Bringing resilience-thinking into water governance: Two illustrative case studies from South Africa and Cambodia

Resilience is a multidimensional concept that is increasingly used to understand environmental change in hydrological systems. Yet, the current discussion about water governance and resilience remains relatively limited, with resilience typically seen as a normative outcome for governance (i.e., to be resilient against change). Using a theoretical multiplicity approach, we explore how the theories of social-ecological systems (SES), resilience and interactive (water) governance can provide new insights for water governance studies. We propose a resilience–governance framework that captures the partly overlapping but distinct characteristics from these three theories. The framework aims to develop a more nuanced way of using resilience-thinking for water governance, viewing resilience as a function of three capacities (absorptive, adaptive and transformative capacity) and noting the simultaneous existence of three interpretations for resilience (as a property, process and outcome) across different scales. The framework also considers issues of power and equity, which are often missing from resilience framings. We illustrate the framework with two case studies – the Tonle Sap Lake in Cambodia and a small sub-catchment of the Limpopo River Basin in South Africa – to provide two distinct examples of the possibilities of resilient governance. Finally, we consider what the framework suggests more broadly for ongoing discussions around resilience and water governance, including the possibilities for governance to also ‘bounce forward’ – i.e., transform – to a new, improved state. We argue that resilience-thinking may be valuable in understanding governance characteristics and guiding governance processes, in addition to seeing resilience (just) as a normative end-goal. In this way, the article supports an epistemological shift away from focusing on institutional structure, towards capturing the dynamic processes within governing systems.     

多坐标系中心组合图在地球信息图谱化中的应用

本文用典型实例验证了斜角坐标系量化图形中的多坐标系中心组合图展现地球信息图谱的优势和特点。这类图形以其“多坐标系”的特点和多种多样的组合形式,能够承载更大量的信息、更易反应数据内在规律。通过选择最佳的图形类型,对地球信息进行高效传输,通过图形使宏观的地学自然规律变得清晰可见,提供地学信息图谱的一种新展现手法。     

顾及误差的宗地合并算法

地籍信息系统的宗地合并操作时常会失效,其原因是实际测量的宗地图形与系统要求的理想化宗地图形有一定的差异。本文针对该问题,讨论了公共点的匹配与公共边的匹配,构造了顾及误差的宗地合并算法。该算法在地籍信息系统GBland中得到应用,应用结果表明了该算法的有效性。     

Probabilistic analysis of groundwater and radionuclide transport model from near surface disposal facilities

As per the regulatory requirements controlling the disposal of radioactive waste, the performance of waste disposal facilities needs to be assessed quantitatively using predictive models. This estimates the potential impact of disposal on the environment and public health. Near Surface Disposal Facilities (NSDFs), constructed to contain the low level radioactive waste are considered to model the radionuclide migration from the system to the geo-sphere. The radiation dose experienced by an individual through drinking water pathway is the endpoint of assessment of the model. A three dimensional groundwater contaminant transport model with a decaying source is modelled numerically to determine the radiation dose for short-lived and long-lived radionuclides. The consideration of uncertainties constitutes an intrinsic part of modelling. The uncertain input parameters include porosity, longitudinal dispersivity, transverse dispersivity, diffusion coefficient and distribution coefficient. The uncertainty propagation and quantification is carried out using collocation based stochastic response surface method (CSRSM). To run the simulations for the huge set of input, a code is developed using built-in python interface in the numerical model. The results are processed further to obtain the sensitive parameters affecting the output concentrations. Further, the probability of radiation dose exceeding permissible value is estimated by subset simulation.     

Assessment of Sentinel-1A data for rice crop classification using random forests and support vector machines

This study developed an approach to map rice-cropping systems in An Giang and Dong Thap provinces, South Vietnam using multi-temporal Sentinel-1A (S1A) data. The data were processed through four steps: (1) data pre-processing, (2) constructing smooth time series VH backscatter data, (3) rice crop classification using random forests (RF) and support vector machines (SVM) and (4) accuracy assessment. The results indicated that the smooth VH backscatter profiles reflected the temporal characteristics of rice-cropping patterns in the study region. The comparisons between the classification results and the ground reference data indicated that the overall accuracy and Kappa coefficient achieved from RF were 86.1% and 0.72, respectively, which were slightly more accurate than SVM (overall accuracy of 83.4% and Kappa coefficient of 0.67). These results were reaffirmed by the government’s rice area statistics with the relative error in area (REA) values of 0.2 and 2.2% for RF and SVM, respectively.     

一体化井筒综合分析系统的设计与实现

本文在中心主库构建成果的基础上,以实现井筒数据的一体化展示与分析为目标,提出并完成了一体化井筒综合分析系统的设计方案,从系统体系架构和系统功能的分析出发,以企业服务总线和Web Services技术为基础,以数据服务为支撑,实现了井筒数据的批量导入、编辑以及可视化浏览,通过软件机制,形成了图形模板与加载井筒数据快速生成一些图鉴的功能,以及对这些图鉴的浏览。     

Staging the Local: rethinking scale in farmers' markets

Local food has become a significant focus of food studies analysis in recent years with much of this work identifying the potential environmental, social and economic benefits of food localisation. However, a growing body of literature destabilises these assumed benefits with research now questioning the utility of scale in assessing food system outcomes. This paper explores this destabilisation by examining how concepts associated with the ‘local’ have been deployed by the Capital Region Farmers Market (CRFM) in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT). This leads to two key conclusions: firstly, the practical case study confirms theoretical insights highlighting the instability of the local, identifying how it is animated in multiple and sometimes contradictory ways often in response to conventional market forces; and secondly, we argue that the role of farmers' markets may not be best understood through the lens of the local but, rather, through their role in facilitating citizen engagement with the food system via the direct consumer–producer relationship at markets and the characteristics of the food purchased there (i.e. freshness and quality). In these ways, farmers' markets can disrupt conventional forms of engagement with the food system, creating a space that enhances social embeddedness and which may promote new forms of consumer understanding of food systems.     

Projects,people, professions: Trajectories of learning through a mega-event (the London 2012 case)

Planning and organization of large-scale events such as Olympic Games are accomplished by several specialized project organizations, in charge of securing finances, completing the infrastructures, negotiating with multiple stake-holders and the day-to-day management of the actual event. These organizations have to cope with a key challenge. Due to their inherently temporary nature they cannot provide the specialized knowledge and specific “project capabilities” (Davies and Brady) on their own, but have to mobilize them from the past and from outside their boundaries, e.g. from previous events or other mega-projects in the host city. Rather than in permanent organizations, then, the knowledge on preparing and performing mega-events is primarily sedimented and embodied in professionals.Drawing on the planning and organization of the London Olympics 2012 as empirical case, the paper addresses, on the one hand, this particular mobilization process. On the other, it looks at how this process is intertwined with three different trajectories that both affect and are affected by the mega-event: the trajectory of the project that aims to recruit necessary skills; the trajectory of individual persons who perceive working for the Olympics as a rewarding episode in their careers; the trajectory of professional communities that expect learning benefits for the construction and project management industry in the UK.