Raw material extraction once offered an effective route to economic development, but societal relationships with environment and technology have changed so fundamentally that extractive industries today appear more likely to lead rural regions to economic addiction. Key characteristics of addictive activities include rising costs of operation at most extractive facilities, combined with downward trends in world commodity prices. Key characteristics of vulnerable communities and regions include increasing geographic isolation, imbalances of scale and power with respect to extractive industries, and the absence of realistic alternatives for diversified development. Key pressures toward addiction are created by ambiguities that mask the addictive tendencies, including ambiguities of price signals, of employment and development possibilities for remote regions, and of resource exhaustion. The net result is that, while the encouragement to develop extractive industries is often coupled with advice to avoid developing an excessive dependency on a single economic sector, the very regions and nations having the greatest need to hear such advice may also have the lowest realistic ability to respond to it.

Addictive Economies: Extractive Industries and Vulnerable Localities in a Changing World Economy

This article reviews the large and growing literature on social or socioeconomic impact assessment (SIA). Sociologists and other social scientists have been examining various “impacts” or consequences for decades, but the field of SIA emerged during the 1970s as a response to new environmental legislation. Both in its origins and its contributions, SIA is thus a hybrid, a field of social science and a component of the policy-making process. SIAs are generally anticipatory—efforts to project likely impacts before they occur-but empirical SIA work has looked at a broad range of social consequences. The largest subset of empirical SIA work has focused on relatively specific construction projects, particularly large-scale energy development projects in rural areas. Important advances have taken place in documenting economic/demographic and also social and cultural impacts. Further developments in findings, theory, and techniques will be necessary to meet the challenges of the future. The field is showing incr...

Social impact assessment

Crop residue mulching (CRM) can be defined as a technology whereby at the time of crop emergence at least 30% of the soil surface is covered by organic residue of the previous crop. The present study proposes CRM as the most adequate term for the technology in view of the substantial controversy and confusion surrounding existing terms, particularly conservation tillage. CRM is a dual-purpose technology that combines conservation and productivity effects. Its conservation potential hinges on the presence of the crop residues as mulch. This mulch provides a protective layer to the soil surface that is extremely effective in halting soil erosion and also amends the soil ecology. Its productivity potential is twofold. First, the mulch tends to stabilise, and occasionally even enhance, crop yield. Second, it implies factor substitution and input use efficiency alterations. The paper presents the residue balance as an analytical tool to assess the current availability of residues—both in terms of current residue production and current residue destinations. Residue destinations typically include extraction, burning in situ, incorporation, weathering and retention as mulch. CRM has profound implications for crop management. First, CRM implies a set of necessary practices so as to ensure the retention of sufficient residues as mulch. Second, CRM may imply complementary adaptations in order to be able to grow a crop and/or maintain productivity levels. Therefore, CRM is not a simple add-on technology, but instead a complete package of cultural practices. The actual potential of the CRM technology depends on a comprehensive assessment of the socio-economic implications of the implied changes. This potential is site-specific and will diverge between the private and social viewpoint. CRM therefore is a promising dual-purpose technology—but no panacea for soil conservation in (semi-)tropical countries.

Crop residue mulching in tropical and semi-tropical countries: An evaluation of residue availability and other technological implications

1. Introduction 2.The Fluvial System 3. The Flow Regime 4. Sediment Sources 5. Large-scale Sediment Transfer 6. Flow in Channels 7. Processes of Erosion, Transport and Deposition 8. Channel Form and Behaviour 9. System Response to Change 10.Managing River Channels

Fundamentals of Fluvial Geomorphology

Honey bee populations have experienced serious losses in Europe and North America. These losses highlight the potential risk to our agricultural systems that could result from loss of pollination. These losses include direct economic repercussions to multiple industries (beekeeping, fruit, vegetable, forage seed, oil seed and biofuel crops), and corresponding threats to human nutrition. Reasons for the losses are varied but include a lack of diverse nectar and pollen resources within intensively farmed agricultural landscapes. Focusing primarily on Europe and the USA, we review the potential approaches to provide and maintain diverse floral resources for honey bees, giving particular consideration to herbaceous plants (“forbs”). These approaches include the cultivation and maintenance of “bee pastures”, consisting of diverse native or non-native flower-rich plantings maintained in fallow areas, field margins, and conservation buffer strips to sustain bee populations, support honey bee health, and aid beekeeping activities. Within this review we examine specific governmental policy initiatives to support these efforts in the USA and Europe.

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Landscape enhancement of floral resources for honey bees in agro-ecosystems.

Over the last 70 years, the United States Congress has taken on the task of determining how federal dollars will be invested in agriculture through farm bills.1 The focus of this paper is to determine how conservation programs have arisen and evolved and to speculate about future direction. Conservation programs have taken a variety of forms since 1933, usually as vehicles for rural investment, income support, and supply control. It was not until the mid-1980s that conservation programs were truly rooted in protecting natural resources. Several important environmental gains have been made over the last 70 years, and the future of conservation programs looks even more promising.

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History and Outlook for Farm Bill Conservation Programs

How can we better manage watersheds so that they can produce the products and services we desire? Most individuals want a product/service mix that includes production of food and-fiber, housing, urban services, industrial sites, wildlife habitat, water quality, etc. Many individuals, communities and states are struggling with how to manage the resources within the watershed to achieve an acceptable mix of products and services (e.g. making the right tradeoffs). Making these decisions requires greater thought about what types of data and information are needed in making informed choices. In addition, the data, information and knowledge needs to be easily accessible and usable by the decision makers and not constrained to one type of operating system or particular brand of hardware or software. One viable option is to make this data, information and decision aids accessible via the Internet where the data and decision aids reside on a central server and users can interact with them for analysis.

This paper details our ideas concerning the research needs (information and knowledge) as well as the decision making supports necessary for individuals and communities to make better choices regarding the tradeoffs among potential goods, services and levels of environmental amenities …

Research needs for water quality management in the 21st century: A spatial decision support system

Conserving soil : insights from socioeconomic research

Rural industrial development and domestic dependency relations: toward an integrated perspective ( America).

SCIENTISTS, policymakers, and citizens increasingly are asking two questions about soil conservation programs. The first: Why, after 50 years of soil conservation programs, are there still massive soil erosion problems? The second: Why are those farmers with highly erodible acres not using effective soil conservation practices?

Conservation professionals have long sought the ultimate technology or best method for protecting land resources from the erosive effects of wind and water. For decades many people have believed that technological innovations combined with the scientific method were the answers to erosion problems. Indeed, Americans have developed such a strong commitment to technological solutions that we think every problem can be resolved through technology. Conservation problems, like other social concerns, frequently have been approached from the perspective of a technological fix.

Such a perspective is based on the position that technology will generate solutions for any and all problems. Creating an appropriate technology or technique will eliminate the identified problem. Proponents of this approach argue that technologies will be developed to produce the highest level of farm output while simultaneously eliminating soil erosion.

Unfortunately, such technologies have not been developed. Professionals in the field have begun to realize that the effects of conservation policies …

Stephen B. Lovejoy

Papers

History and Outlook for Farm Bill Conservation Programs

Research needs for water quality management in the 21st century: A spatial decision support system

Conserving soil : insights from socioeconomic research

Rural industrial development and domestic dependency relations: toward an integrated perspective ( America).

Conserving soil: Sociological insights