The majority of the worlds forests has undergone some form of management, such as clear-cut or thinning. This management has direct relevance for global climate: Studies estimate that forest management emissions add a third to those from deforestation, while enhanced productivity in managed forests increases the capacity of the terrestrial biosphere to act as a sink for carbon dioxide emissions. However, uncertainties in the assessment of these fluxes are large. Moreover, forests influence climate also by altering the energy and water balance of the land surface. In many regions of historical deforestation, such biogeophysical effects have substantially counteracted warming due to carbon dioxide emissions. However, the effect of management on biogeophysical effects is largely unknown beyond local case studies. While the effects of climate on forest productivity is well established in forestry models, the effects of forest management on climate is less understood. Closing this feedback cycle is crucial to understand the driving forces behind past climate changes to be able to predict future climate responses and thus the required effort to adapt to it or avert it. To investigate the role of forest management in the climate system I propose to integrate a forest management module into a comprehensive Earth system model. The resulting model will be able to simultaneously address both directions of the interactions between climate and the managed land surface. My proposed work includes model development and implementation for key forest management processes, determining the growth and stock of living biomass, soil carbon cycle, and biophysical land surface properties. With this unique tool I will be able to improve estimates of terrestrial carbon source and sink terms and to assess the susceptibility of past and future climate to combined carbon cycle and biophysical effects of forest management. Furthermore, representing feedbacks between forest management and climate in a global climate model could advance efforts to combat climate change. Changes in forest management are inevitable to adapt to future climate change. In this process, is it possible to identify win-win strategies for which local management changes do not only help adaptation, but at the same time mitigate global warming by presenting favorable effects on climate? The proposed work opens a range of long-term research paths, with the aim of strengthening the climate perspective in the economic considerations of forest management and helping to improve local decisionmaking with respect to adaptation and mitigation.
Especially during the last decades, the natural forests of Ethiopia have been heavily disturbed by human activities. Some forests have been totally cleared and converted into fields for agricultural use, other suffered from different influences, such as heavy grazing and selective logging. The ongoing research in the Shashemane-Munessa-study area (Gu 406/8-1,2) showed clearly that, in spite of interdiction and control, forests continue to be cleared and degraded. However, it is not yet sufficiently known, how and why these processes are still going on. Growing population pressure and economic constraints for the people living in and around the forests contribute to the actual situation but allow no final answers to the complex situation. Concerning a sustainable management of the forests there is to no solid basis for recommendations from the socioeconomic and socio-cultural view. Therefore, a comprehensive analysis of the traditional needs and forms of forest use, including all forest products, is necessary. The objective of this project is, to achieve this basis by carrying out intensive field observations, the consultation of aerial photographs, satellite imagery and above all semi-structured interviews with the population in the study area in order to contribute to the recommendations for a sustainable use of the Munessa Shasemane forests.
Deviant behaviour on various levels of the food supply chain may cause food risks. It entails irregular technological procedures which cause (increased probabilities of) adverse outcomes for buyers and consumers. Besides technological hazards and hitherto unknown health threats, moral hazard and malpractice in food businesses represent an additional source of risk which can be termed 'behavioural food risk'. From a regulatory perspective, adverse outcomes associated with deviance represent negative externalities that are caused by the breaking of rules designed to prevent them. From a rational choice perspective, the probability of malpractice increases with the benefits for its authors. It decreases with the probability of detection and resulting losses. It also decreases with bonds to social norms that protect producers from yielding to economic temptations. The design of mechanisms that reduce behavioural risks and prevent malpractice requires an understanding of why food businesses obey or do not obey the rules. This project aims to contribute to a better understanding of malpractice on the restaurant/retail level through comparative case studies and statistical analyses of food inspection and survey data. Accounting for the complexity of economic behaviour, we will not only look at economic incentives but consider all relevant behavioural determinants, including social context factors.
This project aims at analysing the influence of competing national and international bureaucracies on the fragmentation of the international forest regime complex (IFRC). Its objectives are: - describing the political dimension of fragmentation of the IFRC programme- explaining the political dimension of fragmentation based on the model of bureaucratic politics- analysing the steering consequences resulting from fragmentation - trans-disciplinary design of solutions for coping with political aspects of fragmentationBuilding on the bureaucratic politics approach these objectives will be pursued by testing the linking hypothesis: Interest and influence of the bureaucracies cause a fragmented programme of the IFRC. This programme supports the goal of profitable timber production but keeps the decision about biodiversity and CO2 sequestration open hindering the effective steering by the IFRC. The project develops an analytical framework consisting of the following independent variables: competing national and competing international bureaucracies, elected politicians, national and international non-state actors and media discourses. The fragmentation of the political programme of the IFRC is the overall dependent variable. This project will analyse the influence of bureaucracies and their coalitions on fragmentation at the international level as well as in national case studies in Sweden, Poland and Germany. The other independent variables will be covered by sub-projects 2, 3 and 4. The findings will be linked to the other political and to the economic and technic-ecological sub projects in order to contribute to the multi-disciplinary description and explanation of fragmentation and its steering consequences.
The rational calculus of farmers assumed in many agricultural economic models is unrealistic and non-predictive of their actual decision making. Understanding structural change in agriculture can thus be improved via a realistic modeling of the decision making by agricultural entrepreneurs. Specifically, slow disinvestment (i.e., postponing farm exit), persistence of market structures (i.e., failure to reallocate land plots towards higher efficiency), and more generally characterizing the decision making of farmers are crucial for a better understanding of structural change and policy advice. We apply economic experiments to better understand such disinvestment choices, land markets with economies of scale and private opportunity costs, different auction and bargaining forms to improve allocation efficiency of land markets, and to generally characterize the decision making of farmers.
Research in 'silviculture' and 'forest economics' very often takes place largely independent from each other. While silviculture predominantly focuses on ecological aspects, forest eco-nomics is sometimes very theoretic. The applied bioeconomic models often lack biological realism. Investigating mixed forests this proposal tries to improve bioeconomic modelling and optimisation under uncertainty. The hypothesis is tested whether or not bioeconomic model-ling of interacting tree species and risk integration would implicitly lead to close-to-nature forestry. In a first part, economic consequences of interdependent tree species mixed at the stand level are modelled. This part is based on published literature, an improved model of timber quality and existing data on salvage harvests. A model of survival over age is then to be developed for mixed stands. A second section then builds upon data generated in part one and concentrates on the simultaneous optimisation of species proportions and harvest-ing ages. It starts with a mean-variance optimisation as a reference solution. The obtained results are compared with data from alternative approaches as stochastic dominance, down-side risk and information-gap robustness.
The number of protected areas in our planet has multiplied as an outcome of the Rio Conference in 1992 which declared the conservation of biodiversity and creation of national parks as priority. However, particularly in central Africa, the establishment of protected areas has resulted in a wide spread displacement of human populations. The issue of resettlement is still much-debated in International discussions. Is the resettlement of 'forest people worthwhile as a conservation strategy in protecting populations of large mammals which are under risk of extinction through hunting? Some schools of thought contend that conventional conservation strategies such as the resettlement of the 'forest people out of National Parks can be regarded as tantamount to abuse of human rights and also altering local livelihood aspects of the village communities for the sake of wildlife and biodiversity. Hitherto, despite much criticism of the displacement of indigenous poor communities, very few studies have researched the possible positive outcomes of resettlement from protected areas. Resettlement therefore, has been a delicate option in conservation planning in most parts of the world due to its socio-economic, political and environmental ramifications. The multifarious challenges faced by the resettled populations make the question of re-settlement of other villages all the more difficult. Using a case study from south west Cameroon, this project examines the outcome of a government initiative to safeguard wildlife following the creation of the Korup National Park through a progressive resettlement scheme of the Ekundukundu Village out of the 'protected zone'. It seeks to ascertain whether the approach in resettling and re-orientating the daily lives of forest dwellers away from their traditional milieu can be a successful method of safeguarding wildlife in our forests. It also complies with the call for an assessment of ''the economic and socio-cultural costs and impacts arising from the establishment and maintenance of protected areas (CBD COP7 2004).
Objective: This project aims to develop, assess and train on various production chains for motor vehicle fuels ligno-cellulosic biomass sources will be used as feedstock to produce synthesis gas from which various vehicle fuels can be derived: CH4, methanol/DME, ethanol (thermo-chemical and enzymatic pathway) and a novel biomass-to-liquid (BTL) fuel. The project will develop and evaluate the respective processing technologies with a view to producing cost effective premium fuels for current and future combustion engines from a wide bandwidth of feedstock. Within 4 vertical subprojects, alternative thermo-chemical gasification, enzymatic fuel production and fuel synthesis processes will be considered, while 2 horizontal subprojects are directed towards technology assessment and training. Two pilot-produced fuels (DME and BTL) will be submitted to extensive motor-tests by 4 leading European car manufacturers within this project. Other fuels will be made available for tests in various other European R&D projects. It is envisaged that this project will lead to the introduction of favourably priced biomass-derived fuels for motor vehicles, from 2010 onwards. Apart from achieving scientific and technological results, RENEW has the vision to develop commonly agreed strategic recommendations, based on an understanding among relevant players in industry, agriculture and research concerning the technological and market potential of different bio-fuels and their production technologies. RENEW is novel and hugely important to Europe. It offers major Kyoto Protocol benefits, enhances the sustainability and security of vehicle fuel supply, and has positive Regional socio-economic impacts. RENEW involves 31 partners, including 7 SME, from 9 EU MS and AS countries. The consortium has the necessary 'critical mass' to achieve its goals and develop the technology to commercial stage beyond the end of the project.
Invasive alien species are recognized as one of the leading threats to biodiversity. They also impose enormous costs on agriculture, forestry and human health. In Europe and elsewhere, most countries are presently developing national and international strategies to assess the full scope of the danger represented by invasive non-indigenous species, and to take the necessary measures to prevent and manage the threat effectively. The initial step in a national programme against non-indigenous species must be a survey of the species already established in the country, as well as those species which are likely to invade the country in the near future, together with their perceived, actual and potential economic and environmental impact. In this project, we propose to carry out an inventory of non-indigenous insects in Bulgaria, Macedonia and Albania. The general objective of the project is to provide these three countries wit information on invasive alien insects in the Balkans and to develop local expertise in the field of invasive alien species management. This will allow the development of national strategies against alien insects, and non-indigenous organisms in general. Firstly, a database on non-indigenous insects established in Bulgaria, Macedonia and Albania will be set up. Then, we will provide informative fact sheets for the 30-40 main invasive, or potentially invasive, insects in the region. Finally, we will analyse the data to extract information on pathways, species or ecosystems traits that make them prone to invasion, and we will incorporate these analyses into similar studies carried out as part of on-going European projects on risk and impact assessment. In addition, as a case study, we are assessing the impact of the horse-chestnut leaf miner, Cameraria ohridella, an invasive moth which first appeared in the Balkans in the 1980s before spreading to the whole of Europe, and which is suspected to threaten the few remaining endemic stands of horse-chestnut (Aesculus hippocastanum) in the Balkans.
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