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Includes bibliographical references. ; Presented at the Building resilience of Mongolian rangelands: a trans-disciplinary research conference held on June 9-10, 2015 in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. ; This study tested the effect of institutional design principles on social outcomes of evolving pastoral institutions in post-socialist Mongolia. Using data from 77 community-based rangeland management (CBRM) groups and 392 member households, we examined the effect of donor facilitation on institutional design. We found that donor facilitation approach significantly influenced group attributes and their external environment, but not institutional arrangements. The study confirmed that small group size, homogeneous interests, and heterogeneity of well-being are important group characteristics that predict higher levels of information diversity, leadership, and income diversity. Institutional arrangements such as the presence of sanctions, group-devised rules, frequent meetings, and recording documents increased cooperation, rules, and information diversity. Similarly, access to training and local government support provided a favorable external environment for increasing social outcomes. Furthermore, group characteristics such as dependence on livestock, homogeneity of interests, and leader legitimacy were critical for increasing social capital, livelihoods, sustainable rangeland practices, and proactive behavior of members. More frequent meetings of leaders were the most influential for these outcomes. Local government support and available donor support were associated with increased trust and norms of reciprocity, sustainable rangeland management practices, proactiveness, and livestock holdings. Lastly, group attributes and external environment influenced social outcomes of pastoral CBRMs in Mongolia more than institutional arrangements.

Forestry has traditionally been one of Myanmar's most important economic sectors, generating more in export earnings in the period 2010-2018. It is estimated that the country will have lost 12 million ha of forest between 1990 and 2020 - the third largest absolute forest loss of all countries during that period. The government now aims to restore or reforest about 884,000 ha on reserved forest (RF) and public protected forest (PPF) land under its 2016-28 Myanmar reforestation and rehabilitation program (MRRP). A range of reforms is needed to encourage private sector investment. These include: (i) identification of sufficiently large areas of suitable land close to potential processing sites or transport infrastructure and planning of land-use allocation; (ii) improving the availability of information on identified areas and on the process of acquiring plantation leases; (iii) streamlining leasing procedures and terms and scope of leases, including possible private management of state plantations; (iv) simplifying regulations on harvest and transport of plantation timber; (v) reviewing the suitability of current fiscal incentives, including tax holidays; (vi) improving information on areas and productivity of established plantations; and (vii) identifying priority research and development needs and delivery mechanisms.

"The archives of the Grand Secretariat currently housed at the Institute were originally kept at the Grand Secretariat Storehouse in the Ch'ing imperial palace. They were removed from the Storehouse when it underwent renovation in 1909. After the overthrow of the Ch'ing, these archives changed hands several times, and were, at one point, even sold to a paper recycling factory. Eventually, the Institute purchased them from Li Sheng-to, a book collector, in 1929 thanks to the efforts of Fu Ssu-nien, the Institute's first director. There are over four thousand Ming (1368-1644) documents and more than three hundred thousand volumes of Ch'ing (1644-1911) archival materials in this collection, including imperial decrees, edicts, memorials, tribute document, examination questions, examination papers, rosters of successful examination candidates, documents from the offices of the Grand Secretariat, documents from the offices for book compilation, and old documents from Mukden. Memorials make up the bulk these documents.The archives contain valuable source materials for institutional, social and economic historians. They record general administrative activities and legal cases, many of which cannot be found in Ch'ing legal compendia." (cited from database website)

Includes bibliographical references. ; Presented at the Building resilience of Mongolian rangelands: a trans-disciplinary research conference held on June 9-10, 2015 in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. ; In 2014 the Mongolian parliament approved the Green Development Policy. Out of 21 aimags, Khovd, Arkhangai, Uvurkhangai, Khentii and Bulgan aimags set an objective of prioritizing green development on their local level. This paper is based on the project "Conducting environmental and social vulnerability research of soums in five aimags leading in green development and developing strategy recommendation" and it is written using Khovd aimag as a case study. Here, in Khovd aimag's 17 soums, we evaluated eight variables including drought-dzud index, vegetation index, preventable livestock loss, prepared hay and fodder, pasture use index, degree of desertification, land degradation and surface water loss, allowing us to make an integrated assessment of ecological vulnerability. According to our analysis, the Gobi desert steppe region was defined as most vulnerable among environmental zones, and out of a total of 17 soums Altai, Uyench, Zereg, Chandmani and Duut soums were defined as most vulnerable, followed by Must, Darvi, Munkhhairkhan, Mankhan and Myangad soums. There is a need to give top priority to the planning and implementation of green policy in these ecologically more vulnerable soums by increasing their "green" budget. This will allow them to develop their capacity to adapt to climate change, decrease their vulnerability, to conduct optimal management of pasture use and have targeted preparation of hay and fodder.

Includes bibliographical references. ; Presented at the Building resilience of Mongolian rangelands: a trans-disciplinary research conference held on June 9-10, 2015 in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. ; Mongolia's socio-ecological rangeland systems face a number of critical, contemporary challenges. Climatic change, persistent poverty and growing land use conflicts, especially around mining, pose complex problems both for herders and policy-makers. Furthermore, there is renewed emphasis on meeting Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and Aichi targets, following the publication of Mongolia's 5th National CBD report in March 2014, and the development of a new National Biodiversity Strategic Action Plan. (E)valuation of the contributions of rangeland ecosystem services (ES) to biodiversity and livelihoods/wellbeing are highlighted as priorities for future planning therein. ES thinking, valuation and commodification are becoming increasingly influential in other contemporary policy initiatives, not least through the development of the national REDD+ roadmap, Business and Biodiversity offset programmes and Government commitments to the 'Green Economy'. Nonetheless critical questions remain about the ES paradigm itself, values/ valuation of ES and how these may be enacted and supported through policy. Here we report on a three year Darwin-Initiative funded project, which aimed to 'generate policy and practice relevant knowledge of values of ecosystem services (ES) in Mongolia, and test the efficacy of Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) schemes, in order to enhance biodiversity and livelihoods'. Aims were realised through i) participatory mapping and analysis of ES, including cultural ES, with 300 herder households across four case study sites, and the development of innovative methods for non-economic valuation; ii) co-development and implementation of a novel rangeland payment for ES (PES) scheme at the four sites, through the Plan Vivo standard; iii) analysis of the impacts ES and of the PES scheme on biodiversity and livelihoods. Methods used included deliberative valuation approaches, mapping, ranking and choice modelling to examine group and individual values and trade-offs between ES across ecologically contrasting areas. We also applied the SOLVES (Social Values of ES) GIS model to highlight spatial, place-specific dimensions of ES values, as part of a series of wider biodiversity, livelihoods and ES assessments. Results highlight spatial and temporal diversities in ES values, importance of cultural ES for wellbeing, and the potential of carefully designed PES schemes to contribute to more resilient socio-ecological rangeland systems in the future.