How to allocate limited healthcare resources: Lessons from the introduction of antiretroviral therapy in rural Mozambique

Proper allocation of limited healthcare resources is a challenging task for policymakers in developing countries. Allocation of and access to these resources typically varies based on how need is defined, thus determining how individuals access and acquire healthcare. Using the introduction of antiretroviral therapy in southern Mozambique as an example, we examine alternative definitions of need for rural populations and how they might impact the allocation of this vital health service. Our results show that how need is defined matters when allocating limited healthcare resources and the use of need-based metrics can help ensure more optimal distribution of services.     

The nation-state and the city: introduction to a debate

In recent years, the urban political landscape has become infused with a potent and incendiary mixture of popular-democratic, anti-globalisation, and separatist rhetoric. One central process driving this has been the problematic relations between the nation-state and the city. This Debates and Interventions forum aims to prompt a debate about where the city should be situated intellectually in respect of the nation-state. Four questions are addressed: (1) How do contemporary processes of urban development reflect changing national geopolitical priorities? (2) To what extent are struggles around immigration, citizenship and recognition conducted within cities rather than around the nation-state? (3) To what degree does the city (as e.g. a physical form, social environment or discourse) help to mobilise, propel and/or contest this new urban politics? And (4) Is the concept of a “post-national” global order appropriate for understanding the city and urban politics today?     

The man/land theme in geography: a Sydney University perspective

Geography as practised at Sydney University over the years has been multi‐faceted. One branch of the discipline is the man/land (or people/environment) theme which was nurtured by the founding fathers of the department, Griffith Taylor and Macdonald Holmes. Numerous staff members have taught and researched aspects of this theme. This paper reviews some of the contributions from the time of Griffith Taylor to the present.     

多维度视角下新疆农村经济可持续发展

科技进步与水土资源是促进经济可持续发展的有力杠杆及资源保证,劳动力是农村经济发展的重要主体。运用生态足迹理论计算了1990-2015年的新疆农村生态人口承载力,该指标代表了农村经济可持续发展水平,并建立与农业全要素生产率、科技投入占总投入比率、水资源灌溉利用率、耕地复耕指数、新疆劳动力转移、劳动力转移性收入的VAR模型。研究结果表明：新疆农村人均资源占有量不断地增大,可承载生态人口数量逐年下降;科技投入目前对于新疆农村经济可持续发展的影响并不明显,短期看来,农业全要素生产率对于其发展有抑制作用,但长期看来有巨大的促进作用;在短期,水资源灌溉利用率有抑制作用,但在长期,有拉动作用;耕地复耕指数长期有抑制作用;短期来说,劳动力转移和劳动力转移性收入对于其发展有促进作用,长期有抑制作用。     

Sustainable environmental resource utilisation: a case study of farmers’ ethnobotanical knowledge and rural change in Bungoma district, Kenya

This paper examines farmers’ ethnobotanical knowledge, innovation and rural change, and indicates one way in which indigenous technical knowledge complementing scientific knowledge may be documented for use by development planners and agencies. This paper firstly identifies plant species recognised as resources by farmers, and considers the value of these resources. Secondly, the paper documents and assesses the ethnobotanical knowledge associated with the utilisation of plant species, before turning to examine how plant resources are defined by use and culture. It also demonstrates that some components of ethnobotanical knowledge have potential for the sustainable development of plant species. The study shows that farmers have started to domesticate some of the ‘traditional’ plants, and new crops have been introduced associated with corresponding innovations in local agricultural systems. Since the farmers have a relatively strong tradition in natural resources conservation, this study suggests that it will be possible to introduce community-based gene banks linked to formal or government facilities. The paper demonstrates that it is important to combine and interweave ‘modern’ and indigenous knowledges to produce a more realistic and sensitive understanding and management of natural environmental resources for sustainable development.     

重庆直辖以来乡村人居环境可持续发展力及其时空分异研究

乡村人居环境是一复杂巨系统,其可持续发展力是各子系统间物质、信息与能量相互流通与交换的结果,本文从经济发展、生产生活、生态环境3个子系统入手构建乡村人居环境可持续发展力的评价指标体系,以1997—2015年重庆市37个区县的面板数据为数据源,运用发展水平(衡量乡村人居环境可持续发展态势)、发展效率(反映乡村人居环境发展趋向可持续的快慢程度)和协调指数(反映各子系统发展水平均衡程度)构建乡村人居环境可持续发展力测度模型,分析了乡村人居环境可持续力并探究其时空分异特征,为因地制宜践行《农村人居环境整治三年行动方案》提供策略支持。结果表明：1997—2015年,乡村人居环境可持续发展力时序上总体态势向好,其中发展水平逐步上升,发展效率波动剧烈,协调性稳步提高,各子系统间可持续发展力差异性较大;乡村人居环境可持续发展力在空间上总体呈现西高东低、“中心-边缘”的分异格局,区县间差异性明显,其中经济发展子系统呈“多级核心-外围”辐射圈层式差异化增长格局、生产生活子系统呈自西向东扩散式增长格局,生态环境子系统总体上先降后升,呈波浪式不均衡增长格局;从政府“制导引导”、城乡“双轮”联动、“点-极-核”整治模式等方面提出了相关整治策略。     

半城镇化农民可持续生计与农村可持续发展——理论框架、研究进展及未来展望

可持续生计理论方法不仅可以应用于城市务工的半城镇化农民,服务于有序推进中国的城镇化,而且可广泛应用于中国西部农村地区和农户尺度的研究,服务于农村可持续发展。本文首先梳理了当前可持续生计的概念及分析框架,并基于半城镇化农民可持续生计与农村可持续发展,从地理学的综合视角提出了一个适应于中国实证研究的理论分析框架。然后依托国家自然科学基金青年科学基金项目“半城镇化农民生计状态评估及市民化阻滞因素与政策调控”,梳理了可持续生计的国际国内研究进展以及半城镇化农民市民化与农村地区可持续发展的中国实证研究成果。最后提出了未来的研究展望,包括半城镇化农民市民化与农村地区可持续发展的联动研究,半城镇化农民市民化转变的主观意愿与客观阻滞因素综合研究,半城镇化农民与农村发展作用机理及其市民化效应,可持续生计与农村可持续发展的集成研究。     

An introduction to Maslov's asymptotic method

Summary. Familiar concepts such as asymptotic ray theory and geometrical spreading are now recognized as an asymptotic form of a more general asymptotic solution to the non-separable wave equation. In seismology, the name Maslov asymptotic theory has been attached to this solution. In its simplest form, it may be thought of as a justification of disc-ray theory and it can be reduced to the WKBJ seismogram. It is a uniformly valid asymptotic solution, though. The method involves properties of the wavefronts and ray paths of the wave equation which have been established for over a century. The integral operators which build on these properties have been investigated only comparatively recently. These operators are introduced very simply by appealing to the asymptotic Fourier transform of Ziolkowski & Deschamps. This leads quite naturally to the result that phase functions in different domains of the spatial Fourier transform are related by a Legendre transformation. The amplitude transformation can also be inferred by this method. Liouville's theorem (the incompressibility of a phase space of position and slowness) ensures that it is always possible to obtain a uniformly asymptotic solution. This theorem can be derived by methods familiar to seismologists and which do not rely on the traditional formalism of classical mechanics. It can also be derived from the sympletic property of the equations of geometrical spreading and canonical transformations in general. The symplectic property plays a central role in the theory of high-frequency beams in inhomogeneous media.     

Conceptualising Irish rural youth migration: a biographical approach

This paper explores the usefulness of a biographical approach in studying Irish rural youth migration. There have been calls recently for an approach to migration study that involves conceptualizing migration as part of individual biographies as well as social structures. However, there is little research that explicitly adopts a biographical approach. This paper presents the theoretical underpinnings, methodological issues and findings of a recent study that was guided by the principles of a biographical approach to migration. The study was an exploration of life-path formation among Irish rural youth from the 1970s to the 1990s. The paper focuses on the three key elements of a biographical approach to migration, and relates them to Irish rural youth migration. Firstly, migration is considered as part of an individual's biography, and the methodological implications of this are explored. Secondly, it is argued, drawing on the research in Ireland, that migration decision-making is a multilayered process. In the case of Irish rural youth migration, a biographical approach highlights the complexity of migration decision-making, revealing the tensions and struggles that lie behind each move, and thus raises questions over the tendency towards simplification of the migration process. Finally, it is argued that migration is a cultural phenomenon, but that this assertion needs careful qualification. This paper problematizes the role of culture in migration processes by untangling the systems of competing discourses of migration that underlie societal norms regarding migration, thereby challenging the view of migration as "normal" for particular societies or cultures.     

The Taconite Inlet Lakes Project: a systems approach to paleoclimatic reconstruction

A comprehensive study of meteorological, hydrological, limnological and sedimentological conditions in the watersheds of density-stratified (meromictic) lakes around Taconite Inlet, Northern Ellesmere Island, N.W.T., Canada was carried out from 1990–1992. Lakes C1 and C2 contain seawater trapped by isostatic uplift as the former embayments became isolated from the sea. These lakes, and Lake C3, contain varved sediments which provide an annually resolvable paleoclimatic record. By studing the major systems influencing sedimentation in one of these lakes (Lake C2) a better understanding of the climatic controls on varve formation, and hence on the paleoclimatic signal in the varved sediment record, was obtained. The varves of Lake C2 provide a proxy record of summer temperature for the region.This is the first in a series of papers published in this issue on the Taconite Inlet Lakes Project. These papers were collected by Dr R. S. Bradley.