Water allocation policies in coastal Karnataka: an analysis of Nethravathy River Basin

The paper to looks at the water allocation policy follow in coastal Karnataka. The state water policy accords top priority to drinking water followed by irrigation, power generation through hydroelectric projects, agro industries, industries and transport. However, there is a mismatch in the policy and its implementation. The analysis of the information and data shows that there are negative social and ecological impacts on the livelihood of the farmers and fisher folk because of poor implementation of these policies. Karnataka Agricultural Policy - 2006 is focused on doubling the agricultural production in the next decade with the aim of achieving a 4.5% growth rate for the agriculture sector and a subsequent increase in the net income of the farmer. Simultaneously, the Karnataka government is planning to set up a PCPIL (petroleum, chemicals and petrochemical investment region) in Dakshin Kanadda (DK) and set up MSEZ near Mangalore as a precursor to the PCPIL project. The area selected for setting up the petrochemical zone comprise villages which are currently involved in agriculture, horticulture and fisheries. The establishment of PCPIL and MSEZ are likely to increase the pressure on the Nethrawathy and Gurupur river basins and cause serious degradation of the marine ecology of the region adversely affecting fist yields. The proposed project is similar to the Reliance petrochemicals project in Jamnagar, Gujarat, which has had serious implications for the welfare of the villages displaced and the ecology. The paper tries to analyses and point out ways in which DK and Mangalore region are likely to be affected because of the proposed petrochemical development. The state has pursued and implemented the water policy contrary to the suggestions from expert recommendations. This is likely to lead to negative impacts on the livelihood of the local communities.Length: pp.558-568River basinsWater pollutionIndustrializationCoastal areaWater allocationWater policyFisheriesSocial impactEconomic impact

Microvariability in BL Lacertae : "zooming'' into the innermost blazar regions

In this work, we present the results of our multi-band microvariability study of the famous blazar BL Lac. We performed microvariablity observations of the source in the optical VRI bands for four nights in 2016. We studied the intranight flux and spectral variability of the source in detail with an objective to characterize microvariability in the blazars, a frequently observed phenomenon in blazars. The results show that the source often displays a fast flux variability with an amplitude as large as ~0.2 magnitude within a few hours, and that the color variability in the similar time scales can be characterized as “bluer-when-brighter” trend. We also observed markedly curved optical spectrum during one of the nights. Furthermore, the correlation between multi-band emission shows that in general the emission in all the bands are highly correlated; and in one of the nights V band emission was found to lead the I band emission by ~13 min. The search for characteristic timescale using z-transformed auto-correlation function and the structure function analyses reveals characteristic timescale of ~50 min in one of the R band observations. We try to explain the observed results in the context of the passage of shock waves through the relativistic outflows in blazars

Alternative to Comprehensive Ecosystem Services Markets: The Contribution of Forest-Related Programs in New Zealand

Due to the public goods characteristics of many ecosystem services and their vital importance to human welfare, various mechanisms have been put in place to motivate private landowners in the provision of ecosystem services. A common approach is to try to develop a comprehensive ecosystem services market where landowners can receive payments from beneficiaries of ecosystem services. Much research has been directed at developing methods for valuing the range of ecosystem services so that they can be incorporated into ecosystem services markets. However, valuation methods are difficult, expensive and time consuming. Other approaches to the provision of ecosystem services such as payments for ecosystem services usually focus on a single service like water or biodiversity. However, in the provision of a particular ecosystem service, there are spill-over effects of providing other ecosystem services, and thus studying those spill-over effects may provide a simple and cost-effective way of ensuring the provision of a wide range of ecosystem services. In New Zealand, there are a variety of forestry programs which provide incentives to landowners to plant trees on their lands to meet particular objectives, but which also produce other ES. This research aims to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of the provision of a wide range of ES by these approaches, the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme, the East Coast Forestry Scheme, and the QEII National Trust.ecosystem services market, spill-over effect, cost-effectiveness, New Zealand, Environmental Economics and Policy,

Nepalese trekking guides: A quantitative study of sexual health knowledge and sexual behaviour

Background: Tourism, a global industry, brings with it a number of public health problems, one of which is the spread of sexually transmitted infections transmitted between travellers and hosts. Previous studies have largely focused on sex workers and sex tourists. This study assesses sexual behaviour, knowledge and condom use among male trekking guides in Nepal. Methods: A self-administered questionnaire survey (n=324) was conducted using snowball sampling amongst men working as mountain trekking guides in Nepal. Results: Most respondents (59%) had initiated sex before the age of 18. Most (84 %) reported sexual relations with a woman other than their partner, 46% reported foreign partners, 43% had Nepalese partners, and 28% had concurrent foreign and Nepalese partners. Most (70 %) reported ever having sex with a foreign woman and two-thirds had had sexual intercourse with foreign women in the previous 12 months. Participants’ age, education status, age of first sex, smoking and drinking habits and English proficiency were significant predictors of having sex with foreign women. About 60% reported condom use during their most recent occasion of extra-martial sex. A similar proportion had used a condom during last sexual intercourse with a foreign woman. The likelihood of condom use was associated with a guide’s age, educational level, ethnicity, age of first sex and work experience. Conclusions: Most trekking guides reported sexual relations with foreign women as well as irregular use of condoms. Although sexual health knowledge about among trekking guides is high, some misconceptions still result in unsafe sex. Hence there is an urgent need to revise the existing training for trekking guides and implement appropriate health promotion programmes

Permutation Polynomials modulo n

Based on preliminary numerical computations, we give complete results for linear and quadratic polynomials. Rivest’s result holds in the linear case while there are plenty of counterexamples in the quadratic case

Frechet algebras with a Laurent series generator and the annulus algebras

Banach and Frechet algebras with a Laurent series generator are investigated leading, via the discrete Beurling algebras, to functional analytic characterisations of the holomorphic function algebras on the annulus as well as the C∞-algebra on the unit circle

Oxidation mechanism in metal nanoclusters: Zn nanoclusters to ZnO hollow nanoclusters

Zn nanoclusters (NCs) are deposited by Low-energy cluster beam deposition technique. The mechanism of oxidation is studied by analysing their compositional and morphological evolution over a long span of time (three years) due to exposure to ambient atmosphere. It is concluded that the mechanism proceeds in two steps. In the first step, the shell of ZnO forms over Zn NCs rapidly up to certain limiting thickness: with in few days -- depending upon the size -- Zn NCs are converted to Zn-ZnO (core-shell), Zn-void-ZnO, or hollow ZnO type NCs. Bigger than ~15 nm become Zn-ZnO (core-shell) type: among them, NCs above ~25 nm could able to retain their initial geometrical shapes (namely triangular, hexagonal, rectangular and rhombohedral), but ~25 to 15 nm size NCs become irregular or distorted geometrical shapes. NCs between ~15 to 5 nm become Zn-void-ZnO type, and smaller than ~5 nm become ZnO hollow sphere type i.e. ZnO hollow NCs. In the second step, all Zn-void-ZnO and Zn-ZnO (core-shell) structures are converted to hollow ZnO NCs in a slow and gradual process, and the mechanism of conversion proceeds through expansion in size by incorporating ZnO monomers inside the shell. The observed oxidation behaviour of NCs is compared with theory of Cabrera - Mott on low-temperature oxidation of metal.Comment: 9 pages, 8 figure