Water Allocation and the Sustainability of Dairying in the Upper Waitaki River Basin

<p>Water as a resource management issue is gaining prominence in New Zealand, both in terms of quality and quantity. In the Waitaki this became critical in 2003 when several proposed development schemes exposed the inadequacies of the RMA and highlighted the need for a catchment wide plan. Legislation was promulgated and a Regional Plan developed to address the issues of efficient allocation. This thesis aimed to question the efficiency of water allocation within the recent legislation and to examine the sustainability of dairying in this area with regard to cumulative effects to the hydrological system. It was found the Plan has failed to achieve its stated aims. Dairying in the upper Waitaki is currently increasing and applications for resource consent are being heard under legislation that is not backed by the science required within its policies. Fieldwork was undertaken to explore some of the science required under the Regional Plan to enable a 'reasonable use' test to be made. The aim was to assess the response of soils in the upper Waitaki to intensive irrigation. This revealed that the potential impacts of intensive irrigation in this area are significant and highlighted the need for further research. This is a study of how poor policy and planning, based on a lack of robust science has resulted in the inefficient allocation of water. This has implications for long-term sustainable resource use.</p>

Water Allocation and the Sustainability of Dairying in the Upper Waitaki River Basin

<p>Water as a resource management issue is gaining prominence in New Zealand, both in terms of quality and quantity. In the Waitaki this became critical in 2003 when several proposed development schemes exposed the inadequacies of the RMA and highlighted the need for a catchment wide plan. Legislation was promulgated and a Regional Plan developed to address the issues of efficient allocation. This thesis aimed to question the efficiency of water allocation within the recent legislation and to examine the sustainability of dairying in this area with regard to cumulative effects to the hydrological system. It was found the Plan has failed to achieve its stated aims. Dairying in the upper Waitaki is currently increasing and applications for resource consent are being heard under legislation that is not backed by the science required within its policies. Fieldwork was undertaken to explore some of the science required under the Regional Plan to enable a 'reasonable use' test to be made. The aim was to assess the response of soils in the upper Waitaki to intensive irrigation. This revealed that the potential impacts of intensive irrigation in this area are significant and highlighted the need for further research. This is a study of how poor policy and planning, based on a lack of robust science has resulted in the inefficient allocation of water. This has implications for long-term sustainable resource use.</p>

Accelerated adoption of sugar palm farming technology to supports sustainable resource utilization in North Sulawesi

The purpose of this study was to examine the characteristics and opportunities of accelerating the adoption of palm sugar farming technology in sustainable resource use in North Sulawesi Province on July to November 2016. The data used are secondary data and primary data derived from respondents as many as 120 palm-based farming households in the central district of palm plantations in Tareran, Tomohon, and Motoling, Analysis used cross tabulation for farmer characteristics and binary logistic regression approach for accelerated adoption opportunities. The results showed that the farmers cultivated sugar palm plants with an intercropping farming system with a variety of plantation and forestry food crops. Good knowledge of palm plant cultivation system (64.84%) in cultivating sugar palm with a good understanding of the sustainability of palm plant-based farming. Opportunities for accelerating the appreciation and adoption of farmers to sugar palm-based farming technology can be realized in the form of participatory technology assistance on all technology components, both basic and optional technology, by expanding the business scale, increasing various processed products, bringing the location of farming closer to residential and information sources technology. To increase the production of aren and their derivative products and to maintain the continuity and preservation of the environment, it is necessary to cultivate and expand the palm area in harmony with regional spatial planning for conservation and sustainable management.

The Last Grain: Designing the Quintessential New Zealand Dwelling for a Future with Less Glass

<p><b>Sand and aggregate are the world’s second-most extracted resource behind only water, and more than 75% of dredged-up sand is used in construction as a critical component of glass and concrete, often causing significant damage to ecosystems and coastlines. Sand extraction is rapidly increasing worldwide, while the recognition that worldwide supplies are finite is still limited. The United Nations have acknowledged sustainable natural resource use as a pivotal factor to improving economic prosperity and human wellbeing globally. </b></p> <p>Meanwhile, New Zealand architecture is increasingly dependent on glass as a key conveyor of the landscape, freedom and command of space. This reliance presents a major contradiction between sustainable natural resource use and themes in idealised residential architecture. This opposition between the poetic aspects of successful architecture and practical application of sustainable principles is also evident in existing scholarship. This research portfolio attempts to develop approaches on how this issue could be addressed. </p> <p>This thesis contributes to the development of much needed scholarship that addresses and problematises the issues associated with the fact that in the near future, the construction industry be more deliberate in how much glass is used for minimal wastefulness but maximum impact. It will investigate opportunities of designing with less glass through poetic design in parallel with scientific analysis, examining existing buildings’ sand usage and determining limitations for a framework for designing with less glass. </p> <p>This thesis aims to raise awareness of the discrepancies between sustainable resource use and current New Zealand architecture themes. The acknowledgment of these issues must be accelerated in the architecture community to prepare for the imminent crises of the sand shortage and its architectural implications.</p>

The Last Grain: Designing the Quintessential New Zealand Dwelling for a Future with Less Glass

<p><b>Sand and aggregate are the world’s second-most extracted resource behind only water, and more than 75% of dredged-up sand is used in construction as a critical component of glass and concrete, often causing significant damage to ecosystems and coastlines. Sand extraction is rapidly increasing worldwide, while the recognition that worldwide supplies are finite is still limited. The United Nations have acknowledged sustainable natural resource use as a pivotal factor to improving economic prosperity and human wellbeing globally. </b></p> <p>Meanwhile, New Zealand architecture is increasingly dependent on glass as a key conveyor of the landscape, freedom and command of space. This reliance presents a major contradiction between sustainable natural resource use and themes in idealised residential architecture. This opposition between the poetic aspects of successful architecture and practical application of sustainable principles is also evident in existing scholarship. This research portfolio attempts to develop approaches on how this issue could be addressed. </p> <p>This thesis contributes to the development of much needed scholarship that addresses and problematises the issues associated with the fact that in the near future, the construction industry be more deliberate in how much glass is used for minimal wastefulness but maximum impact. It will investigate opportunities of designing with less glass through poetic design in parallel with scientific analysis, examining existing buildings’ sand usage and determining limitations for a framework for designing with less glass. </p> <p>This thesis aims to raise awareness of the discrepancies between sustainable resource use and current New Zealand architecture themes. The acknowledgment of these issues must be accelerated in the architecture community to prepare for the imminent crises of the sand shortage and its architectural implications.</p>

Are Humans a Cooperative Species? Challenges & Opportunities for Teaching the Evolution of Human Prosociality

Evolutionary anthropologists commonly describe humans as a highly cooperative species, based on our evolved socio-cognitive capacities. However, students and the general public may not necessarily share this view about our species. At the same time, fostering our ability to cooperate is considered a key foundation for achieving sustainable development, and students’ understanding of the conditions that enable or hinder cooperation is therefore an important learning goal in sustainability education. In this article, we describe a small classroom activity that explored students’ and preservice biology teachers’ preconceptions about the human capacity to cooperate around shared resources in comparison to the capacity of our closest relative, the chimpanzee. Results indicate that students and teachers had limited knowledge about the evolved human capacity for cooperation around shared resources in small groups, most often viewing chimpanzees as more capable of cooperation and sustainable resource use. Based on the results of this classroom intervention, we highlight important learning opportunities for educators in biology on teaching human evolution and human behavior, particularly as related to current challenges of sustainable development.

Farm Production Diversity in Aquaculture Has Been Overlooked as a Contributor to Sustainability

Like many sectors, the expansion of aquaculture has issues related to sustainable resource use and environmental change. These challenges are widely recognised and are addressed with sectoral strategies. Even when culturing a single species, the specifics of impacts, constraints, and pressures are likely to vary in effects for different farm types. On the other hand, production efficiencies can drive farms towards homogeneity. A simple model is used in this study to demonstrate farm-scale budgets and the pressure to intensify production towards an optimum. A range of interventions can provide incentives for less intensive production: these include price premiums and altered cost bases. Integrated multitrophic aquaculture (IMTA) does not offer a route to less intensive production systems if the productivity of the extractive species (e.g., algae) is linked to the intensity of the fish farm, although alternative incentives for IMTA are possible. Increases in the intensity of production (as stocking density) can be mitigated by increasing farm capacity. An expanded production model suggests that this will lead to larger farms at relatively high stocking densities. Where farms are subject to variable economic and biological processes, this can lead to some combinations of intensity and capacity to have less variable earnings than others. The promotion of diverse aquaculture sectors may allow some of the ecological and social synergies available to smaller farms to be combined at a regional scale with the greater production of large farms. Cost, price and/or regulatory incentives are needed to create diverse production systems.

Nexus approaches to foster sustainable resource use: relations between stocks and flows of materials, services, and practices

&lt;p&gt;Societies use material and energy resources to build up, maintain and utilize long-lasting structures such as buildings, infrastructures or machinery, and in the process release huge amounts of wastes and emissions. While in 1900 less than a quarter of all material use served to build up new material stocks, this fraction is now ~60% globally. Nexus approaches provide useful heuristics for interdisciplinary analyses of (un)sustainable resource use and the potentials and limitations of societal agency for interventions. Such a nexus can be conceptualized between different resources (e.g. land, materials, energy, or water), between biophysical stocks and flows involved in social metabolism, and the services and contributions to human well-being they provide. The novel concept of a stock-flow-service nexus explicitly recognizes the diverse and potentially conflicting purposes of resource use (e.g. products, services), thereby enriching concepts of &amp;#8220;eco-efficiency&amp;#8221;. At the same time, its applicability is in some contexts reduced by its dependence on the valuation of services, which has been subject to controversy and debate. Focusing on relationships between stocks, flows and practices, e.g. linkages between the routines of everyday life and the consumption of resources such as materials and energy, the complementary approach of a &amp;#8220;stock-flow-practice&amp;#8221; nexus avoids some of these challenges. Building on prominent theories of practice, especially those that have gained traction in consumption research, it offers a new conceptual basis for engaging with human agency and its implications for resource use. Both nexus approaches emphasize the key role of patterns of material stocks (e.g., settlement patterns, transport or production infrastructures, machinery) in shaping the (un)sustainability of resource use and the importance of services- and practice-oriented efforts to reshape these patterns when aiming to tackle the present sustainability crisis. In this presentation, we discuss how these two complementary nexus approaches can serve as heuristic models for interdisciplinary sustainability research, sketch the different conceptual and empirical research directions each of these two approaches inspires, and reflect on their importance for conceptualizing agency.&lt;/p&gt;

The Future of Transhumants' Sustainable Resource Use in Bhutan: Pressures and Policies

Cattle and yaks in Bhutan are mainly managed in a transhumance system, grazing common pooled resources. This is, however, changing due mainly to policy changes and development pressure. The unequal land policies now restrict mobility for cattle-based transhumance by agro-pastoralists although it is expected to remain the same for the yak-based pastoralists. Essential public infrastructures also are being built in the common pooled resources, thus reducing the grazing areas for cattle and yaks alike. This study uses qualitative interview and focus group discussions in conjunction with administrative data and policy documents to understand the forces that increasingly lead to the decline of transhumance and see how it might change the grazing landscape and socialscape in the future. The study finds that grazing in the future will likely transform from an extensive to a semi-intensive system with smaller herd sizes for cattle-based agro-pastoralists. This is being achieved through interventions implemented by the livestock department, promoting crossbreeding with European dairy breeds. Transhumant herder turned sedentary smallholder farmers are fast adopting a sedentary lifestyle. This is changing not only the landscapes from grazing in large expanses of forest and open meadows to restricted semi-intensively managed smallholder farms with a possible impact on biodiversity. Crossbreds of European dairy cattle are fast replacing indigenous siri cattle of the Bos indicus type. Yak-based transhumance is expected to continue with favorable policies and other opportunities, including collection of the highly priced caterpillar fungus, Cordyceps sinensis. The socialscapes are fast changing for both highlanders as well as mid and lowland herders. Many of these places inhabited by herders are now connected by motorable roads, shortening their travel time to the nearest health facilities or shops from days to hours.