Salinization poses a major challenge for modern agriculture with considerable areas being salt-affected worldwide. However, these lands can be cultivated by applying saline agriculture, involving ...soil, water and salt-tolerant crop management methods. The agricultural use of saline soils helps in addressing food security in times of population growth and climate change. Therefore, there is a need to map saline soils and examine conditions under which saline agriculture can be implemented.
The aim of this study is to identify locations and surface area of saline soils. The potential areas for saline agricultural production are mapped using the QGIS software with a focus on the most promising lands for saline agriculture. To identify these most promising areas, we apply criteria of soil salinity, soil fertility, soil pH, water availability, presence of irrigation equipment, as well as depleted water basins.
Our results show that the total area of salt-affected soils equals 17 million km2, but the largest potential for saline agriculture lays in saline soils above 4 dS/m ECe in non-depleted water basins totalling to 2 million km2. We conclude that further socio-economic analysis is needed to fully determine countries which should be prioritized in exploring the future potential for sustainable food production.
•The total area of salt-affected soils worldwide equals 17 million km2.•The most promising saline soils for saline agriculture total to 2 million km2.•A most restrictive factor limiting the potential area for saline agriculture is water availability.•Future mapping should focus on high populated areas with favourable socio-economic conditions.
Post-mining grounds and spoil tips frequently render landscapes permanently flawed. As a result of mining activity, considerable stretches of land are often permanently excluded from further use. Due ...to the extensively transformed landscape, it is necessary to implement revitalisation processes. Relevant design and investment activities, coupled with the cooperation of specialists such as architects, civil engineers, geotechnicians, hydrotechnicians and environmental engineers, along with local authorities, can offer a comprehensive functional programme for areas degraded by mining and provide local residents with an attractive leisure area. This article discusses the current state of knowledge on the revitalisation of former mining areas, with special regard to architectural, environmental, social, and economic aspects. The aim of the study is to review and promote design solutions which permanently restore previously degraded areas to local communities. Various concepts of revitalisation of degraded areas are presented, based on examples of landscape architecture at home and abroad. The selected examples comprise natural regeneration, reclamation, and ecological engineering. These are examples of a holistic and modern approach to the development of tourist and environmentally active areas in post-mining sites and spoil tips. Furthermore, the study presents the authors' proposal concerning the revitalisation of a spoil tip area at LW Bogdanka mine for winter sport purposes and other activities, for which the demand was signalled by their management. The discussed examples can serve as an inspiration for future actions and executive projects, undertaken in accordance with the guidelines of Agenda 2030 and Fit for 55 policies.
Tereny powyrobiskowe naziemne oraz powstające przykopalniane hałdy niejednokrotnie stanowią trwałą skazę w krajobrazie. W związku z procesami górniczymi, znaczne połacie terenu zostają często trwale wykluczone z dalszego użytkowania. Silnie przekształcony krajobraz stwarza konieczność dla wdrażania procesów rewitalizacyjnych. Odpowiednie działania projektowe i inwestycyjne, przy współpracy z architektami oraz lokalnymi samorządami są w stanie zaoferować bogaty program funkcjonalny dla terenów zdegradowanych działalnością górniczą, zapewniając jednocześnie okolicznym mieszkańcom atrakcyjną przestrzeń wypoczynkową. W artykule dokonano przeglądu aktualnego stanu wiedzy na temat rewitalizacji terenów pogórniczych, ze szczególnym uwzględnieniem aspektów środowiskowych, społecznych i ekonomicznych takich działań. Celem artykułu jest przegląd i popularyzacja rozwiązań projektowych, które w sposób trwały przywracają tereny zdegradowane lokalnym społecznościom. Przedstawiono różne koncepcje rewitalizacji terenów zdegradowanych, opierając się na przykładach realizacji z dziedziny architektury krajobrazu z kraju i ze świata. Wybrane przykłady obejmują naturalną regenerację, rekultywację i inżynierię ekologiczną. Są to przykłady holistycznego i nowoczesnego podejścia do realizacji przestrzeni turystycznych i aktywnych przyrodniczo na terenach dawnych wyrobisk oraz hałd kopalnianych. Opracowanie przestawia również autorską propozycję rewitalizacji terenu hałdy przy kopalni LW Bogdanka na cele związane ze sportami zimowymi. Omawiane przykłady mogą posłużyć jako wzór dla przyszłych działań podejmowanych zgodnie z założeniami polityki Agenda 2030 i Fit for 55.
Identification of land use conflicts (LUCs) from the perspective of ecological security is essential for ensuring regional ecological security. Coastal zones in China experience complex management ...challenges related to increasing demands of ecological protection and economic development, similar to other coastal countries throughout the world. In this study, we established an index system for evaluating the ecological security importance from two perspectives: ecological sensitivity and importance of ecosystem service function. We then used this index system to delimit ecological security space and identify actual LUCs in China's coastal zones in 2018. In addition, we discussed the situation of LUCs in transitional zones of the coastal zones from a horizontal perspective. Results indicated prominent spatio–temporal mismatches among cultivated land, construction land, and the ecological spatial layout in coastal zones. In the ecological space, the area of cultivated land conflict zone was 12.60%, whereas that of the construction land conflict zone was 10.26%. LUCs existed in all coastal provinces. Overall, significant regional differences were observed in the distribution of LUCs, with near-land side and southern region showing higher distributions than the near-sea side and northern region, respectively. Meanwhile, the cultivated land conflict zone generally radiated outward with the construction land conflict zone as the ‘source’. The findings of this study can provide insights for decision-makers into the location of cultivated land and construction land, which are most likely to occupy ecologically important spaces.
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•Established a research framework of LUCs based on ecological security.•LUCs identification is conducted in 12 provinces along the east coast of China.•Conflicts distribution is higher in the near-land side than in the near-sea side.•Land use conflicts in China's coastal provinces have different manifestations.•The degree of conflict varies significantly with the distance from the coastline.
The Chinese government has successfully lifted a significant number of rural people out of absolute poverty in a short span of time by pooling resources and utilizing unconventional and precise means ...of support. Consequently, China's rural development objective has shifted from poverty eradication to enrichment, and the key to achieving this is through a combined approach of market-oriented operation and policy support for corporate participation in rural revitalization. This paper analyzes the role of Chinese listed companies' participation in rural revitalization in terms of their ability to navigate the corporate environment based on the dualistic legitimacy theory. The research findings indicate that the primary goal of enterprises' participation in rural revitalization is to gain adaptive and strategic legitimacy by taking social responsibility, with the ultimate aim of achieving sustainable development. Specifically, enterprises enhance their social responsibility performance and financial performance through social participation in rural revitalization, thereby improving their overall sustainability. Finally, our study identifies optimal paths for different types of enterprises to achieve binary legitimacy. This research enriches the understanding of corporate environmental responsiveness via the perspective of binary legitimacy and uncovers the underlying mechanisms driving enterprises' participation in rural revitalization through corporate social responsibility (CSR).
•The combined path of market-based operation and policy support for corporate participation in rural revitalisation is the key to rural enrichment.•The participation of enterprises in rural revitalisation can improve their social responsibility performance, financial performance and sustainable development performance, thus achieving their own sustainable development.•The purpose of corporate participation in rural revitalisation is to gain adaptive legitimacy and strategic legitimacy through taking social responsibility in order to achieve their own sustainable development.•There are differences in the choice of pro-poor industries among enterprises with different business strategies.•This study enriches the theory of CSR from the perspective of environmental fit and reveals the intrinsic driving mechanism of corporate participation in rural revitalisation.
Network-based rural development approaches, rooted in neo-endogenous or nexogenous models and aiming to mobilise the development potential of local assets and address local needs by connecting to ...broader external actor-networks, have been emphasised in rural development policies worldwide. Since the introduction of its National Rural Revitalisation Strategy in 2017, China has adopted more policies, and advanced more programmes, with networked features, which seek to involve local communities and non-governmental extra-local actors in the implementation of rural policy.
The ‘reaching in’ state has a key role to play in the Chinese networked approach, which drives technocratic remedial programmes in response to rural marginalisation, and which seeks to generate new surplus value from supported local economies. This paper introduces the concept of neo-exogenous development (NED), distinguishing this emergent Chinese hybrid development paradigm from its European-Western counterparts. The ‘reaching out’ of communities in Europe is frequently a response to weakening state intervention, with connections made to non-state actors and networks. However, China's NED approach is characterised by a ‘reaching in’ active party-state and ‘conducted’ (or activated) communities, which are inter-connected by ‘semi-formal party organisations.’ To date, few research studies have explored the specific governance structure of China's NED practices and its dynamics, or sought to situate these in a broader international context of rural development paradigms. This gap in extant research impedes the transfer of knowledge on networked approaches across international rural contexts.
This article reports on research investigating the implementation process of a Modern Agriculture Zone (MAZ) programme in Sichuan, a marginalised region of China. That research drew on semi-structured interviews with key actors from county and town governments, the MAZ Management Committee, local community and collective enterprises, and extra-local enterprises. It aims to unveil the distinctive local-state dynamics of NED practice, to show how the active party-state has provoked the reconfiguration of social relations and produced activated communities.
•The paper introduces the concept of neo-exogenous development (NED), which is presented as an emergent rural development model.•From the imperial, to the Maoist, and to the modern period, China's rural development has been shaped by the state's desire to effectively integrate and govern an otherwise ‘discrete’ rural society.•Rooted in a semi-formal and clientelist rural governance tradition, NED combines exogenous ‘reaching-in’ state interventions with an array of steered endogenous features.•NED connects an active party-state with activated communities via semi-formal rural party networks.•Three drawbacks of NED are underscored: dependency on political recognition and impetus, reliance on public finance, elite capture of benefits.
The Welsh Government's Welsh language strategy, Cymraeg: A million Welsh speakers Welsh Government. 2017a. Cymraeg 2050: A Million Welsh Speakers. Cardiff: Welsh Government, aims to increase the ...numbers of Welsh speakers to one million by 2050. The creation of new Welsh speakers and immersion education form an integral part of the Welsh Government's language revitalisation strategy and this study revisits new Welsh speakers from the Rhymney Valley, South Wales in 2016/2017 a decade on from the 2006 research study Hodges, R. 2009. "Welsh Language Use Among Young People in the Rhymney Valley." Contemporary Wales 22: 16-35. http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/uwp/cowa/2009/00000022/00000001/art00004. This longitudinal research provides further insights into their continuing language journeys, and indicates there has been a sustained reduction in this group's use of Welsh by 2016/2017 due to factors relating to fluency, confidence and a lack of opportunities to use Welsh. However, the results indicate that new speakers play an important role in influencing family language transmission and in increasing language awareness within the workplace. This paper calls for further longitudinal research on new Welsh speakers' language journeys so that this group may be appropriately supported as they make a crucial contribution to language revitalisation in Wales.
The purpose of the article is an attempt to reflect the assumptions resulting from the sustain- -able development principle under the Act on revitalization. Although the Act on revitalization, which ...is a kind of special regulation in the field of spatial planning, does not refer either directly – like the Act on spatial planning and development – or indirectly to the sustainable development principle, it should be assumed that revitalization should certainly be implemented in accordance with the principle of sustainable development. Consequently, all instruments specified under the Act on revitalization, such as the municipal revitalization program, the resolution designating the degraded area and the regeneration area, the Special Revitalization Zone, the local revitalization plan, should be implemented in accordance with the principle of sustainable development. Therefore, the main problem in the Act on revitalization is the lack of reference to the sustainable development principle. The second problem is the lack of uniform standards for sustainable development in the comprehensive revitalization process. Nevertheless, the purpose of the Act on revitalization, can be interpreted by using systematic and teleological interpretation. The considerations lead to an attempt to create the principles of sustainable revitalization in light of the sustainable development principle, the aim of which would be to ensure a process of renewal of degraded areas taking into account integral social, economic and environmental friendly development.
An examination of the Nigerian society discloses the challenge the Yoruba’s cultural system faces. Daily, our moral and cultural values are being challenged by Western ideologies and culture. This is ...especially propagated in our media, which set agendas for our society based on Western ideologies. This research advocates for reviving Yoruba folk opera for preserving Yoruba culture. The study used the data obtained from one hundred audience who watched a folk opera, Oba Waja (The King is Dead), written by Duro Ladipo, and staged by students of Olabisi Onabanjo University, Ago Iwoye. It briefly discusses some features of selected exponents of Yoruba folk opera. Findings from the study show that there has not been a lot of performance or production of Yoruba Opera in recent years, but the few ones examined showcased core Yoruba values and culture, such as respect, modesty, honesty, dignity of labor and more. However, there are many missing gaps to fill to preserve the great heritage of Nigerians, specifically Yoruba people and culture, in encouraging the proliferation of Yoruba folk opera and thus contributing to the preservation of Yoruba culture. The study recommends that the writing and production of Yoruba Folk Operas should receive good sponsorship by Yoruba rulers and the wealthy people of Yoruba, both in Nigeria and in the diaspora. By doing so, folk opera will be revitalized, and its relevance will be felt in the preservation of Yoruba culture. The study also calls for diversification among filmmakers, as well as collaboration of music and drama experts for concurrent productions of Yoruba folk opera, featuring as part of home videos, and incorporation of subtitles for the sake of Yoruba language learners.
We examined the influence of language and socioeconomic factors on academic achievement in the Basque Autonomous Community (BAC): a multilingual society with a recent history of language ...revitalisation. We analysed scores obtained by Grade 4 and Grade 10 students on a diagnostic mathematics test administered in either Basque or Spanish in the BAC. We found that L1 Basque users who were of high socioeconomic status (SES) were the top performers across language groups. A larger percentage of high-SES L1 Spanish users earned top scores when tested in their home language than when tested in Basque. In contrast, low-SES L1 users of Spanish performed better when tested in Basque. These findings corroborate and expand upon findings from previous research conducted in the BAC, which shows that SES and language shape academic achievement in contexts of successful language revitalisation efforts.
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