Soil, a non-renewable resource, sustains life on Earth by supporting around 95% of global food production and providing ecosystem services such as biomass production, filtration of contaminants and ...transfer of mass and energy between spheres. Unsustainable management practices and climate change are threatening the natural capital of soils, particularly in the Mediterranean region, where increasing population, rapid land-use changes, associated socio-economic activities and climate change are imposing high pressures on the region's shallow soils. Despite evidence of high soil susceptibility to degradation and desertification, the true extent of soil degradation in the region is unknown. This paper reviews and summarises the scientific literature and relevant official reports, with the aim to advance this knowledge by synthesizing, mapping, and identifying gaps regarding the status, causes, and consequences of soil degradation processes in the European Mediterranean region. This is needed as scientific underpinning of efforts to counteract soil degradation in the region. Three main degradation categories are then considered: physical (soil sealing, compaction, erosion), chemical (soil organic matter, contamination, salinisation), and biological. We find some degradation processes to be relatively well-documented (e.g. soil erosion), while others, such as loss of biodiversity, remain poorly addressed, with limited data availability. We suggest establishment of a continuous, harmonised soil monitoring system at national and regional scale in the Mediterranean region to provide comparable datasets and chart the spatial extent and temporal changes in soil degradation, and corresponding economic implications. This is critical to support decision-making and fulfilment of related sustainable development goals.
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•The Mediterranean is the most susceptible region in Europe to soil degradation and desertification.•Multiple forms of physical, chemical and biological degradation affect the Mediterranean soils.•Some Mediterranean soils are reaching critical limits for its ability to provide ecosystem services.•A continuous and harmonised soil assessment is required to evaluate trends in soil degradation.
Urban green spaces (UGS) deliver a wide range of regulating, provisioning and cultural ecosystem services (CES), relevant to support the achievement of some United Nations Sustainable Development ...Goals (e.g., Goal 11: sustainable cities and communities, and Goal 3: good health and well-being). However, knowledge of preferences and uses of UGS by urban dwellers is still lacking. This study assesses the CES perceived by different users in five distinct urban parks located in Coimbra, Portugal: Manuel Braga (secular park), Botanical garden, Choupal national forest, Mondego green park (large area placed next to the river), and Vale das Flores (linear park located in a residential area). A questionnaire survey was performed in each park to investigate the activities performed and their relevance for the users, users' motivations to develop the activities on that specific UGS, the perceived benefits regarding physical and emotional well-being and social interactions, and users' perception about disservices. The results showed that walking, meeting people, practicing and doing activities with children are the activities performed by most users and are perceived as beneficial for physical and emotional well-being. Multifunctionality is a characteristic of all parks and highly appreciated by the users. Significant differences in socio-demographic characteristics of the users and motivations are recorded between parks. The tranquillity of space and landscape beauty are the main motivations to use Manuel Braga Park and the Botanical garden. Distance to the park and transportation means are particularly important for Botanical garden and Vale das Flores park users. Age group and average monthly income were associated in both Choupal national forest, Mondego green park and Vale das Flores park, denoting that older and wealthier users are more able to enjoy these parks. Users' problems or ecosystem disservices were not identified, although plagues (e.g., mosquitoes) and dangerous animals recorded average concerns in the Choupal national forest and in the Vale das Flores and Mondego green parks. This work's findings can help decision-makers better understand users' needs and expectations, thus improving UGS design and management to attract more citizens.
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•Accessibility to Urban Green Spaces (UGS) is a key aspect considered by users.•The UGS multifunctionality influences the selection of spaces.•Physical and emotional wellbeing are highly rated by users in all UGS.•Tranquillity and landscape beauty are major motivations in UGS choice.•Ecosystem disservices are not considered a threat in the parks studied.
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to characterize the interfaces between manufacturing companies and the Internet of Things (IoT) suppliers involved in their digital servitization.
...Design/methodology/approach
This paper builds on an explorative case study of a manufacturing firm and its IoT suppliers. This paper relies on the Industrial Network Approach to study interfaces between buying firms and their suppliers.
Findings
This paper identifies three distinct types of supplier interfaces: connected, digital and digital-physical. They all contain technical resource interfaces with additional organizational and/or technical complexities that need to be managed. Connectivity, an Agile approach to software development and strong technical dependence emerged as key factors that impact the interactions between manufacturing firms and IoT suppliers and how their resources are combined.
Practical implications
This paper offers managerial implications regarding the importance of internal organization (such as appropriate cross-functional teams) to manage the dynamics of collaborations required by digital technologies, maintain interactions with IoT suppliers and identify and manage interdependences between IoT suppliers. Building close relationships with suppliers of crucial infrastructure (e.g. IoT cloud platform and data security systems) can also be beneficial for manufacturing firms to reduce risks. Finally, attention should be given to IoT technology strategy, which impacts both digital and digital-physical supplier interfaces.
Originality/value
In digital servitization, manufacturing firms are heavily reliant on external resources for IoT technology. Despite this, few studies have investigated the characteristics of their interfaces with IoT suppliers, how these can be managed and how resources are combined.
Paroxetine (PAR) is a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) antidepressant increasingly detected in surface waters worldwide. Its environmental presence raises concerns about the potential ...detrimental effects on non-target organisms. Thus, this study aimed to increase knowledge on PAR's potential environmental impacts, assessing the effects of commercial formulation (PAR-c) and active ingredient (PAR-a) on fish. Therefore, the short-term exposure effects of PAR-c and PAR-a were assessed on zebrafish (Danio rerio) embryos/larvae to determine the most toxic formulation through median lethal (LC50) and effective concentrations (EC50). PAR-c and PAR-a induced morphological abnormalities (scoliosis) in a dose-dependent manner from 96 hours post-fertilization onwards, suggesting the involvement of a fully functional biotransformation system. As PAR-c exhibited higher toxicity, it was selected to be tested in the subsequent stage (juvenile stage), which was more sensitive (lower LC50). PAR-c significantly decreased fish swimming activity and disrupted fish stress response. Overall, the results highlight the ability of PAR-c to adversely affect fish swimming performance, an effect that persisted even after exposure ceases (21-day depuration), suggesting that PAR-c may impair individual fitness.
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•Paroxetine active ingredient (PAR-a) and commercial formulation (PAR-c) toxicities were studied.•PAR-c was more toxic to Danio rerio's early and young life stages than PAR-a.•D. rerio juvenile stage was the most sensitive.•Acute exposure to PAR-c has long-lasting effects on fish behaviour.
Abstract
Floods in urban environments often result in loss of life and destruction of property, with many negative socio-economic effects. However, the application of most flood prediction models ...still remains challenging due to data scarcity. This creates a need to develop novel hybridized models based on historical urban flood events, using, e.g., metaheuristic optimization algorithms and wavelet analysis. The hybridized models examined in this study (Wavelet-SVR-Bat and Wavelet-SVR-GWO), designed as intelligent systems, consist of a support vector regression (SVR), integrated with a combination of wavelet transform and metaheuristic optimization algorithms, including the grey wolf optimizer (GWO), and the bat optimizer (Bat). The efficiency of the novel hybridized and standalone SVR models for spatial modeling of urban flood inundation was evaluated using different cutoff-dependent and cutoff-independent evaluation criteria, including area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC), Accuracy (A), Matthews Correlation Coefficient (MCC), Misclassification Rate (MR), and F-score. The results demonstrated that both hybridized models had very high performance (Wavelet-SVR-GWO: AUC = 0.981, A = 0.92, MCC = 0.86, MR = 0.07; Wavelet-SVR-Bat: AUC = 0.972, A = 0.88, MCC = 0.76, MR = 0.11) compared with the standalone SVR (AUC = 0.917, A = 0.85, MCC = 0.7, MR = 0.15). Therefore, these hybridized models are a promising, cost-effective method for spatial modeling of urban flood susceptibility and for providing in-depth insights to guide flood preparedness and emergency response services.
Establishing nature reserves (NRs) is a common method to avoid biodiversity loss and degradation of ecosystem services (ESs). The evaluation of ESs in NRs and the exploration of associated ...influencing factors are the basis for improving ESs and management. However, the ES effectiveness of NRs over time remains questionable, namely due to the heterogeneity of landscape characteristics inside and outside of NRs. This study (i) quantifies the role of 75 NRs in China in maintaining ESs (i.e., net primary production (NPP), soil conservation, sandstorm prevention and water yield) from 2000 to 2020, (ii) reveals the trade-offs/synergies, and (iii) identifies the main influencing factors of the ES effectiveness of NRs. The results show that more than 80% of NRs had positive ES effectiveness, which was greater in older NRs. For different ESs, effectiveness over time increases for NPP (E_NPP), soil conservation (E_SC) and sandstorm prevention (E_SP) but declines for water yield (E_WY). There is a clear synergistic relationship between E_NPP and E_SC. Moreover, the effectiveness of ESs is closely correlated with elevation, precipitation, and perimeter area ratio. Our findings can provide important information to support site selection and management of reserves to improve the delivery of critical ecosystem services.
•More than 80% of nature reserves (NRs) in China had positive ESs effectiveness, and the older NRs have better ecosystem services (ESs) effectiveness than younger NRs.•There was a synergetic relationship between effectiveness of net primary production (E_NPP) and effectiveness of soil conservation (E_SC).•The ESs effectiveness were closely correlated with elevation, precipitation, NR perimeter area ratio.
Declining ecosystem services have prompted numerous studies aiming at developing more sustainable management practices for vegetation restoration. Advances in functional ecology indicate that the ...sustainable management of afforestation ecosystems should be performed based on plant functional traits, which provides pivotal knowledge for long-term sustainable vegetation restoration. Currently, the mechanism of how plant functional traits affect long term ecosystem services in restored areas is still unclear. This study investigates plant functional traits and the associated ecosystem services from artificial forestlands (Robinia pseudoacacia, Caragana korshinskii) and natural grasslands following different durations of vegetation restoration (10, 20, 30 and 40 years) in the Danangou watershed, a loess hilly-gully region in the Loess Plateau, China. The results showed that 1) the water conservation services of artificial forestlands first decreased and then increased over time, whereas the soil conservation service had an opposite trend; in turn, natural grassland led to a consistent increase in soil conservation and carbon sequestration services over time. 2) Artificial forestlands had greater soil conservation and carbon sequestration services than natural grassland but had lower water conservation services. 3) Leaves had a greater impact on carbon sequestration and water conservation services than did root length and root biomass density. 4) Root biomass density had a greater effect on soil conservation services than did leaf carbon content and soil organic matter. 5) Leaf carbon content, specific root length, and root biomass density had significant effects on the trade-off value between any two ecosystem services with increasing time after restoration of artificial forestland. 6) Specific leaf area had a greater effect on the trade-off values among the three services than did the other functional traits in the natural grassland. In arid ecosystems, natural grasslands are the best restoration strategy given their higher water conservation services. However, in soil erosion-affected areas, restoration through artificial forestlands is more appropriate. To mitigate the trade-offs between ecosystem services, it is recommended that artificial forestlands be thinned before the leaf carbon content, specific root length, and root biomass density reach a maximum (i.e., mature forestland).
•Natural grassland had greater WCS than artificial forestland over time.•Leaf traits had larger effect on carbon sequestration service (CSS) and WCS than root.•Root had greater effect on soil conservation service (SCS) than leaf over time.•In forestland, WCS decreased first and then increased over time, opposing to SCS.•SCS and CSS increased with restoration years in natural grassland.
Urbanization alters natural hydrological processes and enhances runoff, which affects flood hazard. Interest in nature-based solutions (NBS) for sustainable mitigation and adaptation to urban floods ...is growing, but the magnitudes of NBS effects are still poorly investigated. This study explores the potential of NBS for flood hazard mitigation in a small peri-urban catchment in central Portugal, prone to flash floods driven by urbanization and short but intense rainfall events typical of the Mediterranean region. Flood extent and flood depth are assessed by manually coupling the hydrologic HEC-HMS and hydraulic HEC-RAS models. The coupled model was run for single rainfall events with recurrence periods of 10–, 20–, 50–, and 100–years, considering four simulation scenarios: current conditions (without NBS), and with an upslope NBS, a downslope NBS, and a combination of both. The model-simulation approach provides good estimates of flood magnitude (NSE = 0.91, RMSE = 0.08, MAE = 0.07, R2 = 0.93), and shows that diverting streamflow into abandoned fields has positive impacts in mitigating downslope flood hazard. The implementation of an upslope NBS can decrease the water depth at the catchment outlet by 0.02 m, whereas a downslope NBS can reduce it from 0.10 m to 0.23 m for increasing return periods. Combined upslope and downslope NBS have a marginal additional impact in reducing water depth, ranging from 0.11 m to 0.24 m for 10– and 100–year floods. Decreases in water depth provided by NBS are useful in flood mitigation and adaptation within the peri-urban catchment. A network of NBS, rather than small isolated strategies, needs to be created for efficient flood-risk management at a larger scale.
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•Soil conservation services of four representative basins globally were estimated from 2001 to 2018.•Soil conservation service significantly increased in the Yangtze and Yellow River ...Basins.•Terrain conditions are the main spatial drivers of soil conservation service.•Increasing SC is mainly driven by climate and the combined effects of climate and land cover.
Soil erosion is one of the main drivers of land degradation across the world, thus soil conservation service has received increasing attention. Limited studies have focused on it, hence this study investigates spatial and temporal patterns on soil conservation service in four large representative basins globally (i.e., Amazon, Mississippi, Yangtze, and Yellow River Basins), between 2001 and 2018. Annual soil conservation service and soil erosion rate are estimated under RUSLE framework, and temporal trends are analyzed using Mann-Kendall test. Additionally, impacts of soil erosion factors on spatial distribution of soil conservation service are assessed through fitting stepwise regressions annually and calculating the factors’ contributions. Furthermore, driving factors of temporal changes are identified as climate or land cover dominated, and combined effect of both, according to Z scores from Mann-Kendall test for soil conservation service, R and C factors. Results show the Yangtze River Basin produces the highest average annual erosion rate (mean values of 133.28 Mg ha−1 yr−1 in 2001 and 143.21 Mg ha−1 yr−1 in 2018) and average soil conservation service (mean values of 2663.57 Mg ha−1 yr−1 in 2001 and 3126.43 Mg ha−1 yr−1 in 2018). Amazon River Basin yields the lowest average annual soil erosion rate (15.96 Mg ha−1 yr−1 in 2001 and 21.30 Mg ha−1 yr−1 in 2018), whereas the Mississippi River Basin produces the lowest average soil conservation service (388.48 Mg ha−1 yr−1 in 2001 and 730.70 Mg ha−1 yr−1 in 2018). Over the study period, soil conservation service shows an increasing trend in the Yangtze and Yellow River Basins, with average changing rates of 27.23 Mg ha−1 yr−1 and 16.60 Mg ha−1 yr−1, respectively. Increasing soil conservation service is mainly driven by climate change (i.e., rainfall) and the combined effect of climate and land cover changes, but terrain conditions are the main spatial drivers.
Prescribed (controlled) fire has recently been adopted as an important wildfire-fighting strategy in the Mediterranean. Relatively little research, however, has assessed its impacts on soil erosion ...and soil quality. This paper investigates hillslope-scale losses of soil, organic matter and selected nutrients before and after a ‘worst-case scenario’ prescribed fire in a steep, shrub-vegetated catchment with thin stony soil in central Portugal. Comparison is made with soil erosion measured: (1) on a nearby hillslope burned by wildfire and monitored at the hillslope scale; and (2) on long-unburned terrain at small-plot, hillslope- and catchment-scales. Hillslope-scale pre- and post-fire soil erosion was recorded over periods of 6weeks to 5months for (1) 9.5months pre-fire and 27months post-fire in the prescribed fire catchment, and (2) c. 3years post-fire at the wildfire site. Organic matter content, pH, total N, K2O, P2O5, Ca2+ and Mg2+ were measured in the eroded sediment and in pre- and post-prescribed fire surface soil. Results indicate that: (1) both the prescribed fire and the wildfire caused expected marked increases in erosion compared with unburned terrain; and (2) the hillslope-scale post-prescribed fire soil losses (up to 2.41tha−1yr−1) exceeded many reported plot-scale post-prescribed fire and post-wildfire erosion rates in the Mediterranean. As a comparison, post-fire erosion for both fire types was less than that caused by some other forms of common soil disturbance (e.g. types of tillage) and even that on undisturbed shrubland in low rainfall areas of the region. Total estimated post-prescribed fire particulate losses of organic matter and nutrients represent only 0.2–2.9% of the content in the upper 2cm of soil, suggesting only a modest fire effect on soil quality, although this may reflect in part a lack of extreme rainfall events following the fire. The longer-term implications for soil conservation of repeated prescribed fire in the Mediterranean are explored and future research priorities identified.
•Prescribed fire impacts on soil degradation at the hillslope-scale are presented.•3-year losses of soil, organic matter and nutrients are reported.•Losses are not serious for this individual fire in central Portugal.•Losses are low compared with some agricultural land-uses.•Implications of repeated prescribed fire for soil quality are examined.
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