Novel management to enhance spider biodiversity in existing grass buffer strips

Grass buffer strips have been widely sown to mitigate against intensive agricultural management practices that have negatively impacted on invertebrate and plant biodiversity in arable farming systems. Typically, such strips are floristically species poor and are dominated by grasses. In the present study, we developed management practices to enhance the floristic and structural diversity of these existing strips for the benefit of spiders, a key provider of natural pest control in crops. Across three UK arable farms, we investigated the benefits of: (i) scarification to create germination niches into which wildflower seeds were sown and (ii) the effect of graminicide applications to suppress grass dominance. Spiders were sampled twice per year (July and September) during 2008 and 2009. The combination of scarification with wildflower seeds, as well as graminicide, resulted in the greatest wildflower cover and lowest grass cover, with a general trend of increased abundance of adult and juvenile spiders. The abundance of Pachygnatha degeeri, Bathyphantes gracilis and juvenile wolf spiders of the genus Pardosa was positively correlated with wildflower cover, probably reflecting increased prey availability. Sward structure was negatively correlated with Erigone atra, Oedothorax fuscus and juvenile Pardosa abundance. Management that utilizes existing commonly adopted agri-environment options, such as grass buffer strips, represents a potentially important conservation tool for increasing the quantity and quality of invertebrate habitats. This can maximize opportunities for the provision of multiple ecosystem services, including pest regulation by predators such as spiders. These management practices have the potential to be incorporated into existing U.K. and European agri-environment schemes.

Towards developing a customer relationship management (CRM) strategy for supporting pre-implementation activities in business

Effectively preparing and planning for Customer Relationship Management (CRM) strategy is critical to CRM implementation success. A lack of a common and systematic way to implement CRM means that focus must be placed on the pre-implementation stage to ensure chance of success. Although existing CRM implementation approaches evidence the need to concentrate mostly on the pre-implementation stage, they fail to address some key issues, which raises the need for a generic framework that address CRM strategy analysis. This paper proposes a framework to support effective CRM pre-implementation strategy development.

Soil management in relation to sustainable agriculture and ecosystem services

Requirements for research, practices and policies affecting soil management in relation to global food security are reviewed. Managing soil organic carbon (C) is central because soil organic matter influences numerous soil properties relevant to ecosystem functioning and crop growth. Even small changes in total C content can have disproportionately large impacts on key soil physical properties. Practices to encourage maintenance of soil C are important for ensuring sustainability of all soil functions. Soil is a major store of C within the biosphere – increases or decreases in this large stock can either mitigate or worsen climate change. Deforestation, conversion of grasslands to arable cropping and drainage of wetlands all cause emission of C; policies and international action to minimise these changes are urgently required. Sequestration of C in soil can contribute to climate change mitigation but the real impact of different options is often misunderstood. Some changes in management that are beneficial for soil C, increase emissions of nitrous oxide (a powerful greenhouse gas) thus cancelling the benefit. Research on soil physical processes and their interactions with roots can lead to improved and novel practices to improve crop access to water and nutrients. Increased understanding of root function has implications for selection and breeding of crops to maximise capture of water and nutrients. Roots are also a means of delivering natural plant-produced chemicals into soil with potentially beneficial impacts. These include biocontrol of soil-borne pests and diseases and inhibition of the nitrification process in soil (conversion of ammonium to nitrate) with possible benefits for improved nitrogen use efficiency and decreased nitrous oxide emission. The application of molecular methods to studies of soil organisms, and their interactions with roots, is providing new understanding of soil ecology and the basis for novel practical applications. Policy makers and those concerned with development of management approaches need to keep a watching brief on emerging possibilities from this fast-moving area of science. Nutrient management is a key challenge for global food production: there is an urgent need to increase nutrient availability to crops grown by smallholder farmers in developing countries. Many changes in practices including inter-cropping, inclusion of nitrogen-fixing crops, agroforestry and improved recycling have been clearly demonstrated to be beneficial: facilitating policies and practical strategies are needed to make these widely available, taking account of local economic and social conditions. In the longer term fertilizers will be essential for food security: policies and actions are needed to make these available and affordable to small farmers. In developed regions, and those developing rapidly such as China, strategies and policies to manage more precisely the necessarily large flows of nutrients in ways that minimise environmental damage are essential. A specific issue is to minimise emissions of nitrous oxide whilst ensuring sufficient nitrogen is available for adequate food production. Application of known strategies (through either regulation or education), technological developments, and continued research to improve understanding of basic processes will all play a part. Decreasing soil erosion is essential, both to maintain the soil resource and to minimise downstream damage such as sedimentation of rivers with adverse impacts on fisheries. Practical strategies are well known but often have financial implications for farmers. Examples of systems for paying one group of land users for ecosystem services affecting others exist in several parts of the world and serve as a model.

The interactive responses of water quality and hydrology to changes in multiple stressors, and implications for the long-term effective management of phosphorus

Soluble reactive phosphorus (SRP) plays a key role in eutrophication, a global problem decreasing habitat quality and in-stream biodiversity. Mitigation strategies are required to prevent SRP fluxes from exceeding critical levels, and must be robust in the face of potential changes in climate, land use and a myriad of other influences. To establish the longevity of these strategies it is therefore crucial to consider the sensitivity of catchments to multiple future stressors. This study evaluates how the water quality and hydrology of a major river system in the UK (the River Thames) respond to alterations in climate, land use and water resource allocations, and investigates how these changes impact the relative performance of management strategies over an 80-year period. In the River Thames, the relative contributions of SRP from diffuse and point sources vary seasonally. Diffuse sources of SRP from agriculture dominate during periods of high runoff, and point sources during low flow periods. SRP concentrations rose under any future scenario which either increased a) surface runoff or b) the area of cultivated land. Under these conditions, SRP was sourced from agriculture, and the most effective single mitigation measures were those which addressed diffuse SRP sources. Conversely, where future scenarios reduced flow e.g. during winters of reservoir construction, the significance of point source inputs increased, and mitigation measures addressing these issues became more effective. In catchments with multiple point and diffuse sources of SRP, an all-encompassing effective mitigation approach is difficult to achieve with a single strategy. In order to attain maximum efficiency, multiple strategies might therefore be employed at different times and locations, to target the variable nature of dominant SRP sources and pathways.

Implementing REDD through community-based forest management: lessons from Tanzania

REDD (reduced emissions from deforestation and degradation) aims to slow carbon releases caused by forest disturbance by making payments conditional on forest quality over time. Like earlier policies to slow deforestation, REDD must change the behaviour of forest degrading actors. Broadly, it can be implemented with payments to forest users in exchange for improved forest management, thus creating incentives; through payments for enforcement, thus creating disincentives; or through addressing external drivers such as urban charcoal demand. In Tanzania, community-based forest management (CBFM), a form of participatory forest management, was chosen by the Tanzania Forest Conservation Group, a local NGO, as a model for implementing REDD pilot programmes. Payments are made to villages that have the rights to forest carbon. In exchange, the villages must demonstrably reduce deforestation at the village level. In this paper, using this pilot programme as a case study, combined with a review of the literature, we provide insights for REDD implementation in sub-Saharan Africa. We pay particular attention to leakage, monitoring and enforcement. We suggest that implementing REDD through CBFM-type structures can create appropriate incentives and behaviour change when the recipients of the REDD funds are also the key drivers of forest change. When external forces drive forest change, however, REDD through CBFM-type structures becomes an enforcement programme with local communities rather than government agencies being responsible for the enforcement. That structure imposes costs on local communities, whose local authority limits the ability to address leakage outside the particular REDD village.

Portfolio-Werbung als Technik des Impression Management: Eine Untersuchung zur gegenseitigen Stärkung von Dachmarke und Produktmarken in komplexen Markenarchitekturen

In recent years, the importance of the corporate brand (e.g. P&G, Nestlé, Unilever) has grown significantly and companies increasingly strive to strengthen their corporate brand. One way to strengthen the corporate brand is portfolio advertisement, in which the corporate brand is presented alongside with several product brands of its portfolio (e.g. VW with its product brands Touareg, Touran, Golf and Polo). The aim of portfolio advertising is to generate a positive image spill-over effect from the product brands onto the corporate brand in order to enhance the consumers’ perceived competence of the corporate brand. In four experimental settings Christian Boris Brunner demonstrates the great potential of portfolio advertising and highlights the risks associated with portfolio advertising in practice. In a first experiment, he compares portfolio advertising with single brand advertisements. Moreover, in case of portfolio advertising he manipulates the fit between the product brands, because the consumer has to establish a logical coherence between the individual brands. However, asconsumers have limited capacity for processing information, special attention should be paid to the number of product brands and to the processing depth of the consumer during confrontation with portfolio advertising. These key factors are taken into consideration in a second extensive experiment involving fictitious corporate and product brands. The effects of portfolio advertising on a product brand are also examined. Furthermore, the strength of product brands, i.e. brand knowledge as well as brand image and consumer’s knowledge of the brands, must be taken into consideration. In a third experiment, both the brand strength of real product brands as well as the fit between product brands are manipulated. Portfolio advertising could also have a positive image spill-over effect when companies introduce a new product brand under the umbrella of the corporate brand while communicating all product brands together. Based on considerations, in a fourth experiment, Christian Boris Brunner shows that portfolio advertising could also have a positive image spill-over effect on a new (unknown) product brand. Concluding his work, Christian Boris Brunner provides implications for future research concerning portfolio advertising as well as the management of a corporate brand in complex brand architectures. Concerning practical implications, these four experiments underline a high relevance to marketing and brand managers, who could increase corporate and product brands’ potential by means of portfolio advertising.

Rapid-onset opioids and the management of episodic pain

This is the fourth in a short series of articles that focus on what GPs should consider when monitoring and prescribing specialist-initiated palliative-care medicines. Here, the authors summarise the key issues around the use of apid onset opioids in palliative care.

The role of Investment Management Systems in regulatory compliance: a Post-Financial Crisis study of displacement mechanisms

The financial crisis of 2007–2009 and the resultant pressures exerted on policymakers to prevent future crises have precipitated coordinated regulatory responses globally. A key focus of the new wave of regulation is to ensure the removal of practices now deemed problematic with new controls for conducting transactions and maintaining holdings. There is increasing pressure on organizations to retire manual processes and adopt core systems, such as Investment Management Systems (IMS). These systems facilitate trading and ensure transactions are compliant by transcribing regulatory requirements into automated rules and applying them to trades. The motivation of this study is to explore the extent to which such systems may enable the alteration of previously embedded practices. We researched implementations of an IMS at eight global financial organizations and found that overall the IMS encourages responsible trading through surveillance, monitoring and the automation of regulatory rules and that such systems are likely to become further embedded within financial organizations. We found evidence that some older practices persisted. Our study suggests that the institutionalization of technology-induced compliant behaviour is still uncertain.

Key drivers of frontline employee generation of ideas for customer service improvement

Anchored in the service-dominant logic and service innovation literature, this study investigates the drivers of employee generation of ideas for service improvement (GISI). Employee GISI focuses on customer needs and providing the exact service wanted by customers. GISI should enhance competitive advantage and organizational success (cf. Berry et al. 2006; Wang and Netemeyer 2004). Despite its importance, there is little research on the idea generation stage of the service development process (Chai, Zhang, and Tan 2005). This study contributes to the service field by providing the first empirical evaluation of the drivers of GISI. It also investigates a new explanatory determinant of reading of customer needs, namely, perceived organizational support (POS), and an outcome of POS, in the form of emotional exhaustion. Results show that the major driver of GISI is reading of customer needs by employees followed by affective organizational commitment and job satisfaction. This research provides several new and important insights for service management practice by suggesting that special care should be put into selecting and recruiting employees who have the ability to read customer needs. Additionally, organizations should invest in creating work environments that encourage and reward the flow of ideas for service improvement

Executive project management structure and the challenges acing its adoption in the Nigerian construction industry

Project management (PM) is a globally recognized discipline and has been widely adopted within the construction industry. Despite advancements in the PM discipline, the ineffective traditional management system, typical of the non-executive PM structure, is still widely used in the Nigerian construction industry. The aim of this paper is thus to explore the challenges facing the adoption of the executive PM structure in Nigeria. The paper first assesses the level of growth of PM in Nigeria using UK best practices as a benchmark and identifies the key PM characteristics in the two countries. Focus group interviews were used to collect the primary data for the study and content analysis was used to present the results in a thematic format. The study revealed the key barriers to the adoption of an executive PM structure in Nigeria as a lack of proper awareness, unfavorable policies, skill shortages, the traditional culture of stakeholders and the absence of a regulatory body. It is recommended that the government, as a major player/client in the Nigerian construction industry, should lead the campaign to change the traditional industry approach to project management. This is necessary if construction stakeholders in Nigeria are to be educated and encouraged towards adopting and putting into practice effective PM.

Construction contracts: law and management. 4th edition

This is a fully revised edition of the UK’s leading textbook on the law governing construction contracts and the management and administration of those contracts. Although the legal principles involved are an aspect of general contract law, the practical and commercial complexities of the construction industry have increasingly made this a specialist area. This new edition has been brought up to date with recent cases and developments in the law as it stands at March 2007. The basic approach of the book has been retained. Rather than provide a commentary on standard-form contracts, our approach is to introduce the general principles that underlie contracts in construction, illustrating them by reference to the most important standard forms currently in use. Some of the common standard-form contracts have been revised since the previous edition, and the text has been revised to take account of these changes. Practitioners (consultants, builders, clients and lawyers) will find this an extremely useful source of reference, providing in-depth explanations for all of the features found in contemporary construction contracts, with reasons. A unique feature of this book is the way that it brings together the relevant principles of law with the practical issues arising in construction cases. It is a key text for construction undergraduates and postgraduates as well as for those taking the RIBA Part III and CIOB Part II examinations.

Cost function for sub-agent elements in multi-agent energy management system

Distributed generation plays a key role in reducing CO2 emissions and losses in transmission of power. However, due to the nature of renewable resources, distributed generation requires suitable control strategies to assure reliability and optimality for the grid. Multi-agent systems are perfect candidates for providing distributed control of distributed generation stations as well as providing reliability and flexibility for the grid integration. The proposed multi-agent energy management system consists of single-type agents who control one or more gird entities, which are represented as generic sub-agent elements. The agent applies one control algorithm across all elements and uses a cost function to evaluate the suitability of the element as a supplier. The behavior set by the agent's user defines which parameters of an element have greater weight in the cost function, which allows the user to specify the preference on suppliers dynamically. This study shows the ability of the multi-agent energy management system to select suppliers according to the selection behavior given by the user. The optimality of the supplier for the required demand is ensured by the cost function based on the parameters of the element.

Developing green supply chain management taxonomy-based decision support system

The aim of this paper is to develop a comprehensive taxonomy of green supply chain management (GSCM) practices and develop a structural equation modelling-driven decision support system following GSCM taxonomy for managers to provide better understanding of the complex relationship between the external and internal factors and GSCM operational practices. Typology and/or taxonomy play a key role in the development of social science theories. The current taxonomies focus on a single or limited component of the supply chain. Furthermore, they have not been tested using different sample compositions and contexts, yet replication is a prerequisite for developing robust concepts and theories. In this paper, we empirically replicate one such taxonomy extending the original study by (a) developing broad (containing the key components of supply chain) taxonomy; (b) broadening the sample by including a wider range of sectors and organisational size; and (c) broadening the geographic scope of the previous studies. Moreover, we include both objective measures and subjective attitudinal measurements. We use a robust two-stage cluster analysis to develop our GSCM taxonomy. The main finding validates the taxonomy previously proposed and identifies size, attitude and level of environmental risk and impact as key mediators between internal drivers, external drivers and GSCM operational practices.

Effects of agricultural management practices on earthworm populations and crop yield: validation and application of a mechanistic modelling approach

There is little consensus on how agriculture will meet future food demands sustainably. Soils and their biota play a crucial role by mediating ecosystem services that support agricultural productivity. However, a multitude of site-specific environmental factors and management practices interact to affect the ability of soil biota to perform vital functions, confounding the interpretation of results from experimental approaches. Insights can be gained through models, which integrate the physiological, biological and ecological mechanisms underpinning soil functions. We present a powerful modelling approach for predicting how agricultural management practices (pesticide applications and tillage) affect soil functioning through earthworm populations. By combining energy budgets and individual-based simulation models, and integrating key behavioural and ecological drivers, we accurately predict population responses to pesticide applications in different climatic conditions. We use the model to analyse the ecological consequences of different weed management practices. Our results demonstrate that an important link between agricultural management (herbicide applications and zero, reduced and conventional tillage) and earthworms is the maintenance of soil organic matter (SOM). We show how zero and reduced tillage practices can increase crop yields while preserving natural ecosystem functions. This demonstrates how management practices which aim to sustain agricultural productivity should account for their effects on earthworm populations, as their proliferation stimulates agricultural productivity. Synthesis and applications. Our results indicate that conventional tillage practices have longer term effects on soil biota than pesticide control, if the pesticide has a short dissipation time. The risk of earthworm populations becoming exposed to toxic pesticides will be reduced under dry soil conditions. Similarly, an increase in soil organic matter could increase the recovery rate of earthworm populations. However, effects are not necessarily additive and the impact of different management practices on earthworms depends on their timing and the prevailing environmental conditions. Our model can be used to determine which combinations of crop management practices and climatic conditions pose least overall risk to earthworm populations. Linking our model mechanistically to crop yield models would aid the optimization of crop management systems by exploring the trade-off between different ecosystem services.

Landscape connectivity: a key to effective habitat restoration in lowland agricultural landscapes

Landscape scale habitat restoration has the potential to reconnect habitats in fragmented landscapes. This study investigates landscape connectivity as a key to effective habitat restoration in lowland agricultural landscapes and applies these findings to transferable management recommendations. The study area is the Stonehenge World Heritage Site, UK, where landscape scale chalk grassland restoration has been implemented. Here, the ecological benefits of landscape restoration and the species, habitat and landscape characteristics that facilitate or impede the enhancement of biodiversity and landscape connectivity were investigated. Lepidoptera were used as indictors of restoration success and results showed restoration grasslands approaching the ecological conditions of the target chalk grassland habitat and increasing in biodiversity values within a decade. Restoration success is apparent for four species with a broad range of grass larval host plants (e.g. Melanargia galathea, Maniola jurtina) or with intermediate mobility (Polyommatus icarus). However, two species with specialist larval host plants and low mobility (Lysandra bellargus), are restricted to chalk grassland fragments. Studies of restoration grassland of different ages show that recent grassland restoration (1 or 2 years old) may reduce the functional isolation of chalk grassland fragments. A management experiment showed that mowing increases boundary following behaviour in two species of grassland Lepidoptera; Maniola jurtina and Zygaena filipendulae. Analysis of the landscape scale implications of the grassland restoration illustrates an increase in grassland habitat network size and in landscape connectivity, which is likely to benefit the majority of grassland associated Lepidoptera. Landscape and habitat variables can be managed to increase the success of restoration projects including the spatial targeting of receptor sites, vegetation structure and selection of seed source and management recommendations are provided that are transferrable to other species-rich grassland landscape scale restoration projects. Overall results show restoration success for some habitats and species within a decade. However, additional management is required to assist the re-colonisation of specialist species. Despite this, habitat restoration at the landscape scale can be an effective, long term approach to enhance butterfly biodiversity and landscape connectivity.