Debunking three myths about Madagascar’s deforestation

After more than three decades of describing, explaining, and tackling deforestation in Madagascar, the problem persists. Why do researchers, practitioners, politicians, and farmers remain perplexed about this problem? This essay offers that our collective thinking of the past three decades has inadvertently perpetuated three myths. The first is that farmers are central agents of deforestation. The second is that the Malagasy state has the capacity and willingness to address the problem. And the third is that Madagascar is unique, especially relative to the rest of Africa. This essay examines each of these established ‘truths’ in an effort to overcome deforestation and all the degradation – environmental, social, and economic – that accompanies it. It argues that the assumptions behind conservation policies and projects are perpetuated by a class of powerful domestic and foreign individuals whose interests are best served by not questioning their validity. It concludes that fighting deforestation from now on must entail a deliberate, collective effort to question these assumptions and a willingness to open up the thinking to farmers and fellow Africans

Patterns of Loss and Regeneration of Tropical Dry Forest in Madagascar: The Social Institutional Context

Loss of tropical forests and changes in land-use/land-cover are of growing concern worldwide. Although knowledge exists about the institutional context in which tropical forest loss is embedded, little is known about the role of social institutions in influencing regeneration of tropical forests. In the present study we used Landsat images from southern Madagascar from three different years (1984, 1993 and 2000) and covering 5500 km(2), and made a time-series analysis of three distinct large-scale patterns: 1) loss of forest cover, 2) increased forest cover, and 3) stable forest cover. Institutional characteristics underlying these three patterns were analyzed, testing the hypothesis that forest cover change is a function of strength and enforcement of local social institutions. The results showed a minor decrease of 7% total forest cover in the study area during the whole period 1984–2000, but an overall net increase of 4% during the period 1993–2000. The highest loss of forest cover occurred in a low human population density area with long distances to markets, while a stable forest cover occurred in the area with highest population density and good market access. Analyses of institutions revealed that loss of forest cover occurred mainly in areas characterized by insecure property rights, while areas with well-defined property rights showed either regenerating or stable forest cover. The results thus corroborate our hypothesis. The large-scale spontaneous regeneration dominated by native endemic species appears to be a result of a combination of changes in precipitation, migration and decreased human population and livestock grazing pressure, but under conditions of maintained and well-defined property rights. Our study emphasizes the large capacity of a semi-arid system to spontaneously regenerate, triggered by decreased pressures, but where existing social institutions mitigate other drivers of deforestation and alternative land-use

Extraction of pure components from overlapped signals in gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS)

Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) is a widely used analytical technique for the identification and quantification of trace chemicals in complex mixtures. When complex samples are analyzed by GC-MS it is common to observe co-elution of two or more components, resulting in an overlap of signal peaks observed in the total ion chromatogram. In such situations manual signal analysis is often the most reliable means for the extraction of pure component signals; however, a systematic manual analysis over a number of samples is both tedious and prone to error. In the past 30 years a number of computational approaches were proposed to assist in the process of the extraction of pure signals from co-eluting GC-MS components. This includes empirical methods, comparison with library spectra, eigenvalue analysis, regression and others. However, to date no approach has been recognized as best, nor accepted as standard. This situation hampers general GC-MS capabilities, and in particular has implications for the development of robust, high-throughput GC-MS analytical protocols required in metabolic profiling and biomarker discovery. Here we first discuss the nature of GC-MS data, and then review some of the approaches proposed for the extraction of pure signals from co-eluting components. We summarize and classify different approaches to this problem, and examine why so many approaches proposed in the past have failed to live up to their full promise. Finally, we give some thoughts on the future developments in this field, and suggest that the progress in general computing capabilities attained in the past two decades has opened new horizons for tackling this important problem

On the typology and the worship status of sacred trees with a special reference to the Middle East

This article contains the reasons for the establishment of sacred trees in Israel based on a field study. It includes 97 interviews with Muslim and Druze informants. While Muslims (Arabs and Bedouins) consider sacred trees especially as an abode of righteous figures' (Wellis') souls or as having a connection to their graves, the Druze relate sacred trees especially to the events or deeds in the lives of prophets and religious leaders. A literary review shows the existence of 24 known reasons for the establishment of sacred trees worldwide, 11 of which are known in Israel one of these is reported here for the first time. We found different trends in monotheistic and polytheistic religions concerning their current worship of sacred trees