Ecological and biogeographical drivers of freshwater green algae biodiversity: from local communities to large-scale species pools of desmids

Conflicts between local communities and their governments over natural resource development are not new in Latin America. When mining and oil companies move in, communities have blocked roads, staged protests, and undertaken other forms of direct action. More recently, however, communities have expanded their tactics, turning toward the state and its participatory institutions to contest claims over their land. This article investigates this trend and the conditions that facilitate it by analyzing an original database of 102 attempts by communities in Colombia to implement one participatory institution—the popular consultation—to challenge large scale extractive projects. I argue that communities’ ability to contest extractive projects by leveraging participatory institutions depends on the balance of power between two external players—private firms and expert allies.

Download Full-text

Applied science facilitates the large-scale expansion of protected areas in an Amazonian hot spot

Science Advances ◽

10.1126/sciadv.abe2998 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 7 (31) ◽

pp. eabe2998

Author(s):

Nigel C.A. Pitman ◽

Corine F. Vriesendorp ◽

Diana Alvira Reyes ◽

Debra K. Moskovits ◽

Nicholas Kotlinski ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Land Use ◽

Protected Areas ◽

Large Scale ◽

Amazon Basin ◽

Hot Spot ◽

Terrestrial Ecosystems ◽

Local Communities ◽

Decision Makers ◽

Social Scientists ◽

International Commitments

Meeting international commitments to protect 17% of terrestrial ecosystems worldwide will require >3 million square kilometers of new protected areas and strategies to create those areas in a way that respects local communities and land use. In 2000–2016, biological and social scientists worked to increase the protected proportion of Peru’s largest department via 14 interdisciplinary inventories covering >9 million hectares of this megadiverse corner of the Amazon basin. In each landscape, the strategy was the same: convene diverse partners, identify biological and sociocultural assets, document residents’ use of natural resources, and tailor the findings to the needs of decision-makers. Nine of the 14 landscapes have since been protected (5.7 million hectares of new protected areas), contributing to a quadrupling of conservation coverage in Loreto (from 6 to 23%). We outline the methods and enabling conditions most crucial for successfully applying similar campaigns elsewhere on Earth.

Download Full-text

Maintaining Mutual Benefits between Investor and Local Community: Mechanisms to Reopen Lega Dambi Gold Mining, Ethiopia

PanAfrican Journal of Governance and Development (PJGD) ◽

10.46404/panjogov.v2i1.2913 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 2 (1) ◽

pp. 55-81

Author(s):

Abdisa Olkeba Jima

Keyword(s):

Corporate Social Responsibility ◽

Social Responsibility ◽

Large Scale ◽

Gold Mining ◽

Local Community ◽

Local Communities ◽

Mining Operations ◽

Mining Company ◽

Social License ◽

Corporate Social

Mining, specifically, large-scale gold mining has become one of the primary economic activities that play a pivotal role in the socio-economic development of one country. But there is no consensus among scholars whether gold mining companies maintain mutual benefits with local communities. The main objective of this research is to scrutinize the mechanism to be employed in reopening Lega Dambi large-scale gold mining by maintaining mutual benefits between the company and the local community. The researcher employed a qualitative method and a case study research design. Focus group discussions and semi-structured interviews were used to collect data from the local community, elders, religious leaders, Abbaa Gadaas, Guji Zone, and Odo Shakiso Woreda investment office, land management office, social and labor affair, mineral, and energy office administrators, and Odo Shakiso Woreda health station and Adola hospital. Secondary sources and regulatory frameworks such as FDRE Constitution and Mining Operations Proclamation No. 678/2010 were used to triangulate with primary data. The finding shows that Lega Dambi's large-scale gold mining company failed to maintain mutual benefits between itself and the local community. Basic tenets such as national and regional corporate social responsibility, community development agreement, impact and benefit agreements, social and labor plan, and social license were not implemented properly to balance the mutual benefit between the company and the local community. The researcher concluded that Lega Dambi large-scale gold mining company disregarded the role of the local community during commencement time albeit it had a strong relationship with the central government. Consequently, the company was terminated because of a bad relationship it had with the local community. It is recommended that national and regional corporate social responsibility that shows the company’s specific joint administration of the central and Oromia region governments should be designed and implemented fully. It is also recommended that discussions should be held with local communities and arrived at a consensus concerning the reopening of the company.

Download Full-text

Challenges Posed on The New Mining Act and Its Regulations in Tanzania

Journal of Politics and Law ◽

10.5539/jpl.v8n4p185 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 8 (4) ◽

pp. 185 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Charles W. Marwa ◽

Isabela Warioba

Keyword(s):

Law Enforcement ◽

Large Scale ◽

Good Governance ◽

Land Ownership ◽

Local Communities ◽

Small Scale ◽

Mining Sector ◽

Mining Companies ◽

Mining Law ◽

The Relationship

This paper assesses the challenges that are posed to the new mining law and other Regulations that govern the mining sector in Tanzania. The main issues discussed in this paper include the conflicts between the local people and the mining companies regarding land ownership, compensation and forced eviction, conflicts between Small Scale Mining (SSM) and Large Scale Mining (LSM).The findings obtained by the authors, intimates that the major problems in the mining sector are due to lack of law enforcement and good governance in the sector as well as lack of awareness of the laws governing the sector by the local communities.Lastly, the authors concludes and recommend that, until and unless the laws are adhered to and kept into practice, the problems in the mining sector will not be easily resolved. Hence in order for the mining sector to benefit the indigenous and the investors, there should be enhancement of sustainable development;, people should be educated on the laws and the effects of mining on the environment and the relationship between SSM and LSM be improved.

Download Full-text

The Anti-Politics Machine of Green Energy Development: The Moroccan Solar Project in Ouarzazate and Its Impact on Gendered Local Communities

Land ◽

10.3390/land8060100 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 8 (6) ◽

pp. 100 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

Ryser

Keyword(s):

Solar Energy ◽

Large Scale ◽

Common Property ◽

Common Pool Resources ◽

Local Communities ◽

Scientific Discipline ◽

Green Energy ◽

Common Pool ◽

The Government ◽

Land Water

The Moroccan Agency for Sustainable Energy (MASEN) established one of the largest solar energy projects in the world through a public–private partnership. It is on communal land previously owned by a Moroccan Amazigh (Berber) clan in the Ghessate rural council area, 10 km away from Ouarzazate. The land for the energy project comprises a surface area of more than 3000 hectares. This large-scale land acquisition has led to the loss of access to common-pool resources (land, water, and plants), which were formerly managed by local common property institutions, due to its enclosure, and the areas themselves. This paper outlines how the framing of the low value of land by national elites, the state administration, MASEN, and the subsequent discourses of development, act as an anti-politics machine to hide the loss of land and land-related common-pool resources, and thus an attack on resilience—we call it in our scientific discipline a process of ‘resilience grabbing’, especially for women. As a form of compensation for the land losses, economic livelihood initiatives have been introduced for local people based on the funds from the sale of the land and revenue from the solar energy project Noor Ouarzazate. The loss of land representing the ‘old’ commons is—in the official discourse—legitimated by what the government and the parastatal company call the development-related ‘fruits of growth’, and should serve as ‘new forms of commons’ to the local communities. The investment therefore acts as a catalyst through which natural resources (land, water, and plants) are institutionally transformed into new monetary resources that local actors are said to be able to access, under specific conditions, to sustain their livelihood. There are, however, pertinent questions of access (i.e., inclusion and exclusion), regulation, and equality of opportunities for meeting the different livelihood conditions previously supported by the ‘old’ commons.

Download Full-text

Disaster and Protection of Tenants in Japanese Law: General Principles in Time of Emergencies

Issues in Legal Scholarship ◽

10.1515/ils-2015-0004 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 11 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Shunichiro Koyanagi

Keyword(s):

Large Scale ◽

Social Problems ◽

Legal Protection ◽

Modern Society ◽

Local Communities ◽

General Rules ◽

Japanese Law ◽

The Government ◽

The Right ◽

Japanese Diet

AbstractThis article examines the legal protection of ex-tenants after disasters in Japan. The “Act Providing Temporary Measures concerning Land Lease and Building Lease in the Cities Damaged by War” of 1946 conferred not only the right to lease rebuilt buildings, but also the right of ex-tenants to lease the land of destroyed buildings. Therefore, many victims of the war disaster were entitled to construct and keep self-made shelters on the site of destroyed buildings. Thus, emergencies created exceptions to general rules or principles. The implementation of the Lease Act of 1946 was initially limited to the war disaster, but the government later issued the implementation Cabinet Orders of the Lease Act of 1946 to major disasters until 2004. However, in the case of the Great East Japan Earthquake of 2011, the local communities and local bar associations raised strong oppositions against the Lease Act of 1946 on the motif that the implementation of the Lease Act of 1946 would cause complicated legal and social problems. The Ministry of Justice decided not to enact an implementation Cabinet Order of the Lease Act of 1946. The Japanese Diet adopted a new Act regarding the lease in time of disaster in June 2013 to abolish the right to lease land and to lease newly rebuilt buildings as well. In a highly developed modern society, it is difficult to justify exceptions to general principles even in the case of emergencies caused by large-scale disasters.

Download Full-text

Response to Comment on “Impacts of species richness on productivity in a large-scale subtropical forest experiment”

Science ◽

10.1126/science.aav9863 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 363 (6423) ◽

pp. eaav9863 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Helge Bruelheide ◽

Yuxin Chen ◽

Yuanyuan Huang ◽

Keping Ma ◽

Pascal A. Niklaus ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Species Richness ◽

Tree Species ◽

Large Scale ◽

Subtropical Forest ◽

Natural Forests ◽

Tree Species Richness ◽

Species Pools

Yang et al. have raised criticism that the results reported by us would not be relevant for natural forests. We argue that productivity is positively related to species richness also in subtropical natural forests, and that both the species pools and the range of tree species richness used in our experiment are representative of many natural forests of this biome.

Download Full-text

Transformation of the concept of Identity in the context of interpretation of cultural heritage

Философская мысль ◽

10.25136/2409-8728.2021.4.34078 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 77-85

Author(s):

Sergey Aleksandrovich Pilyak

Keyword(s):

Cultural Heritage ◽

Socioeconomic Development ◽

Large Scale ◽

Local Community ◽

Regional Identity ◽

Local Communities ◽

Natural Heritage ◽

Cultural Specificity ◽

The People ◽

Special Category

The concept of identity in the the era of fundamental rearrangement of the cultural and national map of Europe in the XIX – XX centuries. The threat of losing the identity of entire states, separate regions, and local communities, actualizes the value of cultural specificity and view of identity as a special concept. Regional identity associated with the cultural and natural heritage of a particular region remains most common. Identity alongside cultural heritage overall, is singled out as a special category only in case of its loss. The formation of the concept was related to the process of fundamental rearrangement of the cultural and national map of Europe in during the large-scale socioeconomic processes of the XIX – XX centuries. A sense of losing cultural bonds of the people, region, or local community aroused scientific realization of the value of identity. Determination and translation of regional identity is one of the pivotal stages in socioeconomic development of the regions and formation of attractive image of the territory. Moreover, the professional, age, gender and other types of identity can be distinguished in accordance with unifying characteristics. In light of the aforementioned facts, the author proposes to view the principle of identity as a peculiarity of interpretation of the cultural heritage.

Download Full-text

DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY PORT OF BIAS MUNJUL IN TOURISM RECOVERY AT THE POST COVID-19

ASTONJADRO ◽

10.32832/astonjadro.v11i1.5779 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 11 (1) ◽

pp. 108

Author(s):

I Gede Wahyu Kusuma ◽

Ngakan Ketut Acwin Dwijendra ◽

Ni Made Yudantini

Keyword(s):

Development Strategy ◽

Local Governments ◽

Large Scale ◽

Swot Analysis ◽

Central Government ◽

Local Communities ◽

Tourism Industry ◽

Descriptive Data ◽

Data Presentation ◽

Prime Condition

Indonesia implements Large-Scale Social Restrictions (PSBB) which are enforced per region based on the severity of the outbreak and the assessment is determined by the central government through the Ministry of Health. Restrictions on activities for traveling have a great impact on areas that utilize the tourism industry. Restrictions on activities lead to a decline in the economy of the community, especially in areas that rely on the tourism industry. Infrastructure has an important role in efforts to recover the economy and tourism after the pandemic. The infrastructure used as the object of research is the project Port Munjul Bias, which is one of the ongoing port projects on Ceningan Island. The purpose of the study was to look at the strategy for developing the Port Bias Munjul in the post-Covid-19 pandemic recovery. The type of research used is qualitative research with descriptive data presentation. The approach used is a SWOT analysis to see the strategy for developing the Port Bias Munjul in the midst of the Covid-19 Pandemic. The results obtained are the construction of the Port Bias Munjul in prime condition (SO), which shows that the existence of the Port Bias Munjul project will play a very important role in the recovery of tourism and the economy in Nusa Ceningan or its surroundings. Strategies that can be carried out are in the form of cooperation between local governments and the private sector, empowerment of local communities and improvement of logistical support facilities.

Download Full-text