Introduction to themed issue: “Green security in protected areas”

This introduction to the themed issue discusses the articulation of protected areas, conservation, and security in issue contributions. Protected areas are presented as localized sites to address global crises, such as anthropogenic climate change and the “war on terror.” When they are sites for securitization and militarization, protected areas articulate state and subject formations through violence. As threat discourses have amplified in recent years, communities once deemed putative eco-destroyers have been interpellated as potential threats in wars on drugs and/or terror. The themed issue reveals that reframing environmental crime as organized crime has significant implications for expanding claims of what counts as legitimate use of force in protected areas policing, as well as potential prosecutions. It is apparent that security for one group may hinge on the insecurity of another group at different historical and political moments. In this special issue we challenge conservation actors as well as those critical of conservation to ask: for whom does conservation provide security, under what circumstances, and at what cost?     

“Yes to Peace”? Environmental peacemaking and transboundary conservation in Central America

The use of transboundary conservation as tools for improving interstate relations has become a widely supported initiative in nature conservation. The rationale follows the environmental peacemaking hypothesis, which argues that seemingly neutral environmental issues can provide a sound basis for cooperation between states. The paper investigates the hypothesis’ premise through the case of International System of Protected Areas for Peace (Si-A-Paz), a transboundary protected area shared by Costa Rica and Nicaragua. In recent years, both countries have been involved in a number of border conflicts within Si-A-Paz and linked to the use of the San Juan River, contested land areas, and oil resources. The case of Si-A-Paz shows that transboundary environmental issues can provide arguments for maintaining or even strengthening conflicts rather than fostering peace between states. The case also shows the emergence of environmental issues as a new arena for geopolitical play, where actors not only justify their actions through an environmental discourse but also, the environmental discourse is stretched to include a variety of issues through which actors can obtain international support. The events in Nicaragua and Costa Rica raise questions about the role of transboundary conservation as a peacebuilding tool.     

Erratum to: “Mantle depth facies of high-pressure pyroxene in the Kola region”

Doklady Earth Sciences -     

Modeling transfer of heavy metals in soil–rice system and their risk assessment in paddy fields

Many studies have been conducted on model transfer in soil–plant systems. However, relatively little information is available on modeling metal transfer in soil–rice system and associated risk assessment in real paddy fields. Based on a random sampling method from Nanxun, Shengzhou and Wenling in Zhejiang province, China, 15 pairs of rice and the corresponding soil samples were respectively collected for analysis of heavy metals and soil pH. The results showed that the accumulation ability of rice for different heavy metals was significantly different (p < 0.05), and was in the order of Cd > Zn > Cu > Ni > Cr > Pb. The relationships of heavy metals in rice with those in soil, along with soil pH, were well described by linear regression models. Except for Pb, the contents of most metals in rice were positively correlated with those of the soil. Soil pH was negatively correlated with the contents of Cd, Zn and Ni in rice, and positively correlated with Pb in rice; however, it had less effect on Cr and Cu. Based on risk reference dose (R_fD), the risk assessment data indicated that the rice grown in Zhejiang paddy fields does pose some potential Cd and Cr contamination risk to food safety; rice in Shengzhou posed light Ni risk.     

Calcrete to kimberlite: A prospector’s hunt for “kimberlite traits” in calcretes

Occurrence of calcrete over kimberlite is known all over the world and calcrete can also develop over a wide variety of weathered rocks and/or soil under suitable condition of its formation. The objective of this study is to evaluate the mineralogy and mineral chemistry of kimberlite derived calcretes and highlights their role as an exploration tool in search of kimberlite. The present study reveals the presence of significant minerals, including diamonds, within the calcretes of “kimberlite traits”. Calcrete derived from granite and mafic (dolerite/gabbro) rocks are mineralogically very distinct with those derived from kimberlite. Calcrete can thus be a very useful prospecting tool in kimberlite and diamond exploration.     

Reply to “Consequences of dike breaches and dike overflow in a bifurcating river system”

Natural Hazards - In this reply, we would like to comment on the discussion paper of AlQasimi and Mahdi (Nat Hazards 97:1–4, 2020. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-020-03904-1 ). We discuss...     

Research on transformation from “paired assistance” to “collaborative networks” in post-disaster recovery of 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake,China

Natural Hazards - This paper uses the “protect/accommodate/retreat/avoid” or “PARA” framework to categorize and examine flood disaster risk reduction approaches used to...     

From “cartoneros” to “recolectores urbanos”. The changing rhetoric and urban waste management policies in neoliberal Buenos Aires

This study contributes to the existent literature on neoliberal urban governance examining the process-based character of this formation. I maintain that neoliberal governance is a fluid and evolving formation which is continuously being constructed and reconstructed beneath a rhetorical veneer of inevitable emergence and permanence. In this context, this work examines the interconnections between neoliberal urban ascendancy, changing rhetoric and urban waste management policies, and waste pickers (cartoneros), in a case study setting, Buenos Aires. Since 2002, the neoliberal urban governance in Buenos Aires (its institutions, programs and policies) has mobilized different rhetoric and policies to negotiate the waste pickers’ “disturbing” and “dirty” presence in the streets. In that process, the waste pickers, originally marginalized and stigmatized by the neoliberal discourse, have been regulated and disciplined into legal and “well behaved” workers. I would argue that, regulating this activity does not entail giving the waste pickers an opportunity to become central actors in the future of urban waste management in the city. Rather, it is compatible with the logic of the local neoliberal urban projects, focused on disciplining the city’s physical and social landscape as new opportunities for growth and development continue to emerge.     

Introduction to “Metallogenesis of Continental Collision”

<正>There is a general consensus that Plate Tectonics can explain metallogenesis based on the collisions between oceanic and continental crust.For instance,the large-sized porphyry copper deposits that occur along the Cordillera of the Andes around the east coast of the Pacific,and in the Phillipines,Malaysia and Indonesia along the western coast of the Pacific that sit upon the massive Pacific plates.They are considered to be typical of deposits resulting from collision between the oceanic and continental crust.Many experts,however,have long held a negative view about whether the collision between     

Erratum to: “Criteria for the detection of hydrothermal ecosystem faunas in ores of massive sulfide deposits in the Urals”

The ore-formational, ore-facies, lithological, and mineralogical-geochemical criteria are defined for the detection of hydrothermal ecosystem fauna in ores of the volcanic-hosted massive sulfide deposits in the Urals. Abundant mineralized microfauna is found mainly in massive sulfide mounds formed in the jasperous basalt (Buribai, Priorsk, Yubileinoe, Sultanov), rhyolite—basalt (Yaman-Kasy, Blyava, Komosomol’sk, Sibai, Molodezhnoe, Valentorsk), and the less common serpentinite (Dergamysh) formations of the Urals (O—D₂). In the ore-formational series of the massive sulfide deposits, probability of the detection of mineralized fauna correlates inversely with the relative abundance of felsic volcanic rocks underlying the ores. This series is also marked by a gradual disappearance of colloform pyrite, marcasite, isocubanite, pyrrhotite, and pyrite pseudomorphoses after pyrrhotite; increase of the amount of bornite, fahlores, and barite; decrease of contents of Se, Te, Co, and Sn in chalcopyrite and sphalerite; and inсrease of Tl, As, Sb, and Pb in the colloform pyrite. Probability of the detection of mineralized fauna in the morphogenetic series of massive sulfide deposits decreases from the weakly degraded sulfide mounds to the clastic stratiform deposits. The degradation degree of sulfide mounds and fauna preservation correlates with the attenuation of volcanic intensity, which is reflected in the abundance of sedimentary and volcanosedimentary rocks and the depletion of effusive rocks in the geological sections.     

Contested diamond certification: Reconfiguring global and national interests in Zimbabwe’s Marange fields

This study examines the political uses of “conflict diamond” discourse in global debates about commodity certification and socially responsible mining in Zimbabwe. Engaging critical literature on “conflict-free” corporate branding initiatives, the study focuses on representations of conflict in Marange, in Zimbabwe’s eastern highlands. In 2006, a diamond rush in Marange drew in tens of thousands of artisanal miners from across Zimbabwe as well as foreigners, and the government initiated military crackdowns in 2008. In a highly contested vote in 2009, the international government delegates who comprised the voting members in the Kimberley Process Certification System (KPCS) ruled that conflict in Marange did not meet the KPCS definitions of “conflict diamond.” The study examines discourses of key stakeholders in the multinational diamond industry, human rights organizations, policymakers as well as artisanal miners in Zimbabwe between 2006 and 2014. The article argues that advocacies against diamond certification as well as advocacies favouring certification both tended to overlook the interests of artisanal miners, focusing narrowly on certain forms of conflict while associating artisanal mining with illicitness. The Marange case illustrates how conventional discourses on “conflict diamonds” not only obscure the complex nature of conflicts in contemporary capitalist accumulation processes; they also risk contributing to new forms of structural violence. This analysis highlights the need to pay careful attention to how global commodity certification discourses inter-relate with political agendas at multiple scales. The study draws attention to dilemmas for geographers when portraying the interests of marginalized groups in – and affected by – the diamond mining sector.