Discount Rate and Timber Rotation: the Case of Eucalyptus Saligna

RESUMEN: El Eucalipto es una de las especies de mayor importancia económica y ambiental en Colombia. El objetivo de este artículo es observar la relación existente entre la tasa de descuento y el año de corte del Eucalyptus Saligna, mediante el método de Fisher y Hotelling. La metodología consiste en calcular el máximo Valor Actual Neto y realizar un análisis del comportamiento del año de corte con respecto a la tasa de descuento. La región de estudio es el oriente antioqueño, de donde se tomaron datos suministrados por la reforestadora Doña María para una hectárea típica. Se encontró que el año de corte tiene una relación inversamente proporcional con la tasa de descuento, y que éste disminuye para tasas altas.ABSTRACT: Eucalyptus is one of the most important economical and environmental species in Colombia. The main goal of this article is to study the relationship between the discount rate and the year of Eucalyptus Saligna optimal harvest, through the Fisher and Hotelling’s method. The methodology consists of calculating the maximum Net Present Value and performing a sensitivity analysis between the year of harvest and the discount rate. The area of study is located in the eastern region of the state of Antioquia, where data was available. The results suggest that the optimal year of harvest has an inversely proportional relation with the discount rate, and it decreases for higher rates

Optimal land use under environmental and economic approaches

RESUMEN: La pérdida de suelo derivada de la actividad humana tiene impactos negativos en términos de pérdida de productividad y por lo tanto de ingresos debido a los sobrecostos asociados al mayor uso de fertilizantes como consecuencia de la pérdida de nutrientes y acumulación de carbono orgánico. El objetivo principal de este trabajo es desarrollar una herramienta metodológica que permita la valoración de los usos del suelo desde criterios medioambientales y económicos. Con el fin de observar las variaciones potenciales de pérdida de suelo y beneficio económico potencial en la cuenca del río Negro se usan la metodología RUSLE (Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation, por sus siglas en Inglés) y valoración económica de mercado mediante la herramienta SIG (Sistema de Información Geográfica) ArcGis 9.3. Los resultados obtenidos con el modelo SIG son procesados mediante técnicas de evaluación multicriterio. Mediante esta evaluación se encontró que los usos actuales del suelo para el año 2007, si bien representan un mayor beneficio económico para los agricultores y campesinos a corto plazo, no es una solución económica y ambientalmente óptima a largo plazo.ABSTRACT: Soil losses resulting from human activity have negative impacts in terms of loss of productivity and therefore income. In that sense, there is an overcost associated with the increased use of fertilizers as a result of the decrease of nutrients and organic carbon accumulation. The main objective of this paper is to develop a methodological tool to assess the optimal land use from an environmental and economic point of view. To observe potential variations of soil loss and potential economic benefits in the Negro river watershed, the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE) methodology and economic valuation of market prices was used coupled with Geographic Information Systems (GIS) tool (ArcGIS 9.3). The obtained results with the GIS model are processed using multi-criteria evaluation techniques. Results show that land use in 2007, even though it represents greater economic benefit for farmers and peasants in the short term, it is not an economical and environmental optimal allocation in the long-term

Community mapping based on Milton Santos as a tool for disaster response and risk management in self-built communities: case study of El Pacífico, Medellín, Colombia

This paper aims to showcase the community mapping process that took place in the El Pacífico neighborhood in the city of Medellín, Colombia, which runs alongside the urban-rural border of the high slope of the city’s Comuna 8. The geographical and socio-economic challenges that the community has historically faced have come to light throughout the years in the form of geological hazards and disasters that have led to the destruction of several buildings in the neighborhood, threatening the community’s permanence. As these scenarios intensified, the community sought to participate in research projects with both local and international partners to better understand how to improve their disaster risk management practices. URBE Latam, which is one of these experiences, has been working to improve the neighborhood’s data generation practices, adopting the territorial definitions proposed by Milton Santos in Espaço e Método, coupled with participatory mapping strategies for disaster risk reduction during a three-year period. This has resulted in the mapping of El Pacífico and the improvement of the local grassroot organization’s territorial management practices. These maps have served as tools for the community’s empowerment when dealing with public institutions, as well as for planning and managing their own territorial agendas for the future

Colombian consensus recommendations for diagnosis, management and treatment of the infection by SARS-COV-2/ COVID-19 in health care facilities - Recommendations from expert´s group based and informed on evidence

La Asociación Colombiana de Infectología (ACIN) y el Instituto de Evaluación de Nuevas Tecnologías de la Salud (IETS) conformó un grupo de trabajo para desarrollar recomendaciones informadas y basadas en evidencia, por consenso de expertos para la atención, diagnóstico y manejo de casos de Covid 19. Estas guías son dirigidas al personal de salud y buscar dar recomendaciones en los ámbitos de la atención en salud de los casos de Covid-19, en el contexto nacional de Colombia

Uso de dados das mídias sociais no monitoramento de enchentes

Floods are one of the most devastating types of worldwide disasters in terms of human, economic, and social losses. If authoritative data is scarce, or unavailable for some periods, other sources of information are required to improve streamflow estimation and early flood warnings. Georeferenced social media messages are increasingly being regarded as an alternative source of information for coping with flood risks. However, existing studies have mostly concentrated on the links between geo-social media activity and flooded areas. This thesis aims to show a novel methodology that shows a way to close the research gap regarding the use of social networks as a proxy for precipitation-runoff and flood forecast estimates. To address this, it is proposed to use a transformation function that creates a proxy variable for rainfall by analysing messages from geo-social media and precipitation measurements from authoritative sources, which are then incorporated into a hydrological model for the flow estimation. Then the proxy and authoritative rainfall data are merged to be used in a data assimilation scheme using the Ensemble Kalman Filter (EnKF). It is found that the combined use of authoritative rainfall values with the social media proxy variable as input to the Probability Distributed Model (PDM), improves flow simulations for flood monitoring. In addition, it is found that when these models are made under a scheme of fusion-assimilation of data, the results improve even more, becoming a tool that can help in the monitoring of \"ungauged\" or \"poorly gauged\" catchments. The main contribution of this thesis is the creation of a completely original source of rain monitoring, which had not been explored in the literature in a quantitative way. It also shows how the joint use of this source and data assimilation methodologies aid to detect flood events.As inundações são um dos tipos mais devastadores de desastres em todo o mundo em termos de perdas humanas, econômicas e sociais. Se os dados oficiais forem escassos ou indisponíveis por alguns períodos, outras fontes de informação são necessárias para melhorar a estimativa de vazões e antecipar avisos de inundação. Esta tese tem como objetivo mostrar uma metodologia que mostra uma maneira de fechar a lacuna de pesquisa em relação ao uso de redes sociais como uma proxy para as estimativas de precipitação e escoamento. Para resolver isso, propõe-se usar uma função de transformação que cria uma variável proxy para a precipitação, analisando mensagens de medições geo-sociais e precipitação de fontes oficiais, que são incorporadas em um modelo hidrológico para a estimativa de fluxo. Em seguida, os dados de proxy e precipitação oficial são fusionados para serem usados em um esquema de assimilação de dados usando o Ensemble Kalman Filter (EnKF). Descobriu-se que o uso combinado de valores oficiais de precipitação com a variável proxy das mídias sociais como entrada para o modelo distribuído de probabilidade (Probability Distributed Model - PDM) melhora as simulações de fluxo para o monitoramento de inundações. A principal contribuição desta tese é a criação de uma fonte completamente original de monitoramento de chuva, que não havia sido explorada na literatura de forma quantitativa

Tasa de descuento y rotación forestal: el caso del Eucalyptus Saligna

Eucalyptus is one of the most important economical and environmental species in Colombia. The main goal of this article is to study the relationship between the discount rate and the year of Eucalyptus Saligna optimal harvest, through the Fisher and Hotelling’s method. The methodology consists of calculating the maximum Net Present Value and performing a sensitivity analysis between the year of harvest and the discount rate. The area of study is located in the eastern region of the state of Antioquia, where data was available. The results suggest that the optimal year of harvest has an inversely proportional relation with the discount rate, and it decreases for higher rates

Tasa de descuento y rotación forestal: el caso del Eucalyptus Saligna

El Eucalipto es una de las especies de mayor importancia económica y ambiental en Colombia. El objetivo de este artículo es observar la relación existente entre la tasa de descuento y el año de corte del Eucalyptus Saligna, mediante el método de Fisher y Hotelling. La metodología consiste en calcular el máximo Valor Actual Neto y realizar un análisis del comportamiento del año de corte con respecto a la tasa de descuento. La región de estudio es el oriente antioqueño, de donde se tomaron datos suministrados por la reforestadora Doña María para una hectárea típica. Se encontró que el año de corte tiene una relación inversamente proporcional con la tasa de descuento, y que éste disminuye para tasas altas

Exploring the Geographical Context for Quality Assessment of VGI in Flood Management Domain

Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI) has been used to complement or substitute authoritative data in flood management domain. The main issue regarding the use of volunteered information is to estimate its quality, mainly because it may suffer from heterogeneous quality. Therefore, several methods have been developed in the past few years in order to assess VGI quality. However, existing works lack in assessing VGI quality for the purpose of flood management. To overcome this gap, we propose a method for assessing the quality of VGI for this purpose. This method uses a set of quality metrics that were developed for measuring VGI plausibility. A multiple linear regression was carried out in order to demonstrate the relationship between VGI plausibility and the quality metrics. The results showed that plausibility can be explained by 5 quality metrics. Thus, the proposed method is able to estimate the plausibility of VGI in flood management domain

Exploring the geographical context for quality assessment of VGI in flood management domain

Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI) has been used to complement or substitute authoritative data in flood management domain. The main issue regarding the use of volunteered information is to estimate its quality, mainly because it may suffer from heterogeneous quality. Therefore, several methods have been developed in the past few years in order to assess VGI quality. However, existing works lack in assessing VGI quality for the purpose of flood management. To overcome this gap, we propose a method for assessing the quality of VGI for this purpose. This method uses a set of quality metrics that were developed for measuring VGI plausibility. A multiple linear regression was carried out in order to demonstrate the relationship between VGI plausibility and the quality metrics. The results showed that plausibility can be explained by 5 quality metrics. Thus, the proposed method is able to estimate the plausibility of VGI in flood management domain