¿Por qué la legislación no protege los bosques nativos de Argentina? Conflictos socioambientales y políticas públicas

Tomando la perspectiva de la ecología política, el artículo analiza los conflictos socioambientales que contextualizaron la sanción de la Ley de Ordenamiento Territorial de Bosques Nativos de la Provincia de Córdoba (Ley 9814/2010). Se caracterizan los actores sociales en disputa y sus lógicas e intereses en juego, y se analizan los argumentos que justificaron las posiciones que asumieron durante el conflicto que precedió a la sanción de la ley. Se identifican las alianzas generadas a fin de constituir grupos de interés para accionar políticamente en la arena legislativa, y se contextualiza la disputa local/provincial en el modelo agropecuario dominante a nivel nacional/global. El trabajo concluye que la ley expresa una alianza de poder consolidada históricamente entre los sectores hegemónicos de poder económico y político local, quienes usan y construyen el marco institucional del Estado en su propio beneficio sin importar los costos ambientales y sociales. Esta alianza contribuye a debilitar las demandas y derechos de los sectores más vulnerables de la sociedad, desconoce los procesos de participación ciudadana y compromete la oferta futura de servicios ambientales por parte del bosque nativo

La expansión de monocultivos de exportación en Argentina y Costa Rica : Conflictos socioambientales y lucha campesina por la justicia ambiental

El trabajo analiza la expansión del monocultivo extractivista en Costa Rica y la Argentina en detrimento del capital natural y las poblaciones campesinas. La metodología incluyó entrevistas realizadas a campo en ambos países y consultas a fuentes documentales, periodísticas y bibliográficas. Se concluye que los conflictos ecosociales son provocados por la ausencia de un ordenamiento territorial, la escasa fiscalización estatal en materia ambiental y la alianza de los gobiernos con el capital concentrado. En este contexto, también se evidencian estrategias de resistencia de los campesinos que luchan por la justicia ambiental y la concreción de una institucionalidad socioambiental acorde con sus intereses

La expansión de monocultivos de exportación en Argentina y Costa Rica : Conflictos socioambientales y lucha campesina por la justicia ambiental

El trabajo analiza la expansión del monocultivo extractivista en Costa Rica y la Argentina en detrimento del capital natural y las poblaciones campesinas. La metodología incluyó entrevistas realizadas a campo en ambos países y consultas a fuentes documentales, periodísticas y bibliográficas. Se concluye que los conflictos ecosociales son provocados por la ausencia de un ordenamiento territorial, la escasa fiscalización estatal en materia ambiental y la alianza de los gobiernos con el capital concentrado. En este contexto, también se evidencian estrategias de resistencia de los campesinos que luchan por la justicia ambiental y la concreción de una institucionalidad socioambiental acorde con sus intereses

¿Por qué la legislación no protege los bosques nativos de Argentina? Conflictos socioambientales y políticas públicas

Tomando la perspectiva de la ecología política, el artículo analiza los conflictos socioambientales que contextualizaron la sanción de la Ley de Ordenamiento Territorial de Bosques Nativos de la Provincia de Córdoba (Ley 9814/2010). Se caracterizan los actores sociales en disputa y sus lógicas e intereses en juego, y se analizan los argumentos que justificaron las posiciones que asumieron durante el conflicto que precedió a la sanción de la ley. Se identifican las alianzas generadas a fin de constituir grupos de interés para accionar políticamente en la arena legislativa, y se contextualiza la disputa local/provincial en el modelo agropecuario dominante a nivel nacional/global. El trabajo concluye que la ley expresa una alianza de poder consolidada históricamente entre los sectores hegemónicos de poder económico y político local, quienes usan y construyen el marco institucional del Estado en su propio beneficio sin importar los costos ambientales y sociales. Esta alianza contribuye a debilitar las demandas y derechos de los sectores más vulnerables de la sociedad, desconoce los procesos de participación ciudadana y compromete la oferta futura de servicios ambientales por parte del bosque nativo

¿Por qué la legislación no protege los bosques nativos de Argentina? Conflictos socioambientales y políticas públicas

Tomando la perspectiva de la ecología política, el artículo analiza los conflictos socioambientales que contextualizaron la sanción de la Ley de Ordenamiento Territorial de Bosques Nativos de la Provincia de Córdoba (Ley 9814/2010). Se caracterizan los actores sociales en disputa y sus lógicas e intereses en juego, y se analizan los argumentos que justificaron las posiciones que asumieron durante el conflicto que precedió a la sanción de la ley. Se identifican las alianzas generadas a fin de constituir grupos de interés para accionar políticamente en la arena legislativa, y se contextualiza la disputa local/provincial en el modelo agropecuario dominante a nivel nacional/global. El trabajo concluye que la ley expresa una alianza de poder consolidada históricamente entre los sectores hegemónicos de poder económico y político local, quienes usan y construyen el marco institucional del Estado en su propio beneficio sin importar los costos ambientales y sociales. Esta alianza contribuye a debilitar las demandas y derechos de los sectores más vulnerables de la sociedad, desconoce los procesos de participación ciudadana y compromete la oferta futura de servicios ambientales por parte del bosque nativo

La expansión de monocultivos de exportación en Argentina y Costa Rica : Conflictos socioambientales y lucha campesina por la justicia ambiental

El trabajo analiza la expansión del monocultivo extractivista en Costa Rica y la Argentina en detrimento del capital natural y las poblaciones campesinas. La metodología incluyó entrevistas realizadas a campo en ambos países y consultas a fuentes documentales, periodísticas y bibliográficas. Se concluye que los conflictos ecosociales son provocados por la ausencia de un ordenamiento territorial, la escasa fiscalización estatal en materia ambiental y la alianza de los gobiernos con el capital concentrado. En este contexto, también se evidencian estrategias de resistencia de los campesinos que luchan por la justicia ambiental y la concreción de una institucionalidad socioambiental acorde con sus intereses

Freshwater runoff for Taylor Slough to Florida Bay for 1965 to 2000 for the FATHOM model

The Florida Bay ecosystem supports a number of economically important ecosystem services, including several recreational fisheries, which may be affected by changing salinity and temperature due to climate change. In this paper, we use a combination of physical models and habitat suitability index models to quantify the effects of potential climate change scenarios on a variety of juvenile fish and lobster species in Florida Bay. The climate scenarios include alterations in sea level, evaporation and precipitation rates, coastal runoff, and water temperature. We find that the changes in habitat suitability vary in both magnitude and direction across the scenarios and species, but are on average small. Only one of the seven species we investigate (Lagodon rhomboides, i.e., pinfish) sees a sizable decrease in optimal habitat under any of the scenarios. This suggests that the estuarine fauna of Florida Bay may not be as vulnerable to climate change as other components of the ecosystem, such as those in the marine/terrestrial ecotone. However, these models are relatively simplistic, looking only at single species effects of physical drivers without considering the many interspecific interactions that may play a key role in the adjustment of the ecosystem as a whole. More complex models that capture the mechanistic links between physics and biology, as well as the complex dynamics of the estuarine food web, may be necessary to further understand the potential effects of climate change on the Florida Bay ecosystem.

Per-field land use and land cover data set of the Haean catchment, South Korea

Detailed data on land use and land cover constitute important information for Earth system models, environmental monitoring and ecosystem services research. Global land cover products are evolving rapidly; however, there is still a lack of information particularly for heterogeneous agricultural landscapes. We censused land use and land cover field by field in the agricultural mosaic catchment Haean in South Korea. We recorded the land cover types with additional information on agricultural practice. In this paper we introduce the data, their collection and the post-processing protocol. Furthermore, because it is important to quantitatively evaluate available land use and land cover products, we compared our data with the MODIS Land Cover Type product (MCD12Q1). During the studied period, a large portion of dry fields was converted to perennial crops. Compared to our data, the forested area was underrepresented and the agricultural area overrepresented in MCD12Q1. In addition, linear landscape elements such as waterbodies were missing in the MODIS product due to its coarse spatial resolution. The data presented here can be useful for earth science and ecosystem services research.

Avian species identity and predation success in tropical cacao agroforestry of the Napu Valley in Central Sulawesi, Indonesia

Avian ecosystem services such as the suppression of pests are considered being of high ecological and economic importance in a range of ecosystems, especially in tropical agroforestry. But how bird predation success is related to the diversity and composition of the bird community, as well as local and landscape factors, is poorly understood. The author quantified arthropod predation in relation to the identity and diversity of insectivorous birds, using experimental exposure of artificial, caterpillar-like prey on smallholder cacao agroforestry systems, differing in local shade management and distance to primary forest. The bird community was assessed using both mist netting (targeting on active understory insectivores) and point count (higher completeness of species inventories) sampling. The study was conducted in a land use dominated area in Central Sulawesi, Indonesia, adjacent to the Lore Lindu National Park. We selected 15 smallholder cacao plantations as sites for bird and bat exclosure experiments in March 2010. Until July 2011, we recorded several data in this study area, including the bird community data, cacao tree data and bird predation experiments that are presented here. We found that avian predation success can be driven by single and abundant insectivorous species, rather than by overall bird species richness. Forest proximity was important for enhancing the density of this key species, but did also promote bird species richness. The availability of local shade trees had no effects on the local bird community or avian predation success. Our findings are both of economical as well as ecological interest because the conservation of nearby forest remnants will likely benefit human needs and biodiversity conservation alike.

Diffusion boundary layers ameliorate the negative effects of ocean acidification on the temperate coralline macroalga Arthrocardia corymbosa

Anthropogenically-modulated reductions in pH, termed ocean acidification, could pose a major threat to the physiological performance, stocks, and biodiversity of calcifiers and may devalue their ecosystem services. Recent debate has focussed on the need to develop approaches to arrest the potential negative impacts of ocean acidification on ecosystems dominated by calcareous organisms. In this study, we demonstrate the role of a discrete (i.e. diffusion) boundary layer (DBL), formed at the surface of some calcifying species under slow flows, in buffering them from the corrosive effects of low pH seawater. The coralline macroalga Arthrocardia corymbosa was grown in a multifactorial experiment with two mean pH levels (8.05 'ambient' and 7.65 a worst case 'ocean acidification' scenario projected for 2100), each with two levels of seawater flow (fast and slow, i.e. DBL thin or thick). Coralline algae grown under slow flows with thick DBLs (i.e., unstirred with regular replenishment of seawater to their surface) maintained net growth and calcification at pH 7.65 whereas those in higher flows with thin DBLs had net dissolution. Growth under ambient seawater pH (8.05) was not significantly different in thin and thick DBL treatments. No other measured diagnostic (recruit sizes and numbers, photosynthetic metrics, %C, %N, %MgCO3) responded to the effects of reduced seawater pH. Thus, flow conditions that promote the formation of thick DBLs, may enhance the subsistence of calcifiers by creating localised hydrodynamic conditions where metabolic activity ameliorates the negative impacts of ocean acidification.

Genotypic data for nine microsatellite loci for the seagrass Zostera muelleri collections from Lake Macquarie, NSW, Australia

Seagrasses are ecosystem engineers that offer important habitat for a large number of species and provide a range of ecosystem services. Many seagrass ecosystems are dominated by a single species; with research showing that genotypic diversity at fine spatial scales plays an important role in maintaining a range of ecosystem functions. However, for most seagrass species, information on fine-scale patterns of genetic variation in natural populations is lacking. In this study we use a hierarchical sampling design to determine levels of genetic and genotypic diversity at different spatial scales (centimeters, meters, kilometers) in the Australian seagrass Zostera muelleri. Our analysis shows that at fine-spatial scales (< 1 m) levels of genotypic diversity are relatively low (R (Plots) = 0.37 ± 0.06 SE), although there is some intermingling of genotypes. At the site (10's m) and meadow location (km) scale we found higher levels of genotypic diversity (R (sites) = 0.79 ± 0.04 SE; R (Locations) = 0.78 ± 0.04 SE). We found some sharing of genotypes between sites within meadows, but no sharing of genotypes between meadow locations. We also detected a high level of genetic structuring between meadow locations (FST = 0.278). Taken together, our results indicate that both sexual and asexual reproduction are important in maintaining meadows of Z. muelleri. The dominant mechanism of asexual reproduction appears to occur via localised rhizome extension, although the sharing of a limited number of genotypes over the scale of 10's of metres could also result from the localised dispersal and recruitment of fragments. The large number of unique genotypes at the meadow scale indicates that sexual reproduction is important in maintaining these populations, while the high level of genetic structuring suggests little gene flow and connectivity between our study sites. These results imply that recovery from disturbances will occur through both sexual and asexual regeneration, but the limited connectivity at the landscape-scale implies that recovery at meadow-scale losses is likely to be limited.

Effects of seawater pCO2 and temperature on shell growth, shell stability, condition and cellular stress of Western Baltic Sea Mytilus edulis (L.) and Arctica islandica (L.)

Acidification of the World's oceans may directly impact reproduction, performance and shell formation of marine calcifying organisms. In addition, since shell production is costly and stress in general draws on an organism's energy budget, shell growth and stability of bivalves should indirectly be affected by environmental stress. The aim of this study was to investigate whether a combination of warming and acidification leads to increased physiological stress (lipofuscin accumulation and mortality) and affects the performance [shell growth, shell breaking force, condition index (Ci)] of young Mytilus edulis and Arctica islandica from the Baltic Sea. We cultured the bivalves in a fully-crossed 2-factorial experimental setup (seawater (sw) pCO2 levels "low", "medium" and "high" for both species, temperature levels 7.5, 10, 16, 20 and 25 °C for M. edulis and 7.5, 10 and 16 °C for A. islandica) for 13 weeks in summer. Mytilus edulis and A. islandica appeared to tolerate wide ranges of sw temperature and pCO2. Lipofuscin accumulation of M. edulis increased with temperature while the Ci decreased, but shell growth of the mussels only sharply decreased while its mortality increased between 20 and 25 °C. In A. islandica, lipofuscin accumulation increased with temperature, whereas the Ci, shell growth and shell breaking force decreased. The pCO2 treatment had only marginal effects on the measured parameters of both bivalve species. Shell growth of both bivalve species was not impaired by under-saturation of the sea water with respect to aragonite and calcite. Furthermore, independently of water temperatures shell breaking force of both species and shell growth of A. islandica remained unaffected by the applied elevated sw pCO2 for several months. Only at the highest temperature (25 °C), growth arrest of M. edulis was recorded at the high sw pCO2 treatment and the Ci of M. edulis was slightly higher at the medium sw pCO2 treatment than at the low and high sw pCO2 treatments. The only effect of elevated sw pCO2 on A. islandica was an increase in lipofuscin accumulation at the high sw pCO2 treatment compared to the medium sw pCO2 treatment. Our results show that, despite this robustness, growth of both M. edulis and A. islandica can be reduced if sw temperatures remain high for several weeks in summer. As large body size constitutes an escape from crab and sea star predation, this can make bivalves presumably more vulnerable to predation with possible negative consequences on population growth. In M. edulis, but not in A. islandica, this effect is amplified by elevated sw pCO2. We follow that combined effects of elevated sw pCO2 and ocean warming might cause shifts in future Western Baltic Sea community structures and ecosystem services; however, only if predators or other interacting species do not suffer as strong from these stressors.