•Local perceptions were mixed, reflecting both positive and negative perspectives of socio-demographic changes.•Employment, education, and migration significantly influenced plantation forestry's ...socio-economic contribution to the households.•We implore plantation forestry development to moderate their social repercussions through improved value-addition activities in rural areas.
Global concerns about forest sustainability have shifted the attention to plantation forests as a potential candidate to fill the wood and ecosystem service demand. In this regard, their contribution to lessening the pressure on natural forests has been recognized, and this is becoming increasingly important in the context of a changing climate. This study was designed to conceptualize the influence of large-scale plantation forests on changes in the socio-demographic characteristics in local communities. A mixed-method approach combining qualitative data from two key informant interviews with a household survey of 125 respondents was deployed to explore the local perceptions of the influence of plantation forestry on socio-demographic changes. Our results revealed mixed perceptions of the socio-demographic changes, reflecting both increasing and decreasing trends. All of the socio-demographic factors were positively influenced in a societal desired manner by plantation forestry, except household income and construction materials. The socio-demographic factors were identified as the principal determinants shaping the plantation forestry's contribution to the socio-economic development of respondents’ households. The direction of socio-demographic changes was reported to be positive across all the communities, with the magnitude of influence on the respondent's households varying between low and high. Our results suggest the need for understanding the dynamics associated with land use conversion to forest plantations in rural areas to inspire the search for options to implement an integrated landscape approach for tree plantation development with minimal social impacts on local populations.
Balancing selection (BLS) is the evolutionary force that maintains high levels of genetic variability in many important genes. To further our understanding of its evolutionary significance, we ...analyze models with BLS acting on a biallelic locus: an equilibrium model with long-term BLS, a model with long-term BLS and recent changes in population size, and a model of recent BLS. Using phase-type theory, a mathematical tool for analyzing continuous time Markov chains with an absorbing state, we examine how BLS affects polymorphism patterns in linked neutral regions, as summarized by nucleotide diversity, the expected number of segregating sites, the site frequency spectrum, and the level of linkage disequilibrium (LD). Long-term BLS affects polymorphism patterns in a relatively small genomic neighborhood, and such selection targets are easier to detect when the equilibrium frequencies of the selected variants are close to 50%, or when there has been a population size reduction. For a new mutation subject to BLS, its initial increase in frequency in the population causes linked neutral regions to have reduced diversity, an excess of both high and low frequency derived variants, and elevated LD with the selected locus. These patterns are similar to those produced by selective sweeps, but the effects of recent BLS are weaker. Nonetheless, compared to selective sweeps, nonequilibrium polymorphism and LD patterns persist for a much longer period under recent BLS, which may increase the chance of detecting such selection targets. An R package for analyzing these models, among others (e.g., isolation with migration), is available.
Knowledge of how a species is divided into different genetic units, and the structure among these units, is fundamental to the protection of biodiversity. Procyonidae was one of the families in the ...Order Carnivora with more success in the colonization of South America. The most divergent species in this family is the kinkajou (Potos flavus). However, knowledge of the genetics and evolution of this species is scarce. We analyzed five mitochondrial genes within 129 individuals of P. flavus from seven Neotropical countries (Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia). We detected eight different populations or haplogroups, although only three had highly significant bootstrap values (southern Mexico and Central America; northern Peruvian, Ecuadorian, and Colombian Amazon; and north-central Andes and the southern Amazon in Peru). Some analyses showed that the ancestor of the southern Mexico–Central America haplogroup was the first to appear. The youngest haplogroups were those at the most southern area analyzed in Peru and Bolivia. A “borrowed molecular clock” estimated the initial diversification to have occurred around 9.6 million years ago (MYA). All the spatial genetic analyses detected a very strong spatial structure with significant genetic patches (average diameter around 400–500 km) and a clinal isolation by distance among them. The overall sample and all of the haplogroups we detected had elevated levels of genetic diversity, which strongly indicates their long existence. A Bayesian Skyline Plot detected, for the overall sample and for the three most significant haplogroups, a decrease in the number of females within the last 30,000–50,000 years, with a strong decrease in the last 10,000–20,000 years. Our data supported an alignment of some but not all haplogroups with putative morphological subspecies. We have not discounted the possibility of a cryptic kinkajou species.
Estimating the burden of non-communicable diseases particularly cardiovascular disease (CVD) is essential for health management and policymaking. In this paper, we used a regression model to estimate ...the future impact of demographic changes on the burden of CVD in Iran during the next two decades.
Disability-adjusted life years (DALY) were used to estimate the future burden of CVD in Iran. A regression model was used to estimate DALY caused by CVD in the Iranian population aged 30-100 yr, stratified by age group and sex. The predicted population of Iranians aged ≥ 30 yr was entered into the model and DALY were calculated over 2005-2025. To assess the areas of uncertainty in the model, we did sensitivity analysis and Monte Carlo Simulation.
In the year 2005, there were 847309 DALYs caused by CVD in Iranian adults aged ≥ 30 yr. This figure will nearly be 1728836 DALYs in 2025. In other words, just because of the aging, DALY related to CVD will increase more than two-fold in 2025 compared with 2005. The burden of CVD was higher in men (443235) than in women (404235) in 2005; but in 2025, the difference will be less (867639 vs. 861319).
The burden of CVD will increase steeply in Iran over 2005-2025, mainly because of the aging population. Therefore, more attention is needed to deal with the impact of CVD in the following decades in Iran.
Japan has been confronted with two demographic forces, declining fertility rates and lengthening life spans, which give rise to the increasing ratio of the elderly (aging society), the decline in ...population and the prevalence of nuclear families. This study empirically analyzes the demographic effects on residential electricity and city gas consumption in Japan. Our analysis presents the following main results. First, the aging of the society decreases the electricity demand but does not affect the city gas demand significantly. Second, the decrease in population with the prevalence of nuclear families increases the electricity demand but decreases the city gas demand. The direction of the demand for each alternative depends on the balancing of the first and second effects. Third, the analysis also shows clear results about the own- and cross-price effects. Ongoing energy market reforms for price suppression would increase energy demand with possible substitutability between the two energy sources. Our case study of Japan is also applicable to other countries that will have just started to experience the similar demographic pattern of an aging society with energy market deregulation.
•We analyze demographic effects on residential electricity and city gas consumption in Japan.•The aging of societies decreases the electricity demand but does not affect the city gas demand.•The population decline increases the electricity demand but decreases the city gas demand.•Energy market reforms increase the energy demand with substitutability between the two energy sources.•Our study is applicable to other countries that will experience the similar demographic pattern.
Abstract This study aimed to monitor the demographic changes of some closely related species based on bird ringing data from the CES (Constant Effort Sites) program in Hungary between 2007 and 2018, ...and to explore the reasons for these demographic changes. The CES program tracks breeding bird populations with standard methods. The studied species breeding in Hungary were from genera Sylvia , Curruca, and Phylloscopus . Among these species, the trends of some forest birds, like Eurasian Blackcap (Sylvia atricapilla) , Lesser Whitethroat (Curruca curruca) , Common Chiffchaff (Phylloscopus collybita) and Willow Warbler ( Ph. trochilus) showed no substantial changes, and one of the open-habitat species, the Barred Warbler (Curruca nisoria) – a long distant migrant – showed decreasing trends. The Garden Warbler (Sylvia borin) – a trans-Saharan migrant but forest dweller – also experienced population declines. Short-distance migrants maintained stable populations. Common Whitethroat productivity displayed an increasing trend to compensate for population decline. Upon examining the Eurasian Blackcap, this study detected a strong relationship between the number of adult birds, productivity, and the number of adults captured the following year.
The racial/ethnic diversity of the United States is increasing, yet recent social psychological research has focused primarily on White Americans’ reactions to this demographic trend. The present ...research experimentally examines how members of different racial minority groups perceive increasing diversity, driven by Hispanic population growth, focusing on downstream consequences for political ideology and policy preferences. Four studies reveal that making Hispanic population growth salient leads non-Hispanic racial minorities to identify as more conservative and support more conservative policy positions, compared with control information. The policy preferences of Hispanics, however, were not affected by exposure to information about their in-group’s growth. Considered in tandem with previous research, the present studies suggest that Hispanic population growth may motivate greater support for conservative ideology among members of both racial majority and minority groups.
PDF
