Small Indigenous Freshwater Fish Species: their Role in Poverty Alleviation, Food Security and Conservation of Biodiversity, 23-25 February 2010, Central Inland Fisheries Research Institute, Barrackpore, Kolkata, West Bengal. Workshop report

This is the report on the workshop on “Small Indigenous Freshwater Fish Species: Their Role in Poverty Alleviation, Food Security and Conservation of Biodiversity”, organized by the International Collective in Support of Fishworkers(ICSF) in collaboration with the Inland Fisheries Society of India (IFSI). The workshop was a forum for exchange of views on the role of small indigenous freshwater fish species (SIFFS) in enhancing rural food supply and livelihood security, and in conserving biodiversity. The workshop also discussed the socioeconomic and cultural contexts for the culture and capture of SIFFS, and how to enhance access—especially for women—to better incomes, livelihoods and nutritional security, through appropriate policy spaces. This report provides a fresh focus on SIFFS, usually regarded as ‘trash’ fish. It urges scientists, researchers and decisionmakers to develop policy and legislative measures to ensure the conservation and promotion of SIFFS, both in capture- and culture-fisheries systems. This report will be useful for fishworker organizations, researchers, policymakers, fish farmers, members of civil society and anyone interested in fisheries and livelihoods. (PDF contains 86 pages)

Time for a Sea Change: a Study of the Effectiveness of Biodiversity Conservation Measures and Marine Protected Areas Along Southern Thailand’s Andaman Sea Coastline

This study examines how Thailand’s biodiversity conservation measures affect fishing communities, especially in the marine protected areas (MPAs) on the Andaman Sea coastline. It documents the various efforts of the local fishing communities to protect the resources in the area. Also included are recommendations for government agencies, civil society and the international community. [PDF contains 94 pages]

Alternative trajectories for decarbonizing urban transportation

4 p.

Modeling the Links between Biodiversity, Ecosystem Services and Human Wellbeing in the Context of Climate Change: Results from an Econometric Analysis on the European Forest Ecosystems

25 p.

The Economic Impacts of Biodiversity Policy for Improving the Climate Regulating Services Provided by EU Natura 2000 Habitats

22 p.

Identifying social determinants of urban low carbon transitions: the case of energy transition in Bilbao, Basque Country

33 p.

Decarbonising urban transportation

18 p.

Implications of governance structures on urban climate action: evidence from Italy and Spain

47 p.

Ecosystem exploitation, sustainability and biodiversity: Are they compatible?

This articles offers a basis for describing sustainability and then seeks to place this concept on an energetic basis by reference to recent advances in the understanding of patterns and processes in (mainly pelagic) fresh waters. Finally, by relating these to terrestrial ecosystems, it is shown how their sustainability may be attained through encouraging healthy fresh waters. Features of population succession are taken from observations on phytoplankton ecology.

Temporary ponds in the UK; a critical biodiversity resource for freshwater plants and animals

The importance of ponds for biodiversity in Britain has been demonstrated by a number of studies. However, most of the research and interest has been directed at permanent waterbodies, and temporary ponds have been largely neglected. In this article the author present some preliminary findings from a project which aims to fill some of the many gaps in our knowledge of temporary ponds in Britain. The project, which runs for three years until the end of 2001, aims specifically to investigate the ecology of temporary ponds in England and Wales by describing (i) their wetland plant and macroinvertebrate communities, (ii) their physico-chemical characteristics, and (iii) their value as a biodiversity resource. The article focuses on the assessment of temporary ponds as a biodiversity resource and briefly considers aspects of species richness, rarity and distinctiveness. Where possible, temporary ponds are compared with other waterbody types, mainly permanent ponds from the National Pond Survey (NPS), to give the results a broader context.

Recent research in the African Great Lakes: fisheries, biodiversity and cichlid evolution

The East African Great Lakes are now well known for (1) their fisheries, of vital importance for their rapidly rising riparian human populations, and (2) as biodiversity hotspots with spectacular endemic faunas, of which the flocks of cichlid fishes unique to each of the three largest lakes, Tanganyika, Malawi and Victoria, offer unique opportunities to investigate how new species evolve and coexist. Since the early 1990s research involving over a hundred scientists, financed by many international bodies, has produced numerous reports and publications in widely scattered journals. This article summarizes their main discoveries and examines the status of, and prospects for, the fisheries, as well as current ideas on how their rich endemic fish faunas have evolved. It first considers fisheries projects in each of the three lakes: the deep rift valley lakes Tanganyika and Malawi and the huge Victoria, all of which share their waters between several East African countries. Secondly it considers the biodiversity surveys of each lake, based on underwater (SCUBA) observations of fish ecology and behaviour which have revealed threats to their fish faunas, and considers what conservation measures are needed. Thirdly, using the lakes as laboratories, what have the international investigations (including DNA techniques and follow-up aquarium experiments) now revealed about the origins and relationships of their cichlid species flocks and mechanisms of evolution?

Biodiversity of macrozoobenthos in a large river, the Austrian Danube, including quantitative studies in a free-flowing stretch below Vienna: a short review

The Danube is ca. 2850 km in length and is the second largest river in Europe. The Austrian part of the Danube falls 156 metres in altitude over its 351 km length and, since the early 1950s, the river has been developed into a power-generating waterway, so that the continuity of the river is now interrupted by ten impounded areas. Only two stretches of the original free-flowing river are left, the Wachau region (above river-km 2005, west of Vienna) and the region downstream from the impoundment at Vienna (river-km 1921). Most of the recent theories and concepts related to invertebrates, in the context of the ecology of running waters, are based on studies on small streams, whereas investigations of large rivers have played a minor role for a long time, mainly due to methodological difficulties. The authors' recent detailed studies on macroinvertebrates in the free-flowing section of the Danube below Vienna, provide an excellent opportunity to survey or restate scientific hypotheses on the basis of a large river. In this review the main interest focuses on the investigation of biodiversity, i.e. the number of species and their relative proportions in the whole invertebrate community, as well as major governing environmental factors. The article summarises the species composition, the important environmental variables at the river cross-section and the effect of upstream impoundment on the riverbed and its fauna.