Ecological studies on some lakes of the Amazon valley

Of the three types of lakes studied, clear water, white water, and brown water, the white water lakes are the only ones to have a reasonable autochtonous production of organic matter. Owing probably to the lack of mineral salts, the primary production is very low in the two other types and not very high even in the white waters. The total biomass is high in the white water lakes and the production increases only with rising water level. This may be due to different processes. One is the rains which bring in some quantities of nitrogen, as is well known. The other is the seeping of ground water through the bottom when the general level of the waters around the lake is rising. Of course, when the lake receives water directly from a white water affluent or from the rising Amazon, it also gets a new supply of mineral matter. In the clear and black waters ofthe forest lakes, the organic production is allochtonous and probably the stock of organic material in the lake is increasing progressively with the ecological evolution of the water and with the action of the organisms which store nutrients in their own substance. The autochtonous productivity shows also a small increase when the water level rises but the total biomass always remains small, One of the productivity factors which thus appears important is the number of animals. Firstly these store nutrients which would otherwise be lost to the effluents of the lakes; secondly, they increase the speed of mineralisation of the littoral plant material, which drops into the water, and make it available to the lake cycle. The first process is thus density-dependent, the second density-and-diversity-dependent. The favourable action of the Amazon and white waters on the productivity shows the importance of an accurate hypsometric survey ôf the region for the delimitation of productivity zones in the Amazon basin.Dos três tipos de lagos estudados:.de água clara, âgua branca e água "pteta", são somente os lagos de água branca que possuem uma produção autóctona razoavel de rnatéria orgânica. Devido, provavelmente, à falta de sais minerais, a produção primfuia :#"ta baixa nos dôis outros tipos" sendo mesmo não muito alta tambêm nas águas bran- A biomassa é alta nos lagos de átgua branca, e a produção aumenta somente com a enchente, quer dizer, com o nivel d'água subindo. Este fenómeno pode ter a sua razáo em processos diferentes. IJm deles são as chuvas que trâzem alguma quantidade dè nitrogênio, como bem se sabe, O outro é a penetração de água freâtica atravês do fundo do lago quando sóbe o nivel geral das águas ao redor do lago. E óbvio que o lago quando receber água diretamente dum afluente de água branca ou do enchendo Amazonas mesmo, também ganha um novo suplemento cle rnatéría mineral. Nas águas claras e pretas de lagos florestais, a produção orgânica é allóctona. Parece provavel que o estoque de matéria orgânica, no lago, aumenta progressivamente com a evoluçäo ecológica da âgua e com a ação dos organismos os quais acumulam nutrimentos dentro da própria substância. A produtividade autóctona mostra também um pequeno aumento quando sóbe o nivel da àgua, porém a biomassa total sempre permanece pequena. LT4 IJm dos fatores da produtividade o qual, desta maneir a, parece importante, é o número de animais, Primeiro, eles armazenam nutrimentos os quais, em outro caso, seriam perdidos aos cursos d'água, efluentes dos lagos; segundo, eles aumentam a velocidade da mineralizaçã'o do material, fornecido pelas plantas do litoral, o que cai para dentro da âgua, e tornam-no acessivel ao ciclo do lago. O primeiro processo é, desta forma, dependente da densidade da população animal, o segundo é dependente da densidade e da diversidade da mesma. A ação favoravel do Amazonas e das águas brancas sôbre a produtividade demonstra a importância de um levantamento hipsométrico acurado da região para o fim duma delimitação de zonas de produtividade na ltac-ia arnazönica

Statistics in Focus: Population and social conditions. The EC Household Panel Newsletter (2/99). 1999.8

The European Community Household Panel is a panel survey of 15 European countries that ran from 1994 to 2001, covering a wide range of topics such as income, health, education, housing, demographics and employment characteristics. Its website contains information about the dataset itself and about where to find ECHP based data in Eurostat. As from 2003 the ECHP has been succeeded by the EU SILC

A European Union Approach to Material Deprivation using EU-SILC and Eurobarometer data

The paper discusses methodological issues raised by the construction of indicators on material deprivation, which is defined here as an enforced lack of a combination of items depicting some aspects of living conditions related to housing conditions, possession of durables and capacity to afford basic requirements. More specifically, its focus is on the selection of items, their dimensional structure, their aggregation in a synthetic measure and their weighting. The paper also puts in perspective material deprivation and income-based poverty indicators to emphasise the complementarity of the two approaches. It covers the European Union countries available in the 2007 Community Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) users’ data base.Material deprivation ; EU-SILC ; Eurobarometer ; Poverty ; European Union

Income poverty and material deprivation in European countries

Since 2009, the European Union (EU) portfolio of commonly agreed social in-dicators includes measures of material deprivation. The rationale for this inclu-sion is that if purely income-based indicators of poverty and inequality are es-sential, they are nevertheless not sufficient to satisfactorily reflect the diversity of living conditions in the EU, especially since the 2004 and 2007 enlarge-ments. The paper analyses the relationship between income poverty and mate-rial deprivation in 25 European countries (24 EU Member States plus Norway) and aims at identifying the most important factors that determine the risk of being income poor and/or materially deprived. It is based on the 2007 cross-sectional data of the EU Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) users? data base.material deprivation; income poverty; European Union; Eu-SILC; open method of coordination; social inclusion

Expanding the circle of protection: the evolution of use of force norms within the UN Security Council

During the past decade, a significant change in use of force norms took place within the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). The United Nations (UN) is founded on a collective security agreement, which gives the UNSC the power to authorize the use of force to protect UN member-states. The UN Charter explicitly provides the UNSC with a mandate to keep peace between states, not within them. In 2006, however, the UNSC unanimously adopted the "Responsibility to Protect" (R2P) doctrine, which expanded what I call the UNSC's circle of protection to include "human protection." Further, in exceptional circumstances, R2P gives the UNSC the power to authorize the use of force in a country without the consent of its government. Many UNSC members initially resisted institutionalizing R2P, especially those with contested territory and a history of foreign intervention, such as China. This dissertation attempts to explain how and why this change in use of force norms developed. I argue this macro-level change was principally due to two often overlooked factors: an epistemic community pushing the Council to become more empathetic and altruistic, and Council members wanting to gain social status. In order to adequately explain the development of R2P you must explain the significant role the epistemic community played. And to adequately explain the significance of the epistemic community you must explain the significant role empathy played. Further, to sufficiently explain the UNSC's decision to adopt R2P you must explain the significance of China's acceptance. And to sufficiently explain China's acceptance you must explain the significant role status-seeking played. Explanations for the adoption of R2P that do not acknowledge the significant role of empathy and social influence are incomplete and insufficient. Although others have argued emotion and social influence are important causal variables in international relations, few offer specific mechanisms or micro-processes demonstrating how these factors work. This dissertation attempts to fill this gap. The implications are that empathy and status-seeking matter far more to international relations than many suggest