Integrating ecosystem markets to co-ordinate landscape-scale public benefits from nature

Ecosystem markets are proliferating around the world in response to increasing demand for climate change mitigation and provision of other public goods. However, this may lead to perverse outcomes, for example where public funding crowds out private investment or different schemes create trade-offs between the ecosystem services they each target. The integration of ecosystem markets could address some of these issues but to date there have been few attempts to do this, and there is limited understanding of either the opportunities or barriers to such integration. This paper reports on a comparative analysis of eleven ecosystem markets in operation or close to market in Europe, based on qualitative analysis of 25 interviews, scheme documentation and two focus groups. Our results indicate three distinct types of markets operating from the regional to national scale, with different modes of operation, funding and outcomes: regional ecosystem markets, national carbon markets and green finance. The typology provides new insights into the operation of ecosystem markets in practice, which may challenge traditionally held notions of Payment for Ecosystem Services. Regional ecosystem markets, in particular, represent a departure from traditional models, by using a risk-based funding model and aggregating both supply and demand to overcome issues of free-riding, ecosystem service trade-offs and land manager engagement. Central to all types of market were trusted intermediaries, brokers and platforms to aggregate supply and demand, build trust and lower transaction costs. The paper outlines six options for blending public and private funding for the provision of ecosystem services and proposes a framework for integrating national carbon markets and green finance with regional ecosystem markets. Such integration may significantly increase funding for regenerative agriculture and conservation across multiple habitats and services, whilst addressing issues of additionality and ecosystem service trade-offs between multiple schemes.

Financiamento de Longo Prazo: Explorando o Avanço Recente do Mercado de Debêntures Brasileiro

ABSTRACT Context: in Brazil, there was an expansion of private funding via bond issuances, especially since 2017. Before that period, the sources of long-term financing were concentrated on public funding. Objective: this study aims to explore the main factors that could have positively affect Brazilian bond market and if it would be possible to improve project financing through this debt instruments. Methods: using mixed methods with econometric tests and qualitative interview analysis, this study assesses which were the factors that supported this growth and if there is any difference across industries. Results: we found that a change in the market trend has indeed happened around 2017, and it was more pronounced in specific industries such as electricity. Interviewees suggested that increases in demand (possibly triggered by the reduction of public sources of funding and the fall in local interest rates) could be the main factors that supported this change in trend. Conclusions: therefore, this study reinforces the importance of local market conditions and government policies affecting the relative attractiveness of private versus public sources of corporate investment.

Long-term Financing: Exploring the Recent Advances in the Brazilian Bond Market

ABSTRACT Context: in Brazil, there was an expansion of private funding via bond issuances, especially since 2017. Before that period, the sources of long-term financing were concentrated on public funding. Objective: this study aims to explore the main factors that could have positively affect Brazilian bond market and if it would be possible to improve project financing through this debt instruments. Methods: using mixed methods with econometric tests and qualitative interview analysis, this study assesses which were the factors that supported this growth and if there is any difference across industries. Results: we found that a change in the market trend has indeed happened around 2017, and it was more pronounced in specific industries such as electricity. Interviewees suggested that increases in demand (possibly triggered by the reduction of public sources of funding and the fall in local interest rates) could be the main factors that supported this change in trend. Conclusions: therefore, this study reinforces the importance of local market conditions and government policies affecting the relative attractiveness of private versus public sources of corporate investment.

The United Kingdom’s exposure to corruption is rising

Significance This reflects long-standing dynamics linked to the United Kingdom’s role in facilitating illicit global financial flows. In addition, recent political developments under Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s government have fuelled the perception that UK rule of law standards are declining. Impacts Surging real estate prices and increasing wealth inequality facilitate money laundering. Academic freedom in the United Kingdom is potentially impacted by the increase in private donations to universities. The ruling Conservative Party is particularly vulnerable to charges of corruption, given its reliance on private funding.

Syphilis Trigram: a domain-specific visualisation to combat syphilis epidemic and improve the quality of maternal and child health in Brazil

Background: The Brazilian health system is a large and complex system, especially considering its mixed public and private funding. The number of syphilis cases has been increasing greatly in the last four years, even though it has a cheap and simple treatment. Syphilis notification is compulsory by law, and public health surveillance pays great importance to syphilis notification during pregnancy. Syphilis infection can cause severe newborn conditions, premature births, and abortions. Methods: The Action Research methodology was applied to deal with the complex syphilis surveillance reality in Pernambuco, Brazil. Iterative learning cycles were used, totalling six cycles with a formal validation of an operational version of the Syphilis Trigram visualisation at the end of the process. The original data source was analysed and prepared for use without any new data or changes in the ordinary procedure of the current system. Results: The main result of this study is the Syphilis Trigram, a domain-specific infographic for presenting gestational and birth data. The second contribution of this study is the Average Trigram, an organised pie chart which synthesises the Syphilis Trigram relationship in an aggregated manner. Both visualisations are presented in an Infographic User Interface, a tool that gathers an infographic broad visualisation sense for data visualisation. These interfaces also gather selection and filter tools to assist and refine the presented information. The user can experience a specific case-by-case view and an aggregated perspective by any city monitored by the system. Conclusions: The proposed domain-specific visualisation amplifies the understanding of each syphilis case and the overall case characteristics of a city. This new information produced by the Trigram can clarify the reinfection/relapse cases, optimise resource allocation, and enhance syphilis healthcare policies without any new data. Therefore, health surveillance professionals can see the broad tendency, understand the key patterns through visualisation, and take action in a feasible time.

Knowledge Articulation in Creative Media. Interactive, transmedia and immersive productions developed at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro

Interactive, transmedia and immersive nonfiction creations gain projection in Brazil from 2018 on, with the academy as a great ally. Universities, as spaces for innovation, manage to foster projects of excellence, despite the scarce and high investments required, bringing together people, technological resources and strategic partnerships. In the XR (extended realities) ecosystem of the Brazilian creative industry, the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, one of the most prized, largest and oldest public institutions of higher education in the country, through its Post Graduate Program in Creative Media (PPGMC) becomes a reference center. The institution launches innovative and experimental creations, which would hardly receive private funding, due to the adverse economic situation that the creative sectors are currently facing. This article presents and analyzes recent productions in terms of thematic approaches, technologies and languages. Applied methodologies for the creation of interactive and immersive works are also discussed, from the perspective of how these creative methods have been fostering the practice-based research output at PPGMC, and the currently achieved results.

Private support of public health

Private funding of public health is well established. These additional resources have historically made a substantial contribution by focusing attention and catalysing investments to build public health capacity globally. Private investment has been pivotal in increasing access to available vaccines, treatment services, and innovations in otherwise neglected diseases that contribute to substantial morbidity and mortality rates in resource-constrained settings. The increase in public–private sector partnerships highlight emerging novel approaches to advancing global public health through innovation in research and product development and service delivery for new and re-emerging diseases. Recently a new group of billionaire philanthropists such as Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates, still young and giving while they are alive, have changed the character and scope of giving. However, some giving can inadvertently be associated with negative consequences for the recipients. This chapter provides an overview of the history and current practices and impact of private giving, reflects on the benefits and challenges, and suggests how private investments could more effectively contribute to address the public health challenges of the twenty-first century and beyond.

Of Sovereignty and Saints

The chapter considers what kinds of goods and services a democratic polity should furnish via donation. Donations are a well-known solution to the problem of “public goods,” goods with characteristics that prevent efficient market provision. But are all such goods equally appropriate objects of philanthropy? Common arguments fail to appreciate that part of democracy’s value lies in reserving certain decisions for collective control. Democracy, the chapter argues, makes citizens sovereign over the legislation and administration of matters of basic justice. Citizens’ interests in democratic sovereignty supply a strong reason to maintain public control over public goods that are intimately linked to fundamental rights, duties, and opportunities. The argument helps to justify and explain discomfort that many share about privately sponsored social assistance and private funding of public schools. It also indicates that philanthropy for goods more distant from basic justice—such as the arts, research, sport, and religion—may be easier to justify in democratic terms.

Museums to strengthen young people’s resilience after the COVID-19 Juventocid

Hungary is one of those European countries whose subsoil resources are close to zero. The future of the country lies essentially in the human capital of Hungarian youth. Potentially, the Hungarian museum system plays a key political role in helping Hungarian society to overcome the political immunosenescence of the Corona episode, so that state, municipal and private funding of museum activities achieve a significant return-on-investment. The aim of the research is to determine some of the factors by which the human capital of young people today is greatly reduced after they have had to live for a long time without social recognition by their peers during the Corona period. The result of the research is that we can speak of a COVID-19 Juventocide. The long theft of the resonance space on the one hand, and the shifting of costs into the future and thus to the detriment of the now young on the other, led to a lasting material and immaterial weakening also of Hungarian society the Cultural Long-Covid. It is therefore a central political task to strengthen the resilience of the young again and to take countermeasures after the Covid-19 Juventocide. Our hypothesis - to be verified in the coming years in a renewed Hungarian museum practice - is that Hungarian museums can play a crucial role in this re-resilience task. The Hungarian government should prioritise the funding of artists and cultural institutions to dampen the long-term impact of the Corona measures.