Fostering sustainable urban development in Nakuru, Kenya Rift Valley

The town of Nakuru—Kenya's fourth largest town—lies in a unique setting in the Great Rift Valley. Recent developments on the Menengai Crater, the Mau Escarpment, and the Bahati Highlands exemplify the impacts of poorly planned urban growth on mountain ecosystems. The Nakuru Local Urban Observatory (LUO) project was initiated by the Municipal Council of Nakuru in January 2003, in collaboration with the Centre for Development and Environment (CDE) of the University of Berne and the Intermediate Technology Development Group (ITDG), and with funding from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC). The project aims to provide a framework for sustainable urban development practices by building technical skills and improving participation by local stakeholders in decision-making processes. The potentials of information technology (IT) are being tapped to provide up-to-date information to decision-makers and democratize access to information, in order to improve public participation. The overall objective is to find ways of achieving better urban management in order to mitigate non-sustainable development trends in the town and its surroundings.

Urban Expansion and its impact on urban agriculture - remote sensing based change analysis of Kizinga and Mzinga Valley - Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania

Urban agriculture is a phenomenon that can be observed world-wide, particularly in cities of devel- oping countries. It is contributing significantly to food security and food safety and has sustained livelihood of the urban and peri-urban low income dwe llers in developing countries for many years. Population increase due to rural-urban migration and natural - formal as well as informal - urbani- sation are competing with urban farming for available space and scarce water resources. A mul- titemporal and multisensoral urban change analysis over the period of 25 years (1982-2007) was performed in order to measure and visualise the urban expansion along the Kizinga and Mzinga valley in the south of Dar Es Salaam. Airphotos and VHR satellite data were analysed by using a combination of a composition of anisotropic textural measures and spectral information. The study revealed that unplanned built-up area is expanding continuously, and vegetation covers and agricultural lands decline at a fast rate. The validation showed that the overall classification accuracy varied depending on the database. The extracted built-up areas were used for visual in- terpretation mapping purposes and served as information source for another research project. The maps visualise an urban congestion and expansion of nearly 18% of the total analysed area that had taken place in the Kizinga valley between 1982 and 2007. The same development can be ob- served in the less developed and more remote Mzinga valley between 1981 and 2002. Both areas underwent fast changes where land prices still tend to go up and an influx of people both from rural and urban areas continuously increase the density with the consequence of increasing multiple land use interests.

Opportunities and risks in reconciling conservation and development in a post-Soviet setting: The example of the Tajik National Park

In the Tajik National Park (TNP) - a high-altitude area of nearly 26,000 km2 in Central Asia - past and present human activities visibly contrast with standard conservation requirements for protected areas worldwide. This paper focuses on resource management, and highlights three major processes that threaten both the sustainable use of natural resources and the preservation of nature per se: (i) intensified use of biomass as a fuel resource, (ii) inappropriate pasture management, and (iii) increased pressure on endangered wildlife. From analysis of these processes - their historical background, root causes, trends and interrelationships - options and needs to improve park management are proposed and discussed.

Assessing and mapping LD and SLM to directly support the planning and scaling up of SLM interventions to combat desertification

Global investment in Sustainable Land Management (SLM) has been substantial, but knowledge gaps remain. Overviews of where land degradation (LD) is taking place and how land users are addressing the problem using SLM are still lacking for most individual countries and regions. Relevant maps focus more on LD than SLM, and they have been compiled using different methods. This makes it impossible to compare the benefits of SLM interventions and prevents informed decision-making on how best to invest in land. To fill this knowledge gap, a standardised mapping method has been collaboratively developed by the World Overview of Conservation Approaches and Technologies (WOCAT), FAO’s Land Degradation Assessment in Drylands (LADA) project, and the EU’s Mitigating Desertification and Remediating Degraded Land (DESIRE) project. The method generates information on the distribution and characteristics of LD and SLM activities and can be applied at the village, national, or regional level. It is based on participatory expert assessment, documents, and surveys. These data sources are spatially displayed across a land-use systems base map. By enabling mapping of the DPSIR framework (Driving Forces-Pressures-State-Impacts-Responses) for degradation and conservation, the method provides key information for decision-making. It may also be used to monitor LD and conservation following project implementation. This contribution explains the mapping method, highlighting findings made at different levels (national and local) in South Africa and the Mediterranean region. Keywords: Mapping, Decision Support, Land Degradation, Sustainable Land Management, Ecosystem Services, Participatory Expert Assessment

Fostering networking behavior, career planning and optimism, and subjective career success: An intervention study

The present study evaluated personal resource-oriented interventions supporting the career development of young academics, working at German universities within the STEM fields. The study sought to foster subjective career success by improving networking behavior, career planning, and career optimism. The study involved a quasi-experimental pre-post intervention with two intervention and two control groups (N = 81 research associates). Participants of the first intervention group received networking training; participants of the second intervention group received the same networking training plus individual career coaching. Participants of both intervention groups were female. Participants of the control groups (i.e., male vs. female group) did not participate in any intervention. As expected, path analyses, based on mean differences frompre-test to post-test, revealed an increase in career planning and career optimism within the networking plus career coaching intervention group, that was indirectly positively related to changes in subjective career success. Contrary to our expectations, the networking group training alone and in combination with the career coaching showed no effectiveness in fostering networking behavior. Results are discussed in the context of career counseling and intervention effectiveness studies.

Urban expansion and its impact on urban agriculture – remote sensing based change analysis of Kizinga and Mzinga Valley – Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania

Urban agriculture is a phenomenon that can be observed world-wide, particularly in cities of devel-oping countries. It is contributing significantly to food security and food safety and has sustained livelihood of the urban and peri-urban low income dwellers in developing countries for many years. Population increase due to rural-urban migration and natural, coupled with formal as well as infor-mal urbanization are competing with urban farming for available space and scarce water resources. A multitemporal multisensoral urban change analysis over the period of 25 years (1982-2007) was performed in order to measure and visualize the urban expansion along the Kizinga and Mzinga valley in the South of Dar es Salaam. Airphotos and VHR satellite data were analyzed by using a combination of a composition of anisotropic textural measures and spectral information. The study revealed that unplanned built-up area is expanding continuously and vegetation covers and agricultural lands decline at a fast rate. The validation showed that the overall classification accuracy varied depending on the database. The extracted built-up areas were used for visual in-terpretation mapping purposes and served as information source for another research project. The maps visualize an urban congestion and expansion of nearly 18% of the total analyzed area that had taken place in the Kizinga valley between 1982 and 2007. The same development can be ob-served in the less developed and more remote Mzinga valley between 1981 and 2002. Both areas underwent fast changes where land prices still tend to go up and an influx of people both from rural and urban areas continuously increase density with the consequence of increasing multiple land use interests.

Role of Crop Research and Development in food Security of Africa

Food security is the main concern in Africa as the production and productivity of crops are under continuous threat. Indigenous crops also known as orphan- or as underutilized- crops provide key contributions to food security under the present scenario of increasing world population and changing climate. Hence, these crops which belong to the major categories of cereals, legumes, fruits and root crops play a key role in the livelihood of the resource-poor farmers and consumers since they perform better than the major world crops under extreme soil and climate conditions prevalent in the continent. These indigenous crops have the major advantage that they fit well into the general socio-economic and ecological context of the region. However, despite their huge importance, African crops have generally received little attention by the global scientific community. With the current production systems, only a fraction of yield potential was achieved for most of these crops. In order to devise strategies towards boosting crop productivity in Africa, the current production constraints should be investigated and properly addressed. Key traits known to increase productivity and/or improve nutrition and diverse conventional and modern crop improvement techniques need to be implemented. Commitments in the value-chain from the research, production, marketing to distribution of improved seeds are required by relevant national and international institutions as well as African governments to promote food security in a sustainable manner. The review also presents major achievements and suggestions for stakeholders interested in African agriculture.

Bridging Research and Development : Partnership Actions for Mitigating Syndromes (PAMS) in the Swiss National Centre of Competence (NCCR) North-South - Capitalising on Experience

Within the framework of Switzerland’s international NCCR North-South research programme, Partnership Actions for Mitigating Syndromes (PAMS) are a practice-oriented component with a transdisciplinary approach. By linking research and development practice, they bring together researchers, practitioners and local communities in a common effort to test and evaluate research findings in concrete development contexts. They provide unique insights into innovative approaches and opportunities for promoting sustainable development in countries of the South and East. After an initial four-year phase, the PAMS projects implemented to date were evaluated in order to learn about their potentials and limits, as well as to decide on the direction of the component for the next phase of the programme. The present publication presents the results of this evaluation.