Assessing Regional Crop Irrigation Requirements and Streamflow Availability for Irrigation Development in Saginaw Bay,Michigan

Spatial and temporal variability of soil, crop, and climate significantly affects the estimates of regional irrigation requirements. This paper incorporates soil association data and multiple-station, multiple-year climate data into four simulation models, CERES-MAIZE, SOYGRO, BEANGRO, and YIELD to account for the spatial and temporal variability of the input parameters in estimating the evapotranspiration rates and irrigation requirements of corn, drybean, soybean, and sugarbeet production in the Saginaw Bay basin, Michigan. The Thiessen method was used to delineate the spatial coverage of the weather stations in the study watershed. The results of the simulated crop irrigation requirements at the soil association level were multiplied by the weights of each soil association area to derive regional irrigation requirements. The availability of streamflow at different exceedence probabilities was evaluated to determine the maximum irrigation area the stream is able to sustain without causing water quality degradation. Through a case study of the Saginaw Bay irrigation development, this paper demonstrates that the spatial and temporal variability of soil, crop, and climate can be well represented in the simulation models to provide more realistic simulation results in support of irrigation decision making.     

Regional Identity in Regional Development and Planning1

This paper analyses the regional identity and social capital formation process and components. Regional identity is the special kind of phenomenon, which forms throughout historical and territorial socialization. The great ambition of this paper is to interrelate Anssi Paasi (1986) and other cultural geographers' and sociologists' ideas with recent regional economic development and planning discussion and to enhance regional identity as a planning tool. The theoretical part describes components and the process of regional identity formation. We assume that regional identity correlates with people's volition in achieving common goals, raises their personal activity and influences due to that regional development and planning. The regional identity is crucial in securing public participation in planning. The empirical part of the paper is based on mass survey analysis.     

Information Availability and Market Power in Export Competition: The Case of Regional Health Care Markets

In this paper I analyze the spatial-economic determinants of export competition. I develop a competing central place spatial interaction model to analyze the spatial availability of information, market power, distance, demand threshold, and interregional market variables. Model estimates are based on national data from The Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care, and I examine Medicare health exports from the Seattle hospital market to markets throughout the Pacific Northwest. Information availability and market power for the Seattle export hospitals have a significant effect on export sales of hospital Medicare services. Intra and interregional competition with other major hospital markets are significant determinants of export competition. Distance to the Seattle market has a strong, negative effect on export sales and on patient migration from other markets.     

Foreign Trade and Regional Development in China

This paper puts into focus the regional implications of China's recent open-door policy. The empirical analysis employs a cross-sectional approach with 1986 data. The results suggest that foreign trade is more readily translated into economic development in the most well developed and industrialized eastern coastal provinces.     

Sectoral Versus Territorial Regional Planning and Development in Norway

New regional policies in Norway and many other countries try to empower their regions through creating a balance between central governing with emphasis on redistribution of activities and resources, and local mobilization with emphasis on self reliance, innovation and learning by doing. In Norway municipalities and counties have for a long period had this double function, but we now see that the vertical policy of implementing national welfare policy has grown and become dominant. As a consequence, the horizontal policy of social mobilization has been neglected, and has to some extent been taken over by inter-municipal and interregional organizations. Normally, these organizations are in practice organized as regional development agencies. They seem to be vulnerable political institutions that seek legitimacy from--and need acceptance and support from--both territorial and sectoral governments. The regional planning process is regarded as an important tool in their political institution building process. In this paper I want to explain how regional planning and institution building in Norway in practice have moved towards a two-parallel system.     

Regional Development Agencies and Local Economic Development: Scale and Competitiveness in High-technology Oxfordshire and Cambridgeshire

Regional Development Agencies have been given the fundamental aim of improving their regions' economic performance and competitiveness. Supporting innovation is a cornerstone of this policy. This paper explores the limitations of region-based strategies arguing that this neglects the importance of policy intervention at the local level, using case studies of Oxfordshire and Cambridgeshire.     

我国旅游业研发总体水平、区域分布与政策建议

本文利用文献法和定量分析等方法,深入分析了我国旅游业技术和研发现状。针对我国旅游业研发总体水平低,研发能力集中于发达地区等问题,从观念、政府、机构、人才等方面提出了具体政策建议。     

History,Geomorphological Problems and Effects of Dredging in Cleveland Bay,Queensland

The history of dredging is examined for Cleveland Bay, 1883–1988, as the port of Townsville developed. Between 1883 and 1964 only intermittent data exist on localities, depths and quantities dredged but later much more detailed records are available for analysis. Geomorphological problems emerged and are considered with particular reference to material forming the seabed, the sediment yield from the coastal catchments and its seasonally and annually irregular delivery to the coast by the rivers, and sediment movement within the bay in response to wind, wave and tidal processes. Analysis of aerial photographs, 1941–1988, has enabled some dredging effects to be studied, especially relating to localised land reclamation and more widespread probable effects on seagrass beds and mangroves.