Digital Commons Network^™

Where Did My Land Go?: “Land Rights For Quilombolas And Indigenous Peoples In Brazil”, Joyia Smikle

Landscape Architecture & Regional Planning Masters Projects

This ArcGIS storymap project explores the history of the Quilombolas, the Afro-Brazilian people in Brazil that are descendants of enslaved Africans, and the path to land rights for the Quilombos. In addition this study looks at Indigenous land rights and the importantance of their sustainable practices to the health of the Amazon.

For access to the Storymap including full functionality with the maps, please go to “https://arcg.is/mXumD ”

Participatory Low-Impact Tourism Strategy As A Way Of Achieving Sustainability. Samalayuca Dunes (Mexico), Manuel Ramon González Herrera, Rosa Herminia Suarez, Karina H. Casimiro

Travel and Tourism Research Association: Advancing Tourism Research Globally

The objective of this study is to potentiate a low-impact tourism model with the participation of the local community in the Samalayuca Dunes, Mexico, as a way of achieving sustainability for a New Tourism Era. For this purpose, a participatory tourism strategy was built with community stakeholders, specifically neighboring communities, based on three pillars: conservation of natural and cultural heritage; socioeconomic community development; and reduction of environmental impacts. For this purpose, a participatory tourism strategy was built with community stakeholders, specifically neighboring communities, based on three pillars.

Unit 6, Forrest J. Bowlick

Introduction to Geographic Information Science (GIS) course materials

This unit contains materials on database management concepts, and additional review and practice (study guide, practice exam, and practice exam data) of concepts presented in Units 1-5.

Spreading The Washington Consensus Into Food And Agriculture Sectors: The Case Of The International Monetary Fund, Adel Daoud, Bernhard Reinsberg, Alexander E. Kentikelenis, Thomas H. Stubbs, Lawrence P. King

PERI Working Papers

The mandate and competence of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) do not cover food and agriculture policies. Yet, signs indicate that IMF enages in these policies. Scholars lack a systematic empirical foundation to monitor the extent and impact of IMF’s operations on these sectors. Based on a combination of machine and human coding, we present a comprehensive database on IMF’s policy interventions in food and agriculture. Using new data on IMF conditionality between 1980 and 2014, we assess to what extent the IMF targets these sectors through its ‘conditionalities’—policies that governments need to implement to access IMF credit. The analysis …

Fragmented Forests, Fractured Lives: Ethno-Territorial Struggles And Development In The Pacific Lowlands Of Colombia, Kiran Asher

Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies Faculty Publication Series

The culturally and ecologically diverse Pacific lowlands of Colombia are both the locus and product of key political economic and cultural political conjunctures. Twenty‐five years after they emerged in their current form, Afro‐Colombian ethnic and territorial struggles have become important icons of resistance to development and struggles for social change. But in Colombia as in other parts of the world, the rapid and violent expansion of capitalist accumulation and state power have had devastating consequences for the region's forests and communities—literally and epistemically fragmenting both. Based on long‐term fieldwork, this paper examines the ongoing and contentious co‐production of the Colombian …

From The Editor: An Introduction To A Special Issue Of Landscapes Of Violence: Photo Essays On Policy And Violence, Ventura R. Pérez

Landscapes of Violence

No abstract provided.

Illegal Logging And Its Dynamics Of Violence Within The P'Urhépecha Plateau, Ana Del Conde

Landscapes of Violence

Mexico currently occupies the fifth place in deforestation worldwide . Within this trade 60,000 hectares of both forest and rainforest are lost on a yearly basis through illegal logging. This situation has been the reality for the people in the P'urhépecha plateau of Michoacán, where, thanks to a series of legal vacuums, organized crime has found in illegal logging an additional trade to drug trafficking. Nevertheless, through the implementation of an autonomous government based on the P'urhépecha uses and customs, the municipality of Cherán is developing novel political and social strategies to control this situation.

Integrated Modeling Of Land Use And Climate Change Impacts On Multiscale Ecosystems Of Central African Watersheds, Simon Nampindo

Doctoral Dissertations

Assessment and management of ecosystem services demands diverse knowledge of the system components. Land use change occurring mainly through deforestation, expansion of agriculture and unregulated extraction of natural resources are the greatest challenges of the Congo basin and yet is central to supporting over 100 million people. This study undertook to implement an integrated modeling of multiscale ecosystems of central African watersheds and model the impact of anthropogenic factors on elephant population in Greater Virunga landscape. The study was conducted at varied scales, regional, landscape, and community. Regional study included watershed analysis and hydrological assessment using remotely sensed data implemented …

Spatial And Temporal Habitat Use Of An Asian Elephant In Sumatra, Arnold F. Sitompul, Curtice R. Griffin, Nathaniel D. Rayl, Todd K. Fuller

Environmental Conservation Faculty Publication Series

Increasingly, habitat fragmentation caused by agricultural and human development has forced Sumatran elephants into relatively small areas, but there is little information on how elephants use these areas and thus, how habitats can be managed to sustain elephants in the future. Using a Global Positioning System (GPS) collar and a land cover map developed from TM imagery, we identified the habitats used by a wild adult female elephant (Elephas maximus sumatranus) in the Seblat Elephant Conservation Center, Bengkulu Province, Sumatra during 2007–2008. The marked elephant (and presumably her 40–60 herd mates) used a home range that contained more than expected …

Benefits Of Emptu Promises: Ecotourism And Local Communities, Tamara R.O. Hewlett, Sarah Nicholls

National Environment and Recreation Research Symposium

Abstract

Recent tourism trends have included a shift from traditional packaged tours towards more ecologically-minded and sustainable models, often called ecotourism. Ecotourism is the fastest growing form of international tourism, averaging a 20% growth rate per year since 1990 (www.Ecotourism.org 2006). Ecotourism has been treated by many as a panacea to balance the needs of development and conservation. This case study examines a community-based ecotourism project in rural Chi Phat, Cambodia, assessing whether tourism is delivering on its promise to provide development and conservation benefits. Utilizing open-ended interviews and secondary survey data, the case study examines three issues: community members’ …

Ecology And Conservation Of Sumatran Elephants (Elephas Maximus Sumatranus) In Sumatra, Indonesia, Arnold Feliciano Sitompul

Open Access Dissertations

Sumatran elephant (Elephas maximus sumatranus) populations continue to decline due to habitat loss, poaching and conflict with humans. In Sumatra, elephant populations are fragmented into small isolated populations and increasingly cause conflict with humans. Yet, habitat loss due to the rapid land conversion for development is continuing an alarming situation. Developing effective land conservation strategies for elephants is difficult because there is little information available on foraging ecology, habitat use, movements and home range behaviors. I conducted a study on these topics in Seblat, Bengkulu Province, Sumatra during 2007-2008. The five important families of plants in the elephant …

Frau Doktor Nancy Stafford Of Georgia: From Slave To Physician, Mary R. Bullard, Tracy Moxhay Castle

African Diaspora Archaeology Newsletter

No abstract provided.

Resources For Peace? Managing Revenues From Extractive Industries In Post-Conflict Environments, Philippe Le Billon

PERI Working Papers

The need to build legitimate and capable states in wartorn societies is now widely recognized. The Principles for Good International Engagement in Fragile States, adopted by the development ministers of major donor countries in March 2005, declares that statebuilding is ‘the central objective.’ This represents a striking break from the prevailing wisdom in the closing decades of the 20th century, when the state was widely regarded as the problem. The state has been rediscovered: it is now invoked as the solution. The policy rhetoric has changed from downsizing states to building state capacity. Yet little systematic work has been done …

Effects Of Web-Based Tutoring Software On Math Test Performance : A Look At Gender, Math-Fact Retrieval Ability, Spatial Ability And Type Of Help., Rena L. Walles

Masters Theses 1911 - February 2014

No abstract provided.

Certification Systems As Tools For Natural Asset Building: Potential , Experience To Date, And Critical Challenges, Michael E. Conroy

PERI Working Papers

Certification systems are becoming important tools to encourage and reward social and environmental responsibility. This paper explores whether these systems, which generally have not been designed for the explicit aim of poverty reduction, can assist poor people, either individually or in community-based and small-to-medium production units, to build their natural assets as a basis for sustainable livelihoods. The paper examines two leading certification systems – the Forest Stewardship Council™ and the Fair Trade Certified™ system – and emerging systems in tourism and mining. The results to date have been mixed. In the forestry sector, poverty reduction benefits of certification have …

Extractive Reserves: Building Natural Assets In The Brazilian Amazon, Anthony Hall

PERI Working Papers

Amazonia possesses the world's largest remaining area of tropical rainforest (3.5 million sq. km). Despite three decades of settlement and intensive development, the forest is still relatively intact compared with similar areas elsewhere. The region is an increasingly important source of natural assets for both regional and national economic growth, and provides livelihood support to a population of several million. In addition, the Amazon supplies key environmental services in terms of the conservation of biological diversity, climate regulation, and watershed management, as well as sequestering an estimated ten percent of global carbon emissions.

Aid, Conditionality, And War Economies, James K. Boyce

Economics Department Working Paper Series

When natural resource revenues provide an important motive and/or means for armed conflict, the transition from war peace faces three challenges: (i) ensuring that the benefits and costs of natural resource exploitation are distributed so as to ease rather than exacerbate social tensions; (ii) channeling revenues to peaceful and productive purposes; and (iii) promoting accountability and transparency in natural resource management. Aid conditionality can help to address these challenges provided that three prerequisites are met: (i) there are domestic parties with sufficient authority and legitimacy to strike and implement aid-for-peace bargains; (ii) donor governments and agencies make peace their top …

Web-Based Intelligent Multimedia Tutoring For High Stakes Achievement Tests, Ivon Arroyo

Computer Science Department Faculty Publication Series

We describe Wayang Outpost, a web-based ITS for the Math section of the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT). It has several distinctive features: help with multimedia animations and sound, problems embedded in narrative and fantasy contexts, alternative teaching strategies for students of different mental rotation abilities and memory retrieval speeds. Our work on adding intelligence for adaptivity is described. Evaluations prove that students learn with the tutor, but learning depends on the interaction of teaching strategies and cognitive abilities. A new adaptive tutor is being built based on evaluation results; surveys results and students’ log files analyses.

Natural And Cultural Assets And Participatory Forest Management In West Africa, Kojo Sebastian Amanor

PERI Working Papers

This chapter explores the ways in which concepts of 'community' and 'environmental crisis' are constructed and implemented in contemporary forest policy in West Africa and the implications of these policies for the relationships among people, their production, and the environment. It argues that many West African communities have interacted with the environment in ways that have enhanced the natural resource base. A forestry strategy rooted in a conception of building natural assets – rather than in protecting a threatened and ostensibly pristine nature from human intervention, as characterizes much environmental thinking – can meet the objectives of reducing poverty and …