Rural Planning from an Environmental Systems Perspective

Rural Planning from an Environmental Systems Perspective
Author: Frank B. Golley
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 445
Release: 2012-12-06
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1461214483

This book synthesizes knowledge from several fields that are crucial to sustainable rural development: the physical environment, biological and agricultural production, rural sociology and economics. It takes a systems perspective incorporating systems analysis, landscape analysis and soil, water, and land planning. Directed toward graduate students and professionals, it provides a source of information and concepts for those concerned with land and water policies and practice. It presents an integrated approach using practical and applicable models and methods and takes a middle position between an elementary conceptual approach to land and water management and a highly mathematically advanced treatise based exclusively on system modeling. The book is based on almost twenty years of experience in teaching a course on rural planning and the environment, the authors being specialists from universities, research institutions and companies in Europe and North America.

Participatory Development

Participatory Development
Author: Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Development Centre
Publisher: OECD
Total Pages: 264
Release: 1995
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN:

Describes participatory approaches and instruments of participation. Suggests that local community-based organizations should be treated as partners or integrated into projects by NGOs and aid agencies. Considers democracy and building up of confidence as necessary conditions for popular participation in development.

State of Mediterranean Forests 2018

State of Mediterranean Forests 2018
Author: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
Publisher: Food & Agriculture Org.
Total Pages: 331
Release: 2019-01-08
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 9251310475

The Mediterranean region has more than 25 million hectares of Mediterranean forests and about 50 million hectares of other Mediterranean wooded lands. They make crucial contributions to rural development, poverty alleviation, food security, as well as, the agricultural, water, tourism, and energy sectors. Changes in climate, societies, and lifestyles to create appropriate financial incentives and tools. in the Mediterranean region could have serious negative consequences for forests, with the potential to lead to the loss or diminution of those contributions and to a wide range of economic, social and environmental problems. In the future, Mediterranean forests will support agriculture and human wellbeing. It is therefore crucial to improve policies, practices, and to promote sustainable management to provide social and economic benefits as well as to increase the resilience of ecosystems and societies. This new edition of the State of Mediterranean Forests aims to demonstrate the importance of Mediterranean forests to implementing solutions to tackle global issues such as climate change and population increase. Part 1: The Mediterranean landscape: importance and threats. Despite the important natural capital provided by Mediterranean forests, they are under threats from climate change and population increase and other subsidiary drivers of forest degradation. Part 2: Mediterranean forest-based solutions. Forests and landscape restoration, adaptation of forests and adaptation using forests, climate change mitigation, and conserving biodiversity are additional and complementary approaches to address the drivers of forest degradation to the benefit of populations and the environment. Part 3: Creating an enabling environment to scale up solutions. To scale up and replicate forest-based solutions, there is a need to change the way we see the role of forests in the economy, to put in place relevant policies, more widespread participatory approaches, to recognize the economic value of the goods and services provided by forests and, ultimately, to create appropriate financial incentives and tools.

Water Conservation Techniques in Traditional Human Settlements

Water Conservation Techniques in Traditional Human Settlements
Author: Pietro Laureano
Publisher: Copal Publishing Group
Total Pages: 334
Release: 2013-08-07
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 8192473333

In this beautifully illustrated work, Pietro Laureano shares with us the fruits of more than a quarter of a century of careful observation of traditional knowledge and techniques applied to urban settlements and landscape resources management in all regions of the world. The book introduces us to very sophisticated, thousand-year-old, capacities developed by local communities and civilizations around the world, amongst which water harvesting techniques, recycling of organic wastes and used waters for soil fertility conservation or, in more general terms, the ecosystemic approach to town planning, are anything but new! The volume is also the most convincing illustration of the fact that, whereas modern technological solutions rely on separation and specialization and for most of the time imply the mobilization of external resources, traditional knowledge, which by its very nature applies the principle of integration and uses internal renewable inputs, has proved over time to be effective in the daily struggle of civilizations against adverse environments and, more recently, against desertification.

Agricultural R&D at the Crossroads

Agricultural R&D at the Crossroads
Author: Arnoud Budelman
Publisher: Kit Pub
Total Pages: 256
Release: 1996
Genre: Social Science
ISBN:

This book presents a selection of the papers from the International Symposium on Systems-Oriented Research in Agriculture and Rural Development, held in Montpellier, France, from 21 to 25 November 1994. A detailed annotated bibliography contains English and French sources of 'grey' literature and published material