This essay provides a fresh view on early history of the botanical garden in Buitenzorg by zooming in on the activities of the gardens' first and second directors: Caspar Georg Carl Reinwardt and Carl Ludwig Blume. In particular under Blume's aegis the garden was under constant threat which eventually led to the temporary closure of the garden in 1826. The essay conceptualizes the garden as a provisional niche, in which collectors, gardeners, merchants, administrators, and plant experts with diverse socio-economic backgrounds and networks came together to negotiate the relationship between botany and imperial politics. Taken together this essay argues that plant science and the garden's institutional development need to be analyzed as part of a much wider history of colonial management and agricultural exploitation.
Flora and economic botany, by Augustine Henry, pp. 16-22. ; (Commercial, no. 1, 1896. In continuation of "Commercial, no. 11, 1893.") ; Mode of access: Internet.
During the 18th century British encyclopaedias included in their lemmata an increasing number of botanical lexis, that is the terminology pertaining to "that branch of natural history which treats of the uses, characters, classes, orders, genera, and species of plants. […] and what useful and ornamental purposes may be expected from the cultivation of it [i.e. botany]" (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1768-1771, s.v. BOTANY). More often than not, these terms represented migrating plants coming from exotic places, new geographical areas, whether eastwards or westwards. The general aim of this survey is to investigate the representation of the botanical science in 18th-century universal and specialized encyclopaedias, starting from prefaces and going on with the micro-texts of the single entries s.v. BOTANY. The starting point is thus theoretical botany. A further point in the analysis focuses on applied botany and discusses those plants such as Camellia Sinensis, Coffea Arabica, Theobroma Cacao, Saccharum Officinarum and Cinchona Officinalis which were mostly exploited for commercial and/or medical reasons. The individual entries include the most tiny details on the single headwords-topics and also display an acceptable plurality of beliefs, viewpoints and perspectives, focussing on botanical descriptions, historical information, socio-cultural issues, legal, political and commercial considerations.
The potential value of the efficient utilization of rural lands to cultivate indigenous fruits and vegetables to improve the livelihood of farming households cannot be overemphasized. Using primary data from 400 randomly selected rural farming households in Ondo State, Nigeria, this study applied probit regression, principal component analysis (PCA), and propensity score matching (PSM) models to investigate the factors that determine the decisions of households to utilize their lands to cultivate indigenous fruits and vegetables. The impact of their cultivation on the livelihood of the participants was assessed, and the result revealed that they were profitable (NGN19,187.8/USD 42.60/Ha; Nigerian Naira = NGN, USD = United States Dollar). The farmers who cultivated indigenous fruits and vegetables (n = 277) made an additional 29.40% average total farm revenue than those (n = 123) who did not. Based on the probit regression analysis, factors such as educational attainment, access to government subsidies, and knowledge of the nutritional benefit of the indigenous fruits and vegetables influenced the decision of farmers to cultivate indigenous fruits and vegetables. The PSM model established that the cultivation of indigenous plants increased farm revenue and livelihood outcomes by NGN17,604.85 and NGN2265.00, respectively. In this context, the cultivation of indigenous fruits and vegetables in the selected rural communities is important for improving the livelihoods of households and suggests the need to rethink the present dominant policy narrative that neglects these indigenous plants. A concerted effort needs to focus on increasing their productivity and commercialization as a primary pathway to improve rural livelihood and transformation.
We are surrounded by plants that are not native to the countries in which we live. Some are accidental arrivals but many are deliberate introductions. The first step in the introduction process is the collection of a plant sample. Stating a handful of seeds or dried plant specimens was taken from their native habitat and transferred to a garden or herbarium oversimplifies intricate, complex networks of interpersonal relationships. Fascination with these networks and the long-term environmental, social, biological, economic or political consequences of plant movement and establishment unites researchers across diverse academic disciplines.
vol. 2,5 printed by Robinson & Co. ; Issued in parts each with special t. p. ; "Published under the auspices of Natal Government and Durban Botanical Society." ; Mode of access: Internet.
We examined and analyzed methods used to create numerical equivalence between sites affected by development and proposed conservation offset sites. Application of biodiversity offsetting metrics in development impact and mitigation assessments is thought to standardize biodiversity conservation outcomes, sometimes termed yield by those conducting these calculations. The youth of biodiversity offsetting in application, however, means little is known about how biodiversity valuations and offset contracts between development and offset sites are agreed on in practice or about long-term conservation outcomes. We examined how sites were made commensurable and how biodiversity gains or yields were calculated and negotiated for a specific offset contract in a government-led pilot study of biodiversity offsets in England. Over 24 months, we conducted participant observations of various stages in the negotiation of offset contracts through repeated visits to 3 (anonymized) biodiversity offset contract sites. We conducted 50 semistructured interviews of stakeholders in regional and local government, the private sector, and civil society. We used a qualitative data analysis software program (DEDOOSE) to textually analyze interview transcriptions. We also compared successive iterations of biodiversity-offsetting calculation spreadsheets and planning documents. A particular focus was the different iterations of a specific biodiversity impact assessment in which the biodiversity offsetting metric developed by the U.K.'s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs was used. We highlight 3 main findings. First, biodiversity offsetting metrics were amended in creative ways as users adapted inputs to metric calculations to balance and negotiate conflicting requirements. Second, the practice of making different habitats equivalent to each other through the application of biodiversity offsetting metrics resulted in commensuration outcomes that may not provide projected conservation gains. Third, the pressure of creating value for money diminished projected conservation yields.
The COVID-19 pandemic, its impact on the global economy, and current delays in the negotiation of the post-2020 global biodiversity agenda of the Convention on Biological Diversity heighten the urgency to build back better for biodiversity, sustainability, and well-being. In 2019, the Intergovernmental Science Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) concluded that addressing biodiversity loss requires a transformative change of the global economic system. Drawing on the IPBES findings, this policy perspective discusses actions in four priority areas to inform the post-2020 agenda: (1) Increasing funding for conservation; (2) redirecting incentives for sustainability; (3) creating an enabling regulatory environment; and (4) reforming metrics to assess biodiversity impacts and progress toward sustainable and just goals. As the COVID-19 pandemic has made clear, and the negotiations for the post-2020 agenda have emphasized, governments are indispensable in guiding economic systems and ust take an active role in transformations, along with businesses and civil society. These key actors must work together to implement actions that combine short-term impacts with structural change to shift economic systems away from a fixation with growth toward human and ecological well-being. The four priority areas discussed here provide opportunities for the post-2020 agenda to do so. biodiversity conservation, economic systems, green finance, incentives, metrics, policy, regulation, subsidies, trade, transformative change ; publishedVersion
Vol. ii-vi "by J.M. Wood." ; "Published under the auspices of Natal government and Durban Botanic Society." ; Subtitle varies. ; Mode of access: Internet.
"This catalogue was undertaken . to complete the list of economic products exhibited in the Madras museum, commenced by Mr. Narasinga Rao in 1916 in his 'Catalogue of wood specimens'."--Pref. ; At head of title: Madras government museum. ; Vegetable products.--Animal products.--Mineral products. ; Mode of access: Internet.
In the first part of this paper selected narratives of early exploration of Northwest Amazonia are analysed with the intention to reveal the values that colonisers and scientist hold at the moment of encountering indigenous peoples. It is argued that these values were transformed and adapted for the development of Economic Botany. The discussion continues on questioning: 'Were ethnosciences shaped by imperialistic motives?', 'Has the ethnology of Northwest Amazonia contributed to intercultural dialogue or has it all been part of a colonialist project of Northwest Amazon?'. In the second part of the paper a narrative is presented. The narrative describes a process through which the values of liberal democracy were to be imprinted in indigenous peoples' organisations of the Colombian Amazonia during the 1990s. Leví-Strauss' perspective of intervention: "the society we belong to is the only society we are in a position to transform without risk of destroying it" (Levi-Strauss1973: 392) its taken to develop a critical appraisal of the process described. The paper finalises with a call for ethnoscientists to consider 'fair play' rather than 'objectivity' when attempting research in Northwest Amazonia. It is concluded that Amazonia and its indigenous population would gain much if each political actor (including scientists) would express their own subjectivity clearly and without hesitation.
The recognition of the economic consequences of alien invasive plants in terms of water-supply costs was pivotal in the establishment of the Working for Water programme, which has spent over R3 billion in dealing with the problem while simultaneously addressing poverty relief. Given competition from other social development projects for future funding, however, there is a need to justify further alien control programmes and to maximize efficiency within the programme. This requires valuing the biodiversity benefits of alien control and improving of the evaluation methods used. The concept of ecological goods and services has been a useful political tool, but the resource-economics concept of the Total Economic Value of biodiversity forms a more useful analytical framework. Studies on the impacts of alien invasive plants in South Africa initially concentrated on water losses, but more recently have included values of direct consumptive and non-consumptive use, option and existence value, and other indirect measures. Secondary effects such as downstream changes in aquatic ecosystem functions have not been assessed. Studies have varied in their scale and scope, as well as in the 'currency' of evaluation (such as financial or economic). Several approaches have been used for valuing water losses, with initial estimates having been the most conservative. Estimates of non-water benefits have frequently involved extrapolation from site-specific investigations within the study area, or been estimated from estimates at the regional level. None of the contingent valuation studies used has been applied following internationally accepted guidelines. In water-yielding catchments, alien control programmes are easy to justify in economic terms. In other areas, this may be more difficult. Cost-benefit analyses to date have tended to include the full financial costs of clearing, whereas, in reality, the opportunity cost of labour is close to zero, and economic costs are therefore much smaller. Benefits, which accrue later, tend to be underestimated from lack of information on biodiversity values and by high discount rates. A revised approach would favour the outlook for control programmes. If this fails to secure funding, what alternatives are there? New regulations are considered suboptimal and likely to fail. Opportunities for creating incentives to clear aliens from private lands are extremely limited, and there are no incentives that can reduce future invasions. Government-funded control programmes are thus the most efficient option. Future studies will need to address the right questions using the appropriate methods, incorporate both ecological and economic dynamics, express values in the right 'currency', and use a discount rate that reflects the rights of future generations. The quality of this research will depend on relevant ecological enquiry.
From ancient time fisheries has been a major source of food for humanity and provider of employment and economic benefits to those engaged in it. Namibia is an arid country and with limited freshwater fisheries, chiefly found in the northern part of the country (Kavango and Zambezi River in the Caprivi region).Although freshwater fisheries is limited in Namibia, it serves a vital societal role in terms of food security and source of income. This stydy attempts to describe the status of Kavango fisheries from local people's and ecological perspectives. The study further attempts to analyse historical development of fisheries in Kavango and relate it to questions of sustainable resource utilisation in terms of ecosystem dynamic, socio-economic processes, institutions and rules and regulations. This was done by looking at the rationale behind the use of different types of gear (traditional and modern), socio-economic characteristics of fishing population, people's perception about the carrying capacity of fish resource and most efficient way of managing the resource (i.e. traditional, government or both). The results of this study indicated that some fish species have declined, and there is a growing awareness among local people that modern gears are the cause. People in Kavango seemed to prefer traditional over modern gears. There seemed to be few formal employment opportunities in the area, and the sale of fish as source of income has increased and to continue to increase further in the future. Both traditional and government laws and regulation are poorly enforced. However, the local people preferred fishing to be traditionally regulated. As is often the case in rural communities in Africa, women have the main household responsibility for food security and they tend to fish more than men. Co-management (where functions, rights and responsibilities of resouce management are shared among stakeholders), provision of good storage and transportation of fish and diversification of agricultural production are among the recommendations made to relieve pressure on the resource. ; M-MNRSA
Informal gold mining (IGM) is a major driver of deforestation and source of global mercury emissions. Policy makers may seek to control the spread of IGM by enforcing rules and/or providing alternative livelihoods. We investigated the dynamics and drivers of IGM in northern Myanmar to shed light on the conditions needed for alternative livelihood and enforcement interventions to succeed. We surveyed 226 respondents who practiced mining and/or farming. We found that mining and agriculture provided complementary livelihoods for many respondents as they met different livelihood needs, and that many of the miners were economic migrants. Livelihood-based interventions based on agriculture/plantations—as currently planned by the regional government—are thus unlikely to provide true substitutes. The willingness of migrant miners to move under different economic circumstances suggests that livelihood-based interventions are unlikely to scale well—mining may simply be displaced to other regions, or new migrants might replace old migrants. We estimated that current enforcement efforts were insufficient and that a much higher level of enforcement—either constant presence of enforcement officials at each informal mining site, or confiscating equipment every month—would be required to make informal mining unprofitable. Enforcement effectiveness was further undermined by corruption in the guise of informal payments to local authorities. Our study is the first to estimate costs that enforcement imposes and the level of enforcement required to deter informal gold mining, and adds to the growing body of evidence that enforcement and alternative livelihood approaches alone are unlikely to deter informal gold mining.
Atlases accompany v. 1, pt. 1; v. 2; and v. 5-v. 7. ; "Published by authority of the Legislature of Ohio." ; v.1-3, Geology and Palaeontology -- v.4 Zoology and Botany -- v.5-6 Economic geology -- v.7 Economic geology, archaeology, botany, paleontology -- v.8 Comprising reports on various mineral industries -- v.9 Comprising Bulletins 4-5-6-7 and 8 of the Fourth Series. ; Atlases accompany v. 1, pt. 1; v. 2; and v. 5-v. 7. ; Mode of access: Internet.
