Rural Investment and the Cost of Income Uncertainty

This paper studies optimal investment decision in agriculture under diminishing income expectations. The goal is to study the cost of income uncertainty and its implications to the efficiency of investment subsidies. Investment decision is modelled as a Markov decision process, extended to account for risk. Applying a stochastic programming approach, the cost of imperfect information is evaluated as the difference between the profitability of investment under stable income and under uncertain income. Computational experiments demonstrate that the cost of imperfect information can be high, deteriorating the efficiency of investment subsidies. Also, examples suggest that the optimal timing of the investment can be sensitive to risk.

Impacts of land cover data selection and trait parameterisation on dynamic modelling of species' range expansion

Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Models of Arctic-alpine refugia highlight importance of climate and local topography

Projected climatic warming calls for increased attention to the identification of suitable refugia for the preservation of biota and ecosystems in changing high-latitude environments. One such way is the development of models for drivers of refugia. Here, we investigate the distribution and species richness of Arctic-alpine vascular plant species' refugia. The study is carried out in an environmentally variable area in N Europe, encompassing the northern boreal to the Arctic-alpine zone. We defined refugia as isolated 1 km x 1 km grid cells with multiple Arctic-alpine plant species occurrences outside their main distribution area and assessed the main environmental factors underlying their distribution and richness using cross-validated boosted regression tree modelling. In the modelling, we examined the effects of climatic, topographic, and geologic factors, and the connectivity of sites with refugia incrementally, i.e. first modelling climatic impact alone, then with separate additions of topographic, geologic and connectivity variables, concluding with a model including all predictor variables. The inclusion of slope and connectivity significantly improved model performance. Although climate has a central role in controlling the occurrence of refugia, topography provides important clues for recognizing heterogeneous locations that harbour refugia with suitable local thermal and moisture conditions. Results suggest considering refugia as, on the one hand, isolated pockets of suitable habitat, but on the other hand as potentially interconnected habitat networks. In general, our study demonstrates that the spatial patterns of refugia can be successfully modelled, but emphasizes a need for high-quality data sampled at resolutions reflecting significant environmental gradients.Peer reviewe

Quantifying the climate exposure of priority habitat constrained to specific environmental conditions : Boreal aapa mires

Climate velocity is an increasingly used metric to detect habitats, locations and regions which are exposed to high rates of climate change and displacement. In general, velocities are measured based on the assumption that future climatically similar locations can occur anywhere in the study landscape. However, this assumption can provide a biased basis for habitats which are constrained to specific environmental conditions. For such habitats, a set of selected suitable locations may provide ecologically more realistic velocity measures. Here, we focus on one environmentally constrained habitat, aapa mires, which are peat-accumulating EU Habitats Directive pri-ority habitats, whose ecological conditions and biodiversity values may be jeopardised by climate change. We assess the climate exposure of aapa mires in Finland by developing velocity metrics separately for the whole >= 10 ha aapa mire complexes ('aapa mires') and their wettest flark-dominated parts ('flark fens'). Velocity metrics were developed for six bioclimatic variables (growing degree days (GDD5), mean January and July temperatures, annual precipitation, and May and July water balance, based on climate data for 1981-2010 and for 2040-2069 as derived from global climate models for two Representative Concentration Pathways (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5). For the six variables, velocities were calculated based on the distance between climatically similar present-day and nearest future mire, divided by the number of years between the two periods, and by excluding the unsuitable matrix. Both aapa mires and flark fens showed high exposure (>5 km/year) to changes in January temperature, and often also considerably high velocities for GDD5 and July temperatures. The flark fens showed significantly higher climate velocities than the aapa mires and had a smaller amount of corresponding habitat in their sur-roundings. Thus, many of the studied mires, particularly the flark fens, are likely to face increased risks of exposure due to changes in winter and summer temperatures. Moreover, considerable changes in precipitation -related conditions may occur at the southern margin of the aapa mire zone. Our results show that specifically tailored climate velocity metrics can provide a useful quantitative tool to inform conservation and management decisions to support the ecosystem sustainability of this EU Habitats Directive biotope and targeting restoration towards the most vulnerable aapa mires.Peer reviewe

The Immunogenetic Conundrum of Preeclampsia

Pregnancy is an immunological challenge to the mother. The fetal tissues including the placenta must be protected from activation of the maternal immune system. On the other hand, the placental tissue sheds into the maternal circulation and must be adequately identified and phagocytized by the maternal immune system. During a healthy pregnancy, numerous immunosuppressive processes take place that allow the allograft fetus to thrive under exposure to humoral and cellular components of the maternal immune system. Breakdown of immune tolerance may result in sterile inflammation and cause adverse pregnancy outcomes such as preeclampsia, a vascular disease of the pregnancy with unpredictable course and symptoms from several organs. Immunological incompatibility between mother and fetus is strongly indicated in preeclampsia. Recently, genetic factors linking immunological pathways to predisposition to preeclampsia have been identified. In this mini-review genetic variation in immunological factors are discussed in the context of preeclampsia. Specifically, we explore immunogenetic and immunomodulary mechanisms contributing to loss of tolerance, inflammation, and autoimmunity in preeclampsia.Peer reviewe

Incorporating landscape heterogeneity into multi-objective spatial planning improves biodiversity conservation of semi-natural grasslands

Recent actions to mitigate biodiversity loss in agricultural environments appear insufficient despite the considerable efforts channeled via the European Union’s Common Agricultural Policy. One likely reason for this failure is the limited attention paid to the regional and landscape level ecological characteristics in farmland conservation planning. We demonstrate how to obtain conservation prioritization solutions that would address simultaneously three goals, including two landscape level targets: minimizing local habitat quality loss, maximizing habitat connectivity, and incorporating landscape heterogeneity. As these goals may be contradictory, we investigate the potential trade-offs between them. We used the Zonation prioritization tool to examine how our three goals could be implemented in the agricultural landscapes of southwest Finland. We used measures of (i) biodiversity value of grasslands, (ii) connectivity between grasslands, and (iii) landscape heterogeneity which comprised of (land cover type based) compositional heterogeneity and (field margin based) configurational heterogeneity. Integration of landscape heterogeneity measures and habitat connectivity resulted in some tradeoffs with local habitat quality, the most prominent observation being that landscape heterogeneity co-varied with grassland connectivity. Among the two landscape heterogeneity parameters, inclusion of compositional heterogeneity resulted in more clustered prioritization solutions than configurational heterogeneity, which had a spatially more balanced impact. Concordance among landscape scale factors implies high potential for reconstruction of a functioning network of semi-natural grasslands in areas under intensive agricultural use. Broader scale multi-objective planning approaches can thus importantly support targeting biodiversity conservation planning and mediating the implementation of Common Agricultural Policy objectives.peerReviewe

Achieving equity through 'gender autonomy': the challenges for VET policy and practice

This paper is based on research carried out in an EU Fifth Framework project on 'Gender and Qualification'. The research partners from five European countries investigated the impact of gender segregation in European labour markets on vocational education and training, with particular regard to competences and qualifications. The research explored the part played by gender in the vocational education and training experiences of (i) young adults entering specific occupations in child care, electrical engineering and food preparation/service (ii) adults changing occupations