Weather index insurance: Lessons learned and best practices for Bangladesh

WorldFish and the International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD) held a two-day workshop on the topic of Weather Index-Based Insurance: Lessons Learned and Best Practices for Bangladesh. Weather index insurance is based on a predefined weather event which when triggered ensures automatic payout to farmers who have taken out insurance. For example, the climatic trigger could be a predefined consecutive number of days where rainfall is below a set level or when the floodwater level reaches above a certain point. Index insurance has been operating for about 10 years in many countries but is still at an early stage in Bangladesh, where there are two schemes currently being piloted and three other projects being developed. The aim of the two-day workshop was twofold: to ascertain the present state of index insurance in Bangladesh and elsewhere, and to work together to identify ways forward.

Radiolarian flux in the Santa Barbara Basin as an index of climate variability

Annual radiolarian flux (1954-1986) extrapolated from varved Santa Barbara Basin sediments was compared to instrumental data to examine the effect of interannual climate variability. Paleo-reconstructions over large geographic areas or 10^3 years and longer typically rely on changes in species composition to signal environment or climate shifts. In the relatively short period studied, climate fluctuations were insufficient to significantly alter the assemblage, but there was considerable variability in the total flux of radiolarians. This variability, greatest on 5- to 25-year time scales, appears to be linked to regional climate variability. Total flux correlates to regional California sea surface temperature and the composite of sea level pressure over the Northern Hemisphere for years of high radiolarian flux resembles positive PNA circulation.

Studies on the status of pollution in certain estuarine areas in Kakinada

The BOD levels and saprotrophication of 2 stations in an estuarine habitat at Kakinada India, was studied during one full tidal cycle. Both the stations were found to be heavily polluted by sewage with BOD values ranging between 10.8 and 12.8 ppm at the commercial canal (station 1) and between 4.8 and 8.8 ppm at the mangrove creek (station 2). Tides did not seem to have much influence on the dilution of the pollutants. Based on planktonic indicator species observed and saprobity index which worked out to be 2.75, both the sampling areas are considered as heavily polluted alpha-mesosaprobic zones.

沿水分梯度草原群落NPP动态及对气候变化响应的模拟分析

水分条件不仅影响半干旱区群落的组成，而且在一定程度上决定了群落的功能。处于不同水分条件生境下群落的优势物种在水分利用和同化物利用效率方面的功能特征会存在差异，这些差异将导致群落对于气候变化产生不同的响应，进而影响到景观和区域尺度上对于全球变化下碳动态和格局的分析。本研究选取了锡林河流域典型草原区沿水分梯度的四个代表群落，在野外实验测定并结合长期定位研究成果基础上，利用BIOME-BGC模型对代表群落的长期净初级生产力(NPP)动态进行了模拟和模型验证。通过分析该地区1953~2005年气候变化趋势，推测了未来可能的气候变化情景，进而模拟了气候变化下四个群落长期NPP动态的响应。 野外实验分析表明，在四个群落中，净光合速率与光合有效辐射呈单峰曲线关系，与温度和蒸气压亏损(VPD)成反比，叶片氮含量和比叶面积也会影响到光合能力。四个群落由于水分与土壤条件的差别，净光合速率随VPD与温度的变化表现出不同的增减幅度。将日变化分为四个阶段，分别为大致在6:00~8:00左右的低温高湿阶段，10:00~16:00的高温低湿阶段，16:00以后的低温低湿阶段和低温高湿阶段变为高温低湿阶段过程中的适温适湿阶段。在每个阶段中，影响羊草光合速率的主导因子是不同的。在不同的水分与土壤状况下，羊草的光合特性表现出明显差异，但总体说来水分仍是光合作用的主导因子。 模型模拟结果表明，当前气候条件下，羊草群落NPP平均值为197.76 gC m-2 (SE=7.11)，大针茅群落NPP平均值为198.95 gC m-2 (SE=6.41)，贝加尔针茅群落NPP平均值为210.41 gC m-2 (SE=7.87)，克氏针茅群落NPP平均值为144.92 gC m-2 (SE=4.64)，四个群落NPP平均值为188.01 gC m-2 (SE=3.72)。 日最高温度与最低温度在1953~2005年间都明显增加，而降水变化很大。温度增加下(P0T1)NPP平均下降14.2%，降水增加下(P1T0)NPP平均增加13.2%，温度与降水都增加情景下(P1T1)NPP平均下降2.7%。在半干旱区，降水是NPP变化的主要限制因子，而温度通过影响了植物的呼吸与蒸散作用对NPP产生影响。 由于生境水分条件差别和优势物种功能特征差异，四个群落在气候变化中表现出对温度与降水不同的敏感程度，这与水分胁迫系数WSI、碳胁迫系数CSI变化密切相关。克氏针茅群落由于所处生境水分条件差，水分胁迫系数高，对降水的依赖程度最大;贝加尔针茅群落一方面处于较好的水分生境，具有相对较小的水分胁迫系数，另一方面，由于具有高碳氮比，维持呼吸消耗的光合产物比例低，碳胁迫系数远低于其它三个群落，未来气候变化下NPP较其它三个群落仍较高。