Ecological Governance and the Sustainability of Rural Household Water Conservation Systems in the Savannah Region of Ghana

This chapter examined the link between ecological governance and water conservation as sustainable pathways for enhancing rural livelihoods in the Savannah Region. Designs adopted were post-positivist and cross-sectional. Probability sampling techniques were used to sample 450 household and official respondents. Questionnaires were administered, while descriptive statistics and chi-square test were utilised to analyse the data. Findings showed significant relationship between conservation initiatives, finance, rehabilitation/maintenance, and gender inclusion and domestic water conservation. Therefore, with commitment to maintenance, funding, and gender inclusion in water decisions, there is the likely for water to be locally sustainable in rural communities of the region. Democratic, decentralised, and participatory approaches to ecological governance and empowerment of the local communities are recommended as essential preconditions for achieving ecologically self-governing communities and sustaining domestic water systems in the rural areas of the region.

Addressing Energy Poverty Through Ecological Governance of Solar Home Systems in South Africa

South Africa has long recognised the need to eliminate energy poverty, and significant progress has been made since 1996. With the recent global outcry about the use of sustainable and clean energy sources for human and ecological development, it has become essential for countries to upscale the use of non-grid electrification in order to effectively and sustainably eradicate energy poverty. South Africa implements different non-grid electrification programmes which focuses on ensuring universal access to clean energy by all, with one of these initiatives being the Solar Home Systems Programme. This study aims to contribute to academic discussion and knowledge about the role that solar home systems can play in bringing change on the current status of the energy poverty eradication initiatives which negatively affect the environment and the people. The study used a qualitative approach in assessing how the Solar Home Systems Programme contributes to energy poverty eradication and environmental preservation if managed in line with ecological governance principles. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with a total of 40 households in Limpopo and officials from government departments in the province as well as a service provider responsible for the roll-out and maintenance of solar home systems in Limpopo. Framed within the ecological economics theory which advocates for ecological and environmental solutions that take into consideration the future generation, the study established that the solar home systems can eradicate energy poverty and contribute to the protection of the environment if managed in line with ecological governance principles. The study further revealed that the Solar Home Systems Programme in South Africa failed due to lack of proper governance systems that provide solutions for the future as the programme was short-term focused and lacked proper ecological governance systems. In order for the solar home systems to contribute to energy poverty eradication and environmental protection, the study recommends a total overhaul of the programme which includes ensuring that the provision of SHSs is not viewed as a temporary measure that is only meant for poor rural households but a long-term and sustainable initiative.

Equitable Access to Water at Alfred Duma Local Municipality

Water plays a central role in the life of society. However, factors such as population growth, pollution, and poor allocation and distribution mechanisms place severe pressures on adequate and equitable water supply. The aim of this chapter was to look into equitable water access in the Alfred Duma Local Municipality as well as the ecological governance framework that supports water access in local areas. The chapter also looked at the position of local municipality in water access and the impact of ecological scale on water provision. Many people are still unable to exercise their constitutional right to water in Alfred Duma Local Municipality, where most women feel disempowered, marginalized, and excluded from the process of making water access decisions. This brings challenges to disadvantaged and arginalized groups socially, economically, and environmentally where vulnerable and marginalised groups have no opportunity to equitably benefit from water access.

Evaluation of Farmers satisfaction with Ecological Governance and its improvement path

As the participants and stakeholders of rural ecological governance, the evaluation of farmers’ satisfaction plays an important role in improving the performance of government ecological governance. Based on the criteria of ecological civilization construction and customer satisfaction, this paper constructs an evaluation system of farmers’ ecological governance satisfaction, which includes 34 indicators. Factor analysis is used to classify indicators, and IPA model is used to analyze the ecological governance plates that affect satisfaction. The research shows that the comprehensive satisfaction of rural ecological governance farmers in four towns of Changde City, Hunan Province is 3.6, which is basically recognized by farmers. The factors that farmers’ demand is strong but does not meet the expectations are sewage treatment, chemical fertilizer and pesticide pollution treatment, ecological legal system implementation, government investment and other indicators. The evaluation section of restriction satisfaction mainly focuses on ecological environment, institutional culture and infrastructure, and finally puts forward suggestions from three aspects: ecological environment, infrastructure and farmers’ sense of participation.

Analysis of Coupling Degree of Economic Governance Capability and Ecological Governance Capability of Regional Industry

Promoting the modernization of the national governance system and governance capabilities is an important starting point to promote the advancement of the industrial structure and the green development of the industry, and it is also an inevitable requirement for my country to achieve high-quality economic development. The relationship between ecological governance capabilities and economic governance capabilities runs through national governance. A main line of the modernization of the system and governance capabilities,only by accurately measuring and evaluating my country’s ecological and economic governance and the synergy between the two can we better promote the development of the new normal economy. For this reason,based on the research and evaluation of province data from 2015 to 2019, this paper found that the ecological governance capabilities and economic governance capabilities of China's provinces are quite different. Further, in terms of the coupling coordination degree between the two, in the time dimension, the coupling coordination degree between the ecological governance capacity and economic governance capacity of each province showed a trend of increasing and then decreasing during the period 2015-2019, but generally showed an upward trend, with the highest point being reached in 2016; in the regional dimension, there were large regional differences in the coupling coordination degree between the ecological governance capacity and economic governance capacity, the coupling coordination degree of ecological governance capacity and economic governance capacity is positively correlated with the level of economic development. This paper provides a theoretical basis for the objective evaluation of the coupling coordination degree of ecological and economic governance capacity in China, and has important practical significance for the coordinated promotion of the modernization of the national governance system and governance capacity.

Managing the Complexity of Climate Change

This paper indicates how the knowledge of complex systems can be put into practice to counter climate change. A contribution of the paper is to show how individual behaviour, institutional analysis, political science and management can be grounded and integrated into the complexity of natural systems to introduce mutual sustainability. Bytes are used as the unit of analysis to explain how nature governs complexity on a more reliable and comprehensive basis than can be achieved by humans using markets and hierarchies. Tax incentives are described to increase revenues while encouraging organisations to adopt elements of ecological governance found in nature and in some social organisations identified by Ostrom and the author. Ecological corporations provide benefits for all stakeholders. This makes them a common good to promote global common goods like enriching democracy from the bottom up while countering: climate change, pollution, and inequalities in power, wealth and income.