Constructing the News: The Role of Local Newspapers in Environmental Risk Communication*

Effective risk communication is central to good environmental risk management. While studies have shown that newspapers are the primary source of information to the public regarding environmental issues, little is known about how environmental news is used as a risk‐communication tool. This article explores the role of local information systems in risk communication, using newspaper content analysis as well as in‐depth interviews with journalists and community residents to develop a case study of an environmental assessment process for a nonhazardous industrial‐waste landfill. Results indicate that risk messages were chosen and shaped by journalists on the basis of their own exigencies. In addition, while newspapers were a major source of risk information, their impact was mitigated by resident distrust and access to other information sources, most notably their own personal information networks. These results have implications for environmental policy, as decision makers often use—either passively or actively—print media as a risk‐communication tool.     

An environmental justice assessment of public beach access in Miami,Florida

The scope of empirical environmental justice (EJ) research has expanded beyond hazards exposure to scrutinize social inequities in access to amenities, but no prior study has examined the EJ implications of public beach access. Furthermore, quantitative research on white privilege is very scarce. To address these knowledge gaps, our study examines racial/ethnic and socioeconomic inequities in access to public beaches in the Miami metropolitan statistical area, Florida. Public beach accessibility is modeled with an innovative geospatial approach that involves population weighted distances to beach access sites. To assess EJ implications of public beach access for various racial/ethnic and socioeconomically vulnerable groups, spatial regression models are estimated using census tract-level data. Results indicate that beaches are more accessible to neighborhoods with a higher proportion of non-Hispanic Whites, while neighborhoods with higher percentages of Hispanics and socioeconomically disadvantaged residents have limited access. This study demonstrates the importance of assessing white privilege and access to environmental amenities in EJ research to better understand social inequities.     

中国流动人口的城市宜居性感知及其对定居意愿的影响

流动人口是中国城镇化进程的重要参与者,加强其定居意愿特征分析对制定中国新型城镇化发展政策具有重要参考价值。基于中国40个主要城市的宜居城市问卷调查数据,运用描述统计和地理探测器方法,揭示中国流动人口的城市宜居性感知特征及其对定居意愿的影响。研究结果表明：①中国流动人口的城市宜居性感知评价分异明显,呈现出“公共服务设施便利性>自然环境舒适性>社会人文环境舒适性>环境健康性>交通便捷性>城市安全性”的递减特征;②中国流动人口的公共服务设施便利性、社会人文环境舒适性、环境健康性和城市安全性等4个维度城市宜居性感知对其定居意愿具有显著影响,且影响强度依次递减,但二者关系并不完全呈简单的线性特征。③相对他人收入满意度、生活满意度、住房价格感知和地理区位等参照变量,以及年龄、性别和职业等个体与家庭属性也是影响中国流动人口定居意愿的重要因素。     

Modeling Environmental Concern for Urban Tree Protection Using Biophysical and Social Psychological Indicators

Urban forest management is being increasingly recognized as a viable policy vehicle for improving community health, sustainable development, and well-being for city dwellers. To improve our understanding of public concern for the local urban forest, a theoretical framework employing concepts traditionally explored in social–psychological and environmental concern studies was tested using data from a public opinion survey of 800 homeowners living in a major urban area in Southern Appalachia, USA. Publicly available geographic information system (GIS) data were analyzed to measure tree canopy density around survey respondents’ properties. Structural equation modeling was used to test the validity of the hypothesized relationships among the survey-derived constructs and the spatial data as predictors of public support for urban forest protection policy. The results suggest that homeowners living around urban trees place greater importance on various attributes of trees, and that tree knowledge and experience are indirectly and positively related to support for urban forest protection.     

Re-constructing the urban landscape through community mapping: an attractive prospect for sustainability?

Community mapping is a relatively new tool with considerable potential in giving practical effect at the local level to sustainable development rhetoric. As a repository of socially constructed knowledge, it has considerable value in democratizing information both in terms of what is recorded and public access to it, in a manner that facilitates more meaningful participation of non-experts in planning and advocacy processes. Focusing on a community mapping project in Galway, Ireland, this research paper explores how the city's municipal authority is employing community mapping not just to record and promote the city's social, environmental, economic and cultural assets but also as a practical tool to bolster public participation in policy-making and to improve local communities' trust in the municipal authority, thereby shaping sustainability practices through enhanced governance.     

Recreational Access to Privately Owned Rural Land: A Case Study in Canterbury Hill Country, New Zealand

There is public concern that private ownership restricts public access to land for such uses as recreation and amenity value. There is little systematically collected information about the extent of unfavourable attitudes to public access in New Zealand. This case study analyses the responses of 94 farmers/foresters to a request to operate a series of large‐scale sporting events that traversed privately owned rural land. Issues of concern to landowners included visitor health and safety, disturbance to farm or forest management, and spread of disease. Despite these concerns 90 percent of the landowners who were approached allowed access to their land for recreation. An approach for handling possible landowner requests to charge for access for large‐scale events is suggested.     

Rights of Public Access for Outdoor Recreation: What Does the Public Know?

This study addresses the public's perceptions of their access rights to the New Zealand countryside for outdoor recreation. An interviewer‐administered questionnaire survey of 300 Christchurch residents investigated people's knowledge of their access rights, perceptions of access mechanisms, the availability of access information and their experiences of gaining access to land. Whilst individuals are aware of their rights in a general sense, and feel confident they know where they can go, their level of knowledge was found to be low. Findings indicate that knowledge of access rights exerts a strong influence over where people recreate.     

基于CVM的扎龙湿地生物多样性维持服务价值评价

运用条件价值法这一成熟的方法 ,定量评价了扎龙湿地生物多样性维持服务价值。采用实地调研和网络发放问卷相结合的方式,共发放支付卡式问卷424份,回收有效问卷414份。结果表明:2011年扎龙湿地的生物多样性维持服务价值为340.82亿元;对生物多样性的关心程度和调查方式是影响居民支付意愿的主要因素,当保护物种越具体时,公众的支付值越高。为了保护好扎龙湿地生物多样性,政府应加大宣传力度,提高公众的环保意识。     

Monitoring Controversial Environmental/Natural Resource Issues: Differential Effects of Telephone and Mail Surveys

Monitoring public opinion, especially about controversial environmental/natural resource issues, through various survey modes remains an important social science tool used by scholars, advocates, newspaper reporters, and policymakers alike. However, with this use there has been a concomitant decline in response rates. To address this problem, increased use of mixed modes of surveys has occurred. The degree to which results of different modes can be combined remains a basic question. Can findings be compared to assess changes in public views across time or differences among various regions when different modes of data collection are used? We addressed this question by assessing how two comparable samples of residents' responses to the same questions differed depending upon survey mode (telephone or mail) while controlling for sampling procedures and survey content.     

Environmental and socioeconomic dynamics of the Indian Ocean tsunami in Penang,Malaysia

This paper addresses some of the environmental and socioeconomic dimensions of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami on Penang, Malaysia. We aim to offer wide access to unique and perishable data, while at the same time providing insight to ongoing debates about hazards, vulnerability and social capital. Our social survey examines some of the dynamics that shaped the tsunami impact, response and recovery process. While in terms of lives lost Penang may not conform to arguments surrounding vulnerable environments, the recovery process is more marked by social disparities in terms of the ability to access resources. Our physical survey records local topography, flow depth and flow direction, and charts the differential impact of the tsunami. Yet measuring hazards is not a straightforward process, and relies on reflexive methodologies and eyewitness accounts.     

Natural Resource Access Rights and Wrongs: Nontimber Forest Products Gathering in Urban Environments

This article uses research about non-timber forest products (NTFP) gathering in Seattle, Washington, USA to examine how people gain access to natural resources in urban environments. Our analysis focuses on gathering in three spaces: parks, yards, and public rights of way. We present a framework for conceptualizing access, and highlight cognitive mechanisms of access associated with foragers’ internal moral judgments about harvesting. Key findings are: (1) internal moral calculations about whether it is right or wrong to harvest a particular NTFP in a particular place are an important but previously unacknowledged mechanism governing resource access; and (2) these calculations may help prevent over-harvesting of NTFPs, which are common pool resources, in urban environments where social and environmental conditions lend themselves to a de facto situation of open access. Our findings suggest that voluntary codes of conduct may be the best way to manage NTFP access in cities.     

基本公共服务对不同规模城市流动人口居留意愿的影响效应

利用2016年中国流动人口动态监测调查数据中的东部沿海6省市数据集,将长期居住意愿、户籍迁入意愿和本地购房打算三部分指标的加和定义为城市居留意愿指标,将城镇基本公共服务分为就业关联和非就业关联两种类型,运用序次Logistic回归模型,系统考察两类城镇基本公共服务的获得特征对流动人口城市居留意愿的影响及其在不同规模城市间的差异特征。研究发现：流动人口城市居留意愿和城镇基本公共服务获得率呈现出随城市规模扩大而上升的梯度变动特征;在流动人口获得的城镇基本公共服务较为有限时,流动人口的城市居留意愿不高。从影响效应看,流动人口在流入城市获得的城镇基本公共服务是影响其城市居留意愿的关键因素,此类影响效应因公共服务内容和城市规模的不同而存在差异。大城市流动人口获得的医疗保险、失业保险和住房保障显著增进了流动人口的城市居留意愿,但上述影响效应在中小城市并不明显;健康档案和健康教育普及程度除了在个别规模城市中没有显著影响效应外,在其余规模城市中都具有显著的正向影响效应;在小城市,仅健康档案和健康教育普及程度对其流动人口城市居留意愿具有显著且正向的影响作用。     

Satellite imagery activism: Sharpening the focus on tropical deforestation

Since the first land remote sensing satellite was launched in the early 1970s, government agencies, private companies and research institutions have used satellite imagery data for a growing range of civil and commercial applications focused on natural resource management and exploitation, and environmental monitoring. The global diffusion of remote sensing expertize, along with growing public access to satellite images, has created conditions for improving levels of global transparency. One aspect of this global transparency is the advent of new users of imagery data – or 'imagery activists'– including, among others, issue-oriented nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), media groups, multinational organizations and academic researchers who now are able to access satellite imagery in order to draw domestic and international attention to particular public policy concerns. This paper broadly surveys the contemporary phenomenon of satellite imagery activism and outlines the main challenges facing imagery activists, particularly in relation to deforestation and other forest monitoring issues.     

公众参与型环境规制的时空格局及驱动因子研究——以长江经济带为例

以长江经济带公众参与型环境规制为研究对象,运用空间分析方法研究其时空格局,通过地理探测器筛选其主导驱动因子,基于GWR（Geographically Weighted Regression）模型揭示主导驱动因子空间异质性。结果表明：① 各年份公众参与型环境规制均呈显著空间正相关,但集聚程度逐年下降;② 公众参与型环境规制空间分异格局基本稳定;③ 地理探测器剔除地均固定资产投资和万人在校大学生数两个初选因子;④ 公众参与型环境规制驱动因子作用力由大到小依次为环境风险、人地压力、排放强度、信息化水平、经济水平、产业结构;⑤ 各驱动因子存在特征不同的空间异质性,为制定针对性政策提供理论依据。     

Measuring and Reporting Changing Public Access to and Along the Coast

Public access to and along the coast is identified as a matter of national importance in the Resource Management Act 1991. Despite this, few local authorities have started to monitor public access to and along the coast. The adoption of two indicators of public coastal access by the Ministry for the Environment deserves closer analysis ‐ how can local authorities implement those indicators as part of their section 35 responsibilities? Research carried out in Otago in 1999 examined the effectiveness of five indicators of public coastal access. This research concluded that one of the Ministry's indicators is a good measure of public access, but it could be extended to include other factors that influence public access.     

Viable insertion in agribusiness value chains? Seaweed farming after Typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan) in Iloilo Province,the Philippines

This article provides one of the first academic assessments of upstream agribusiness value chain and rural livelihood challenges after the November 2013 Typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan), which devastated many coastal communities in the central Philippines. Based on a survey and semistructured interviews among fisherfolk, seaweed farmers and other stakeholders in Iloilo Province, this article lays bare the limited viability of the seaweed value chain as a result of the recurring typhoon threat, other environmental pressures and an ineffective regional political economy. Since Typhoon Yolanda, the marginalized communities have depended on horizontal coordination and support from international civil society. The empirical results show that enhanced information dissemination and public sector cooperation are necessary for the seaweed value chain to become more inclusive. The results could also have a wider significance for rural development in other coastal areas in Southeast Asia, namely in the spheres of adaptive strategies amidst vulnerability, upstream vertical coordination and upgrading.     

Combining conventional and volunteered geographic information to identify and model forest recreational resources

It is now common for researchers in natural resource management and economics to develop spatial models of recreation demand for the purposes of valuation and planning. Such an approach has significant advantages but requires access to relatively detailed spatial data. In the absence of official data concerning resources, researchers may benefit from employing increasingly available volunteered geographic information (VGI) as a central source of data or to complement more traditional data sources. This paper describes the development of a map of forest recreational resources in Ireland by combining conventional forest cover data and VGI of recreational trails. As an extension the new map is combined with household survey data to explore respondent's ability to identify local recreational forests and models the impact of the characteristics of the closest forest on their annual visitation. The results suggest that VGI can be a useful resource to researchers in both the identification and characterisation of recreational resources. In addition, this paper finds that the distance to and characteristics of the nearest recreational forest has a significant impact on total annual visitation by members of the public.     

基于地块图斑单元的湖南省土地生态承载力评价

从人口、资源、环境、发展之间的关系入手,充分利用土地调查、地质调查、水文地质、环境地质调查、土壤普查、农业普查等成果和资料信息,以地块图斑为分析单元,以地理信息系统、遥感技术以及数学模型分析为手段,采用层次分析法和综合指数法对湖南省土地生态承载力进行分析和评价.研究表明,湖南省土地生态承载力地域差异明显,整体处于由低层次的不均衡逐渐向高层次的均衡方向发展.     

Reduction of disparities in access to green spaces: Their geographic insertion and recreational functions matter

Green spaces (GS) have many functions that can moderate the climate change impact and help prevent disease and thus alleviate public health expenses in a context of aging societies. However, several socioeconomic, demographic and geographic processes may render the access to GS challenging. Moreover, it is often critical to know what type of GS service to develop at a specific place. Also, measurements accuracy issues could be critical for planning and decision making. As an example of what could happen in many other cities of different sizes, we modeled and compared the access to GS, including several of their specific functions, in the Census Metropolitan Areas (CMA) of Montreal and Quebec City in Canada. We used the Quebec Integrated Chronic Disease Surveillance System (QICDSS) (average of 3 million people per year over 1996–2011) to measure over time, the proximity of each individual to the closest GS boundary using travel costs and spatial interaction models. ANOVA models and their corresponding base regressions were used to evaluate the statistical significance of the relationship of GS distances and surface to density, deprivation, gender and age, including interaction terms. The spatial clustering of the reduction of distances to GS was evaluated on a chronological basis. Unlike the larger CMA of Montreal, Québec City CMA showed greater equity in access to GS, largely due to the specific geographic insertion of linear GS. The CMA of Montreal showed an improvement in the access to GS which benefits the wealthy in the densest areas on the island of Montreal. Everything happens as if a green gentrification process affects the access to GS in Montreal. Our results suggest that for the promotion of GS as an important element of primary prevention in public health, both the quality or functions of GS and the geographic determinants of their access are of higher importance than a simple consideration of total GS surface per capita as often used by decision makers or public health promoters. They also underline the limits of standard measurements of attraction and accessibility and the complexity for large cities to promote environmental justice, given the complexity of their socio-demographic processes.