Learning fast: broadband and the future of education

Educational institutions have always had a central place in the online age. Before the advent of high-speed broadband, other communications technologies and services also played a big role in education.  University researchers were among the first Australian users of what became known as the Internet. When the domain name system was deployed in the mid-1980s, the .au domain was delegated to Robert Elz at the University of Melbourne. When the Australian Vice-Chancellor’s Committee decided to set up a national communications network to support research, Geoff Huston transferred to its payroll from ANU to work as technical manager for AARNet, whose current chief executive, Chris Hancock, is interviewed by Liz Fell in this issue. When a 56 kbps ARPANET link with Australia was made by NASA and the University of Hawaii via Intelsat in June 1989, the connection was established in Elz’s University of Melbourne laboratory. (Clarke 2004: 31) In earlier times, the postal service made learning-at-a-distance possible by ‘correspondence’, particularly in remote areas of Australia. Advances in radio communications made it easier and the interactivity more immediate. Television sets and later video cassette and DVD players and recorders made it more visual. The telephone provided a tool of communication for teachers and learners; the best of them understood that most people were both at different times. Then simple low bandwidth tools like email and web browsing provided new ways for students, teachers and their institutions to communicate and distribute and share information. Learning management systems like Blackboard have been widely deployed through the education sector. Information that was once housed in libraries is now available online and social media platforms are providing new ways for students to collaborate. Ubiquitous, faster broadband and mobile access via smartphones and tablets promise further transformations. &nbsp

New Approaches to Participation in Fisheries Research

This study was commissioned by FAO (Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations) and SIFAR (Support Unit for International Fisheries and Aquatic Research) on the recommendation of the Advisory Committee on Fisheries Research (ACFR). It is concerned with research in the context of fisheries development.The ACFR acknowledges that the fisheries sector is faced with serious social and environmental problems and that current approaches to research have their limitations. It is recognised that participatory approaches and methods potentially have a greater role to play in fisheries research. This study aims to explore that potential and to suggest how we might move forward. The main focus of the report is on experiences in developing countries because this is where much of the innovative work in participation in research is being carried out. However, it is acknowledged that there is also much to be learnt from developed world experience

The Socio-economic Impacts of Fisheries Management and Policy Designed to Achieve Biodiversity Conservation

This report responds to a request from the Tubney Charitable Trust to carry out a basic review of current knowledge of the socio-economic impacts of fisheries management and policy designed to achieve biodiversity conservation. The fisheries sector is having a significant impact upon marine biodiversity in UK waters. The report discusses the importance and diversity of socio-economic knowledge and how it can help to place fisheries into the broader, more holistic, framework of sustainable development. It emphasises the complexity of the policy environment and the need to understand the conflicting and contrasting motives of the different stakeholders. Understanding what motivates policymakers and fishers is the first step to changing their behaviour. The report discusses the divergence between policy and policy implementation, and the complexity of policy instruments

Policy and Management Work within International Agricultural Research

The diversity of players in the field of agricultural (and, more generally, rural) policy and management research is sketched in a global overview of relevant research resources, and the small but important part played by the CGIAR Centres in this is explored, particularly where it has maximum value in terms of international public goods, and for strategic links to other parts of the CGIAR portfolio. The patchy and often slender (and perhaps diminishing in specific cases) capacity of national agricultural policy research and analysis units in the less‐developed world to deliver the needed research products is examined.Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies,

Small gauge transformations and universal geometry in heterotic theories

The first part of this paper describes in detail the action of small gauge transformations in heterotic supergravity. We show a convenient gauge fixing is `holomorphic gauge' together with a condition on the holomorphic top form. This gauge fixing, combined with supersymmetry and the Bianchi identity, allows us to determine a set of non-linear PDEs for the terms in the Hodge decomposition. Although solving these in general is highly non-trivial, we give a prescription for their solution perturbatively in alpha' and apply this to the moduli space metric. The second part of this paper relates small gauge transformations to a choice of connection on the moduli space. We show holomorphic gauge is related to a~choice of holomorphic structure and Lee form on a `universal bundle'. Connections on the moduli space have field strengths that appear in the second order deformation theory and we point out it is generically the case that higher order deformations do not commute.Comment: 48 pages, 1 figure; v2 improved diagram and introduction, references added; v3 improved some discussion & calculations in the main text, new appendix on the dilaton; v4 published versio

Monopole--Instantons in M2-brane Theories

We study monopole-instantons in M2-brane theories, focussing on the ABJM class of Chern-Simons gauge theories coupled to matter. We calculate calculate explicitly the 8-fermion term in the effective action induced by these monopole-instantons, and discuss their role in resolving a classical singularity in the moduli space. The results are compared with monopole-instantons in N=8 3d SYM and D-brane theories, as well the dual supergravity description as a membrane scattering process.Comment: 44 page

Drought: Economic Consequences and Policies for Mitigation Global Overview

The natural variation in climate around the world means that periods of severe shortfall of rainfall are inevitable, and some times occur on a large geographical scale. Human settlements have adapted to this reality in many different ways, including the development of agricultural systems that feature variously robust aspects in the face of drought. As climates change under the influence of modified atmospheric composition, it seems likely that many parts of the world will face increased incidence of drought and thus more challenging tasks for farm managers, managers of non- farm enterprises that are sensitive to drought, national policy makers and, last but not least, households in rural areas that are close to subsistence levels even in non-drought seasons. The agricultural economics profession must continue to contribute to better dealing with all these challenges.Environmental Economics and Policy,

Environmental Issues and Farming in Developing Countries

Formerly a rich-county preoccupation, dealing more explicitly with environmental concerns around agriculture is becoming a mainstream concern for developing countries. Concerns arise with all the major resources underpinning farming, such as land and water which are selectively reviewed here but most attention is concentrated on the soil resource and carbon sequestration possibilities. The results of some environmental interventions constitute public goods at variously local, regional and global levels and thus provide a rationale for potential engagement for governments and development agencies.Environmental Economics and Policy, Farm Management, Land Economics/Use,

Institutional Reforms for Getting an Agricultural Knowledge System to Play Its Role in Economic Growth

While alarmists shriek the crisis of accelerating soil erosion and declining water quality as the major impediment to the future of global agriculture in supplying the needs of humanity, the argument here is that, although resource degradation is indeed a threat to achievement of satisfactory crop yields over the next several decades, the main threat is not degradation of natural resources. Rather, it is degradation of the capacity of societies, particularly those in the less-developed countries, to develop the knowledge embodied in people, technology and institutions necessary to meet the challenge of higher yields and intensified agricultural production. Dealing with this threat of degradation of knowledge institutions and resources must be an important focus of economic development policy in agrarian societies. In short, the agricultural knowledge and information systems (AKISs) serving the developing world must be put in effective and stable shape to deliver the needful.