As an effective livelihood approach to alleviate poverty without rural population migration, ethnic tourism has become the primary choice of economic development in ethnic areas worldwide in addition to traditional livelihood approaches. This article applies the theories of livelihood to study the community evolution driven by tourism livelihood and examine three mountainous tourism communities in different stages of tourist area life cycle. Drawing on the methods of GIS spatial analysis, semi-structured interviews and questionnaires, this article proposes a sustainable livelihood framework for ethnic tourism to explore the evolution of ethnic tourism communities by identifying changes in livelihood assets (natural, financial, social, cultural and human capitals) in the process of tourism development. The results show that the development of ethnic tourism has led to changes in the increase of building land, and the diversification of land use functions with a trend of shifting from meeting local villagers' living needs to satisfying tourists, income composition and uneven distribution of tourism income spatially. Ethnic tourism also led to the deterioration of traditional social management structure, collapse of neighboring relationship, the over- commercialization and staged authenticity of ethnic culture, as well as the gradual vanish of agricultural knowledge with a trend of increasing modern business knowledge and higher education. In addition, these changes, involving livelihood assets from natural, economic, human, social and cultural aspects are interrelated and interactive, which form new evolution characters of ethnic community. This study reveals the conflicts over livelihood approaches which have formed new vulnerabilities to impact on sustainable evolution of ethnic communities. This research provides implications for achieving the sustainable development of ethnic communities with the driving force of tourism livelihood. 相似文献
In thermal-related engineering such as thermal energy structures and nuclear waste disposal, it is essential to well understand volume change and excess pore water pressure buildup of soils under thermal cycles. However, most existing thermo-mechanical models can merely simulate one heating–cooling cycle and fail in capturing accumulation phenomenon due to multiple thermal cycles. In this study, a two-surface elasto-plastic model considering thermal cyclic behavior is proposed. This model is based on the bounding surface plasticity and progressive plasticity by introducing two yield surfaces and two loading yield limits. A dependency law is proposed by linking two loading yield limits with a thermal accumulation parameter nc, allowing the thermal cyclic behavior to be taken into account. Parameter nc controls the evolution rate of the inner loading yield limit approaching the loading yield limit following a thermal loading path. By extending the thermo-hydro-mechanical equations into the elastic–plastic state, the excess pore water pressure buildup of soil due to thermal cycles is also accounted. Then, thermal cycle tests on four fine-grained soils (natural Boom clay, Geneva clay, Bonny silt, and reconstituted Pontida clay) under different OCRs and stresses are simulated and compared. The results show that the proposed model can well describe both strain accumulation phenomenon and excess pore water pressure buildup of fine-grained soils under the effect of thermal cycles.
The Zhangjiajie Sandstone Peak Forest Geopark (Zhangjiajie World Geopark) of northwest Hunan, China hosts a well-preserved
sequence of fluvial terraces and karst caves. In this contribution, a comparative study of fluvial terraces with karst caves
along the middle-lower Suoxi River in Zhangjiajie World Geopark is presented to improve the understanding of the development
of striking sandstone landscape in the upper Suoxi River. By integrating geomorphological, sedimentological, and geochronological
techniques, the possible correlation between fluvial terraces and karst caves, as well as their climatic and tectonic implications
is investigated. The available electron spin resonance and thermo-luminescence numerical ages coupled with morphostratigraphic
analysis indicate that aggradation of fluvial terrace levels occurred at ca. 347 ± 34 ka (T4), 104.45 ± 8.88 to 117.62 ± 9.99 ka (T3), 60.95 ± 5.18 ka (T2), and Holocene (T1), followed by the stream incision. Fluvial terrace levels (T4 to T1) correlate morphologically with the karst cave levels (L1 to L4), yet the proposed chronology for the fluvial terrace levels is a bit later than the chronological data obtained from karst
caves. In northwest Hunan, where a unique sandstone peak forest landscape was extensively developed, the fluvial terrace sequences
as well as the cave systems are the important archives for studying the evolution of the sandstone landscape. The beginning
of the sandstone landscape development must be earlier than the aggradation of the fluvial terrace T4, allowing this unique landscape to occur in the Middle Pleistocene. 相似文献
Karst rocky desertification is a process of land degradation involving serious soil erosion, extensive exposure of basement
rocks. It leads to drastic decrease in soil productivity and formation of a desert-like landscape. In this regard, changes
in climatic conditions are the main origin of the soils degradation. Indeed, soils subjected to successive dry/wet cycling
processes caused by climate change develop swelling and shrinkage deformations which can modify their water retention properties,
thus inducing the degradation of soil–water capacity. The ecological characteristics of cultivation soils in karst areas,
Southwest of China, are extremely easy to be affected by external environmental factors due to its shallow bedding and low
vegetation coverage. Based on the analysis of the climate (precipitation) of this region during the past decades, an experimental
study has been conducted on a cultivated soil obtained from the typical karst area in southwestern China. Firstly, the soil–water
properties have been investigated. The measured soil–water retention curve shows that the air-entry value of the soil is between
50 and 60 kPa, while the residual saturation is about 12%. Based on the experimental results, three identifiable stages of
de-saturation have been defined. Secondly, a special apparatus was developed to investigate the volume change behavior of
the soil with controlled suction cycles. The vapor equilibrium technique was used for the suction control. The obtained results
show that under the effect of dry/wet cycles, (1) the void ratio of the cultivated soil is continuously decreasing, leading
to a gradual soil compaction. (2) The permeability decreases, giving rise to a deterioration of water transfer ability as
well as a deterioration of soil–water retention capacity. It is then obvious that the long-term dry/wet cycling process caused
by the climate change induce a continuously compaction and degradation of the cultivated soil in karst rocky desertification
areas. 相似文献