5 research outputs found
Environmental change: prospects for conservation and agriculture in a southwest Australia biodiversity hotspot
Accelerating environmental change is perhaps the greatest challenge for natural resource management; successful
strategies need to be effective for decades to come. Our objective is to identify opportunities that new environmental conditions may provide for conservation, restoration, and resource use in a globally recognized biodiversity hotspot in southwestern Australia. We
describe a variety of changes to key taxonomic groups and system-scale characteristics as a consequence of environmental change (climate and land use), and outline strategies for conserving and restoring important ecological and agricultural characteristics. Opportunities for conservation and economic adaptation are substantial because of gradients in rainfall, temperature, and land use,
extensive areas of remnant native vegetation, the ability to reduce and ameliorate areas affected by secondary salinization, and the existence of large national parks and an extensive network of nature reserves. Opportunities presented by the predicted environmental changes encompass agricultural as well as natural ecosystems. These may include expansion of aquaculture, transformation of
agricultural systems to adapt to drier autumns and winters, and potential increases in spring and summer rain, carbon-offset plantings, and improving the network of conservation reserves. A central management dilemma is whether restoration/preservation efforts should have a commercial or biodiversity focus, and how they could be integrated. Although the grand challenge is conserving, protecting,
restoring, and managing for a future environment, one that balances economic, social, and environmental values, the ultimate goal is to establish a regional culture that values the unique regional environment and balances the utilization of natural resources against protecting remaining natural ecosystems
Environmental change: prospects for conservation and agriculture in a southwest Australia biodiversity hotspot
Accelerating environmental change is perhaps the greatest challenge for natural resource management; successful strategies need to be effective for decades to come. Our objective is to identify opportunities that new environmental conditions may provide for conservation, restoration, and resource use in a globally recognized biodiversity hotspot in southwestern Australia. We describe a variety of changes to key taxonomic groups and system-scale characteristics as a consequence of environmental change (climate and land use), and outline strategies for conserving and restoring important ecological and agricultural characteristics. Opportunities for conservation and economic adaptation are substantial because of gradients in rainfall, temperature, and land use, extensive areas of remnant native vegetation, the ability to reduce and ameliorate areas affected by secondary salinization, and the existence of large national parks and an extensive network of nature reserves. Opportunities presented by the predicted environmental changes encompass agricultural as well as natural ecosystems. These may include expansion of aquaculture, transformation of agricultural systems to adapt to drier autumns and winters, and potential increases in spring and summer rain, carbon-offset plantings, and improving the network of conservation reserves. A central management dilemma is whether restoration/preservation efforts should have a commercial or biodiversity focus, and how they could be integrated. Although the grand challenge is conserving, protecting, restoring, and managing for a future environment, one that balances economic, social, and environmental values, the ultimate goal is to establish a regional culture that values the unique regional environment and balances the utilization of natural resources against protecting remaining natural ecosystems
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Collective and individual voice: convergence in Europe?
This paper uses longitudinal survey data from Britain, Germany and Sweden to examine whether, as some researchers have suggested, there has been a convergence internationally towards individual forms of employee voice mechanism and, if so, to measure the extent and trajectory of change. The paper begins by examining the importance of the employee voice issue. It then reviews competing accounts of the utility of different forms of employee voice and their manifestations within different varieties of capitalism. It is hypothesized that there has been a general trend away from collective and towards individual voice mechanisms; this reflects the predominant trajectory of managerial practices towards convergence with the liberal market model. This hypothesis is largely rejected. The data showed only very limited evidence of directional convergence towards individual voice models in the three countries. Collective voice remains significant in larger organizations, and although it takes a wide range of forms that include but go beyond unions and works councils, this is a positive finding for proponents of those institutions