The next widespread bamboo flowering poses a massive risk to the giant panda

The IUCN Red List has downgraded several species from “endangered” to “vulnerable” that still have largely unknown extinction risks. We consider one of those downgraded species, the giant panda, a bamboo specialist. Massive bamboo flowering could be a natural disaster for giant pandas. Using scenario analysis, we explored possible impacts of the next bamboo flowering in the Qinling and Minshan Mountains that are home to most giant pandas. Our results showed that the Qinling Mountains could experience large-scale bamboo flowering leading to a high risk of widespread food shortages for the giant pandas by 2020. The Minshan Mountains could similarly experience a large-scale bamboo flowering with a high risk for giant pandas between 2020 and 2030 without suitable alternative habitat in the surrounding areas. These scenarios highlight thus-far unforeseen dangers of conserving giant pandas in a fragmented habitat. We recommend advance measures to protect giant panda from severe population crashes when flowering happens. This study also suggests the need to anticipate and manage long-term risks to other downgraded species

Urbanization and Green Spaces—A Study on Jnana Bharathi Campus, Bangalore University

Global warming is amongst the most alarming problems of the new era. Carbon emission is evidently the strongest fundamental factor for global warming. So increasing carbon emission is one of today’s major concerns, which is well addressed in the Kyoto Protocol. Trees are amongst the most significant elements of any landscape, because of both biomass and diversity, and their key role in ecosystem dynamics is well known. Trees absorb the atmospheric carbon dioxide and act as a carbon sink, since 50 % of biomass is carbon itself and the importance of carbon sequestration in forest areas is already accepted, and well documented. With this background, a carbon sequestration potential study was carried out in Jnana Bharathi campus, Bangalore University using the Quadrat method. The total geographical area is about 449.74 ha with a rich vegetation sector and the total amount of both above ground carbon (AGC) and below ground carbon (BGC) was estimated as an average of 54.8 t/ha. The total amount of carbon dioxide assimilated into the vegetation in terms of both above ground and below ground biomass was estimated as an average of 200.9 t/ha. Urbanization and habitat fragmentation seem to be increasing worldwide, substantiated by a case study in Bangalore City. The analysis revealed that increase in built-up area at the city level was by about 164.62 km2, while the vegetation and water bodies decreased by about 285.72 and 7.2 km2 respectively. However, Bangalore University, Jnana Bharathi campus attains a good vegetation cover and is seen as one of the ‘green lungs’ of Bangalore city

Socio-Cultural Appropriateness of the Use of Historic Persian Gardens for Modern Urban Edible Gardens

Historic gardens have the ability to provide several ecosystem services in cities, including provisioning services (i.e., food production). The historic gardens in Iran (known as “Persian Gardens”) have never been considered as places that could be used for food production. As a result, the purpose of this paper is to investigate whether the Iranian historic gardens’ spatial and structural layout is suitable for modern urban food gardening. We conducted field studies in six recognized Persian gardens in four provinces of Iran via qualitative analysis according to socio-cultural guidelines drawn from a literature review. The results suggested that combining the elements of formal landscape design, non-edible decorative plants, and traditional artwork would increase the Persian gardens’ attractiveness. Regarding encouraging users to become involved in urban gardening, we found that separating productive units containing edible plants from public units using a central meeting spot populated by aesthetic plants and items may attract ordinary visitors who are interested in gardening without disturbing anyone’s activities. Furthermore, the Persian gardens’ multifunctionality, aesthetic value, and health-promoting qualities constitute a considerable historic achievement in garden design, making the gardens a suitable model for edible urban gardening. The results of this study can enhance our understanding of the Persian gardens’ spatial and structural design and provide practical implications for sustainable urban planning and landscape architecture

Ecosystem services research in China: Progress and perspective

This paper provides a comprehensive review of ecosystem services and their economic valuation in China. The main objective of this review is to introduce the findings of the various valuation studies, and explore the challenges that emerged in these studies. This paper shows that ecosystem services research in China went through four stages covering all the main ecosystem types and multi-scales. These studies have raised public awareness of the value of ecological and bio-resource issues, and promoted the establishment of eco-compensation mechanisms in China. However, there are still many controversies and challenges that have emerged from current ecosystem services research. We propose that future ecosystem services research focuses on i) the corresponding definition and classification systems for all ecosystems; ii) the observation and establishment of the relationship between ecosystem structures and corresponding functions; iii) the improvement and normalization of valuation methods; and iv) the exploration and analysis of the spatial and temporal variations of ecosystem services. Furthermore, it is important to improve the accessibility of ecosystem services valuation in environmental decision-making.Ecosystem Ecosystem service Valuation China

Forest Biomass Energy Resources in China: Quantity and Distribution

As one of the most important renewable and sustainable energy sources, the forest biomass energy resource has always been the focus of attention of scholars and policy makers. However, its potential is still uncertain in China, especially with respect to its spatial distribution. In this paper, the quantity and distribution of Chinese forest biomass energy resources are explored based mainly on forestry statistics data rather than forest resource inventory data used by most previous studies. The results show that the forest biomass energy resource in China was 169 million tons in 2010, of which wood felling and bucking residue (WFBR),wood processing residue (WPR), bamboo processing residue, fuel wood and firewood used by farmers accounted for 38%, 37%, 6%, 4% and 15%, respectively. The highest resource was located in East China, accounting for nearly 39.0% of the national amount, followed by the Southwest and South China regions, which accounted for 17.4% and 16.3%, respectively. At the provincial scale, Shandong has the highest distribution, accounting for 11.9% of total resources, followed by Guangxi and Fujian accounting for 10.3% and 10.2%, respectively. The actual wood-processing residue (AWPR) estimated from the actual production of different wood products (considering the wood transferred between regions) showed apparent differences from the local wood processing residue (LWPR), which assumes that no wood has been transferredbetween regions. Due to the large contribution of WPR to total forestry bioenergy resources, the estimation of AWPR will provide a more accurate evaluation of the total amount and the spatial distribution of forest biomass energy resources in China