Geographic information system-based decision support for soil conservation planning in Tajikistan

Soil erosion on sloping agricultural land poses a serious problem for the environment, as well as for production. In areas with highly erodible soils, such as those in loess zones, application of soil and water conservation measures is crucial to sustain agricultural yields and to prevent or reduce land degradation. The present study, carried out in Faizabad, Tajikistan, was designed to evaluate the potential of local conservation measures on cropland using a spatial modelling approach to provide decision-making support for the planning of spatially explicit sustainable land use. A sampling design to support comparative analysis between well-conserved units and other field units was established in order to estimate factors that determine water erosion, according to the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE). Such factor-based approaches allow ready application using a geographic information system (GIS) and facilitate straightforward scenario modelling in areas with limited data resources. The study showed first that assessment of erosion and conservation in an area with inhomogeneous vegetation cover requires the integration of plot-based cover. Plot-based vegetation cover can be effectively derived from high-resolution satellite imagery, providing a useful basis for plot-wise conservation planning. Furthermore, thorough field assessments showed that 25.7% of current total cropland is covered by conservation measures (terracing, agroforestry and perennial herbaceous fodder). Assessment of the effectiveness of these local measures, combined with the RUSLE calculations, revealed that current average soil loss could be reduced through low-cost measures such as contouring (by 11%), fodder plants (by 16%), and drainage ditches (by 53%). More expensive measures such as terracing and agroforestry can reduce erosion by as much as 63% (for agroforestry) and 93% (for agroforestry combined with terracing). Indeed, scenario runs for different levels of tolerable erosion rates showed that more cost-intensive and technologically advanced measures would lead to greater reduction of soil loss. However, given economic conditions in Tajikistan, it seems advisable to support the spread of low-cost and labourextensive measures.

Dynamics of Shifting Cultivation Landscapes in Northern Lao PDR Between 2000 and 2009 Based on an Analysis of MODIS Time Series and Landsat Images

The rotational nature of shifting cultivation poses several challenges to its detection by remote sensing. Consequently, there is a lack of spatial data on the dynamics of shifting cultivation landscapes on a regional, i.e. sub-national, or national level. We present an approach based on a time series of Landsat and MODIS data and landscape metrics to delineate the dynamics of shifting cultivation landscapes. Our results reveal that shifting cultivation is a land use system still widely and dynamically utilized in northern Laos. While there is an overall reduction in the areas dominated by shifting cultivation, some regions also show an expansion. A review of relevant reports and articles indicates that policies tend to lead to a reduction while market forces can result in both expansion and reduction. For a better understanding of the different factors affecting shifting cultivation landscapes in Laos, further research should focus on spatially explicit analyses.

The Importance of Place Names in the Search for Ecosystem-Like Concepts in Indigenous Societies: An Example from the Bolivian Andes

This paper aims to deepen the search for ecosystem-like concepts in indigenous societies by highlighting the importance of place names used by Quechua indigenous farmers from the central Bolivian Andes. Villagers from two communities in the Tunari Mountain Range were asked to list, describe, map and categorize the places they knew on their community’s territory. Results show that place names capture spatially explicit units which integrate biotic and abiotic nature and humans, and that there is an emphasis on topographic terms, highlighting the importance of geodiversity. Farmers’ perspectives differ from the classical view of ecosystems because they ‘humanize’ places, considering them as living beings with agency. Consequently, they do not make a distinction between natural and cultural heritage. Their perspective of the environment is that of a personalized, dynamic relationship with the elements of the natural world that are perceived as living entities. A practical implication of the findings for sustainable development is that since places names make the links between people and the elements of the landscape, toponymy is a tool for ecosystem management rooted in indigenous knowledge. Because place names refer to holistic units linked with people’s experience and spatially explicit, they can be used as an entry point to implement an intercultural dialogue for more sustainable land management.

From Statistical Data to Spatial Knowledge - informing decision making in Vietnam

Vietnam has developed rapidly over the past 15 years. However, progress was not uniformly distributed across the country. Availability, adequate visualization and analysis of spatially explicit data on socio-economic and environmental aspects can support both research and policy towards sustainable development. Applying appropriate mapping techniques allows gleaning important information from tabular socio-economic data. Spatial analysis of socio-economic phenomena can yield insights into locally-specifi c patterns and processes that cannot be generated by non-spatial applications. This paper presents techniques and applications that develop and analyze spatially highly disaggregated socioeconomic datasets. A number of examples show how such information can support informed decisionmaking and research in Vietnam.

INTEGRATED ASSESSMENT OF ANTHROPOGENIC, CLIMATE, AND POLICY INDUCED CHANGES OF PHOSPHORUS EXPORT IN THE UNITED STATES LAURENTIAN GREAT LAKES WATERSHEDS

Anthropogenic activities have increased phosphorus (P) loading in tributaries to the Laurentian Great Lakes resulting in eutrophication in small bays to most notably, Lake Erie. Changes to surface water quality from P loading have resulted in billions of dollars in damage and threaten the health of the world’s largest freshwater resource. To understand the factors affecting P delivery with projected increasing urban lands and biofuels expansion, two spatially explicit models were coupled. The coupled models predict that the majority of the basin will experience a significant increase in urban area P sources while the agriculture intensity and forest sources of P will decrease. Changes in P loading across the basin will be highly variable spatially. Additionally, the impacts of climate change on high precipitation events across the Great Lakes were examined. Using historical regression relationships on phosphorus concentrations, key Great Lakes tributaries were found to have future changes including decreasing total loads and increases to high-flow loading events. The urbanized Cuyahoga watersheds exhibits the most vulnerability to these climate-induced changes with increases in total loading and storm loading , while the forested Au Sable watershed exhibits greater resilience. Finally, the monitoring network currently in place for sampling the amount of phosphorus entering the U.S. Great Lakes was examined with a focus on the challenges to monitoring. Based on these interviews, the research identified three issues that policy makers interested in maintaining an effective phosphorus monitoring network in the Great Lakes should consider: first, that the policy objectives driving different monitoring programs vary, which results in different patterns of sampling design and frequency; second, that these differences complicate efforts to encourage collaboration; and third, that methods of funding sampling programs vary from agency to agency, further complicating efforts to generate sufficient long-term data to improve our understanding of phosphorus into the Great Lakes. The dissertation combines these three areas of research to present the potential future impacts of P loading in the Great Lakes as anthropogenic activities, climate and monitoring changes. These manuscripts report new experimental data for future sources, loading and climate impacts on phosphorus.

Water quality and health in a Sahelian semi-arid urban context: an integrated geographical approach in Nouakchott, Mauritania

Access to sufficient quantities of safe drinking water is a human right. Moreover, access to clean water is of public health relevance, particularly in semi-arid and Sahelian cities due to the risks of water contamination and transmission of water-borne diseases. We conducted a study in Nouakchott, the capital of Mauritania, to deepen the understanding of diarrhoeal incidence in space and time. We used an integrated geographical approach, combining socio-environmental, microbiological and epidemiological data from various sources, including spatially explicit surveys, laboratory analysis of water samples and reported diarrhoeal episodes. A geospatial technique was applied to determine the environmental and microbiological risk factors that govern diarrhoeal transmission. Statistical and cartographic analyses revealed concentration of unimproved sources of drinking water in the most densely populated areas of the city, coupled with a daily water allocation below the recommended standard of 20 l per person. Bacteriological analysis indicated that 93% of the non-piped water sources supplied at water points were contaminated with 10-80 coliform bacteria per 100 ml. Diarrhoea was the second most important disease reported at health centres, accounting for 12.8% of health care service consultations on average. Diarrhoeal episodes were concentrated in municipalities with the largest number of contaminated water sources. Environmental factors (e.g. lack of improved water sources) and bacteriological aspects (e.g. water contamination with coliform bacteria) are the main drivers explaining the spatio-temporal distribution of diarrhoea. We conclude that integrating environmental, microbiological and epidemiological variables with statistical regression models facilitates risk profiling of diarrhoeal diseases. Modes of water supply and water contamination were the main drivers of diarrhoea in this semi-arid urban context of Nouakchott, and hence require a strategy to improve water quality at the various levels of the supply chain.

A physical approach on flood risk vulnerability of buildings

The design of efficient hydrological risk mitigation strategies and their subsequent implementation relies on a careful vulnerability analysis of the elements exposed. Recently, extensive research efforts were undertaken to develop and refine empirical relationships linking the structural vulnerability of buildings to the impact forces of the hazard processes. These empirical vulnerability functions allow estimating the expected direct losses as a result of the hazard scenario based on spatially explicit representation of the process patterns and the elements at risk classified into defined typological categories. However, due to the underlying empiricism of such vulnerability functions, the physics of the damage-generating mechanisms for a well-defined element at risk with its peculiar geometry and structural characteristics remain unveiled, and, as such, the applicability of the empirical approach for planning hazard-proof residential buildings is limited. Therefore, we propose a conceptual assessment scheme to close this gap. This assessment scheme encompasses distinct analytical steps: modelling (a) the process intensity, (b) the impact on the element at risk exposed and (c) the physical response of the building envelope. Furthermore, these results provide the input data for the subsequent damage evaluation and economic damage valuation. This dynamic assessment supports all relevant planning activities with respect to a minimisation of losses, and can be implemented in the operational risk assessment procedure.

Evaluating the Quality and Accuracy of TanDEM-X Digital Elevation Models at Archaeological Sites in the Cilician Plain, Turkey

Satellite remote sensing provides a powerful instrument for mapping and monitoring traces of historical settlements and infrastructure, not only in distant areas and crisis regions. It helps archaeologists to embed their findings from field surveys into the broader context of the landscape. With the start of the TanDEM-X mission, spatially explicit 3D-information is available to researchers at an unprecedented resolution worldwide. We examined different experimental TanDEM-X digital elevation models (DEM) that were processed from two different imaging modes (Stripmap/High Resolution Spotlight) using the operational alternating bistatic acquisition mode. The quality and accuracy of the experimental DEM products was compared to other available DEM products and a high precision archaeological field survey. The results indicate the potential of TanDEM-X Stripmap (SM) data for mapping surface elements at regional scale. For the alluvial plain of Cilicia, a suspected palaeochannel could be reconstructed. At the local scale, DEM products from TanDEM-X High Resolution Spotlight (HS) mode were processed at 2 m spatial resolution using a merge of two monostatic/bistatic interferograms. The absolute and relative vertical accuracy of the outcome meet the specification of high resolution elevation data (HRE) standards from the National System for Geospatial Intelligence (NSG) at the HRE20 level.

An initiative for participatory monitoring of large scale acquisitions: Opportunities and results thus far

Increasing commercial pressures on land are provoking fundamental and far-reaching changes in the relationships between people and land. Much knowledge on land-oriented investments projects currently comes from the media. Although this provides a good starting point, lack of transparency and rapidly changing contexts mean that this is often unreliable. The International Land Coalition, in partnership with Oxfam Novib, Centre de coopération internationale en recherche agronomique pour le développement (CIRAD), University of Pretoria, Centre for Development and Environment of the University of Bern (CDE), and GIZ, started to compile an inventory of land-related investments. This project aims to better understand the extent, trends and impacts of land-related investments by supporting an ongoing and systematic stocktaking exercise of the various investment projects currently taking place worldwide. It involves a large number of organizations and individuals working in areas where land transactions are being made, and able to provide details of such investments. The project monitors land transactions in rural areas that imply a transformation of land use rights from communities and smallholders to commercial use, and are made both by domestic and foreign investors (private actors, governments, government-back private investors). The focus is on investments for food or agrofuel production, timber extraction, carbon trading, mineral extraction, conservation and tourism. A novel way of using ITC to document land acquisitions in a spatially explicit way and by using an approach called “crowdsourcing” is being developed. This approach will allow actors to share information and knowledge directly and at any time on a public platform, where it will be scrutinized in terms of reliability and cross checked with other sources. Up to now, over 1200 deals have been recorded across 96 countries. Details of such transactions have been classified in a matrix and distributed to over 350 contacts worldwide for verification. The verified information has been geo-referenced and represented in two global maps. This is an open database enabling a continued monitoring exercise and the improvement of data accuracy. More information will be released over time. The opportunities arise from overcoming constraints by incomplete information by proposing a new way of collecting, enhancing and sharing information and knowledge in a more democratic and transparent manner. The intention is to develop interactive knowledge platform where any interested person can share and access information on land deals, their link to involved stakeholders, and their embedding into a geographical context. By making use of new ICT technologies that are more and more in the reach of local stakeholders, as well as open access and web-based spatial information systems, it will become possible to create a dynamic database containing spatial explicit data. Feeding in data by a large number of stakeholders, increasingly also by means of new mobile ITC technologies, will open up new opportunities to analyse, monitor and assess highly dynamic trends of land acquisition and rural transformation.

A 600 years warm-season temperature record from varved sediments of Lago Plomo, Northern Patagonia, Chile (47°S)

High-resolution records of calibrated proxy data for the past millennium are fundamental to place current changes into the context of pre-industrial natural forced and unforced variability. Although the need for regional spatially-explicit comprehensive reconstructions is widely recognized, the proxy data sources are still scarce, particularly for the Southern Hemisphere and especially for South America. We present a 600-year long warm season temperature record from varved sediments of Lago Plomo, a proglacial lake of the Northern Patagonian Ice field in Southern Chile (46°59′S, 72°52′W, 203 m a.s.l.). The thickness of the bright summer sediment layer relative to the dark winter layer (measured as total brightness; % reflectance 400–730 nm) is calibrated against warm season SONDJF temperature (1900–2009; r = 0.58, p(aut) = 0.056, RE = 0.52; CE = 0.15, RMSEP = 0.28 °C; five-year triangular filtered data). In Lago Plomo, warm summer temperatures lead to enhanced glacier melt and suspended sediment transport, which results in thicker light summer layers and to brighter sediments. Although Patagonia shows pronounced regional differences in decadal temperature trends and variability, the 600 years temperature reconstruction from Lago Plomo compares favourably with other regional/continental temperature records, but also emphasizes significant regional differences for which no data and information existed so far. These regional differences seem to be real as they are also reflected in modern climate data sets (1900–2010). The reconstruction shows pronounced subdecadal – multidecadal variability with cold phases during parts of the Little Ice Age (16th and 18th centuries) and in the beginning of the 20th century. The most prominent warm phase is the 19th century which is as warm as the second half of the 20th century. The exceptional summer warmth AD 1780–1810 is also found in other archives of Northern Patagonia and Central Chile. Our record shows the delayed 20th century warming in the Southern Hemisphere. The comparison between winter precipitation and summer temperature (inter-seasonal coupling) from Lago Plomo reveals alternating phases with parallel and contrasting decadal trends of winter precipitation and summer temperature (positive and negative running correlations Rwinter PP; summer TT). This observation from the sediment proxy data is also confirmed by two sets of reanalysis data for the 20th century. Reanalysis data show that phases with negative correlations between winter precipitation and summer temperature (e.g., dry winters and warm summers) at Lago Plomo are characteristic for periods when circumpolar Westerly flow is displaced southward and enhanced around 60°S.

Marginal lands or marginal people? Analysing key processes determining the outcomes of large-scale land acquisitions in Lao PDR and Cambodia

This chapter aims to overcome the gap existing between case study research, which typically provides qualitative and process-based insights, and national or global inventories that typically offer spatially explicit and quantitative analysis of broader patterns, and thus to present adequate evidence for policymaking regarding large-scale land acquisitions. Therefore, the chapter links spatial patterns of land acquisitions to underlying implementation processes of land allocation. Methodologically linking the described patterns and processes proved difficult, but we have identified indicators that could be added to inventories and monitoring systems to make linkage possible. Combining complementary approaches in this way may help to determine where policy space exists for more sustainable governance of land acquisitions, both geographically and with regard to processes of agrarian transitions. Our spatial analysis revealed two general patterns: (i) relatively large forestry-related acquisitions that target forested landscapes and often interfere with semi-subsistence farming systems; and (ii) smaller agriculture-related acquisitions that often target existing cropland and also interfere with semi-subsistence systems. Furthermore, our meta-analysis of land acquisition implementation processes shows that authoritarian, top-down processes dominate. Initially, the demands of powerful regional and domestic investors tend to override socio-ecological variables, local actors’ interests, and land governance mechanisms. As available land grows scarce, however, and local actors gain experience dealing with land acquisitions, it appears that land investments begin to fail or give way to more inclusive, bottom-up investment models.

Beyond deforestation monitoring in conservation hotspots: Analysing landscape mosaic dynamics in north-eastern Madagascar

Due to its extraordinary biodiversity and rapid deforestation, north-eastern Madagascar is a conservation hotspot of global importance. Reducing shifting cultivation is a high priority for policy-makers and conservationists; however, spatially explicit evidence of shifting cultivation is lacking due to the difficulty of mapping it with common remote sensing methods. To overcome this challenge, we adopted a landscape mosaic approach to assess the changes between natural forests, shifting cultivation and permanent cultivation systems at the regional level from 1995 to 2011. Our study confirmed that shifting cultivation is still being used to produce subsistence rice throughout the region, but there is a trend of intensification away from shifting cultivation towards permanent rice production, especially near protected areas. While large continuous forest exists today only in the core zones of protected areas, the agricultural matrix is still dominated by a dense cover of tree crops and smaller forest fragments. We believe that this evidence makes a crucial contribution to the development of interventions to prevent further conversion of forest to agricultural land while improving local land users' well-being.

Motivational interviewing and feedback for college drinkers: Handling missing values with complete case analysis and multiple imputation

Objective: In this secondary data analysis, three statistical methodologies were implemented to handle cases with missing data in a motivational interviewing and feedback study. The aim was to evaluate the impact that these methodologies have on the data analysis. ^ Methods: We first evaluated whether the assumption of missing completely at random held for this study. We then proceeded to conduct a secondary data analysis using a mixed linear model to handle missing data with three methodologies (a) complete case analysis, (b) multiple imputation with explicit model containing outcome variables, time, and the interaction of time and treatment, and (c) multiple imputation with explicit model containing outcome variables, time, the interaction of time and treatment, and additional covariates (e.g., age, gender, smoke, years in school, marital status, housing, race/ethnicity, and if participants play on athletic team). Several comparisons were conducted including the following ones: 1) the motivation interviewing with feedback group (MIF) vs. the assessment only group (AO), the motivation interviewing group (MIO) vs. AO, and the intervention of the feedback only group (FBO) vs. AO, 2) MIF vs. FBO, and 3) MIF vs. MIO.^ Results: We first evaluated the patterns of missingness in this study, which indicated that about 13% of participants showed monotone missing patterns, and about 3.5% showed non-monotone missing patterns. Then we evaluated the assumption of missing completely at random by Little's missing completely at random (MCAR) test, in which the Chi-Square test statistic was 167.8 with 125 degrees of freedom, and its associated p-value was p=0.006, which indicated that the data could not be assumed to be missing completely at random. After that, we compared if the three different strategies reached the same results. For the comparison between MIF and AO as well as the comparison between MIF and FBO, only the multiple imputation with additional covariates by uncongenial and congenial models reached different results. For the comparison between MIF and MIO, all the methodologies for handling missing values obtained different results. ^ Discussions: The study indicated that, first, missingness was crucial in this study. Second, to understand the assumptions of the model was important since we could not identify if the data were missing at random or missing not at random. Therefore, future researches should focus on exploring more sensitivity analyses under missing not at random assumption.^

Compilation of North Atlantic albacore tuna (Thunnus alalunga) fork length frequencies in 2 centimeter intervals from catches in the North Atlantic for the period 1956-2010

The development of the ecosystem approach and models for the management of ocean marine resources requires easy access to standard validated datasets of historical catch data for the main exploited species. They are used to measure the impact of biomass removal by fisheries and to evaluate the models skills, while the use of standard dataset facilitates models inter-comparison. North Atlantic albacore tuna is exploited all year round by longline and in summer and autumn by surface fisheries and fishery statistics compiled by the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT). Catch and effort with geographical coordinates at monthly spatial resolution of 1° or 5° squares were extracted for this species with a careful definition of fisheries and data screening. In total, thirteen fisheries were defined for the period 1956-2010, with fishing gears longline, troll, mid-water trawl and bait fishing. However, the spatialized catch effort data available in ICCAT database represent a fraction of the entire total catch. Length frequencies of catch were also extracted according to the definition of fisheries above for the period 1956-2010 with a quarterly temporal resolution and spatial resolutions varying from 1°x 1° to 10°x 20°. The resolution used to measure the fish also varies with size-bins of 1, 2 or 5 cm (Fork Length). The screening of data allowed detecting inconsistencies with a relatively large number of samples larger than 150 cm while all studies on the growth of albacore suggest that fish rarely grow up over 130 cm. Therefore, a threshold value of 130 cm has been arbitrarily fixed and all length frequency data above this value removed from the original data set.

Compilation of Thunnus thynnus (bluefin tuna) catches in the Northeast Atlantic Ocean 1950-2010

The data have been extracted and compiled from various sources but mainly from the ICES data base. The ICES data are from catch databases downloaded from the ICES website on 2014-01-14. These data are resolved by ICES area, country and year. During inspection of these data, it was noted that Norwegian data for years before 1950 had not been entered into the catch database on the ICES website. ICES has been notified of this omission by B. R. MacKenzie. The Norwegian data from ICES Bulletins. Statistiques has been added. Additional historical bluefin tuna catch data from other fishery reports and sources have been included in the data file for years preceding those when countries started reported their landings officially to ICES. These additional data have been reported in the literature previously (MacKenzie and Myers 2007, Fisheries Research).