No.08: IMPROVING THE PROFITABILITY OF WET MARKET FOOD VENDORS IN CHINA

■ The characteristics of individual vendors and their business operations have a more significant impact on business profits than more general socioeconomic factors. Policy interventions need to prioritize the former. ■ The profits of wet market vendors vary spatially in Nanjing, China. The average profit level in central urban districts is higher than in peri-urban districts. ■ Almost all determinants have more significant impacts on vendor profitability in peri-urban than urban areas. Measures should therefore be taken to improve the profitability of wet market vendors in peri-urban areas

No. 14: The Impact of Proximity to Wet Markets and Supermarkets on Household Dietary Diversity in Nanjing City, China

Existing studies suggest that despite the proliferation of supermarkets, traditional wet markets have persisted in many countries and have been playing an important role in people’s daily food access. Yet, studies investigating the issue of food access and its influences on food security have mainly focused on food deserts and the proximity to supermarkets, with limited focus on wet markets and other food outlets. This study investigates the influence of the proximity to wet markets and supermarkets on urban household dietary diversity in Nanjing. Based on the data collected through a citywide survey in 2015 and the map data of wet markets and supermarkets, the Poisson regression model was deployed to examine the correlations between geographical proximity to supermarkets and wet markets and household dietary diversity. The results show that the coefficients for the distance to the nearest wet market are not statistically significant. Although the coefficients for the distance to nearest supermarket are statistically significant, they were too minor to be of practical importance. We argue, however, that the insignificant correlations reflect exactly the high physical accessibility to food outlets and the extensive spatially dense food supply network constituted by wet markets, supermarkets and small food stores in Nanjing. This is verified by the survey data that more than 90% of households purchased fresh food items within their neighbourhoods or in walking distance. In addition to the densely distributed food outlets, various other factors contributed to the non-significant influence of the distance to the nearest wet market and supermarket, including the many small food stores within or close to residential communities, the prevalence of three-generation extended households and high household income. This study highlights the importance of allowing mixed land use for food outlets with residential land and integrating wet markets into urban infrastructure planning

The influence of local officials' promotion incentives on carbon emission in Yangtze River Delta, China

China's carbon emissions is heavily influenced by economic growth, which can be largely related to the local officials' promotion incentives. The current study was conducted to test the hypothesis that the influence of local officials' individual characteristics on carbon emissions was driven by the promotion incentives. Yangtze River Delta where carbon emissions accounted for around 13.95% of China's total emissions was selected as the research area. The multiple linear regression model was applied to determine the relationship between local officials' characteristics and total carbon emissions and carbon emissions from different sectors. The results indicated that local officials' promotion source, tenure and age significantly influenced the total carbon emission. Despite insignificance influence of officials' academic level on carbon emissions, the professional background in economics and management had a significant influence on carbon reduction. Our results indicated the importance of local officials' promotion incentives for carbon emission in China. Therefore, low carbon development should be included as an important part of official promotion system

Electric Drive System Speed Sensor Fault-Tolerant Control of Electric Vehicle

In this paper, for the speed sensor of the electric vehicle electric drive system prone to damage, a new Fault-Tolerant control is researched. This damage will cause the car run failure or even dangerous situations. This control algorithm combined the traditional vector control system with speed sensor with a speed sensorless vector control algorithms. And the algorithm has the advantages of simple implementation and flux estimation accuracy. This paper proposes a practical method of fault detection and analyzes the process of the two control algorithms and realizes the smooth transition between the two control algorithms when the speed sensor failure. Finally, the simulation analysis and experiment result prove the validity

An Automated Analyzer for Financial Security of Ethereum Smart Contracts

At present, millions of Ethereum smart contracts are created per year and attract financially motivated attackers. However, existing analyzers do not meet the need to precisely analyze the financial security of large numbers of contracts. In this paper, we propose and implement FASVERIF, an automated analyzer for fine-grained analysis of smart contracts' financial security. On the one hand, FASVERIF automatically generates models to be verified against security properties of smart contracts. On the other hand, our analyzer automatically generates the security properties, which is different from existing formal verifiers for smart contracts. As a result, FASVERIF can automatically process source code of smart contracts, and uses formal methods whenever possible to simultaneously maximize its accuracy. We evaluate FASVERIF on a vulnerabilities dataset by comparing it with other automatic tools. Our evaluation shows that FASVERIF greatly outperforms the representative tools using different technologies, with respect to accuracy and coverage of types of vulnerabilities

Ethnobotany of dye plants in Dong communities of China

BACKGROUND: Dyes derived from plants have an extensive history of use for coloring food and clothing in Dong communities and other indigenous areas in the uplands of China. In addition to use as coloring agents, Dong communities have historically utilized dye plants for their value for enhancing the nutritive, medicinal and preservative properties of foods. However, the persistence of plant-derived dyes and associated cultural practices and traditional knowledge is threatened with rapid socio-economic change in China. Research is needed to document the ethnobotany of dye plants in indigenous communities towards their conservation and potential commercialization as a sustainable means of supporting local development initiatives. METHODS: Semi-structured surveys on plants used for coloring agents and associated traditional knowledge were conducted in fifteen Dong villages of Tongdao County in Hunan Province of South Central China during 2011–2012. Transect walks were carried out with key informants identified from semi-structured surveys to collect samples and voucher specimens for each documented plant species for taxonomic identification. RESULTS: Dong households at the study sites utilize the flowers, bark, stems, tubers and roots of 13 plant species from 9 families as dyes to color their customary clothing and food. Out of the documented plants, a total of 7 are used for coloring food, 3 for coloring clothing and 3 for both food and clothing. Documented plants consist of 3 species that yield black pigments, 3 for brownish red/russet pigments, 3 for red pigments, 2 for dark blue pigments and 2 for yellow pigments. In addition to dyes, the plants have multiple uses including medicinal, ornamental, sacrificial, edible, and for timber. CONCLUSIONS: The use of dyes derived from plants persists at the study sites for their important role in expressing Dong cultural identity through customary clothing and food. Further research is needed to evaluate the safety of dye plants, their efficacy in enhancing food items and their commercial potential. Conservation policies and management plans are called for to preserve these ethnobotanical resources in a sustainable manner that supports local livelihoods while maintaining cultural practices

Comprehensive food system planning for urban food security in Nanjing, China

Food system planning is important to achieve the goal of “zero hunger” in the UN’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (UN, 2016). However, discussion about comprehensive planning for food security is scarce and little is known about the situation in Chinese cities. To narrow this gap, this study collected and analyzed four medium-term plans and two annual plans for the “vegetable basket project” in Nanjing, China. This study examines the strategies for urban food security in Nanjing to shed light on how the city developed a comprehensive approach to food system planning over the past three decades. The evolution of incremental food system planning in Nanjing provides valuable lessons for other cities facing food security challenges and shortages of financial resources. Reducing food insecurity is an ongoing challenge for the city governments in the Global South and comprehensive planning is a useful tool for addressing the challenge of urban food insecurity