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The Politics of Land and Food Scarcity (Earthscan Food and Agriculture)
by Paolo De CastroIn recent years the issue of food security has become centre stage in the global agenda. Since the 2007/8 food price crisis, a number of works have been published on the topic, addressed from various perspectives: economic, social and cultural, environmental, agronomic and climate change. Very rarely is there a comprehensive approach, which also includes the crucial issue of politics. Through a multidisciplinary approach, this book provides an overview of the new global challenges connected with land, food supply and agriculture. It also contributes to engagement in a new global food policy, through a political analysis of land and food scarcity, including 'land grabs' by affluent countries in poorer nations. It does not simply raise the debate; rather it aspires to move forward the debate that has started with the G20 meetings. It discusses how national governments, local agricultural policies and supranational entities are facing the new scenario of feeding a growing population when land resources are limited and subject to competing claims.
The Politics of Military Coalitions
by Scott WolfordMilitary coalitions are ubiquitous. The United States builds them regularly, yet they are associated with the largest, most destructive, and consequential wars in history. When do states build them, and what partners do they choose? Are coalitions a recipe for war, or can they facilitate peace? Finally, when do coalitions affect the expansion of conflict beyond its original participants? The Politics of Military Coalitions introduces newly collected data designed to answer these very questions, showing that coalitions - expensive to build but attractive from a military standpoint - are very often more (if sometimes less) than the sum of their parts, at times encouraging war while discouraging it at others, at times touching off wider wars while at others keeping their targets isolated. The combination of new data, new formal theories, and new quantitative analysis will be of interest to scholars, students, and policymakers alike
The Politics of Nuclear Energy in China
by Xu Yi-ChongExplores the history and challenges of nuclear energy development in China, across five main areas: politics, economics, environment, technology transfer and the nuclear fuel cycle. It emphasizes the political challenges in developing a set of long-term national strategies to ensure speedy, safe and secure nuclear energy development.
The Politics of Partnerships: A Critical Examination of Nonprofit-Business Partnerships
by Maria May SeitanidiThe widespread partnering phenomenon in the US and the UK spurred a significant amount of literature focusing on its strategic use. The Politics of Partnerships diverges by examining if partnerships can deliver benefits that extend beyond the organisational to the societal level resulting from the intentional combined efforts of the partners.
The Politics of Public Accountability: Policy Design in Latin American Oil Exporting Countries (International Series on Public Policy)
by Guillaume Fontaine Cecilia Medrano Caviedes Iván NarváezThis book seeks to consistently explain the role of ideas and institutions in policy outcomes, and addresses the problem of how resource nationalism causes a deficit of public accountability in oil producing countries from Latin America and the Caribbean. The authors present a causal mechanism linking ideas and policy outcomes through institutional arrangements, focusing on policy design to describe the role of instruments selection and combination in improving or reducing public accountability through agenda setting, policy formulation, cross-sectorial coordination and political interplays.
The Politics of Resource Extraction
by Suzana Sawyer Edmund Terence GomezInternational institutions (United Nations, World Bank) and multinational companies have voiced concern over the adverse impact of resource extraction activities on the livelihood of indigenous communities. This volume examines mega resource extraction projects in Australia, Bolivia, Canada, Chad, Cameroon, India, Nigeria, Peru, the Philippines.
The Politics of Shale Gas in Eastern Europe: Energy Security, Contested Technologies and the Social License to Frack (Cambridge Studies in Comparative Public Policy)
by Andreas GoldthauFracking is a novel but contested energy technology – so what makes some countries embrace it while others reject it? This book argues that the reason for policy divergence lies in procedures and processes, stakeholder inclusion and whether a strong narrative underpins governmental policies. Based on a large set of primary data gathered in Poland, Bulgaria and Romania, it explores shale gas policies in Central Eastern Europe (a region strongly dependent on Russian gas imports) to unveil the importance of policy regimes for creating a ‘social licence’ for fracking. Its findings suggest that technology transfer does not happen in a vacuum, but is subject to close mutual interaction with political, economic and social forces; and that national energy policy is a matter not of ‘objective’ policy imperatives, such as Russian import dependence, but of complex domestic dynamics pertaining to institutional procedures and processes, and winners and losers.
The Politics of Space Security
by James Clay MoltzMoltz (national security affairs, US Naval Postgraduate School) traces military space developments from 1957 to the present--including weapons tests and deployments, arms control treaties, and less formal cooperative agreements--in order to understand underlying causes and possible future developments relevant to the policy debate over military uses of space and defense of space-based assets by the United States. After discussing the historical and conceptual background, he focuses on how competition between the Soviet Union and the United States grew more limited following an initially hostile, open-ended, and military-led space programs as both sides accepted mutual constraints on deployable weapons in return for safe access to space for other uses. He next examines the period between the collapse of the Soviet Union and 2001, noting that the US generally maintained self-restraint and cooperative space relations even in the face of the decline of Russian space capabilities. Finally, he looks at the very different dynamics under the Bush administrations and analyzes the underlying factors for the change and concludes with a discussion of possible space futures, ranging from atomized and state-centric to highly integrated and transnational. Annotation ©2008 Book News, Inc. , Portland, OR (booknews. com)
The Politics of Technological Progress: Parties, Time Horizons and Long-term Economic Development
by Joel W. Simmons"Why are some countries richer than others and why do some economies grow more rapidly? The Politics of Technological Progress answers these vital questions by highlighting the importance of technological progress for sustained economic development. The author also explains why some countries exhibit faster technological progress than others. Armed with a wealth of cross-national empirical evidence, Professor Simmons stresses the importance of properly constructed political parties for establishing an environment conducive to technological progress. 'Well-institutionalized' ruling parties are essential for technological progress, he argues, because only in such parties are time horizons long enough for governments to accept the deferred returns that are an inherent feature of government efforts to encourage innovation and technology adoption in the economy"--
The Politics of Technology in Africa
by Iginio GagliardoneAs more Africans get online, information and communication technologies (ICTs) are increasingly hailed for their transformative potential. Yet, the fascination for the possibilities of promoting more inclusive forms of development in the information age have obfuscated the reality of the complex negotiations among political and economic actors who are seeking to use technology in their competition for power. Building on over ten years of research in Ethiopia, Iginio Gagliardone investigates the relationship between politics, development, and technological adoption in Africa's second most populous country and its largest recipient of development aid. The emphasis the book places on the 'technopolitics' of ICTs, and on their ability to embody and enact political goals, offers a strong and empirically grounded counter-argument to prevalent approaches to the study of technology and development that can be applied to other cases in Africa and beyond.
The Politics of Trash: How Governments Used Corruption to Clean Cities, 1890–1929
by Patricia Strach Kathleen S. SullivanThe Politics of Trash explains how municipal trash collection solved odorous urban problems using nongovernmental and often unseemly means. Focusing on the persistent problems of filth and the frustration of generations of reformers unable to clean their cities, Patricia Strach and Kathleen S. Sullivan tell a story of dirty politics and administrative innovation that made rapidly expanding American cities livable. The solutions that professionals recommended to rid cities of overflowing waste cans, litter-filled privies, and animal carcasses were largely ignored by city governments. When the efforts of sanitarians, engineers, and reformers failed, public officials turned to the habits and tools of corruption as well as to gender and racial hierarchies.Corruption often provided the political will for public officials to establish garbage collection programs. Effective waste collection involves translating municipal imperatives into new habits and arrangements in homes and other private spaces. To change domestic habits, officials relied on gender hierarchy to make the women of the white, middle-class households in charge of sanitation. When public and private trash cans overflowed, racial and ethnic prejudices were harnessed to single out scavengers, garbage collectors, and neighborhoods by race. These early informal efforts were slowly incorporated into formal administrative processes that created the public-private sanitation systems that prevail in most American cities today. The Politics of Trash locates these hidden resources of governments to challenge presumptions about the formal mechanisms of governing and recovers the presence of residents at the margins, whose experiences can be as overlooked as garbage collection itself. This consideration of municipal garbage collection reveals how political development often relies on undemocratic means with long-term implications for further inequality. Focusing on the resources that cleaned American cities also shows the tenuous connection between political development and modernization.
Pollen Chemistry & Biotechnology
by Nesrin Ecem Bayram Aleksandar Ž. Kostic Yusuf Can GercekPollen is made up of many chemical constituents such as proteins, sugars, lipids, minerals and phytochemicals. These components make pollen products an excellent source of nutrients and antioxidants for consumers. However, mycotoxigenic fungi are also common in pollen, creating contamination from generated mycotoxins. With adequate monitoring, sampling, processing and storage of pollen the development of mycotoxins can be significantly prevented. Since pollen grain has strong membranes which can limit the bioavailability of some nutrients and phytochemicals, novel methods and pretreatments are required with special emphasis on microbiological pretreatment methodologies. Pollen Chemistry & Biotechnology summarizes current knowledge of the chemical composition of pollen, its importance as a functional food ingredient and its health promoting properties. As Introduction part a short elaborate about botanical characteristics and data, including morphology and anatomy of pollen and bee preferences, is given. Important factors such as the botanical and geographical origin, best practices for preservation of nutritional composition, bioactivity and safety of pollen are covered in full. The nutritional profile of pollen based on data for minerals, lipids and nutrients is presented. A detailed phytochemical profile of pollen based on data for phenolics, flavonoids, carotenoids, vitamins, bioactive compounds is also covered. Areas for the improvement of the bioavailability of different nutrients and bioactive compounds of pollen via applied pretreatments are presented, as are best practices for adequate pollen collection, procession and storage in order to obtain safe products. At the end, an overview about pollen bioactivity as reason to use it as source of pharmaceuticals is made.
Pollination Biology
by Dharam P. AbrolThis book has a wider approach not strictly focused on crop production compared to other books that are strictly oriented towards bees, but has a generalist approach to pollination biology. It also highlights relationships between introduced and wild pollinators and consequences of such introductions on communities of wild pollinating insects. The chapters on biochemical basis of plant-pollination interaction, pollination energetics, climate change and pollinators and pollinators as bioindicators of ecosystem functioning provide a base for future insights into pollination biology. The role of honeybees and wild bees on crop pollination, value of bee pollination, planned honeybee pollination, non-bee pollinators, safety of pollinators, pollination in cages, pollination for hybrid seed production, the problem of diseases, genetically modified plants and bees, the role of bees in improving food security and livelihoods, capacity building and awareness for pollinators are also discussed.
Pollination Biology, Vol.1
by Dharam P. AbrolThe book covers interplay between pest management strategies and safety of pollinators. Detailed information is provided on pests and pollinators of temperate, subtropical and tropical fruit crops. Most of the fruit crops are highly cross pollinated and depend upon insects or benefit from insect pollination for fruit set. Insect pests on the other hand cause major economic damage on fruit crops in tropics, subtropics and temperate. Evidently, pest management in fruit crops on one hand and providing safety to the pollinators on the other is a challenging task in the context of increasing horticultural productivity without upsetting the ecological balance. This book aims to integrate and develop pest control strategies in a way to minimize their impact on beneficial insect species such as natural enemies and pollinators to enhance fruit production and quality. The book covers interplay between pest management strategies and safety of pollinators. Detailed information is provided on pests and pollinators of temperate, subtropical and tropical fruit crops. Pollinators play a crucial role in flowering plant reproduction and in the production of most fruits and vegetables. Most of the fruit crops are highly cross pollinated and depend upon insects or benefit from insect pollination for fruit set. Insect pests on the other hand cause major economic damage on fruit crops in tropics, subtropics and temperate. Evidently, pest management in fruit crops on one hand and providing safety to the pollinators on the other is a challenging task in the context of increasing horticultural productivity without upsetting the ecological balance. This book aims to integrate and develop pest control strategies in a way to minimize their impact on beneficial insect species such as natural enemies and pollinators to enhance fruit production and quality. Most of the fruit crops are highly cross pollinated and depend upon insects or benefit from insect pollination for fruit set. Insect pests on the other hand cause major economic damage on fruit crops in tropics, subtropics and temperate. Evidently, pest management in fruit crops on one hand and providing safety to the pollinators on the other is a challenging task in the context of increasing horticultural productivity without upsetting the ecological balance. This book aims to integrate and develop pest control strategies in a way to minimize their impact on beneficial insect species such as natural enemies and pollinators to enhance fruit production and quality. The book covers interplay between pest management strategies and safety of pollinators.
Pollination Services to Agriculture: Sustaining and enhancing a key ecosystem service
by Barbara Gemmill-HerrenIt is only recently that the immense economic value of pollination to agriculture has been appreciated. At the same time, the alarming collapse in populations of bees and other pollinators has highlighted the urgency of addressing this issue. This book focuses on the specific measures and practices that the emerging science of pollination ecology is identifying to conserve and promote animal pollinators in agroecosystems. It reviews the expanding knowledge base on pollination services, providing evidence to document the status, trends and importance of pollinators to sustainable agricultural production. It provides practical and specific measures that land managers can undertake to ensure that agroecosystems are supportive and friendly to pollinators. It draws on the Global Pollination Project, supported by UNEP/GEF and implemented by FAO and seven partner countries (Brazil, Ghana, India, Kenya, Nepal, Pakistan and South Africa), which serve to provide "lessons from the field".
Pollutant Discharge and Water Quality in Urbanisation
by Yoshiaki TsuzukiThe main purpose of water quality monitoring may be seen as evaluating water quality conformity against water quality standards, especially for administrative purposes. Moreover, water quality monitoring data can be applied to estimate and evaluate pollutant loads in rivers. Chronological water quality fluctuations and vertical water quality profiles in water bodies are also important when taking into account the effects of land-based pollutants on coastal sea and estuary water quality. This book discusses the relationships between pollutant discharge and water quality, taking into account urban development and indicators like the pollutant load per capita flowing into the water body (PLCwb), an index used to evaluate the contribution of municipal wastewater pollutant discharge to pollutant loads flowing into ambient water bodies such as coastal zones, bays and lakes.
Pollutant Diseases, Remediation and Recycling
by Eric Lichtfouse Jan Schwarzbauer Didier RobertPollution has no borders. This popular 70's saying from early ecologists is surprisingly still true nowadays despite overwhelming scientific evidence and public awareness of the occurrence of artificial toxic substances in water, food, air, living organisms and the environment. This book presents advanced reviews on pollutant occurrence, transfer, toxicity and remediation. The chapter on school air quality by Dambruoso et al. highlights the overlooked health issue of airborne pollutants in buildings. Children are particularly threatened because they spend 90% of their time indoors, even in summer. The chapter on industrial wastewater pollutants by Dsikowitzky and Schwarzbauer reviews pollutants from textile, petrochemical, paper, tire, chemical and pharmaceutical plants. The authors describe advanced analytical methods and ecotoxicity tests. Industrial pollutants include dioxins and furans that are also reviewed in the chapter by Mudhoo et al. The chapter on fly ash by Gianoncelli et al. presents many techniques to treat fly ash and, in turn, decrease pollutant concentrations. The authors also explain that fly ash can be recycled in agriculture, buildings and geopolymers. The chapter on antifouling paints used for ship protection, by Sousa et al. , highlights the occurrence of toxic organotins in human organs such as heart, liver and breast milk. The chapter on surfactants by Rebello et al. focuses on safety concerns for humans and the ecosystems. Remediation techniques and green surfactants are presented. The chapters on toxic metals by Nava-Ruíz and Méndez-Armenta, Abarikwu and RistiÄ++ et al. describe sources, monitoring and diseases induced by lead, mercury, cadmium and thallium. The chapter on carcinogenic nitrosamines by Li et al. presents techniques and materials such as zeolites to remediate liquids and smoke containing nitrosamines.
Pollutant Effects in Freshwater: Applied Limnology
by J. Jacoby E. WelchPollutant Effects in Freshwater provides a practical and concise introduction to the ecological consequences of water pollution in aquatic ecosystems. In tackling the problem of water quality deterioration, this book combines the limnological and water pollution literature to describe how pollutants in wastewater affect populations of organisms in freshwater environments.Substantially revised, updated and expanded, with additional specialist contributors, this retitled new edition of Ecological Effects of Wastewater will continue to focus on the effects and management of eutrophication, water quality standards to protect aquatic life, and widen the debate over micro organisms and their public health significance in the aquatic environment.With ever tighter controls on pollution levels of freshwater bodies being implemented and enforced world wide, this book is essential reading for students of public health and environmental engineering, and a reference tool for professionals in consultancies, contractors and for those in regulatory and enforcement bodies.
Pollutant Transfer and Transport in The Sea: Volume I
by Gunnar KullenbergThis book covers those subject areas considered essential for the transfer and transport of pollutants in the marine environment. This publication will stimulate discussions and interdisciplinary research relevent to pollution problems as well as serve as an educational reference book.
Pollutants and Recent Trends in Wastewater Treatment (Water and Wastewater Management)
by Ali Müfit Bahadir Andreas Haarstrick Fatma Beduk Senar AydinThis book demonstrates the variability and extension of environmental pollutants in water and wastewater, besides with recent technological developments in wastewater treatment. It covers review articles and research studies written in a clear style that makes it informative for scientists, researchers, professionals, and students. This book provides a comprehensive overview of the current state of knowledge regarding source, transport and fate of not only emerging compounds, but also pollutants gaining importance over time, such as pharmaceuticals, microplastics, and viruses. It ensures to understand the dimension of the adverse effects on ecosystem and human health through various exposure pathway. The book also covers recent trends in wastewater treatment, with a focus on membrane technologies allowing to remove even very small concentrations of pollutants.
Pollutants and Water Management: Resources, Strategies and Scarcity
by Pardeep Singh Rishikesh Singh Rahul Bhadouria Vipin Kumar SinghPOLLUTANTS AND WATER MANAGEMENT Pollutants and Water Management: Resources, Strategies and Scarcity delivers a balanced and comprehensive look at recent trends in the management of polluted water resources. Covering the latest practical and theoretical aspects of polluted water management, the distinguished academics and authors emphasize indigenous practices of water resource management, the scarcity of clean water, and the future of the water system in the context of an increasing urbanization and globalization. The book details the management of contaminated water sites, including heavy metal contaminations in surface and subsurface water sources. It details a variety of industrial activities that typically pollute water, such as those involving crude oils and dyes. In its discussion of recent trends in abatement strategies, Pollutants and Water Management includes an exploration of the application of microorganisms, like bacteria, actinomycetes, fungi, and cyanobacteria, for the management of environmental contaminants.Readers will also discover a wide variety of other topics on the conservation of water sources including: The role of government and the public in the management of water resource pollutionThe causes of river system pollution and potential future scenarios in the abatement of river pollution Microbial degradation of organic pollutants in various water bodies The advancement in membrane technology used in water treatment processes Lead contamination in groundwater and recent trends in abatement strategies for it Highly polluting industries and their effects on surrounding water resources Perfect for graduate and postgraduate students and researchers whose focus is on recent trends in abatement strategies for pollutants and the application of microorganisms for the management of environmental contaminants, Pollutants and Water Management: Resources, Strategies and Scarcity also has a place in the libraries of environmentalists whose work involves the management and conservation of polluted sites.
Pollutants, Human Health and the Environment
by Nick Voulvoulis K. Vala Ragnarsdottir Jane A. PlantPollutants, Human Health and the Environment is a comprehensive, up-to-date overview of environmental pollutants that are of current concern to human health.Clearly structured throughout, the main body of the book is divided by pollutant type with a chapter devoted to each group of pollutants. Each chapter follows a similar format to facilitate comparison and discussion. For each pollutant, the authors describe the sources, pathways, environmental fate and sinks as well as known toxicological effects. Importantly, the second chapter on heavy metals and other inorganic substances deals with trace element deficiencies which can have serious problems for human health. Some rocks and soils are naturally low in some trace elements and intensive agriculture over the past half century has effectively mined many trace elements reducing their levels in soils and crops. The final chapter is a discussion about the various risk assessment frameworks and regulations covering the main pollutants.Comprehensive, up-to-date coverage of environmental pollutants of concern to human health Clearly divided into pollutant type with each chapter devoted to a different pollutant group Clearly structured throughout with the same format for each chapter to help facilitate comparison and discussion and enable readers to prioritise chemicals of concern Description of the sources, pathways, environmental fate and known toxicological effect Includes contributions from leading researchers and edited by a team of experts in the field
Pollutants in Buildings, Water and Living Organisms
by Eric Lichtfouse Jan Schwarzbauer Didier RobertThis book presents advanced methods to analyse and clean pollutants, such as nanotechnology to treat water, techniques to remediate building materials, and bioindicators. It is very important that the understanding of these methods are brought to the attention of scientists, as cities and ecosystems are still polluted by toxic compounds despite efforts to clean the planet.
Pollutants of Global Concern: A Comprehensive Overview of Persistent Organic Pollutants (Emerging Contaminants and Associated Treatment Technologies)
by Kanchan KumariThis book is a compilation of all the necessary attributes associated with the knowledge of Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) that have been meticulously identified and charted down by the Stockholm Convention. Essential details starting from technical characteristics of the POPs to their expanse of nationwide usage, their remedial procedures adopted in India in comparison to available international data, and their consequent effects on biota and future perspectives are summarized with precision. Additionally, in-house scientific works that have been performed on each chemical are presented. Moreover, a unique feature of this book is that each chapter is dedicated to focusing on a single POP so that all the aspects of its usage, effects and fate can be accurately laid out. The book aims to be a go-to guidebook for stakeholders and academicians dealing with these chemicals who wish to be more acquainted with the present scenario of POPs and their status.
Polluted Sites
by Paul LecomteThis is a translation of ""Les sites pollues: traitement des sols et des eaux souterraines"", second edition. It covers: contaminated sites; environmental diagnosis; assessment of hazard; remediaiton; costs; new legal requirements; and investments and role of insurance.