The Conservation of Biodiversity in Iran: Threats,Challenges and Hopes

Because of its diverse geological formations, climates, and soils, Iran is home to outstanding biodiversity. National conservation started in Iran over fifty years ago and today nearly 10 percent of the country is protected. However, biodiversity in Iran is threatened, with about 100 species of vertebrate fauna vulnerable or endangered. Increased population and human activity, climate change, drought, desertification, agriculture, poaching, and economic sanctions have helped create this crisis. Many of these causes can be mitigated through better planning, sustainable policies, and increased civil society and local engagement. Promoting awareness about the impacts of human practices will also be important for the long-term sustainability of Iran’s ecosystems. Iranian conservation NGOs have already taken an active role in preserving biodiversity.     

Policies for Biodiversity Conservation: The Case of Sub-Saharan Africa

Why does biodiversity conservation matter, and what can be done about it? The article discusses the options in the case of Sub-Saharan Africa, drawing on the results of a Darwin Initiative project on the ecology and economics of biodiversity conservation in the continent. It uses the case of Sub-Saharan Africa to illustrate both the consequences of biodiversity loss and the constraints within which policy-makers operate. To most people the biodiversity loss that matters is not the global extinction of species, but the effects of local change in flora and fauna on watershed protection, soil conservation, habitat, productivity and amenity. For this reason, biodiversity conservation concerns even the poorest communities. But because poverty, indebtedness, insecurity of land tenure and other social conditions affect the way in which people respond to incentives, the policy options for biodiversity conservation may be different in different parts of the world.     

Towards Decolonisation of Australia's Protected Area Management: the Nantawarrina Indigenous Protected Area Experience

Management of Australia's National Parks and Protected Areas originally developed according to the United State's ‘Yellowstone’ model. Aimed primarily at preserving ‘wilderness’ areas, this form of protected area management has excluded indigenous habitation and land management, effectively colonising these landscapes. Since the 1980s indigenous exclusion from protected area management has been contested in the public sphere. Indigenous peoples have become involved in protected area management in various ways, such as the joint management of national parks. However, greater indigenous control is necessary to truly decolonise protected area landscapes and fully recognise the importance of indigenous Australians in land management. This paper explores a new initiative in protected area management: the Indigenous Protected Area (IPA) program. IPAs are established through voluntary declaration of indigenous land with the aim of enhancing indigenous control of protected area landscapes. Nantawarrina, the first declared IPA, is considered as a case study. Although some manifestations of colonialism are still evident in the Nantawarrina IPA, the program has made some significant contributions to the decolonisation of protected area management in Australia.     

Biodiversity and Nature Conservation: Some Common Arguments and Alternative Views

Abstract

The impact of human activities on the environment is perhaps now reaching its greatest level of awareness in human history. There is concern regarding health effects of pollutants generated by industry, climate change related to burning of fossil fuels and effects of anthropogenic activities in terms of promoting the extinction of biological species. Proposals are being put forward at local, national and international levels to preserve biodiversity. It is commonly believed that human activities, if not controlled, will lead to dramatic decreases in the earth's biodiversity. In this report, temporal perspectives of biodiversity (e.g. from palaeontology) are emphasized both as reasons for conservation and as possible errors of reasoning in conservation debates. Questions and novel implications related to an integral view of humans as a part of nature are also presented in the context of related environmental issues.     

Property Rights for Biodiversity Conservation and Development: Extractive Reserves in the Brazilian Amazon

Many of the world's most valuable biodiverse areas are successfully managed by indigenous communities, often under peculiar property rights structures. In many cases, these communities are economically disadvantaged, even by local standards. But can particular local property rights regimes which are ecologically successful also allow communities to compete productively in market economies? The extractive reserves of the Brazilian Amazon offer an opportunity for investigating the connections between property rights, conservation and development in the context of tropical forests. This article aims to analyse whether the existing property rights in these reserves — an idiosyncratic mixture of public, collective and private property rights — can support the explicit development aim of a competitive, yet sustainable, exploitation of the area's natural resources. The analysis identifies three promising development paths open to extractive reserves, but points to a fundamental contradiction between the static structure of the property rights system and the dynamic nature of two of these paths. The current design of internal property rights fails to take into account the broader economic context in which reserves must generate a viable revenue stream. If extractive reserves are expected to develop without reliance on external aid, then changes to the property rights structure both inside and outside the extractive reserves have to be explicitly considered.     

Primitive Ideas: Protected Area Buffer Zones and the Politics of Land in Africa

This article critically evaluates participatory, integrated conservation and development programmes in Africa, focusing on protected area buffer zones. I argue that, despite the emphasis on participation and benefit-sharing, many of the new projects replicate more coercive forms of conservation practice and often constitute an expansion of state authority into remote rural areas. I suggest that the reasons for this state of affairs can be traced in part to the persistence in conservation interventions of Western ideas and images of the Other. These stereotypes result in misguided assumptions in conservation programmes which have important implications for the politics of land in buffer zone communities.     

Policing the Holy Nation: The State and Righteous Violence in Vanuatu

ABSTRACT In Vanuatu, the police force has in recent years been strengthened by foreign government aid. AusAid and NZAid are heavily involved inside the police force, seeking to create ‘good governance’ and to shape Vanuatu's national developments. However, these measures also coincide with some other unexpected developments. Recent cases of violence, and especially of sorcery, have led the police to intervene in a quest for moral order. Police are becoming part of the articulation of new occult understandings of wealth and power. These developments are traced back partly to the history of colonial governance and the idea of righteous violence, but also to current restructurings of the Vanuatu state and growing Christian conceptions of Vanuatu as a holy nation.     

中央财政经济委员会成立始末

中央财政经济委员会从 194 8年 9月中央政治局扩大会议提出逐步统一财经工作 ,到194 9年 3月中共七届二中全会正式决定建立 ,经过筹备 ,于 194 9年 7月 12日正式成立。中央财政经济委员会是由原中央财政经济部与华北财经委员会合并成立的 ,简称“中财委” ,由陈云任主任、薄一波任副主任。中财委成立后在短短两个月内 ,在稳定当时的金融物价、统一财经管理、调整工商业方面做了大量的工作 ,为建国初期财政经济的恢复和发展奠定了一定的基础。 194 9年 10月 2 1日 ,政务院财经委员会在中央财政经济委员会的基础上成立 ,5年后 ,政务院财政经济委员会撤消 ,其职能被国务院相关部委和直属机构所取代。     

Pastoralism and Protected Area Management in Mongolia's Gobi Gurvansaikhan National Park

The Gobi Gurvansaikhan National Park was established in south central Mongolia in 1993 and is used by over 1100 families with pastoralism as their main means of livelihood. Research conducted in 1998–2000 to analyse grazing management problems identified a number of issues and concerns, including a significant increase in the number of herders and the size of the herd; variations in herd size reflecting differences in wealth; problems with marketing of livestock or livestock products; declining stock movements because of transportation costs and loss of water sources; and significant competition and conflicts for grazing areas. The socio‐economic problems associated with Mongolia's transition to a market system, coupled with the expansion of protected areas, mean that herders have to adapt to both the current economic system and changes in land use. Although some aspects of the development of the park can be seen as a positive influence on maintaining pastoral livelihoods in this area, the national goal of protecting 30 per cent of the country, doubling the area of Mongolia currently under protected area status, could have negative effects on pastoral livelihoods, unless ministry officials, protected area administrators and pastoralists can work effectively to solve resource problems.     

The Carnival of Custom: Land Dives,Millenarian Parades and Other Spectacular Ritualizations in Vanuatu

ABSTRACT This paper deals with the aestheticization and commoditization of culture in specific grand rituals held in Vanuatu. Through political, commercial and juridical processes, the traditional referent of these neo‐ritualizations has been replaced by a celebration of the kastom theme itself; the official value of a regional, national, and global cultural heritage. The examination of two iconic rituals, the Nagol land dive on Pentecost island and the 15th February annual commemoration of John Frum on Tanna island, reveals them as similarly invoking a Christian and colonially inspired reverence in their idealization of an ancestral past. Nevertheless, the increasing monetarization of village communities through the global promotion of kastom spectacles by media and for touristic purposes is ever more frequently considered locally as a factor of inequality or division.     

Handling Sorcery in a State System of Law: Magic,Violence and Kastom in Vanuatu.

ABSTRACT This paper addresses the consequences of a local sorcery accusation that came to the attention of Vanuatu state police, courts and media. The paper discusses what happens to sorcery practices when these become absorbed into a modern, bureaucratic context. The argument revolves around the national imaginary formed by state power and the mass media in people's contemporary lives. In formulating new forms of opposition to sorcery, they also create a new imaginary space of national belonging.     

危机与应对:论皖南地区的经济抗战

经济抗战是中国抗战历史的重要内容,对于保证中国抗战的最后胜利具有决定性作用。在位于东南战场大后方的皖南地区,除对敌开展军事斗争外,经济战也是当地军民反抗日本侵略的一种重要方式。在战时皖南行署的领导下,皖南敌后区实施了增加生产、平抑物价、严查敌货、打击走私、组建金融网等一系列经济举措,在一定程度上改善了皖南敌后区严峻的经济形势,粉碎了日敌的经济进攻,为这一地区乃至东南战场抗战力量的持久存续以及中国抗战的最终胜利做出了重要贡献。皖南地区的经济抗战实为中国经济抗战历史的一个真实缩影。     

The Burghal Hidage: The Establishment of a Text

EXCAVATION OF THE 500 sq. m. waterfront site at Trig Lane in the City of London revealed a well-preserved series of timber and stone revetments on the medieval foreshore. They survived to heights of up to 3 m. and had been erected during the piecemeal reclamation and subsequent consolidation of the riverfront between the mid 13th and late 15th century.

The structures are described in detail, and their form and function discussed. Ninety-four oak samples were submitted for dendrochronological analysis, the results of which enabled a relative chronology for part of the revetment sequence to be established and absolute dates postulated.     

作为经济过程的陶器起源

长期以来,陶器、磨光石器和农业起源一直被视为新石器时代开始的标志,而对这些发明产生的原因大多被归因于人类智慧的创造或技术的累进。19世纪的极端传播论者甚至认为,全世界陶器是来自埃及的单一发明。虽然这种起源观在世界各地大量独立发明的考古证据面前已经不堪一驳,但是对其为何会在世界各地独立起源则一直缺乏令人信服的探讨和解释。布朗的这篇文章从史前人类经济发展的角度分析了陶器出现前后容器技术的变化和发展,认为随着食物资源的变化所导致的加工、储藏、炊煮需求加大,使得陶器在生产和用途上成为比其他容器更具优势的选择。而且,随着定居生活的开始,陶器生产作为妇女家务的一部分,与其他容器生产相比,也具有时间安排灵活和省时省力的优点。由于维生方式的变化(日趋定居)、食物资源特点(种子、坚果和贝类)和加工技术上的优点,最后使得陶器在全世界成为农业社会的不二选择。因此,对陶器起源的原因应该从社会的经济和适应层面去了解。我国一些全新世早期的遗址如湖南的八十垱、玉蟾岩和浙江的上山、小黄山、跨湖桥遗址出土了很早的陶器,但是并没有成熟农业的迹象。特别是跨湖桥陶器制作的精致程度令一些学者怀疑其年代测定的古老性。因此,我们应当跳出传统思维的文化累进窠臼,尝试从这些遗址的维生方式和经济过程来探讨陶器起源和发展的原因。而布朗的这篇文章可望为我们的研究提供一个比较合适的视角和切入点。     

Managing for Effective Archaeological Conservation: The Example of Salisbury Plain Military Training Area,England

Abstract

Salisbury Plain Military Training Area, Wiltshire, England is the major zone of southern Engizsh chalk downland where archaeological field monuments are comparatively well preserved over large areas. The land is currently managed with regard to military considerations, to its secondary use for forming, and to conservation concerns. Following expressions of concern about archaeological damage, a working party was set up to evaluate the present state of archaeological survival and to recommend for the future. A survey of all sites evaluated their condition by means of a scoring system. Recommendations were made about military use, agriculture, and controlling natural agencies of destruction; and a solution was offered that incorporated eight elements of strategy. The Salisbury Plain study is considered in its context—the English national policy that there should be an archaeological stock-taking of what we have, and a scoring system to make possible some rational choice in selecting from it what is most precious and what is in most need of protection.