革的几点思考

应坚持“环境监测实质上是一项政府行为”的定位，通过明确职能、职责、作用，实行新的运行管理机制，来推动环境监测在市场经济条件 下的体制改革。     

全国党校(行政学院)系统学习贯彻习近平生态文明思想理论研讨会综述

2018"全国党校(行政学院)系统学习贯彻习近平生态文明思想理论研讨会"成功召开,达成了至少以下三方面的共识:首先,习近平生态文明思想发源于福建,发展和成熟于浙江,是习近平新时代中国特色社会主义思想最富原创性的成果之一。这一重要思想体现了"一脉相承",体现了对马克思主义理论和我国传统文化的继承与发展。其次,生态文明建设的"四梁八柱"已搭建完成,下一步的重点在于如何落实。从地方推进改革的战略维度,关键要坚持与强化党的全面领导,着力解决突出环境问题,推进绿色发展主导,优化国土空间开发规划,注重制度建设与创新引领。最后,生态文明建设领域的学科建设与教学培训尚处于起步阶段。与会学者提出了几组反映中国经验及其逻辑和特征的核心概念或实践探索,包括生态系统生产总值(GEP)核算、生态产品的内涵及其价值实现,以及自然资源资产负债表编制等。     

Portrayal of sustainability principles in the mission statements and on home pages of the world's largest organizations

Conservation can be achieved only if sustainability is embraced as core to organizational cultures. To test the extent to which the related concepts of sustainability, conservation, response to climate change, poverty alleviation, and gender equity have been incorporated into organizational culture, we compared mission statements published from 1990 to 2000 with those published in 2014 for 150 organzations, including conservation nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), aid NGOs, government development agencies, resource extraction companies, and retailers (30 in each category). We also analyzed the 2014 home web pages of each organization. Relative to the earlier period, the frequency with which mission statements mentioned poverty alleviation, biodiversity conservation, and a range of sustainable practices increased only slightly by 2014, particularly among resource extractors and retail companies. Few organizations in any sector had embedded either climate change or gender equity into their mission statements. In addition, the proportional intensity with which any of the aspirations were expressed did not change between periods. For current home pages, conservation NGOs, resource extractors, and government agencies were significantly more likely to acknowledge the importance of matters that were not part of their core business, but few aid agencies or retail companies promoted goals beyond alleviation of crises and profit maximization, respectively. Overall, there has been some progress in recognizing poverty alleviation, biodiversity conservation, and sustainable practices, but gender equity and a determination to reduce impacts on climate change are still rarely promoted as central institutional concerns. Sustainability in general, and biodiversity conservation in particular, will not be achieved unless their importance is more widely apparent in core communication products of organizations.     

Practitioner insights as a means of setting a context for conservation

A key obstacle to conservation success is the tendency of conservation professionals to tackle each challenge individually rather than collectively and in context. We sought to prioritize barriers to conservation previously described in the conservation literature. We undertook an online survey of 154 practitioners from over 70 countries to ascertain the most important barriers to conservation they faced. We used statistical analyses to identify the key impediments to conservation success and to examine whether these were affected by organizational attributes. Twenty-one barriers were identified. The importance ascribed to those was influenced by continent of operation and organization size, but not by organization age or autonomy (from larger parent organizations). We found the most important barriers to consider when undertaking conservation action were wider issues (e.g., population growth, consumerism, favoring development, and industrial-scale activity), operating environment (e.g., lack of political will, ineffective law enforcement, weak governments, corruption, safety and security), community attributes (e.g., dynamics, conflicts, and education levels), and the way conservation is undertaken (overconfidence, lack of funding, and externally set agendas). However, we advise against applying a one-size-fits-all approach. We propose that conservationists account for the complex socioecological systems they operate in if they are to achieve success.