INNOVATIVE TOOLS TO ADDRESS DROUGHT RISK IN GRAZING LANDS

Livestock Production/Industries, Risk and Uncertainty,

Responding to natural disasters: Examining identity and prosociality in the context of a major earthquake

How does a major natural disaster relate to individuals’ orientation towards society? We collected repeated cross‐sectional surveys before (n = 644) and after the 2010 Chile earthquake (n = 1,389) to examine levels of national identity, prosocial values, helping motivations, and prosocial behaviours in the context of such a calamitous societal event. Our research questions, derived from the literature on helping in times of crisis, considered how natural disasters may implicate identity and prosociality, as well as how identity, prosocial values, and motivations are linked to prosocial action after a disaster. Higher levels of national identity, helping motivations, and disaster‐related helping were found after the earthquake, suggesting that in the aftermath of a disaster, people unite under a common national identity and are motivated to take action related to disaster relief. National identity and prosocial values were closely linked to helping after the earthquake, but specific helping motivations rarely predicted prosocial behaviours. Additionally, proximity to the epicentre was related to higher levels of national identity and participation in reconstruction efforts. These findings contribute to our understanding of people's responses to natural disasters and suggest ways of encouraging prosocial behaviour in the aftermath of unexpected tragic events

Ammonia emissions from livestock production in Chile: an inventory and uncertainty analysis

Indexación: Web of Science; Scielo.The objective of this work was to quantify the country's NH3 emissions from livestock production. This calculation was based on the mass flow of total ammoniacal nitrogen (TAN). The analysis was performed for all 15 geographical regions in Chile. The definition of livestock subcategories was based on data from the Chilean Agriculture and Forestry Census as well as technical reports published by the Chilean National Statistics Institute. Significant differences were observed among the sources of livestock emissions in Chile's regions, and there was high variability depending on the degree of livestock confinement. In 2013, the total calculated emissions were 69.1 kt NH3/year (± 31.1). The O’Higgins Region had the highest NH3 emissions in Chile, representing 45% of the total. In terms of livestock production, 45% of the emissions were generated by pigs, 22% by poultry, 16% by cattle, 11% by equines and 4% by sheep. Emissions from the TAN that was available during manure and slurry management and the degree of animal confinement were the primary sources of uncertainty. This uncertainty could be greatly reduced by developing regional emission factors and by including the degree of animal confinement in Chile's national statistics such as the Agriculture, Livestock and Forestry Census.http://www.scielo.cl/scielo.php?pid=S0718-95162016005000005&script=sci_abstrac

Health and heating in the city of Temuco (Chile). Monetary savings of replacing biomass with PV system in the residential sector

The paper conducts a comprehensive analysis of replacing residential use of wood burning stoves for heating with photovoltaic systems for the generation of electricity using storage batteries (PV + storage systems). The research focuses on the city of Temuco (Southern Chile) as a case study, since this city has a high use of firewood for heating (80% of households) and also because this city has been declared by authorities as an area saturated with suspended particles. The total cost corresponds to the acquisition of systems. The reduction of monetary value of the impact of polluting emissions, resulting from the combustion of firewood, on health and traffic accidents is calculated. The interactive tool GDB Compare has been used to calculate the impact of pollution on health both in terms of attributable deaths and disability-adjusted life years. The monetary value of the impact on health has been calculated using two alternative approaches: the value of statistical life and the human capital approach. To identify firewood use requirements, heating degree–days has been used for temperatures ≤15 °C and ≤18 °C. The emissions avoided calculations have been refined, including emissions associated with the manufacture and transport of systems through the life cycle analysis. For all scenarios, the main results show that the savings outweigh the costs

Determining the driving forces to environmental change processes of La Araucanía, Chile. The "cultural landscape" as a framework

Indexación: Scopus; Scielo.El artículo propone el concepto de paisaje cultural como una perspectiva holística de análisis de procesos de transformación del paisaje. Para ello se utilizó como caso de estudio el proceso de degradación ambiental de la región de La Araucanía (Chile). Se esclarecieron las motivaciones de las actuaciones en el territorio y sus fuerzas conductoras. Estas fuerzas se relacionan a objetivos económicos externos a la población local y generaron una transformación del paisaje impactando la forma de vida de sus habitantes, quebrando el acoplamiento estructural entre población y paisaje, resultando en un paisaje cultural degradado ambientalmente.The notion of cultural landscape was deployed to analyze transformation processes of rural landscapes. As a case study, environmental degradation processes in La Araucania (Chile) region were analyzed. The goals of actions over the territory and their driving forces were determined. These actions were related to economic motives external to local inhabitants and produced deep transformations of the landscape and impacted the way of life of its inhabitants, breaking down the structural coupling between population and landscape, resulting in an environmentally degraded cultural landscape.https://scielo.conicyt.cl/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0719-26812017000300051&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=e

Dibujar el territorio de la Araucanía, Chile: aproximaciones cartográficas a las construcciones territoriales que se dieron desde la llegada de los españoles (siglo XVI) hasta los inicios de la República (siglo XIX)

El siguiente trabajo presenta un acercamiento al territorio de la Araucanía durante un espacio de tiempo (principalmente desde el siglo XVI al XIX). Durante este período el territorio fue construido por dos culturas de una forma asimétrica. Por una parte, fue construida por el pueblo mapuche o araucano y, por otra, por la colonia española. Presentaremos una exposición de las principales formas de construcción territorial que se conocen de aquella época, tanto las morfologías territoriales mapuches como las españolas. El trabajo se basa principalmente en las fuentes de la historia, la antropología y la cartografía.The following work presents an approach to the territory of Araucanía during a space of time (mainly from the 16th to the 19th century). During this period the territory was built by two cultures in an asymmetrical way. On the one hand, it was built by the Mapuche or Araucanian people and, on the other hand, by the Spanish colony. We will present an exposition of the main forms of territorial construction that are known from that time, both the Mapuche and Spanish territorial morphologies. The work is based mainly on the sources of history, anthropology and cartography

South American Melolonthinae (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae) classification and nomenclature: some problems and solutions

Classificatory changes are made for some taxa of New World Melolonthinae based on the examination of specimens (including type specimens) and a reevaluation of some of the characters used to justify previous classification decisions. Blepharotoma angustata (Blanchard) (new combination) is transferred from the genus Aplodema Blanchard. The Neotropical members of the genus Heteronyx Guérin-Méneville are transferred to the genus Blepharotoma resulting in the following new combinations: Blepharotoma boliviana (Moser), Blepharotoma corumbana (Moser), Blepharotoma cuyabana (Moser), Blepharotoma heynei (Moser), and Blepharotoma schencklingi (Moser). The genus Blepharotoma is transferred from the tribe Liparetrini to the tribe Sericoidini. The genus Aplodema and the junior synonym Haplodema Harold are transferred from the tribe Liparetrini to the tribe Sericoidini and synonymized with the genus Sericoides Guérin-Méneville. Sericoides magellanica (Blanchard) (new combination) is transferred from the genus Aplodema and placed as a senior synonym of Apterodema acuticollis Fairmaire (new synonymy). Ampliodactylus (new genus) is described for two southern South American species: Ampliodactylus marmoratus (Curtis) (new combination) and Ampliodactylus vestitus (Philippi) (new combination). The genus Chremastodus Solier is placed in synonymy with the genus Macrodactylus Dejean (Macrodactylini) and Chremastodus pubescens Solier is placed as a junior synonym of Macrodactylus chilensis Solier (new synonymy). Macrodactylus crassipes Philippi and Macrodactylus nigrinus Philippi are placed as junior synonyms of Macrodactylus farinosus Philippi (new synonymies). The genus Astaenosiagum Martínez is placed in synonymy with the genus Pristerophora Harold (Macrodactylini). Pristerophora longipes (Philippi) (new combination) is transferred from the genus Astaenosiagum and Schizochelus ursulus Philippi is placed as a junior synonym of this species (new synonymy). Pristerophora paulseni (new species) is described. Pristerophora picipennis (Solier) is placed as a senior synonym of Schizochelus breviventris Philippi (new synonymy) and Schizochelus serratus Philippi (new synonymy). Pusiodactylus (new genus) is described for two southern South American species: Pusiodactylus mondacai (new species) and Pusiodactylus flavipennis (Philippi) (new combination). The genus Paulosawaya Martínez and D'Andretta is placed in synonymy with the genus Clavipalpus Laporte (Macrodactylini) resulting in the new combination Clavipalpus ornatissima (Martínez and D'Andretta). The following replacement names are proposed for three junior secondary homonyms the genus Plectris LePeletier and Serville: Plectris evansi (new name) for Plectris cinerascens Moser (junior secondary homonym of Plectris cinerascens (Blanchard)), Plectris katovichi (new name) for Plectris bonariensis Frey (junior secondary homonym of Plectris bonariensis (Bruch)), and Plectris tacoma (new name) for Plectris comata (Blanchard) (junior secondary homonym of Plectris comata (Blanchard))