An ex-post impact assessment of IFPRI's GRP22 program, Water Research Allocation

An ex-post impact assessment of IFPRI's GRP22 program, Water Research Allocation
Author: Bennett, Jeffrey W.
Publisher: Intl Food Policy Res Inst
Total Pages: 70
Release: 2013-04-10
Genre: Social Science
ISBN:

The performance of the International Food Policy Research Institute’s (IFPRI’s) research program that focuses on water resource issues is reviewed for the period 1994–2010 around the three themes that constitute the program: global modeling, river basin modeling, and institutions. The IFPRI water team has been involved in leading-edge research in a number of dimensions: it has focused on analysis at varying geographic scales; the work has been truly interdisciplinary by engaging economics with biophysical science and other social sciences; and research outputs have been innovative in advancing institutional analysis and water pricing and in policy measures addressing the complexities of water supply management. In the research tasks, IFPRI’s water team actively collaborated with a wide range of researchers from within the CGIAR network, national research institutes, and universities. Within the team, a largely stable group of leaders has been responsible for the professional development of a substantial cohort of junior staff who have moved onto successful careers elsewhere. The output of the program has been prolific and prominent in academic, policy, and development communities. The approach taken is to review selected publications from the themes; assess the quality of the journals in which papers have been published; and evaluate the performance, on average, of researchers in the program. In addition, surveys of stakeholders were carried out, and three specific projects were subjected to detailed review. The assessment demonstrated the high regard in which the program research outputs and researchers are held. The IFPRI water team has been remarkably productive throughout the 16 years considered, working on issues that are of high relevance to policy and producing work that has largely been cutting edge. However, impacts generated by individual projects were not consistently or readily identifiable. To maximize the benefits of this performance and to overcome challenges associated with securing more outcomes, this report recommends that a more coordinated approach be taken to develop the research project portfolio. This would involve better targeting of projects to policy objectives through a more systematic review of research demand forces and improved integration of research work with policy development processes. The latter in particular requires the development of a sense of research project “ownership” within the policy circles the research is designed to influence. More effort in the development of in-country research partnerships can aid this process as local researchers can act as “champions” within local policy circles. Where government agencies have a research function, their integration into the partnerships is recommended. Avoidance of completing research projects in a “policy vacuum” is critical but requires both advanced planning of each research project as well as constant adaptation of the work plan to (often rapidly) evolving policy contexts. To achieve project impacts beyond the immediacy of the specific case study context, a more targeted and coordinated publication strategy should be developed in light of changing publication technology. Project webpages within the IFPRI website, with readily downloadable reports, are useful during the implementation of each project and more formal papers should be targeted for publication in high-impact factor technical journals with parallel papers prepared for more policy-oriented journals that have high circulations.

Issues in Urban Policy and Planning: 2011 Edition

Issues in Urban Policy and Planning: 2011 Edition
Author:
Publisher: ScholarlyEditions
Total Pages: 284
Release: 2012-01-09
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 146496727X

Issues in Urban Policy and Planning / 2011 Edition is a ScholarlyEditions™ eBook that delivers timely, authoritative, and comprehensive information about Urban Policy and Planning. The editors have built Issues in Urban Policy and Planning: 2011 Edition on the vast information databases of ScholarlyNews.™ You can expect the information about Urban Policy and Planning in this eBook to be deeper than what you can access anywhere else, as well as consistently reliable, authoritative, informed, and relevant. The content of Issues in Urban Policy and Planning: 2011 Edition has been produced by the world’s leading scientists, engineers, analysts, research institutions, and companies. All of the content is from peer-reviewed sources, and all of it is written, assembled, and edited by the editors at ScholarlyEditions™ and available exclusively from us. You now have a source you can cite with authority, confidence, and credibility. More information is available at http://www.ScholarlyEditions.com/.

Agent-Based Modeling of Environmental Conflict and Cooperation

Agent-Based Modeling of Environmental Conflict and Cooperation
Author: Todd BenDor
Publisher: CRC Press
Total Pages: 365
Release: 2018-10-12
Genre: Law
ISBN: 1351106244

Conflict is a major facet of many environmental challenges of our time. However, growing conflict complexity makes it more difficult to identify win-win strategies for sustainable conflict resolution. Innovative methods are needed to help predict, understand, and resolve conflicts in cooperative ways. Agent-Based Modeling of Environmental Conflict and Cooperation examines computer modeling techniques as an important set of tools for assessing environmental and resource-based conflicts and, ultimately, for finding pathways to conflict resolution and cooperation. This book has two major goals. First, it argues that complexity science can be a unifying framework for professions engaged in conflict studies and resolution, including anthropology, law, management, peace studies, urban planning, and geography. Second, this book presents an innovative framework for approaching conflicts as complex adaptive systems by using many forms of environmental analysis, including system dynamics modeling, agent-based modeling, evolutionary game theory, viability theory, and network analysis. Known as VIABLE (Values and Investments from Agent-Based interaction and Learning in Environmental systems), this framework allows users to model advanced facets of conflicts—including institution building, coalition formation, adaptive learning, and the potential for future conflict—and conflict resolution based on the long-term viability of the actors’ strategies. Written for scholars, students, practitioners, and policy makers alike, this book offers readers an extensive introduction to environmental conflict research and resolution techniques. As the result of decades of research, the text presents a strong argument for conflict modeling and reviews the most popular and advanced techniques, including system dynamics modeling, agent-based modeling, and participatory modeling methods. This indispensable guide uses NetLogo, a widely used and free modeling software package, to implement the VIABLE modeling approach in three case study applications around the world. Readers are invited to explore, adapt, modify, and expand these models to conflicts they hope to better understand and resolve.

Handbook of Applied Hydrology, Second Edition

Handbook of Applied Hydrology, Second Edition
Author: Vijay P. Singh
Publisher: McGraw Hill Professional
Total Pages: 1438
Release: 2016-03-07
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 0071835105

Fully Updated Hydrology Principles, Methods, and Applications Thoroughly revised for the first time in 50 years, this industry-standard resource features chapter contributions from a “who’s who” of international hydrology experts. Compiled by a colleague of the late Dr. Chow, Chow’s Handbook of Applied Hydrology, Second Edition, covers scientific and engineering fundamentals and presents all-new methods, processes, and technologies. Complete details are provided for the full range of ecosystems and models. Advanced chapters look to the future of hydrology, including climate change impacts, extraterrestrial water, social hydrology, and water security. Chow’s Handbook of Applied Hydrology, Second Edition, covers: · The Fundamentals of Hydrology · Data Collection and Processing · Hydrology Methods · Hydrologic Processes and Modeling · Sediment and Pollutant Transport · Hydrometeorologic and Hydrologic Extremes · Systems Hydrology · Hydrology of Large River and Lake Basins · Applications and Design · The Future of Hydrology

Riparian Areas

Riparian Areas
Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
Total Pages: 449
Release: 2002-10-10
Genre: Science
ISBN: 0309082951

The Clean Water Act (CWA) requires that wetlands be protected from degradation because of their important ecological functions including maintenance of high water quality and provision of fish and wildlife habitat. However, this protection generally does not encompass riparian areasâ€"the lands bordering rivers and lakesâ€"even though they often provide the same functions as wetlands. Growing recognition of the similarities in wetland and riparian area functioning and the differences in their legal protection led the NRC in 1999 to undertake a study of riparian areas, which has culminated in Riparian Areas: Functioning and Strategies for Management. The report is intended to heighten awareness of riparian areas commensurate with their ecological and societal values. The primary conclusion is that, because riparian areas perform a disproportionate number of biological and physical functions on a unit area basis, restoration of riparian functions along America's waterbodies should be a national goal.