Guinea pig or pioneer: Translating global environmental objectives through to local actions in Central Kalimantan,Indonesia’s REDD+ pilot province

Many difficulties have arisen from top-down approaches to the design and implementation of global environmental initiatives. The concept of translation and other analytical features of Actor-Network Theory (ANT) can offer a way of conceptualising these difficulties and their practical effects. By translation, we refer to what happens in-between the formulation of international goals and the results of implementation, and more specifically, relations and negotiations within this broader process. We examine several aspects of translation in the case of Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+), a prominent global environmental initiative. Using an ethnographic approach, we explore local responses in Central Kalimantan province, Indonesia, to REDD+ ideas and goals that originate at international and national levels. Following selection in 2010 as the official REDD+ pilot province, Central Kalimantan became a site for the convergence of actors and projects with varied sources of funding. The study identifies a central tension that emerged between an initial vision of Central Kalimantan as a pioneer, and local concerns about being used as an experimental subject or ‘guinea pig’ for the testing of externally designed schemes. Results show that greater flexibility in the design of programs and initiatives is needed, to provide space for local inputs. Implementation should pay attention to how local actors are included in planning processes that inform decision-making at higher jurisdictional levels. To bring about intended changes in land use, programs like REDD+ need to extend beyond a focus on short-term projects and targets, to instead emphasise long-term investments and forms of collective action that support learning.     

Closing the governance gaps in the water-energy-food nexus: Insights from integrative governance

The water-energy-food nexus has become a popular concept in environmental change research and policy debates. Proponents suggest that a nexus approach promotes policy coherence through identifying optimal policy mixes and governance arrangements across the water, energy and food sectors. Although the nexus literature identifies some barriers to achieving coherence it does not clearly explain why the barriers are present, what influences them, and how they can be acted upon. These gaps disconnect the nexus literature from the governance processes it ultimately seeks to influence. This paper examines how the integrative environmental governance literature can help to close these gaps. It extracts insights from seven streams of research literature and discusses their relevance for the nexus literature. We argue that connecting the nexus to decision-making processes requires: i) rethinking the boundaries of nexus analysis vis-à-vis other sectors and levels; ii) elaboration of shared principles that can guide decision-making towards policy coherence − or an appropriate form of fragmentation − in different contexts; iii) viewing policy coherence as a continuous process of changing values and perception rather than as an outcome.     

基于A-Train卫星编队资料的热带气旋强度估算

准确估算热带气旋(TC)强度,对于预测TC发展、减少财产损失具有重要的意义。前人将TC看作满足静力平衡和梯度风平衡的轴对称涡旋系统,基于云顶高度、云顶温度、海表面气压等物理量建立了TC强度估算模型,该模型未考虑环境垂直风切变对TC强度的影响。本文提出一种修正模型,通过统计拟合手段将垂直风切变加入原模型中。从2006—2015年的Cloud Sat资料中筛选出穿心个例共63个。针对云雷达(CPR)数据特点,提出根据反射率因子的垂直分布确定眼墙和外围边界位置的方法。分别用原模型与修正模型对这63个TC个例进行强度估算。与最佳路径数据相比,原模型结果总体偏大,尤其对风切变较大、强度较小的个例估算效果不佳。修正模型对于风切变大于5 m·s~(-1)的个例误差明显减小,平均绝对误差MAE、均方根误差RMSE和平均绝对误差百分比MAPE分别从5.8 m·s~(-1)、7.7 m·s~(-1)和19.5%变为3.5 m·s~(-1)、4.9 m·s~(-1)和11.5%。在一定强度范围内,修正模型估算效果随着强度的增强而提升。修正模型对于成熟阶段的个例效果更好,北半球的估算精度高于南半球,纬度越高,估算误差越小。试验结果表明,用该修正模型估算TC强度是可行的,可以对现有的技术进行辅助和补充。     

Environmental inequality and pollution advantage among immigrants in the United States

Environmental inequality scholarship has paid little attention to the disproportional exposure of immigrants in the United States (U.S.) to unfavorable environmental conditions. This study investigates whether new international migrants in the U.S. are exposed to environmental hazards and how this pattern varies among immigrant subpopulations (e.g., Hispanics, Asian, European). We combine sociodemographic information from the American Community Survey with toxicity-weighted chemical concentrations (Toxics Release Inventory) to model the relationship between toxin exposure and the relative population of recent immigrants across Public Use Microdata Areas (PUMAs, n = 2054) during 2005–2011. Results from spatial panel models show that immigrants tend to be less exposed to toxins, suggesting resilience instead of vulnerability. This pattern was pronounced among immigrants from Europe and Latin America (excluding Mexico). However, our results revealed that Mexican immigrants are disproportionately exposed to environmental hazards in wealthy regions.     

Wasp-waist populations and marine ecosystem dynamics: Navigating the “predator pit” topographies

Many marine ecosystems exhibit a characteristic “wasp-waist” structure, where a single species, or at most several species, of small planktivorous fishes entirely dominate their trophic level. These species have complex life histories that result in radical variability that may propagate to both higher and lower trophic levels of the ecosystem. In addition, these populations have two key attributes: (1) they represent the lowest trophic level that is mobile, so they are capable of relocating their area of operation according to their own internal dynamics; (2) they may prey upon the early life stages of their predators, forming an unstable feedback loop in the trophic system that may, for example, precipitate abrupt regime shifts. Experience with the typical “boom-bust” dynamics of this type of population, and with populations that interact trophically with them, suggests a “predator pit” type of dynamics. This features a refuge from predation when abundance is very low, very destructive predation between an abundance level sufficient to attract interest from predators and an abundance level sufficient to satiate available predators, and, as abundance increases beyond this satiation point, decreasing specific predation mortality and population breakout. A simple formalism is developed to describe these dynamics. Examples of its application include (a) a hypothetical mechanism for progressive geographical habitat expansion at high biomass, (b) an explanation for the out-of-phase alternations of abundances of anchovies and sardines in many regional systems that appear to occur without substantial adverse interactions between the two species groups, and (c) an account of an interaction of environmental processes and fishery exploitation that caused a regime shift. The last is the example of the Baltic Sea, where the cod resource collapsed in concert with establishment of dominance of that ecosystem by the cod’s ‘wasp-waist” prey, herring and sprat.     

Modeling environmental effects on the size-structured energy flow through marine ecosystems. Part 2: Simulations

Numerical simulations using a physiologically-based model of marine ecosystem size spectrum are conducted to study the influence of primary production and temperature on energy flux through marine ecosystems. In stable environmental conditions, the model converges toward a stationary linear log–log size-spectrum. In very productive ecosystems, the model predicts that small size classes are depleted by predation, leading to a curved size-spectrum.It is shown that the absolute level of primary production does not affect the slope of the stationary size-spectrum but has a nonlinear effect on its intercept and hence on the total biomass of consumer organisms (the carrying capacity). Three domains are distinguished: at low primary production, total biomass is independent from production changes because loss processes dominate dissipative processes (biological work); at high production, ecosystem biomass is proportional to primary production because dissipation dominates losses; an intermediate transition domain characterizes mid-production ecosystems. Our results enlighten the paradox of the very high ecosystem biomass/primary production ratios which are observed in poor oceanic regions. Thus, maximal dissipation (least action and low ecosystem biomass/primary production ratios) is reached at high primary production levels when the ecosystem is efficient in transferring energy from small sizes to large sizes. Conversely, least dissipation (most action and high ecosystem biomass/primary production ratios) characterizes the simulated ecosystem at low primary production levels when it is not efficient in dissipating energy.Increasing temperature causes enhanced predation mortality and decreases the intercept of the stationary size spectrum, i.e., the total ecosystem biomass. Total biomass varies as the inverse of the Arrhenius coefficient in the loss domain. This approximation is no longer true in the dissipation domain where nonlinear dissipation processes dominate over linear loss processes. Our results suggest that in a global warming context, at constant primary production, a 2–4 °C warming would lead to a 20–43% decrease of ecosystem biomass in oligotrophic regions and to a 15–32% decrease of biomass in eutrophic regions.Oscillations of primary production or temperature induce waves which propagate along the size-spectrum and which amplify until a “resonant range” which depends on the period of the environmental oscillations. Small organisms oscillate in phase with producers and are bottom-up controlled by primary production oscillations. In the “resonant range”, prey and predators oscillate out of phase with alternating periods of top-down and bottom-up controls. Large organisms are not influenced by bottom-up effects of high frequency phytoplankton variability or by oscillations of temperature.     

Protein expression signatures: an application of proteomics

The methods of proteomics, the study of the protein complement of the genome, are applicable to environmental testing. Sets of proteins specific to different stressors can be isolated using computer imaging software. Individual proteins can be identified by mass spectrometry. The Protein Expression Signatures (PES) obtained have potential in diagnosing adverse factors in the environment. The challenge is to demonstrate their feasibility in complex environments. We have shown that PES for three endocrine disrupting compounds in trout (Onchorhynchus mykiss), can be detected in mixed sewage effluent. Other studies support these results. As protein databases expand, identification becomes routine, and capture molecules specific to each protein are developed, the possibility of simple field tests for multiple stressors becomes real.     

Interannual fluctuations in recruitment of walleye pollock in the Oyashio region related to environmental changes

The Japanese Pacific walleye pollock (Theragra chalcogramma) stock is the largest stock of this species in Japanese waters. It is a key component of the Oyashio ecosystem. In southern Hokkaido waters, these fish spawn mainly during January and February near the mouth of Funka Bay (FB), and most eggs and larvae are transported into FB. During midsummer juvenile pollock migrate along the southern coast of Hokkaido to a nursery ground on the continental shelf off eastern Hokkaido (Doto area). However, some eggs and larvae are transported southward to the Tohoku region (TR). Transport depends largely on the Oyashio, which generally flows southward along the eastern coasts of Hokkaido and Tohoku. Thus, this stock has two different recruitment routes: FB–Doto and FB–TR. In the 1980s, when the southward flow of the Oyashio was strong, the number of age-2 pollock estimated from a virtual population analysis (VPA) indicated that recruitment to the entire stock remained at a medium level. In the 1990s, when the Oyashio weakened, strong year-classes occurred in 1991, 1994, and 1995, but not in the latter half of the 1990s. Juvenile catches in the TR by commercial fisheries, which can be taken as indices of recruitment level via FB–TR, were high during the 1980s and decreased in the 1990s. Although there was no significant difference in the average number of recruits between the 1980s and the 1990s as estimated from a VPA, the recruitment patterns differed between the two decades. Here, we propose that recruitment routes of this stock shifted in response to environmental changes.     

Interviewing people about the coast on the coast: Appraising the wider adoption of ICZM in North East England

This paper tests the hypothesis that Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM) is the best strategy for achieving good coastal governance on the North East coast of England using two geographically adjacent case studies: the East Riding coast, which has an ICZM framework in place and the Northumberland coast, which does not. Semi-structured questionnaires were used for face-to-face interviews with local representatives at each study site to underpin a common context and understanding between the interviewer and interviewee. Postal surveys were used to solicit responses from non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and governmental representatives.     

锥状斯氏藻生活史及其生理生态调控

锥状斯氏藻ＳＴＤＰ０１克隆品系于１９９３年１月分离自大鹏湾底泥中的单个锥状斯氏藻孢囊，并经单细胞分离培养成藻侏。在电子显微镜下，对该藻的营养细胞和孢囊形态进行了观察，该藻营养细胞与多甲藻目的其它甲藻不同，没有非常明显的甲板；