Biodiversity protection through networks of voluntary sustainability standard organizations?

This paper explores the potential for voluntary sustainability standards (VSS) organizations to contribute to policy-making on biodiversity protection by examining their biodiversity policies, total standard compliant area, proximity to biodiversity hotspots, and the networks and p

The Canadian context for evidence-based conservation and environmental management

Canada has strong institutional capacity for science-based decision-making related to natural resource conservation and environmental management. Yet, the concept of using systematic reviews (conducted in accordance with established guidelines) to support evidence-based conservation and environmental management in Canada is in its infancy. Here we discuss the Canadian context for implementing more rigorous evidence-based approaches using systematic reviews. Of particular relevance to Canada is its vast size, broad diversity of ecosystems and heavy economic reliance on natural resources that vary widely in the type and scale of their environmental effects. These factors result in a wide variety of environmental monitoring needs over an extensive area that pose challenges to the scientific community charged with overseeing wise use of the environment. In addition, there are diverse and engaged user groups (e.g., hunters, trappers, fishers, bird watchers, foresters) and indigenous peoples that have constitutional rights to their natural resources. Traditional environmental knowledge is a complementary source of evidence in the Canadian environmental impact assessment process and therefore must be a part of evidence synthesis. Systematic reviews are not intended to replace local field studies, but rather have the opportunity to draw upon a broader suite of evidence that can be interfaced with local perspectives. The existing institutional structures in Canada could easily incorporate systematic reviews into their science advice and decision-making frameworks but to date, there are few examples of where this has occurred. Drawing on the expertise of a growing global collaboration for environmental evidence synthesis, Canadian institutions (federal, provincial and NGO) are poised to more broadly incorporate systematic reviews once their benefits are fully realized and the capacity to undertake such systematic reviews is fully developed. Systematic reviews offer a consolidated view of the available scientific literature on a given question. The results may offer significant value when working with stakeholders and decision makers contributing other sources of information to the question. For example, mechanisms to capture and integrate scientific knowledge with stakeholder and traditional knowledge may benefit from the scientific sources being filtered, interpreted and summarized for discussion. In other cases, wher

Effects of antiplatelet therapy on stroke risk by brain imaging features of intracerebral haemorrhage and cerebral small vessel diseases: subgroup analyses of the RESTART randomised, open-label trial

Background Findings from the RESTART trial suggest that starting antiplatelet therapy might reduce the risk of recurrent symptomatic intracerebral haemorrhage compared with avoiding antiplatelet therapy. Brain imaging features of intracerebral haemorrhage and cerebral small vessel diseases (such as cerebral microbleeds) are associated with greater risks of recurrent intracerebral haemorrhage. We did subgroup analyses of the RESTART trial to explore whether these brain imaging features modify the effects of antiplatelet therapy

Genetic mechanisms of critical illness in COVID-19.

Host-mediated lung inflammation is present1, and drives mortality2, in the critical illness caused by coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Host genetic variants associated with critical illness may identify mechanistic targets for therapeutic development3. Here we report the results of the GenOMICC (Genetics Of Mortality In Critical Care) genome-wide association study in 2,244 critically ill patients with COVID-19 from 208 UK intensive care units. We have identified and replicated the following new genome-wide significant associations: on chromosome 12q24.13 (rs10735079, P = 1.65 × 10-8) in a gene cluster that encodes antiviral restriction enzyme activators (OAS1, OAS2 and OAS3); on chromosome 19p13.2 (rs74956615, P = 2.3 × 10-8) near the gene that encodes tyrosine kinase 2 (TYK2); on chromosome 19p13.3 (rs2109069, P = 3.98 ×  10-12) within the gene that encodes dipeptidyl peptidase 9 (DPP9); and on chromosome 21q22.1 (rs2236757, P = 4.99 × 10-8) in the interferon receptor gene IFNAR2. We identified potential targets for repurposing of licensed medications: using Mendelian randomization, we found evidence that low expression of IFNAR2, or high expression of TYK2, are associated with life-threatening disease; and transcriptome-wide association in lung tissue revealed that high expression of the monocyte-macrophage chemotactic receptor CCR2 is associated with severe COVID-19. Our results identify robust genetic signals relating to key host antiviral defence mechanisms and mediators of inflammatory organ damage in COVID-19. Both mechanisms may be amenable to targeted treatment with existing drugs. However, large-scale randomized clinical trials will be essential before any change to clinical practice

The Marine Stewardship Council

Origins and design The MSC was not the first fisheries certification or labelling initiative. Organic agriculture organizations, such as the Soil Association, released organic aquaculture standards starting in the late 1980s (Tacon and Brister 2002) and a label for ‘dolphin-safe’ tuna also formed around this time (Brown 2005). It was not until the mid-1990s that MSC formed as a collaborative project between the WWF and Unilever. At the time, the WWF was beginning an oceans campaign with the aim of advancing marine protection and appropriate fisheries management; this served to solidify its interest in fisheries certification (Flanders 1998). Unilever, for its part, was confronting two challenges. First, following the cod stock collapse off the Newfoundland coast, the company sought scientific advice on the stability of North Sea stocks for fear that its fish supplies might be threatened (Hamprecht 2005: 100). Second, like WWF, Greenpeace was mounting an ocean campaign focused on industrial fishing of sandeel in the North Sea, which supplied fish meal and oil used for animal feed and some food products. Heavy extraction of these fish depleted a key food source for ocean species, such as seals and sea birds. Greenpeace targeted a number of companies, including Unilever, requesting that they stop selling products containing, or derived from, fish oil (Auld 2009). With WWF focusing on ocean conservation and Unilever facing pressure to address fishing practices, communications between them identified their shared interest in fisheries sustainability and led to the formal launch of the MSC in early 1996 (Hamprecht 2005; Murphy and Bendell 1997: 170). Although they had different reasons for championing the initiative, both were eager to explore how a Forest Stewardship Council (FSC)-type programme might work for fisheries (Burgmans 2003; Sutton 1996)

Assessing certification as governance: Effects and broader consequences for coffee

Nonstate certification programs have emerged as a new tool for steering the use and exchange of natural resources. Yet, despite being innovative, certification remains controversial. Questions surround how best to engage mainstream businesses in certification and respond to the proliferation of schemes. Examining the coffee sector, this article engages these debates to discuss whether certification can be a tool for change and what type of change that is l

Transforming Markets? Activists’ Strategic Orientations and Engagement With Private Governance

Private governance regimes—instances where nonstate actors set rules that govern their behavior and/or the behavior of others—are increasingly common intermediaries between activists and corporations. Activists are often thought to drive corporations to participate in private governance. By participating, corporations hope to be shielded from activist pressures. Yet there are many instances where activists oppose particular private governance regimes, even ones that are seen as leaders in a sector. Why is this? This article contributes answers to this question by examining how activists’ different strategic orientations affect their perceptions of private governance. It unpacks three distinct ideal-type strategic orientations—prefiguration, targeting, and cooperation—activists may hold in their efforts to transform markets and the different forms of private governance each orientation will prefer. It then details how market entry conditions, sequencing and interactions, and feedbacks affect how activists are likely to engage the private governance regimes that develop in a given sector

Confronting trade-offs and interactive effects in the choice of policy focus: Specialized versus comprehensive private governance

In setting standards for responsible business practices, certification programs create issue boundaries delineated by the focus of their standards. These issue boundaries may impede action on certain causes of problems (i.e. problem interactive effects) or lead to policy actions that affect other governance initiatives (i.e. policy interactive effects). When these interactions are extensive, programs confront trade-offs: develop as a comprehensive program