Convenient Solutions To An Inconvenient Truth

Author : World Bank
Publisher : World Bank Publications
Page : 132 pages
File Size : 53,5 Mb
Release : 2009-11-19
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9780821381274

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Convenient Solutions to an Inconvenient Truth by World Bank Pdf

Global warming and changes in climate will have severe and lasting impacts on national efforts to alleviate poverty and promote sustainable development. Some of the world s poorest countries and communities are the most vulnerable and are already suffering the consequences. Yet often these countries are rich in natural capital, ecosystems, and biodiversity that can contribute to solutions as they can to climate change. Biodiversity is the foundation and mainstay of agriculture, forests, and fisheries. Biological resources provide the raw materials for livelihoods, agriculture, medicines, trade, tourism, and industry. Forests, grasslands, freshwater, and marine and other natural ecosystems provide a range of services, often not recognized in national economic accounts but vital to human welfare: regulating water flows and water quality, flood control, pollination, decontamination, carbon sequestration, soil conservation, and nutrient and hydrological cycling. Current efforts to address climate change focus mainly on reducing emissions of greenhouse gases, mainly through cleaner energy strategies, and on attempting to reduce vulnerability of the communities at risk by improving infrastructure to meet new energy and water needs. This book book sets out a compelling argument for including ecosystem-based approaches to mitigation and adaptation as a third essential pillar in national strategies to address climate change. Such ecosystem-based strategies can offer cost-effective, proven and sustainable solutions contributing to, and complementing, other national and regional adaptation strategies.

Author : Global Environment Facility
Publisher : Global Environment Facility
Page : 48 pages
File Size : 42,5 Mb
Release : 2011
Category : Nature
ISBN : 9781884122415

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Experiences from SGP by Global Environment Facility Pdf

Author : Jaap Spier,Ulrich Magnus
Publisher : AFRICAN SUN MeDIA
Page : 258 pages
File Size : 52,9 Mb
Release : 2014-07-01
Category : Science
ISBN : 9781920689278

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Climate Change Remedies by Jaap Spier,Ulrich Magnus Pdf

ÿClimate change poses very serious risks to mankind. Adaptation and damages are emphasised more and more. Although adaptation is important, priority should be given to prevention (mitigation). The contributions in this volume emanate from an international research project that deals with a legal kaleidoscope of legal issues and focuses primarily on preventive remedies. The contributions of Spier and Magnus tackle injunctive relief and discuss the myriad of legal questions courts have to answer if they are willing to grant injunctive relief. This part of the book addresses procedural, private international and substantive law. Kemp?s contribution discusses the role criminal law could play to come to grips with the threats of climate change. So far, the greater part of the debate is about the United States, Europe and, increasingly, Asia. Ruppel fills this gap by painting an African perspective.

Author : Melissa R. Marselle,Jutta Stadler,Horst Korn,Katherine N. Irvine,Aletta Bonn
Publisher : Springer
Page : 494 pages
File Size : 40,5 Mb
Release : 2019-06-11
Category : Medical
ISBN : 9783030023188

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Biodiversity and Health in the Face of Climate Change by Melissa R. Marselle,Jutta Stadler,Horst Korn,Katherine N. Irvine,Aletta Bonn Pdf

This open access book identifies and discusses biodiversity’s contribution to physical, mental and spiritual health and wellbeing. Furthermore, the book identifies the implications of this relationship for nature conservation, public health, landscape architecture and urban planning – and considers the opportunities of nature-based solutions for climate change adaptation. This transdisciplinary book will attract a wide audience interested in biodiversity, ecology, resource management, public health, psychology, urban planning, and landscape architecture. The emphasis is on multiple human health benefits from biodiversity - in particular with respect to the increasing challenge of climate change. This makes the book unique to other books that focus either on biodiversity and physical health or natural environments and mental wellbeing. The book is written as a definitive ‘go-to’ book for those who are new to the field of biodiversity and health.

Author : Lucas N. Joppa,Jonathan E. M. Bailie,John G. Robinson
Publisher : John Wiley & Sons
Page : 288 pages
File Size : 44,6 Mb
Release : 2016-02-10
Category : Science
ISBN : 9781118338131

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Protected Areas by Lucas N. Joppa,Jonathan E. M. Bailie,John G. Robinson Pdf

Protected areas spearhead our response to the rapidly accelerating biodiversity crisis. However, while the number of protected areas has been growing rapidly over the past 20 years, the extent to which the world’s protected areas are effectively conserving species, ecosystems, and ecosystem services is poorly understood. Highlights new techniques for better management and monitoring of protected areas Sets guidelines for the decision making processes involved in setting up and maintaining protected areas Fully international in scope and covering all ecosystems and biomes

Author : Tony Allan,Brendan Bromwich,Martin Keulertz,Anthony Colman
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 640 pages
File Size : 47,5 Mb
Release : 2019-09-27
Category : Electronic
ISBN : 9780190669805

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The Oxford Handbook of Food, Water and Society by Tony Allan,Brendan Bromwich,Martin Keulertz,Anthony Colman Pdf

Food, water and society: what is managed by whom, and with what impacts? Our food supply chains are at risk. Water resources--sometimes scarce, often damaged, and always under-valued--are among the major reasons why food and water security rank high every year in the World Economic Forum's major global risk analysis. A stable and sustainable food system is critical to society's survival. This Handbook shows that keeping the food system stable comes at the expense of the environment, especially of water resources and those who consume and manage them. The way the food system operates reflects hard political realities. Rather than pay for the environmental costs of sustainable production, society expects food at ever lower prices. Governments reflect their electorates in this regard. Given that farm production may account for as little as 10% of the food value chain in wealthy economies, it is striking that governments have been unwilling (or unable) to put in place the essential laws and accountability that would enable famers to ensure both production and stewardship. Corporate food traders, food manufacturers, and retailers on the other hand operate in markets that make profits and pay taxes. But these corporations are not contractually bound to utilize highly nutritious, sustainably produced food commodities. The articles in this Oxford Handbook have been written by water and food system scientists and professionals, including farmers, rarely heard voices who understand the problems of food producers, food manufacturers, and regulating markets and public policy. The articles address the blind spots of society and its public policymakers, demonstrating the importance of informing society about the consequences of its food preferences and the heroic challenges it is beginning to face. The damage we are doing to our water and soil ecosystems is as important as the damage we do to the atmosphere. Impressed by the technical and organizational advances of the past two centuries, the contributors featured in this book also take note of where economic inefficiencies and cultural deadlock in a 4,000 year old system are putting our critical food supply chains at risk.

Author : Anastasia Telesetsky,An Cliquet,Afshin Akhtar-Khavari
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
Page : 318 pages
File Size : 52,9 Mb
Release : 2016-12-01
Category : Law
ISBN : 9781317633679

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Ecological Restoration in International Environmental Law by Anastasia Telesetsky,An Cliquet,Afshin Akhtar-Khavari Pdf

Human activities are depleting ecosystems at an unprecedented rate. In spite of nature conservation efforts worldwide, many ecosystems including those critical for human well-being have been damaged or destroyed. States and citizens need a new vision of how humans can reconnect with the natural environment. With its focus on the long-term holistic recovery of ecosystems, ecological restoration has received increasing attention in the past decade from both scientists and policymakers. Research on the implications of ecological restoration for the law and law for ecological restoration has been largely overlooked. This is the first published book to examine comprehensively the relationship between international environmental law and ecological restoration. While international environmental law (IEL) has developed significantly as a discipline over the past four decades, this book enquires whether IEL can now assist states in making a strategic transition from not just protecting and maintaining the natural environment but also actively restoring it. Arguing that states have international duties to restore, this book offers reflections on the philosophical context of ecological restoration and the legal content of a duty to restore from an international law, European Union law and national law perspective. The book concludes with a discussion of several contemporary themes of interest to both lawyers and ecologists including the role of private actors, protected areas and climate change in ecological restoration.

Author : Sonia J. Song
Publisher : AuthorHouse
Page : 296 pages
File Size : 53,5 Mb
Release : 2008-06-19
Category : Biography & Autobiography
ISBN : 9781467867917

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Donkey Baby by Sonia J. Song Pdf

Carried by a donkey during the People’s Liberation Army’s triumphant march to Beijing in 1948-49, a newborn at the birth of New China. Spent her formative years in an idyllic showcase boarding kindergarten, sometimes sitting on the lap of frequent visitor Ho Chi Minh. Daughter of a cabinet minister and member of the communist elite, she saw up-close the power struggles as the turbulent years unfolded: purges, the Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution, and reform attempts. Marched with Che Guevara through Tiananmen Square while in middle school. Faced a crowd of thousands calling her names during the Cultural Revolution. She was forced to watch her mother being tortured by Red Guards. Treated ailing villagers as a barefoot doctor in a commune. Swam across the Yangtze with a rifle on her back when she was a soldier in the People’s Liberation Army. Defied the commissars by folk-dancing in England when she was a government exchange student and under tight control. Trekked the roof of the world in Tibet and Nepal as a tour guide, and savored a high-altitude romance with her mountaineering French lover. Interpreted for Chinese delegations in UN and private meetings with George H. W. Bush, Ronald Reagan, Ferdinand Marcos, and Pope John Paul II. Entered UC Berkeley and earned a master’s and a Ph.D. in comparative legal studies. Saw her dreams for China dashed as students in Tiananmen Square fell under gunfire in June 1989. She refused to back down when the Chinese consulate confiscated her passport for her pro-democracy activities, and stood up to a false accusation that she was a double agent. Survived a vicious frame-up and million-dollar lawsuit. She seized opportunity from adversity and founded Human Harmony ADR, the Bay Area’s first Chinese-English bilingual mediation service. Endured abortion, miscarriage, and acquaintance rape. She raised two good sons as a single mother. Her memoir intertwines intimate personal experience with major events in modern China. Unflagging in her idealism, she never stopped searching for something new to believe in after Mao. Politically active, spiritually grounded, and enjoying soul-satisfying relationships, Sonia Song now lives in Marin County, California and continues to pursue her dream of being a bridge between East and West, China and America. She offers this memoir to her hometown at the time of the Olympics in Beijing. Donkey Baby is her story.

Author : E. Lisa F. Schipper,Jessica Ayers,Hannah Reid,Saleemul Huq,Atiq Rahman
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 304 pages
File Size : 48,5 Mb
Release : 2014-01-21
Category : Business & Economics
ISBN : 9781136252365

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Community-Based Adaptation to Climate Change by E. Lisa F. Schipper,Jessica Ayers,Hannah Reid,Saleemul Huq,Atiq Rahman Pdf

As climate change adaptation rises up the international policy agenda, matched by increasing funds and frameworks for action, there are mounting questions over how to ensure the needs of vulnerable people on the ground are met. Community-based adaptation (CBA) is one growing proposal that argues for tailored support at the local level to enable vulnerable people to identify and implement appropriate community-based responses to climate change themselves. Community Based Adaptation to Climate Change: Scaling it up explores the challenges for meeting the scale of the adaptation challenge through CBA. It asks the fundamental questions: How can we draw replicable lessons to move from place-based projects towards more programmatic adaptation planning? How does CBA fit with larger scale adaptation policy and programmes? How are CBA interventions situated within the institutions that enable or undermine adaptive capacity? Combining the research and experience of prominent adaptation and development theorists and practitioners, this book presents cutting edge knowledge that moves the debate on CBA forward towards effective, appropriate, and ‘scaled-up’ adaptive action.

Author : Nordiska Ministerrådet
Publisher : Nordic Council of Ministers
Page : 78 pages
File Size : 45,5 Mb
Release : 2010
Category : Electronic
ISBN : 9789289320283

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Nordic Biodiversity Beyond 2010 by Nordiska Ministerrådet Pdf

We all depend on biodiversity, but we must make biodiversity relevant to people. The long-term loss of nature and biodiversity is, however, not as easily translated into clear messages, let alone economic opportunities, as are measures to tackle climate change. The changes are dispersed, and often act slowly and subtly. Connecting the economic problems and threats people face due to the degradation of our biological resources is also frequently hard to express in facts and figures, as we have seen with the efforts to replicate the review of the economic impacts of climate change. Yet we all see the impact of degradation and loss of biodiversity in our daily lives when we are hiking, fishing, hunting and enjoying nature. We must create a vision and a powerful metaphor, communicated to and understood by ordinary people, that describes our co-existence with and dependence upon nature and how the loss of nature reflects on ourselves as Nordic people and societies. The need to stop the loss of biodiversity does not end in 2010. What will we call upon now? That is our challenge. On 26-27 October 2009, the Nordic Council of Ministers hosted a Nordic symposium on biodiversity in Trondheim, Norway. The title chosen for this symposium was Nordic Biodiversity Beyond 2010 - Challenges and Experiences in Global Perspective. The aim was to take stock of Nordic biodiversity and look beyond 2010. About 70 participants from all the Nordic countries gathered in Trondheim for two days to start this work. They represented public authorities, non-governmental organizations and research institutions concerned with the goal of halting the loss of biodiversity in the Nordic countries. This report contains the results from this symposium as well as conclusions and recommendations for the future.

Author : Fabrice G. Renaud,Karen Sudmeier-Rieux,Marisol Estrella
Publisher : United Nations University Press
Page : 522 pages
File Size : 54,7 Mb
Release : 2013
Category : Nature
ISBN : 9789280812213

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The Role of Ecosystems in Disaster Risk Reduction by Fabrice G. Renaud,Karen Sudmeier-Rieux,Marisol Estrella Pdf

The uptake of ecosystem-based approaches for disaster risk reduction (DRR) is slow, however, despite some success stories. There are multiple reasons for this reluctance: ecosystem management is rarely considered as part of the portfolio of DRR solutions because the environmental and disaster management communities typically work independently from each other; its contribution to DRR is highly undervalued compared to engineered solutions and therefore not given appropriate budget allocations; and there are poor interactions between policymakers and researchers, leading to unclear and sometimes contradictory scientific information on the role of ecosystems for DRR. The aim of this book is to provide an overview of knowledge and practice in this multidisciplinary field of ecosystems management and DRR. The contributors, professionals from the science and disaster management communities around the world, represent state-of-the-art knowledge, practices, and perspectives on the topic.

Author : Bruce Bueno de Mesquita
Publisher : SAGE
Page : 601 pages
File Size : 46,9 Mb
Release : 2013-01-14
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9781452202983

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Principles of International Politics by Bruce Bueno de Mesquita Pdf

This work shows students how leaders translate their personal interests and ambitions into actions of the state and, thus, demonstrates how international and domestic politics are inextricably linked. It covers topics such as power, the causes of war and international affairs.

Author : Heidi Wittmer,Haripriya Gundimeda
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 386 pages
File Size : 43,7 Mb
Release : 2012
Category : Business & Economics
ISBN : 9781849712521

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The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity in Local and Regional Policy and Management by Heidi Wittmer,Haripriya Gundimeda Pdf

Human well-being is dependent upon 'ecosystem services' provided by nature for free, such as water and air purification, fisheries, timber and nutrient cycling. These are predominantly public goods with no markets and no prices, so their loss is often not detected by our current economic incentive system and therefore continues unabated. A variety of pressures resulting from population growth, changing diets, urbanisation, climate change and many other factors is causing biodiversity to decline and ecosystems to be degraded. The world's.

Author : Stephen Hilgartner,Clark Miller,Rob Hagendijk
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 305 pages
File Size : 44,5 Mb
Release : 2015-03-05
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9781136748271

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Science and Democracy by Stephen Hilgartner,Clark Miller,Rob Hagendijk Pdf

In the life sciences and beyond, new developments in science and technology and the creation of new social orders go hand in hand. In short, science and society are simultaneously and reciprocally coproduced and changed. Scientific research not only produces new knowledge and technological systems but also constitutes new forms of expertise and contributes to the emergence of new modes of living and new forms of exchange. These dynamic processes are tightly connected to significant redistributions of wealth and power, and they sometimes threaten and sometimes enhance democracy. Understanding these phenomena poses important intellectual and normative challenges: neither traditional social sciences nor prevailing modes of democratic governance have fully grappled with the deep and growing significance of knowledge-making in twenty-first century politics and markets. Building on new work in science and technology studies (STS), this book advances the systematic analysis of the coproduction of knowledge and power in contemporary societies. Using case studies in the new life sciences, supplemented with cases on informatics and other topics such as climate science, this book presents a theoretical framing of coproduction processes while also providing detailed empirical analyses and nuanced comparative work. Science and Democracy: Knowledge as Wealth and Power in the Biosciences and Beyond will be interesting for students of sociology, science & technology studies, history of science, genetics, political science, and public administration.

Author : Nadine Salzmann,Christian Huggel,Samuel U. Nussbaumer,Gina Ziervogel
Publisher : Springer
Page : 292 pages
File Size : 53,5 Mb
Release : 2016-10-03
Category : Science
ISBN : 9783319407739

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Climate Change Adaptation Strategies – An Upstream-downstream Perspective by Nadine Salzmann,Christian Huggel,Samuel U. Nussbaumer,Gina Ziervogel Pdf

Climate change and the related adverse impacts are among the greatest challenges facing humankind during the coming decades. Even with a significant reduction of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, it will be inevitable for societies to adapt to new climatic conditions and associated impacts and risks. This book offers insights to first experiences of developing and implementing adaptation measures, with a particular focus on mountain environments and the adjacent downstream areas. It provides a comprehensive ‘state-of-the-art’ of climate change adaptation in these areas through the collection and evaluation of knowledge from several local and regional case studies and by offering new expertise and insights at the global level. As such, the book is an important source for scientists, practitioners and decision makers alike, who are working in the field of climate change adaptation and towards sustainable development in the sense of the Paris Agreement and the Agenda 2030.