Wildlife management and land reform in southeastern Zimbabwe: a compatible pairing or a contradiction in terms?

This paper examines the melding of two discourses in southeastern Zimbabwe: land reform and wildlife management. The former seeks to redistribute large, ‘under-utilized’ landholdings to smallholders whilst the latter needs extensive land holdings to be viable. These two discourses are rooted in very different models of development. The land reform exercise emphasizes direct redistribution, equity and land for crops; whilst the wildlife management discourse tends to stress maximizing foreign exchange earnings, encouraging public-private partnerships and trickle down. Yet there has been a recent flurry of interest in the development of ‘wildlife models’ for land reform which would combine the two. This paper investigates whether the competing discourses about land for smallholders and wildlife-based land reform are compatible or can be successfully reconciled. It traces the ways they have come together in Zimbabwe’s southeast lowveld and examines the ‘science’ and politics underlying their melding. Finally it explores the potential implications for rural people’s livelihoods of this development. It concludes that land reform and wildlife management can be reconciled, but probably not in a particularly equitable way: it is more likely to provide an opening for an equitable land reform agenda to be usurped by local and non-local elites with wildlife interests.     

Proposal of a National Mitigation Strategy Against Earthquakes in Turkey

While laboratory and analytical studies can provide valuable information about earthquake hazard mitigation, the most effective educator is the impact of a full-scale earthquake on a full-scale city. The recent earthquakes in Turkey showed that the governmental as well as individual attitudes towards earthquakes did not represent proportionate responses to the risk levels concerned. Turkey had weaknesses in preparing, planning, mitigating and responding to disasters in spite of the known seismic vulnerability of the country. Many steps have been taken after 1999 earthquakes in Turkey, however, the preparations largely concentrate on the response and recovery phases and a fundamental step to reform the current disaster management system and steps to rehabilitate the vulnerable building stock has not been undertaken until today. This would involve changing the present laws and regulations and de-centralising the disaster management system. The aim of this paper is to propose a national mitigation strategy for Turkey for a time-frame of 10 years. The model proposed is a very comprehensive model for earthquake risk reduction in Turkey and within this context, the legislative and technical aspects of mitigation will be discussed in detail. Strategies for mitigating and retrofitting the existing building stock will also be proposed.     

Mise en évidence d'un nouveau front de chevauchement dans l'Atlas tunisien oriental de Tunisie par sismique réflexion. Contexte structural régional et rôle du Trias salifère

Structural interpretations of newly acquired seismic lines in northeastern Tunisia allow us to highlight a new thrust front for the Atlasic range of Tunisia, in contrast to the previously Zaghouan fault thrust Dorsale zone. This new thrust front takes place on weakness tectonic zones, materialized by inherited faults anchored on the pre-Triassic basement. This front seems to be a paleogeographic trend controlling structural style and basin fill with a synsedimentary activity. The front is expressed by reverse faults, thrust faults, back thrusting, and decollement structures. To cite this article: S. Khomsi et al., C. R. Geoscience 336 (2004).     

A decade of council tax inequities? Geographical perspectives and a research agenda

Local taxation reform is back on the agenda in the light of the recent Local Government Bill. In reviewing the literature on the council tax, it is noted that researchers tend to view this from one of two perspectives: either as a fiscal policy, focusing on the tax burden, or as a housing policy, focusing on the property price valuations. Recent debate on council tax reform has gone as far as suggesting that there are regional inequities in the council tax, but what tends to be neglected remains the council tax incidence at the local scale. A research agenda is proposed here as a means of promoting geographically conscious inter-disciplinary research on local taxation.     

RURAL DEVELOPMENT IN EL HATILLO, NICARAGUA: GENDER, NEOLIBERALISM AND ENVIRONMENTAL RISK

El Hatillo is a rural community in the Sébaco valley in Nicaragua, which suffers from an eroding resource base, high levels of poverty and malnutrition, and a high susceptibility to hazards. Structural adjustment policies have been devastating for small and subsistence farmers and have increased the level of economic, social and environmental marginalisation in rural Nicaragua. This paper explores initiatives to promote sustainable development in Nicaragua in the context of structural adjustment and environmental degradation. Drawing on qualitative research conducted in El Hatillo, it outlines the ways in which women in this community are attempting to address the multiple challenges of rural poverty and environmental risk and considers the potential of these strategies for gender equality.     

面向数字化测绘生产工作流的Web存储系统

讨论了一个面向工作流的项目管理系统中 ,各类计划、实施、监督管理、汇总报表等结构化文档及非结构化文档的存储访问系统的构造方法 ,并设计与实现了一个数字化测绘生产管理系统实例     

The eastward subtropical countercurrent on isopycnal surface in the western North Pacific

The classic Sverdrup theory suggests that the water movement in the central subtropical gyre of North Pa-cific be slowly westward or southwestward.In the late sixties of the20th century,the existence of a peculiar eastward narrow flow between20°N and25°N in spring was theoretically predicted.It was named the Subtropical Countercurrent(STCC),although direct observational evidences were not yet sufficient to con-firm whether or not such eastward flow between20°N and25°N was a persistent…     

Evolutionary aseismic design and retrofit of structures with passive energy dissipation

A new computational framework is developed for the design and retrofit of building structures by considering aseismic design as a complex adaptive process. For the initial phase of the development within this framework, genetic algorithms are employed for the discrete optimization of passively damped structural systems. The passive elements may include metallic plate dampers, viscous fluid dampers and viscoelastic solid dampers. The primary objective is to determine robust designs, including both the non‐linearity of the structural system and the uncertainty of the seismic environment. Within the present paper, this computational design approach is applied to a series of model problems, involving sizing and placement of passive dampers for energy dissipation. In order to facilitate our investigations and provide a baseline for further study, we introduce several simplifications for these initial examples. In particular, we employ deterministic lumped parameter structural models, memoryless fitness function definitions and hypothetical seismic environments. Despite these restrictions, some interesting results are obtained from the simulations and we are able to gain an understanding of the potential for the proposed evolutionary aseismic design methodology. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

上海市公共卫生中心空调设计

介绍了上海市公共卫生中心空调通风的设计特点,突出反映在呼吸道传染病区、呼吸道门诊、呼吸道临检、生物安全实验室的系统设计中,并介绍了空调水系统的特殊要求。     

中国中西部前陆盆地的地质特征及油气聚集

中国中西部前陆盆地具有十分丰富的油气资源,近年来油气勘探也取得了很大的成果,但总体上来说其地质情况复杂、研究程度较低。世界上典型的前陆盆地一般位于造山带和稳定的克拉通之间的狭长槽地,而在中国中西部则主要为与古特提斯造山带在新特提斯阶段再活动有关的陆内会聚形成的“再生”前陆盆地,因此与世界典型前陆盆地相比中国中西部前陆盆地具有一定的“特殊性”。根据两期前陆的叠合程度差异造成的盆地几何形态、挠曲沉降、地层层序、沉积充填、构造变形特征的特点,将中国中西部前陆盆地归纳为改造型、新生型、叠加型和早衰型四种组合类型的前陆盆地。中西部不同组合类型前陆盆地具有不同的结构特征,决定了不同组合类型前陆盆地成藏特征和油气勘探潜力上的差异。