Prototype of social-ecological system’s resilience analysis using a dynamic index

Resilience is understood as a social-ecological system (SES) property that embodies nature and society and a research perspective with high potential to be applied in reaching sustainability goals. A system’s property is composed of ecological and social limits representing boundaries that, if trespassed, result in the system’s regime change with increasing uncertainties. These changes can impact the reliability of delivering a set of desired ecosystem services, and consequently, society’s wellbeing can be negatively affected. Thus, modeling a complex and adaptive SES, with feedback, nonlinearities, and path–dependence becomes a crucial tool to inform building a responsible governance behavior that tackles SES resilience. This work built a prototype model of SES resilience for a case study in a Brazilian coastal city with the following aims: 1) to formalize the principles underpinning resilience into a dynamic index, 2) to assess the extent to which this understanding highlights system interdependencies and tradeoffs, and 3) to learn about the benefits of making quantitative assessments of such socio–institutional principles. Multiscale Integrated Model of Ecosystem Services – MIMES (Boumans et al., 2015, Oliveira et al., 2022) is a SES modeling framework using System Dynamics that embraces complexities’ attributes in an interdisciplinary and integrated model. Constructing a causal loop diagram embracing the social sphere represented by the seven resilience principles proposed by Biggs et al. (2015), revealed the necessity to include social goals in the model. It was considered that the Homo economicus represents the most common social perspective and determinant for those goals. Ten different types of ecosystem services were extracted from the ecological part of the simulation (Oliveira et al. 2022) and then combined with those seven resilience principles into the Dynamic Resilience Index (DRI) using a Cobb Douglas–like production function. The numerical simulation produced four insights about resilience that are described and discussed: 1st insight: resilience of what to what? The resilience of the whole system in providing a set of Ecosystem Services against changes in slow variables; 2nd insight: resilience presents seasonal variations; 3rd insight: the system is operating as if it is in the K phase during ecological succession; 4th insight: not all resilience principles have the same weight in resilience. Conclusions point out that resilience can present seasonal variations, and that response diversity and functional redundancy are leverage principles with higher influence in resilience

A feasibility study on Lambunao coffee crops enhancement and processing project

IntroductionBackground and Rationale Coffee is a simple yet organic part of the breakfast table. Either as home brewed, as instant coffee or as an expensive concoction sold in multinational coffee shops, it sure does entice the Filipino taste. These days, coffee drinking is being transformed from simply a way of life to one of a status symbol. Behind every cup of coffee, however, lies a very tedious job of farming, harvesting, post-harvesting, processing, farm-to-market transporting, grading, cleaning, blending, roasting, grinding for roast and for ground coffee, processing into instant coffee, packing and distribution to wholesalers and retailers, and then finally to our breakfast table. Coffee is one of the oldest crops produced here in the Philippines. The tree was first known before the year 1740 when it was first planted in Lipa, Batangas. Coffee production peaked in 1880 when the Philippines became the fourth largest exporter in the world. In 1960, the Philippine government came up with a program aimed at improving the quality of coffee production. As a result, the Philippines further became popular as exporter of coffee, especially when production of major exporters like Brazil & Angola suffered due to extreme cold climate. In 1980, a new variety called “Robusta” introduced. The variety has good quality and produces higher yield. But in 1990, the International “quota” for coffee was abolished and resulted to a very low price for coffee. As a result, a lot of farmers discontinued coffee production and shifted to other crops. There was also a sudden drop in production in 1990 when the crop was stricken by an epidemic called “Coffee Rust”. The drink that keeps us Ilonggos awake has it’s own shaking up to do. Presently, the Philippine coffee industry is a slowly dying one. It has not been a profitable undertaking especially since the prices for coffee beans are down. In response, government created the Presidential Task Force on Coffee production in order to revive the sluggish coffee industry. The Department of Agriculture has recognized coffee as one of the “high value commercial crops” in the Gintong Ani Program. Moreover, Nestle’ Philippines is the major buyer of coffee produced under the Gintong Ani Program. Objectives of the Project The study sought to determine the feasibility of a Coffee Crop Enhancement and Processing Project in Lambunao Iloilo (CCEPP). The desire for this study has been very timely with the establishment of the National Task Force on Coffee Rehabilitation whose mandate includes revitalizing and rehabilitating 22,000 hectares of coffee farms, establishing and implementing standards of quality coffee production, milling and roasting to be used locally and for exports purposes. Aside from being a valuable material for the Municipality of Lambunao, this study is intended for use by the different players of the coffee industry and as reference material for other LGU’s, NGO’s and others who wish to work on a similar project. Scope of the Project This study covers the marketing, technical, financial, economic, environmental, logical framework and institutional aspect of the Coffee Enhancement Program. Basically, this study will show the feasibility of the project in the Municipality of Lambunao, Iloilo. Study Approach This study employed the use of secondary data, expert’s opinion, interview, survey, and needs assessment. The team gathered information and insights from the Department of Agriculture on priority projects of the province. Secondary data on the coffee industry of the Municipality of Lambunao and other pertinent data.Includes bibliographical referencesMaster in Public Administratio

Managerial Views of Corporate Impacts and Dependencies on Ecosystem Services : A Case of International and Domestic Forestry Companies in China

A line of research is emerging investigating the private sector impacts and dependencies on critical biodiversity and ecosystem services, and related business risks and opportunities. While the ecosystem services narrative is being forwarded globally as a key paradigm for promoting business sustainability, there is scarce knowledge of how these issues are considered at managerial level. This study thus investigates managerial views of corporate sustainability after the ecosystem services concept. We analyse interviews conducted with 20 managers from domestic and international forestry companies operating with a plantation-based business model in China. Content analysis was employed to analyse the data, with a focus on four key areas: (1) interviewee familiarity with the ecosystem services concept; (2) their views of corporate dependencies and impacts on ecosystem services; (3) related business risks and opportunities; and (4) viability of existing instruments and practices that can be employed in detecting and addressing business impacts and dependencies on ecosystem services. Through an inductive approach to the empirical findings, we refined a framework that holds operational value for developing company response strategies to ecosystem services impact/dependence assessment, ensuring that all issues are addressed comprehensively, and that related risks and opportunities are properly acknowledged.Peer reviewe

Assessment of life cycle impacts on ecosystem services: promise, problems and prospects

The analysis of ecosystem services (ES) is becoming a key-factor to implement policies on sustainable technologies. Accordingly, life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) methods are more and more oriented toward the development of harmonized characterization models to address impacts on ES. However, such efforts are relatively recent and have not reached full consensus yet. We investigate here on the transdisciplinary pillars related to the modeling of LCIA on ES by conducting a critical review and comparison of the state-of-the-art in both LCIA and ES domains. We observe that current LCIA practices to assess impacts on "ES provision" suffer from incompleteness in modeling the cause-effect chains; the multifunctionality of ecosystems is omitted; and the "flow" nature of ES is not considered. Furthermore, ES modeling in LCIA is limited by its static calculation framework, and the valuation of ES also experiences some limitations. The conceptualization of land use (changes) as the main impact driver on ES, and the corresponding approaches to retrieve characterization factors, eventually embody several methodological shortcomings, such as the lack of time-dependency and interrelationships between elements in the cause-effect chains. We conclude that future LCIA modeling of ES could benefit from the harmonization with existing integrated multiscale dynamic integrated approaches

An improved life cycle impact assessment principle for assessing the impact of land use on ecosystem services

In order to consider the effects of land use, and the land cover changes it causes, on ecosystem services in life cycle assessment (LCA), a new methodology is proposed and applied to calculate midpoint and endpoint characterization factors. To do this, a cause-effect chain was established in line with conceptual models of ecosystem services to describe the impacts of land use and related land cover changes. A high-resolution, spatially explicit and temporally dynamic modeling framework that integrates land use and ecosystem services models was developed and used as an impact characterization model to simulate that cause-effect chain. Characterization factors (CFs) were calculated and regionalized at the scales of Luxembourg and its municipalities, taken as a case to show the advantages of the modeling approach. More specifically, the calculated CFs enable the impact assessment of six land cover types on six ecosystem functions and two final ecosystem services. A mapping and comparison exercise of these CFs allowed us to identify spatial trade-offs and synergies between ecosystem services due to possible land cover changes. Ultimately, the proposed methodology can offer a solution to overcome a number of methodological limitations that still exist in the characterization of impacts on ecosystem services in LCA, implying a rethinking of the modeling of land use in life cycle inventory

Diversité et fonctions microbiennes en milieu aquatique

National audienceLes intitulés des communications sont les suivants : (1) "Fonctionnement microbien de biofilms épilithiques épipsammiques de 3 cours d'eau chimiquement contrastés", (2) "Influence de la fraction biotique provenant de différents effluents de stations d'épuration sur les cinétiques de nitrification en masse d'eau. Étude in vitro à effectif initial équivalent de bactéries nitrosantes", (3) "Etude de la dynamique du biofilm de Garonne sous conditions variées de charge eutrophisante", (4) "Diversité génétique et dynamique des bactéries et des cyanophages dans les grands lacs alpin français (Annecy, Bourget, Leman", (5)Étude de la réponse de la communauté périphytique suite à un rejet de déversoir d`orage simulé en canaux artificiels : influence de la durée d`exposition" et (6) "Evaluation de l'impact d'un effluent industriel sur le périphyton des eaux courantes"