Linking changes in land cover and land use of the lower Mekong Basin to instream nitrate and total suspended solids variations

Population growth and economic development are driving changes in land use/land cover (LULC) of the transboundary Lower Mekong River Basin (LMB), posing a serious threat to the integrity of the river system. Using data collected on a monthly basis over 30 years (1985–2015) at 14 stations located along the Lower Mekong river, this study explores whether spatiotemporal relationships exist between LULC changes and instream concentrations of total suspended solids (TSS) and nitrate—as proxies of water quality. The results show seasonal influences where temporal patterns of instream TSS and nitrate concentrations mirror patterns detected for discharge. Changes in LULC influenced instream TSS and nitrate levels differently over time and space. The seasonal Mann–Kendall (SMK) confirmed significant reduction of instream TSS concentrations at six stations (p < 0.05), while nitrate levels increased at five stations (p < 0.05), predominantly in stations located in the upper section of the basin where forest areas and mountainous topography dominate the landscape. Temporal correlation analyses point to the conversion of grassland (r = −0.61, p < 0.01) to paddy fields (r = 0.63, p < 0.01) and urban areas (r = 0.44, p < 0.05) as the changes in LULC that mostly impact instream nitrate contents. The reduction of TSS appears influenced by increased forest land cover (r = −0.72, p < 0.01) and by the development and operation of hydropower projects in the upper Mekong River. Spatial correlation analyses showed positive associations between forest land cover and instream concentrations of TSS (r = 0.64, p = 0.01) and nitrate (r = 0.54, p < 0.05), indicating that this type of LULC was heavily disturbed and harvested, resulting in soil erosion and runoff of nitrate rich sediment during the Wet season. Our results show that enhanced understanding of how LULC changes influence instream water quality at spatial and temporal scales is vital for assessing potential impacts of future land and water resource development on freshwater resources of the LMB

Integration of remote-sensing based metrics and econometric models to assess the socio-economic contributions of carbon sequestration in unmanaged tropical dry forests

Carbon sequestration by forests is one of the vital ecosystem services regulating the global climate. Equally important are the socio-economic co-benefits of carbon sequestration, given their implications for designing policies focused on conservation or restoration of tropical forests. Much debate has been around how to account for, and maximize, the co-benefits of carbon sequestration. Prior research suggests that a better understanding of the spatial relationship between carbon sequestration potential and forest types and dynamics - as a function of geographical context and time - is needed to better estimate their socio-economic benefits. Hence, this paper uses the Tropical Dry Forests of Central and South America to propose a new approach to quantify carbon sequestration of this biome, and its efficiency, using time series of the Terra-MODIS satellite. Our estimations of carbon sequestration are then coupled with a benefit transfer approach to infer carbon sequestration's monetary cost. Results reveal that these tropical forests sequester an annual average of 22.3 ​± ​3.3 tCO2 ha-1 yr-1 or in total, 1.16 GtCO2. The associated social cost of carbon, calculated using three econometric models, ranges from USD 489 ​ha-1 ​yr-1 to USD 2828 ​ha-1 ​yr-1. These results can open new perspectives regarding the benefits of carbon sequestration against the costs of the negative impacts of climate change for national welfare accounts, their relevance for environmental policy-making, and the implementation or monitoring of carbon-based incentive programs (e.g., WAVES)

Towards a deep-learning-based framework of sentinel-2 imagery for automated active fire detection

This paper proposes an automated active fire detection framework using Sentinel-2 imagery. The framework is made up of three basic parts including data collection and preprocessing, deep-learning-based active fire detection, and final product generation modules. The active fire detection module is developed on a specifically designed dual-domain channel-position attention (DCPA)+HRNetV2 model and a dataset with semi-manually annotated active fire samples is constructed over wildfires that commenced on the east coast of Australia and the west coast of the United States in 2019-2020 for the training process. This dataset can be used as a benchmark for other deep-learning-based algorithms to improve active fire detection accuracy. The performance of active fire detection is evaluated regarding the detection accuracy of deep-learning-based models and the processing efficiency of the whole framework. Results indicate that the DCPA and HRNetV2 combination surpasses DeepLabV3 and HRNetV2 models for active fire detection. In addition, the automated framework can deliver active fire detection results of Sentinel-2 inputs with coverage of about 12,000 km(2) (including data download) in less than 6 min, where average intersections over union (IoUs) of 70.4% and 71.9% were achieved in tests over Australia and the United States, respectively. Concepts in this framework can be further applied to other remote sensing sensors with data acquisitions in SWIR-NIR-Red ranges and can serve as a powerful tool to deal with large volumes of high-resolution data used in future fire monitoring systems and as a cost-efficient resource in support of governments and fire service agencies that need timely, optimized firefighting plans

Land Use and Spatial Planning: Enabling Sustainable Management of Land Resources

This book reconciles competing and sometimes contradictory forms of land use, while also promoting sustainable land use options. It highlights land use planning, spatial planning, territorial (or regional) planning, and ecosystem-based or environmental land use planning as tools that strengthen land governance. Further, it demonstrates how to use these types of land-use planning to improve economic opportunities based on sustainable management of land resources, and to develop land use options that strike a balance between conservation and development objectives. Competition for land is increasing as demand for multiple land uses and ecosystem services rises. Food security issues, renewable energy and emerging carbon markets are creating pressures for the conversion of agricultural land to other uses such as reforestation and biofuels. At the same time, there is a growing demand for land in connection with urbanization and recreation, mining, food production, and biodiversity conservation. Managing the increasing competition between these services, and balancing different stakeholders’ interests, requires efficient allocation of land resources

Land Use Planning

This working paper analyzes the role of land use and spatial planning tools, processes and approaches to improve socio-economic opportunities through sustainable management of land resources (i.e., soil, water, and biodiversity). Section 1 explores the nexus between land use planning and changes in the land system, as well as interdependent factors which influence land use planning. Section 2 briefly describes the evolution of different land use types over time, and the basic requirements of land use planning. Principles of best practice in land use planning for sustainable land use and management are identified, and case studies of land use policy, built upon these principles, are presented in Section 3. The final section presents evidence of contributions of land use and spatial planning to sustainable land use and management, as well as to the improvement of economic opportunities and the strengthening of land governance

Governing drylands as global environmental commons

Recent years have seen growing calls to govern land resources as global environmental commons, delivering benefits to all of humanity in support of the Sustainable Development Goals. Applying this call to drylands – almost half of the world's land – allows responses that are better tailored to dryland attributes. Four key elements for global drylands governance emerge from linking an understanding of drylands attributes with recent global governance scholarship: the need for a polycentric system with nested goal setting, transparent monitoring and graduated sanctions. These elements require nuanced application in drylands, with an emphasis on empowering the local. We describe how the present global governance architecture for drylands – the UN Convention to Combat Desertification – provides a partial scaffolding, but falls short in specific areas that deserve attention

Commentary : on the under-valuing of Australia’s expertise in drylands research and practice globally

Global drylands are a significant driver of earth system processes that affect the world’s common resources such as the climate. Their peoples are also among the first to be widely affected by global changes such as land degradation and climate change. Yet drylands are a source of many social and technical innovations, globally, as well as in Australia. As a major developed dryland nation, Australia has previously played a major role in extending these innovations to the rest of the world. The nation has reaped reputational and commercial benefits through major research and practice contributions to dryland agriculture, water management and governance, remote area services, indigenous partnerships, dryland monitoring systems, and ‘desert knowledge’ innovation. Australian researchers continue to contribute to various relevant international processes, yet recognition and support for this within Australia has dropped off markedly in recent years. We analyse the Australian government’s investment in research and in overseas aid for drylands over the last two decades, and explore trends in government’s active involvement in major international processes related to land. These trends are short-sighted, overlooking potential economic benefits for Australian enterprises, and undermining Australia’s stance and scientific leadership in dryland systems globally. In this commentary, we argue that it is time for the trends to be reversed, as this is an area of comparative advantage for Australian diplomacy with significant returns on investment for Australia, both direct and indirect, especially when most emerging economies contain substantial drylands. We identify four major pathways to obtaining benefits from science diplomacy, and four interrelated actions within Australia to enable these – to place a higher emphasis on science diplomacy, to re-forge a bipartisan recognition of Australian drylands expertise, to establish a dedicated Dryland Information Hub, and to create a network of relevant science and technology advisors

An ecosystem-based approach and Bayesian modelling to inform coastal planning : a case study of Manly, Australia

Managing coastal areas under an Ecosystem Based Approach–Marine Spatial Planning framework acknowledges the complexity associated with the need to address multiple environmental and socioeconomic issues. The development of efficient management plans is critical to the implementation success of the framework; in this regard, unresolved challenges remain for measuring the effectiveness of planning plans and monitoring implementation progress. This paper describes the development of a Bayesian Belief Network as a prototype Decision Support Tool to assist coastal planning in the catchment areas of the Sydney Harbour, New South Wales, Australia. The model was co-designed with local managers, underpinned by the Drivers-Pressures-States-Impacts-Responses analytical framework to identify key coastal cause-effect relationships, and by the Recreational Opportunity Spectrum framework to account for significant recreational areas. The Bayesian Belief Network was structured on a conceptualisation of the relationships between key pressures affecting coastal management targets (biological areas and human activities) and their impacts on the state of the variables, with emphasis on the beach ecosystem. The socio-economic component of the model consists of predictive socio-economic modelling on preferred beach activities, the assessment of beach recreational settings, and a beach quality survey. Conditional probability tables were derived from local and regional databases. The model structure allows decision makers enhanced understanding of key interactions between management variables, assessment of management scenarios, and increased accountability of planning decisions. Future work on the prototype could expand the model to become a Bayesian Decision Network, through the integration of proposed management actions and their utilities, thereby helping managers identify optimal decisions

Poorly-designed goals and objectives in resource management plans : assessing their impact for an ecosystem-based approach to marine spatial planning

Planning frameworks such as Ecosystem-Based Marine Spatial Planning are based on socio-ecological systems and require effective design of management goals and objectives, a task often overlooked in conservation and resource planning. This paper discusses research undertaken in a coastal council of Australia, to assess the significance of well-defined goals and objectives as drivers of management plans. SMART criteria and Open Standards for the Practice of Conservation approaches were integrated into a framework to examine management scope of existing plans; assess the quality of stated goals and objectives; analyse the use of natural and socio-economic targets; and provide recommendations for the development of future plans. Findings provided no indication of organizational learning through revision of previous plans, revealing an ongoing planning cycle with ad-hoc reviews frequently driven by policy changes. Main weaknesses identified included linguistics ambiguity; unclear planning hierarchy; lack of clear time-frames; and adoption of highly ambitious plans. The absence of measurable and time-bounded goals and objectives was noted. Additionally, poor definition of targets resulted in goals not meeting the impact-oriented criteria, and objectives were not outcome-oriented. Recommendations drawn in support of mainstreaming the Ecosystem Based Approach in future coastal and marine plans include: explicit definition of societal values; developing complementary cross-realm management goals and objectives; increasing commitment to produce 'on-the-ground' outcomes progressively within each planning period; a greater use of pro-active management measures; and providing an economic context to the plans, fostering alignment of financial resources and future investments with the vision developed by the council

Environmental mainstreaming and policy coherence : essential policy tools to link international agreements with national development : a case study of the Caribbean region

The 2030 agenda for sustainable development adopted in September 2015 advocates for a balanced integration of the economic, social and environmental dimensions of sustainable development. Existing multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs) can provide guidance for policy-makers to promote inclusive and sustainable economic growth, within safe ecological limits. This paper presents a practical approach to mainstream international obligations of MEAs with national development priorities and strategies. It identifies pathways of policy coherence from national strategies to specific instruments and indicators to advance implementation of MEAs and help counties to fulfill agreed obligations. The approach is grounded in the driving forces–pressure–state–impact– response (DPSIR) framework, and it was applied in two national and two regional case studies in the Caribbean. The outcomes from the case studies show that mainstreaming rate of MEAs is low, and linkages across multiple MEAs are rarely considered. The DPSIR framework was useful for addressing national development priorities and those of MEAs in tandem, through adopting a cross-sectoral, multistakeholder perspective. The research shows that addressing environmental degradation and improving MEAs’ implementation requires that international and regional agencies identify linkages among MEAs to assist in creating policy coherence to ensure their integration into national strategies by connecting with policies and strategies in tandem implementation of MEAs for national policy-makers to work with