Forest fires and fire management in Sweden

Forest fires have been an influential disturbance on the flora and the fauna both in the Boreal and in the Mediterranean regions. Through this project, it has been shown that this problem is very different from one region to the other. In the Boreal region, there is a lack of forest fires due to the intense and efficient fight against them, which may result in a less diverse flora and fauna. In the Mediterranean region the forest fires burn every year a large surface, sometimes even jeopardizing people's lives. This enormous difference is mainly due to climatic and socio-economic factors. In Boreal regions, the main cause for forest fires is lightning ignition, while in the Mediterranean region it involves just a low percentage of the total forest fires; most of them are caused by men, with a high incidence of arson due to different conflicts. Once that the forest fires are not any longer a problem in the Boreal region, the use of prescribed burning has received a renewed interest. By mean of this, it is tried to favour the different fire-adapted organisms and to create favourable conditions for forest regeneration. Different studies have shown the benefits of the forest fires for the regeneration of several species. The present goal for forest companies, as expressed in their policies and in the forest certification criteria, is to burn a specific amount of land. It is likely that in the future, emphasis will shift towards obtaining maximal ecological gains with the aid of fire. The problem of fire management is not to abolish fire but to establish its proper proportion, to reconcile fire use with fire control. What this means specifically will vary with the specific purposes of specific lands. Within the Mediterranean region the current situation is completely different. Despite all the efforts made and all the money invested, forest fires keep on being a serious problem. The number of forest fires is increasing every year, although the total area burnt is slightly decreasing. Even though a big effort is being made throughout this entire region, forest fires still spread over large surfaces every year. Throughout this project, I have also gone through the different ways of fighting forest fires, from the prevention to the extinction, and some of the new technologies that are already being used

Better Differentially Private Approximate Histograms and Heavy Hitters using the Misra-Gries Sketch

We consider the problem of computing differentially private approximate histograms and heavy hitters in a stream of elements. In the non-private setting, this is often done using the sketch of Misra and Gries [Science of Computer Programming, 1982]. Chan, Li, Shi, and Xu [PETS 2012] describe a differentially private version of the Misra-Gries sketch, but the amount of noise it adds can be large and scales linearly with the size of the sketch: the more accurate the sketch is, the more noise this approach has to add. We present a better mechanism for releasing a Misra-Gries sketch under (ε,δ)-differential privacy. It adds noise with magnitude independent of the size of the sketch size, in fact, the maximum error coming from the noise is the same as the best known in the private non-streaming setting, up to a constant factor. Our mechanism is simple and likely to be practical. We also give a simple post-processing step of the Misra-Gries sketch that does not increase the worst-case error guarantee. It is sufficient to add noise to this new sketch with less than twice the magnitude of the non-streaming setting. This improves on the previous result for ε-differential privacy where the noise scales linearly to the size of the sketch

Orientations and Placement of the Middle and Late Neolithic Housepits of Ostrobothnia: A First Investigation Based on On-site and Lidar Observations

The orientations and placements of 349 single-room and 72 multi-room housepits or 'longhouses' of Middle and Late Neolithic Ostrobothnia have been analysed and compared with each other and the orientations and placement of the Giants' Churches. It was found that while the housepits in general were often oriented along the local termin, some of them were oriented towards certain, probably astronomically determined directions. The astronomical orientations seem to be related to hitherto unrecognized subgroups of the housepits, which were partly covered but not exhausted by the selected subgroups of this study. The multi-room pithouses a.k.a. terraced houses and 'longhouses' had an orientation distribution different from all other subgroups of housepits and the Giants' Churches, and may have been deliberately oriented perpendicular to the Giants' Churches. The doorways of rectangular housepits were found to mostly reflect the axial orientations of the housepits, and there may have been regional differences: in the large dwelling sites of Kokkola-Kruunupyy-Pedersöre region, the doorways of the housepits seem to have been preferably oriented towards the four cardinal directions. The astronomical orientations of the housepits may indicate the ex.istence of a lunar or lunisolar "seasonal pointer" calendric system, the kinds of wh ich have previously been detected in the Giants' Churches and European megalithic monuments. It was observed that in addition to possible astronomical orientations, also cairns and other signs of ritualization, which are frequently encountered with the Giants' Churches, are seen around some middle-sized and large housepits. The ritualization of a housepit could be connected to beliefs concerning the 'death' of a house, and the process of turning a decaying pithouse into a ritual site, perhaps a mortuary or ancestral monument. Among the housepits, the existence of the class of 'central', i.e. prominently placed middle-sized or large housepits is suggested. The central housepits cannot be distinguished from the Giants' Churches by their placement among other housepits or orientations alone, and together these two categories of prominent structures may indicate the existence of social and/or regional hierarchy with different levels in Late Neolithic Ostrobothnia

Arts-Based Methods for Decolonising Participatory Research

In an effort to challenge the ways in which colonial power relations and Eurocentric knowledges are reproduced in participatory research, this book explores whether and how it is possible to use arts-based methods for creating more horizontal and democratic research practices. In discussing both the transformative potential and limitations of arts-based methods, the book asks: What can arts-based methods contribute to decolonising participatory research and its processes and practices? The book takes part in ongoing debates related to the need to decolonise research, and investigates practical contributions of arts-based methods in the practice-led research domain. Further, it discusses the role of artistic research in depth, locating it in a decolonising context. The book will be of interest to scholars working in art history, design, fine arts, service design, social sciences and development studies

The 9th International Conference on Sustainable Development

The International Conference on Sustainable Development (ICSD) was held virtually on September 20-21, 2021, with the conference theme “Research for Impact: A Sustainable and Inclusive Planet.” ICSD provides a forum for academia, government, civil society, UN agencies, and the private sector to come together to share practical solutions to achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The two-day conference hosted 49 different sessions across multiple time zones to accommodate the global audience, with 204 oral presenters, 239 poster presenters, and 977 total authors

Brand Response to Consumer Backlash in Social Media: A Typology

The use of social media by consumers to admonish firms for their conduct has become increasingly common. Such backlash can take many forms and often occurs rapidly, spreads widely and is highly visible. The potential damage to brands can be severe if these situations are not dealt with effectively. To date, the issue has been examined relatively superficially in a range of disciplines without specific regard to the management of consumer-brand relationships in online environments. Our research examines the nature of company reactions to social media backlash and conceptualises a typology that categorises reputational damage and effective response. We present four typical reactionary scenarios and conclude that insufficient research exists in this domain proportionate to the level of consumer-brand social media discourse to the peril of practitioners operating via these channel