Using culturomics and social media data to characterize wildlife consumption

Wildlife provides food, medicine, clothing, and other necessities for humans, but overexploitation can disrupt the sustainability of wildlife resources and severely threaten global biodiversity. Understanding the characteristics of consumer behavior is helpful for wildlife managers and policy makers, but the traditional survey methods are laborious and time-consuming. In contrast, culturomics may more efficiently identify the features of wildlife consumption. As a case study of the culturomics approach, we examined tiger bone wine consumption in China based on social media and Baidu search engine data. Tiger bone wine is one of the most purchased tiger products; its consumption is closely related to tiger poaching, which greatly threatens wild tiger survival. We searched a popular social media website for the term “tiger bone wine” and focused on posts that were originally created from 1 January 2012 to 31 December 2018. We filtered and classified posts related to the purchase, sale, or consumption of tiger bone wine and extracted information on providers, consumption motivations, year of production, and place of origin of the tiger bone wines based on the texts and photos of these posts. We found 756 posts related to tiger bone wine consumption, 113 of which mentioned providers of tiger bone wine, including friends (53%), elder relatives (37%), peer relatives (7%), and others (3%). Out of the 756 posts, 266 indicated the motivations of tiger bone wine consumption. Tiger bone wines were consumed as a tonic (34%), medicine (23%), game product (30%), and a symbol of wealth (28%). Some posts indicated ≥2 consumption motivations. These findings were consistent with the search queries from Baidu index. Such information could help develop targeted strategies for tiger conservation. The culturomics approach illustrated by our study is a rapid and cost-efficient way to characterize wildlife consumption.     

企业社会责任:推动可持续发展的第三种力量

可持续发展是企业社会责任的重要领域。企业社会责任在推动可持续发展方面发挥着独特的作用。一定程度上弥补了政府干预和市场调节的缺陷。我国企业承担可持续发展责任需要企业和社会的互动。     

Prioritization of Sustainable Groundwater Management Needs: The Case of the Israel's Stressed Coastal Aquifer

On-going population growth and resulting domestic demand for water require rapid and effective decision-making as regards groundwater management and control of the various sources of salinization and pollution in Coastal aquifers. Sustainability of water resources for utilization by future generations must therefore be a high priority, not only for the purpose of fulfilling needs for water usage but also for bringing people into harmony with their ambient natural environment.The objective of this paper is to propose an empirical approach for prioritization of the needs involved for sustainable aquifer management. The approach involves a schematic format to:(1) develop a global understanding of an aquifer's hydrological and environmental properties in order to delineate appropriate eco-hydrological scenarios and recommend corresponding operational management activities; and(2) emphasize the importance of educating and increasing the awareness of the population involved as to the need for and viability of socially acceptable measures for sustainable management of groundwater and other resources.The psychologist Abraham Maslow utilized a pyramid to illustrate that until people's most basic needs were fulfilled, higher levels of needs would remain irrelevant. This paper postulates a comparable pyramid prioritizing hydrological needs required for progressing towards sustainable groundwater resources. Two sub-regions of Israel's Coastal aquifer in the Sharon region have been presented as representative areas, each characterized by different stress of exploitation. In assessing these sub-regions situation, specific measures have been recommended for achieving and/or maintaining sustainable groundwater resources in light of the ambient environment, and the level of the population on the pyramidal hierarchy of groundwater needs.     

社会和谐与可持续发展

本文运用系统科学原理阐释了社会和谐的内涵,指出社会和谐须以人与自然和谐为基础,以人与人之间的平等、友爱和同合作为表征,其构建与实现应遵从人类社会的演化规律,依赖予在把握人类社会需求演绎、协同人与自然关系的基础上推动生产力的高效有序发展和自然资源、生态环境的可持续支持.进而从可持续发展角度,提出了人与自然和谐的"双剩余理论",以揭示其间的供瓣枧理和协同准则;推导出了社会收益分配的相对公平系数,以衡量人与人公平要求下的社会和谐.针对国情和战略目标要求,提出了以加强小城镇建设为轴心的城市、小城镇与农村人流、物流、财流和信息流合理聚散的"三元结构"发展模式,以促进我国和谐社会的建设和可持续发展战略的有序实践.     

最优环境税:庇古法则与税制协调

从经济学的角度对国外关于最优环境税的经典理论——庇古法则及近十年来研究的前沿内容——一般均衡模型等作出阐释，并在外部性理论的基础上通过一个一般均衡模型考察环境税的效率特性和在次优情形下最优环境税的决定因素。随后是对我国开征环境税的几点思考：环境税的课征范围应暂定为排放各种废水、废气（烟尘）和固体废弃物的行为。环境税税率的确定可以采用“反复迭代”的方法，即“环境效益优先，兼顾税收协调和收入分配等效应。”其他相关问题的处理，如环境税和其它政策手段的配合使用，环境税税收的使用等。     

SUSTAINABILITY AT THE LOCAL LEVEL: MANAGEMENT TOOLS AND MUNICIPAL TAX INCENTIVE MODEL

The implementation of sustainable development may seem a simple concept when written on paper. However to carry-out long term actions put forward by the Agenda 21 (AG21) at the local level represents one of the main challenges as municipal governments in general do not have the capacity to effectively implement the process. Regional environmental assessment (REA) has shown to be effective in supporting decision-making not only to correct environmental problems due to past unsustainable social-economic developments but also help local governments to implement sustainable actions. However this requires long-term investments of AG21 plans and projects. The allocation of regular and consistent financial resources is one of the main ingredients for the sustainable development process. But traditional plans and projects financed by national and/or international funds may not be sustainable in the long-term because they become dependent on external funding. Research demonstrate that innovative economic instruments such as ecotaxes represent a feasible alternative to sponsor local sustainability because taxes are collected permanently by the government and could be invested in continuous actions. Ecotaxes experiences have provided important reference to structure a municipal incentive model (MIM) to sponsor AG21’s environmental plans and projects on a long-term (permanent) basis. However sustainable development cannot be solely through economic investments. A comprehensive municipal environmental management scheme (MEMS) has been established to support the incentive model. The scheme seeks not only to improve local institutional framework but also incentive continuous participation of local stakeholders at all levels of society. Participatory events and the provision of incentives (educational and financial) are key to motivate society to protect the environment and support actively the sustainable development process as emphasised in the RIO-92 Conference.     

京津冀地区钢铁行业协同减排成本-效益分析

京津冀地区是我国钢铁行业布局最集中的区域,也是大气污染治理的重点区域之一.分析京津冀地区钢铁行业各类治污手段中长期减排的成本-效益,对于选择最经济有效的减排路径、加快推动该地区大气环境质量达标意义重大.基于能源环境、环境分布、人群健康效益评价等模块构建多模型耦合方法,以2015年为基准年,以每5 a为时间节点,设计了京津冀地区钢铁行业规模-结构、规模-技术、规模-末端治理、综合减排4种协同减排情景,计算各情景下2015—2030年京津冀地区钢铁行业主要污染物(SO₂、NO_x、PM₁₀、PM_2.5、CO₂)的减排成本与效益,比较获取治污减排的最优路径方案.结果表明:①基于减排成本计算,规模-末端治理减排情景成本最低,分别为规模-结构、规模-技术减排情景投入的15.18%、23.94%;综合减排情景下治污减排潜力最大,但综合成本最高.②基于环境税效益评价方法、人群健康效益评价方法计算显示,人群健康效益评价方法计算的减排效益高于环境税效益评价方法,表明污染减排的潜在人群健康效益更高;基于两种减排效益方法,4种协同减排情景中综合减排效益分别为10.78×108、76.14×108元,高于规模-结构、规模-技术、规模-末端治理减排情景效益.③基于环境税效益评价方法,4种协同减排情景的效益-成本比表现为规模-末端治理减排情景(0.46) >规模-技术减排情景(0.24) >综合减排情景(0.15) >规模-结构减排情景(0.10);基于人群健康效益评价方法4种协同减排情景的效益-成本比依次为规模-末端治理减排情景(8.35) >综合减排情景(1.07) >规模-结构减排情景(0.57) >规模-技术减排情景(0.65),表明规模-末端治理减排情景的减排路径最优.研究显示,京津冀地区钢铁行业应基于环境质量底线目标要求,综合考虑减排潜力、减排成本与收益,以规模-末端治理为主要途径,选取协同减排的最优路径.      

牛粪-化肥配施对水稻田氮磷迁移转化的影响

在控制外源N输入量相同的前提下,通过田间小区实验,探讨有机肥与化肥不同施用量（牛粪施用量：5,10,20t/hm²）对稻田田间土-水界面氮磷迁移转化特征的影响.结果表明：控制稻田水中NH₄⁺-N、NO₃^--N、TN和TP输出的最佳时期分别为施肥后的第5,30,7,20d,且TN和TP浓度随时间变化符合单指数衰减方程（0.7444≤R²≤0.9724;1.1×10^-6≤F≤0.0055）.采用牛粪部分代替化肥的施肥方式,在一定范围内能降低稻田退水中TN、TP输出负荷（41.8%、36.0%、64.3%;20.3%、39.1%、48.9%）,还可以降低稻田水中N/P,降低水体富营养化风险.同时,牛粪的施用可提高土壤中脲酶和磷酸酶的含量,促进氮磷向植物可吸收形态转化.综合经济成本和生态效益核算,采用10t有机肥代替无机肥的处理是相对经济环保的施肥方法,该施肥方式下,氮磷年输出负荷分别为17.70,1.26kg/hm².     

Economic development and environmental protection: an ecological economics perspective

This paper argues on both theoretical and empirical grounds that, beyond a certain point, there is an unavoidable conflictbetween economic development (generally taken to mean 'materialeconomic growth') and environmental protection. Think for a moment of natural forests, grasslands, marine estuaries, salt marshes, and coral reefs; and of arable soils, aquifers, mineraldeposits, petroleum, and coal. These are all forms of 'natural capital' that represent highly-ordered self-producing ecosystemsor rich accumulations of energy/matter with high use potential (low entropy). Now contemplate despoiled landscapes, eroding farmlands, depleted fisheries, anthropogenic greenhouse gases,acid rain, poisonous mine tailings and toxic synthetic compounds.These all represent disordered systems or degraded forms of energy and matter with little use potential (high entropy). The main thing connecting these two states is human economic activity. Ecological economics interprets the environment-economyrelationship in terms of the second law of thermodynamics. The second law sees economic activity as a dissipative process. Fromthis perspective, the production of economic goods andservices invariably requires the consumption of available energy and matter. To grow and develop, the economynecessarily 'feeds' on sources of high-quality energy/matter first produced by nature. This tends to disorder and homogenizethe ecosphere, The ascendance of humankind has consistently been accompanied by an accelerating rate of ecological degradation, particularly biodiversity loss, the simplificationof natural systems and pollution. In short, contemporary political rhetoric to the contrary, the prevailing growth-oriented global development paradigm is fundamentally incompatible with long-term ecological and social sustainability. Unsustainability is not a technical nor economic problem as usually conceived, but rather a state of systemic incompatibilitybetween a economy that is a fully-contained, growing, dependent sub-system of a non-growing ecosphere. Potential solutions fly inthe face of contemporary development trends and cultural values.     

Selecting Socio-Economic Metrics for Watershed Management

The selection of social and economic metrics to document baseline conditions and analyze the dynamic relationships between ecosystems and human communities are important decisions for scientists, managers, and watershed citizens. A large variety of social and economic data is available but these have limited use without theoretical frameworks. In this paper, several frameworks for reviewing social-ecosystem relations are offered, namely social sanctions, sense of place, civic structure, and cultural differences. Underlying all of these frameworks are attitudes, beliefs, values, and norms that affect which questions are asked and which indicators are chosen. Much work and significant challenges remain in developing a standard set of spatially based socio-economic metrics for watershed management.