Ongoing rehabilitation of coastal communities in Aceh province : a new project

This article presents an overview of the project on Rehabilitation of Fisheries and Aquaculture in Tsunami-affected Coastal Communities in Aceh Province. Building on the research results from the recently completed projects detailed in the previous articles, this project shall synthesize information on coastal fishing communities and resources in order to develop site-specific management options to support rehabilitation of fisheries and aquaculture.Disasters, Coastal zone, ISEW, Indonesia, Aceh,

Towards Sustainable Development of Small-Scale Fisheries in the Philippines: Experiences and Lessons Learned from Eight Regional Sites

The focus of this paper is on the governance of small-scale or municipal fisheries in the Philippines in light of the critical role they play in the livelihoods of coastal communities and in the nation as a whole. The information and insights presented in this lessons learned brief derive from the project entitled Strengthening Governance and Sustainability of Small-Scale Fisheries Management in the Philippines: An Ecosystem Approach. The project was funded principally by the Department of Agriculture's Bureau of Agricultural Research (DA-BAR), and implemented from 2008 to 2011 by WorldFish in collaboration with the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) and selected partners. The underlying project's goal was to 'strengthen governance and sustainability of small-scale fisheries management in the Philippines.' There were a variety of objectives spread across two project phases but the primary objectives relevant to this brief include: (1) identifying issues at project sites and assessing potential for an ecosystem based approach to fisheries management, and (2) assessing current fisheries management practices at different levels of governance and identifying best practices. The purposes of this paper are twofold. First, it aims to provide brief highlights of the project findings; second, it aims to present the lessons learned in project implementation covering substantive sectoral concerns as well as methodological issues. It wraps up with some strategic directions that need to be undertaken to reverse the deteriorating conditions of small-scale fisheries (SSF) while at the same time promoting their sustainable development

Fisheries rehabilitation in post-tsunami Aceh: Status and needs from participatory appraisals

The widespread and long-term nature of the tsunami damage in Aceh province, Indonesia has threatened the continued use of coastal and fisheries resources. This article describes the application of the Rapid Appraisal of Fisheries Management System (RAFMS) methodology and presents key findings from the participatory appraisals in 15 study sites. The focus is on changes in the number and types of fishing boats and fishing effort, consumption and marketing flow patterns and community perspectives on livelihood options. The level of aid (for new boats), mainly from international organizations, has been unevenly distributed with the number of boats in 13 of 15 villages still being well below the pre-tsunami levels. A focus on supplying small vessels may put increased fishing pressure on the near-shore zone. Consumption data and marketing flows suggest that most fishing villages are supplying outside markets and adding considerably to the wider food security of the province. Despite the tsunami, marine fisheries-related livelihoods are still preferred, although there are indications for the potential expansion of livelihoods into the culture of new species. Alternative resource-based livelihoods need to be tested and refined to fit the needs of the current conditions in Aceh to provide viable options for eliminating hunger and reducing poverty

Optimal endowments of public investment: an empirical analysis for the Spanish regions

Following Aschauer's (1989) influential contribution, the role of public investment has been stressed as a crucial factor leading to higher private capital productivity, which would lead in turn to higher growth rates. According to this author, the decline in productivity growth experienced by the US economy during the seventies, would explained to a great extent by the decrease in the provision of public infrastructures during that period. In this way, the next years have witnessed the appearance of a great amount of empirical literature that analysed the impact of public investment on economic growth. Although the first empirical studies made use of aggregate time series for countries, this approach has been also extended to a regional framework using panel data, obtaining results that were quantitatively lower than those found with aggregate data. The reason would be the spillover effects related to the regional endowments of public capital, whose effect would extend not only the own region, but also to the neighbouring regions. In any case, public infrastructure seems to play an important role in the growth process of regions that should not be neglected. On the other hand, the issue of the optimal endowments of public infrastructure has been hardly discussed. In a recent paper, Karras (1997) has developed a simple condition to assess whether public capital is optimally provided, namely, whether the marginal productivities of both private and public capital are equal or not. By estimating a simple growth equation for fifteen European countries during the period 1960-1992, he is unable to reject the null hypothesis that the marginal productivities of private and public capital are equal, so that government investment would be neither underprovided nor overprovided in the fifteen countries of his sample. In this paper we try to address this issue (i.e., whether the endowments of public investment are optimal or not) in a regional framework, using Spanish data for the period 1967-91. Unlike Karras (1997), who assumes that the production function exhibits constant returns to scale in all factors, we are able to generalise his condition without the need of this constraint. On the other hand, the Spanish economy can provide an interesting case of study, since it has experienced a sustained period of growth in the last forty years, which has been accompanied by a strong process of structural change. In particular, the establishment of new regional governments after the restoration of democracy in 1977, coupled with the strong increase experienced by public investment since them, are all of them elements that can justify the interest of the Spanish case for the objectives of this paper. Therefore, in this paper we will first derive the theoretical condition under which public capital would be optimally provided, and then we will provide an empirical application of the model, for the case of the Spanish regions during the period 1965-1995.

Optimal endowments of public investment: an empirical analysis for the spanish regions

The aim of this paper is to estimate the optimal endowments of public investment in Spanish regions. Starting from the standard dynamic neoclassical model, augmented with the public capital stock, the optimal condition for the provision of public capital would be that, in the steady state, the marginal productivities of both public and private capital should be equal. In the empirical application we will estimate a growth equation derived from a simple Cobb-Douglas production function, where the coefficients on the rates of investment in private and public capital would be their respective marginal productivities. The econometric estimation of such an equation with data for the Spanish regions would provide us estimates of the marginal productivities of both factors, which would allow us to infer whether public capital stock in the Spanish regions would be insufficient or otherwise excessive.

The Arched Flexure VSA: A Compact Variable Stiffness Actuator with Large Stiffness Range

The high stiffness of conventional robots is beneficial in attaining highly accurate positioning in free space. High stiffness, however, limits a robot\u27s ability to perform constrained manipulation. Because of the high stiffness, geometric conflict between the robot and task constraints during constrained manipulation can lead to excessive forces and task failure. Variable stiffness actuators can be used to adjust the stiffness of robot joints to allow high stiffness in unconstrained directions and low stiffness in constrained directions. Two important design criteria for variable stiffness actuation are a large range of stiffness and a compact size. A new design, the Arched Flexure VSA, uses a cantilevered beam flexure of variable cross-section and a controllable load location. It allows the joint to have continuously variable stiffness within a finite stiffness range, have zero stiffness for a small range of joint motion, and allow rapid adjustment of stiffness. Using finite element analysis, flexure geometry was optimized to achieve high stiffness in a compact size. A proof-of-concept prototype demonstrated continuously variable stiffness with a ratio of high stiffness to low stiffness of 55

Habituation in Occupational Therapy for People with Alcohol Use Disorder

Alcohol use disorder (AUD) is an ongoing chronic health problem affecting millions of people worldwide. Habituation is a construct used by the occupational therapy (OT) practice model, the Model of Human Occupation (MOHO). Habituation relates to a persons’ roles, habits, and routines, and how these interact to shape occupational participation and performance. Since the habitual use of alcohol is a key component of AUD, an understanding of how habituation is addressed in OT intervention is essential. The OT literature has not been systematically reviewed to determine how habituation is addressed in OT practice in clients with AUD, leaving it difficult for practitioners to address clients’ habituation in OT intervention. The purpose of this project was to conduct a scoping review of the literature to identify how habituation was addressed in OT intervention with clients with AUD. This study aimed to answer: How is habituation addressed in the literature addressing occupational therapy intervention with clients with alcohol use disorder? Established scoping review methodology guided this review. Of 156 identified articles, 14 studies met the inclusion criteria and were reviewed. Data was grouped into themes and is displayed in frequency tables in relation to the major MOHO constructs. Findings indicate that the MOHO construct of habituation was discussed in the literature more than the other MOHO constructs but was addressed the least in OT interventions. This disconnect suggests that OT intervention should have a more focused approach to habituation in intervention planning.https://soar.usa.edu/otdcapstones-spring2022/1023/thumbnail.jp

A trophic model of the coastal fisheries ecosystem off the west coast of Sabah and Sarawak, Malaysia

A mass-balance steady-state trophic model of the coastal fisheries ecosystem off the West Coasts of Sabah and Sarawak, Malaysia (10 - 60 m depth) was constructed using the Ecopath software. The ecosystem models were partitioned into 29 ecological/trophic groups. The input values (e.g. biomasses) for selected groups were obtained from the research (trawl) surveys conducted in the area in 1972. The estimated mean trophic level of the fisheries catch for both models is about 3.3. The biomass values obtained from Ecopath when compared with the estimates of the fishery catch indicate a low level of exploitation of coastal fisheries resources in 1972.Fishery resources, Demersal fisheries, Fishery surveys, Biomass, Population density, Shrimp fisheries, Catch/effort, Trawling, Mathematical models, Coastal fisheries, Marine fisheries, Ecosystems, Trophic structure, ISEW, Malaysia, Sarawak, ISEW, Malaysia, Sabah,