The Impacts of the Arid Lands Resource Management Project (ALRMPII) on Livelihoods and Vulnerability in the Arid and Semi-arid Lands of Kenya

The Impacts of the Arid Lands Resource Management Project (ALRMPII) on Livelihoods and Vulnerability in the Arid and Semi-arid Lands of Kenya PDF Author: Nancy Johnson
Publisher: ILRI (aka ILCA and ILRAD)
ISBN: 9291462578
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 107

Get Book Here

Book Description

The Impacts of the Arid Lands Resource Management Project (ALRMPII) on Livelihoods and Vulnerability in the Arid and Semi-arid Lands of Kenya

The Impacts of the Arid Lands Resource Management Project (ALRMPII) on Livelihoods and Vulnerability in the Arid and Semi-arid Lands of Kenya PDF Author: Nancy Johnson
Publisher: ILRI (aka ILCA and ILRAD)
ISBN: 9291462578
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 107

Get Book Here

Book Description


Measuring resilience in a volatile world

Measuring resilience in a volatile world PDF Author:
Publisher: Intl Food Policy Res Inst
ISBN:
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 36

Get Book Here

Book Description
Substantial numbers of the world’s chronically poor and malnourished population live in an increasingly volatile world. The dangerous nexus of climate change, rapid population growth, conflict, and food price volatility already appears to have pushed several poor regions into states of permanent crisis, even as the rest of the world has seen unprecedented progress against poverty. This disturbing state of affairs, along with our expanded knowledge of the intimate interactions between short-term shocks and long-run development, has catalyzed widespread interest in resilience building, and in what such a framework implies for understanding the causes and consequences of acute vulnerability to natural and man-made disasters. In this paper we ask what this paradigm implies for the measurement and analysis of resilience. Resilience is fundamentally about complex dynamics. Slower-moving ecological, economic, demographic, and social stressors create vulnerability to short-run shocks, which in turn can have long-term consequences by reinforcing preexisting vulnerabilities. In our view, this basic conception of resilience has fundamental measurement implications. First, resilience can be measured and understood only through higher-frequency surveys that capture the causes and consequences of time-varying stressors and shocks, including seasonal shocks. Second, resilience can be understood only through surveys that capture the multidimensional complexity of stressors, shocks, and feedback loops, including the complex interactions between economic, social, and ecological forces. Third, the underlying stressors that create vulnerability, and the resilience-building interventions that reduce vulnerability, can be gauged and evaluated only over the longer term. This conceptualization of resilience motivates us to go a step further than existing research on resilience and on food and nutrition security measurement, by outlining a far more expansive strategy for improving and scaling up the monitoring, measurement, and analysis of the world’s most vulnerable populations. We propose the development of a multicountry system of high-frequency, long-term sentinel sites in the world’s most vulnerable regions. If implemented along the lines we conceive, this system could be a high-return investment for resilience-building efforts, since it would serve multiple purposes. This system offers the only rigorous means of monitoring vulnerability and resilience in the world’s most volatile regions. This system would bolster existing early-warning systems by complementing them with household-level indicators. This system would improve the targeting of emergency resources. This system would be instrumental for diagnosing the underlying sources of vulnerability, for identifying key thresholds of resilience, and for designing appropriate resilience-building strategies. And this system would provide a rigorous foundation for large-scale evaluations of resilience-building activities. While there are strong justifications for such a system, the devil is necessarily in the details, and much of this paper is concerned with those details. Largely to learn from existing experience, we first review existing measurement strategies that are similar in purpose or design to the sentinel system outlined above. When implemented, long-term, high-frequency measurement systems have often yielded great benefits but been hampered by cost, lack of institutional coordination, and insufficient dissemination and usage of data. The need to keep costs down and benefits widespread therefore motivates us to consider which countries in the world have the highest priority for the development of sentinel sites, based on indicators such as child nutrition and health outcomes, exposure to disasters, and past emergency assistance levels from the international community. We then turn to crucial issues of data collection design by outlining a hybrid sampling and survey design that will help achieve the various objectives outlined above while keeping costs down. We also argue that the proliferation of mobile phones and other information and communications technologies offers substantial scope for a cost-effective system of this kind, far more so than would have been available in the past. Finally, we consider who should lead and contribute to this ambitious effort. Since the principal advantage of this approach is that it can yield benefits for a wide range of institutions and purposes (relief and development, operations and research, social and biophysical sciences), and since the costs of a long-term commitment to these sentinel surveys would be large indeed for any single agency, we propose the need for a relatively broad consortium of international donors. This consortium should first focus on establishing partnerships with national governments and then commit to long-term resilience monitoring as well as domestic capacity building. With this essential commitment in place, this consortium would then need to secure implementing partners with a permanent presence on the ground, as well as the technical expertise of international organizations of various sorts. Ultimately, we argue, it is only this kind of long-term, cooperative commitment that will provide a scientific evidence base for diagnosing and resolving the world’s worst problems of hunger, poverty, and malnutrition. Only this kind of sentinel system can generate the data and evidence needed to inform actions to build resilience and to help the global community eliminate extreme poverty in the generation ahead. The status quo is simply not enough.

Environmental Assessment and Management Framework

Environmental Assessment and Management Framework PDF Author: Arid Lands Resource Management Project (Kenya)
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Arid regions
Languages : en
Pages : 99

Get Book Here

Book Description


Arid Land Systems: Sciences and Societies

Arid Land Systems: Sciences and Societies PDF Author: Troy Sternberg
Publisher: MDPI
ISBN: 3039213474
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 380

Get Book Here

Book Description
Understanding deserts and drylands is essential, as arid landscapes cover >40% of the Earth and are home to two billion people. Today's problematic environment–human interaction needs contemporary knowledge to address dryland complexity. Physical dimensions in arid zones—land systems, climate and hazards, ecology—are linked with social processes that directly impact drylands, such as land management, livelihoods, and development. The challenges require integrated research that identifies systemic drivers across global arid regions. Measurement and monitoring, field investigation, remote sensing, and data analysis are effective tools to investigate natural dynamics. Equally, inquiry into how policy and practice affect landscape sustainability is key to mitigating detrimental activity in deserts. Relations between socio-economic forces and degradation, agro-pastoral rangeland use, drought and disaster and resource extraction reflect land interactions. Contemporary themes of food security, conflict, and conservation are interlinked in arid environments. This book unifies desert science, arid environments, and dryland development. The chapters identify land dynamics, address system risks and delineate human functions through original research in arid zones. Mixed methodologies highlight the vital links between social and environmental science in global deserts. The book engages with today's topical themes and presents novel analyses of arid land systems and societies.

The Arid Lands

The Arid Lands PDF Author: R. L. Heathcote
Publisher: Longman Publishing Group
ISBN:
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 360

Get Book Here

Book Description


Arid and Semiarid Land Stewardship

Arid and Semiarid Land Stewardship PDF Author: Peter F. Ffolliott
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Arid regions
Languages : en
Pages : 84

Get Book Here

Book Description
The International Arid Lands Consortium (IALC) was established in 1990 to promote research, education, and training activities related to the development, management, and restoration or reclamation of arid and semiarid lands worldwide. The IALC, a leading international organization, supports ecological sustainability and development of arid and semiarid lands. Building on a decade of experience, IALC continues to increase the knowledge-base for managers by funding research, development, and demonstration projects, and special initiatives. The results from the scientific and technical projects enhance management and stewardship of arid and semiarid ecosystems for sustainable use, while maintaining the integrity of the ecological processes. The publication presents a review of the accomplishments and contributions of IALC's science and technical programs through a synopsis of the projects and initiatives. We group the projects and initiatives into soil and water resources development and conservation, land use and reclamation, processes enhancing the management of ecological systems, and inventorying and measurements techniques and monitoring.

Natural Resources And Development In Arid Regions

Natural Resources And Development In Arid Regions PDF Author: Enrique Campos-Lopez
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 0429705069
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 370

Get Book Here

Book Description
In this book, the authors integrate various perspectives on the evaluation of natural resources in arid and semiarid zones, analyze development options, and discuss systems analysis tools that could be important for the management of technology.

Realistic Planning for Arid Lands

Realistic Planning for Arid Lands PDF Author: Matlock W. G.
Publisher: CRC Press
ISBN: 9783718600519
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 300

Get Book Here

Book Description


Plant Resources of Arid and Semiarid Lands

Plant Resources of Arid and Semiarid Lands PDF Author: J. R. Goodin
Publisher: Academic Press
ISBN: 1483272273
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 353

Get Book Here

Book Description
Plant Resources of Arid and Semiarid Lands: A Global Perspective is a collection of papers that evaluates the existing native plant resources in the arid and semiarid regions. The papers deal with the resources found in these arid regions such as food potential, forage, fuel, fiber, medicinal or industrial uses. The book covers the arid regions of Africa, Australia, the Indian subcontinent, Middle East, North America, China, South America, and the USSR. The treatment of these regions includes geographical descriptions such as area, annual precipitation, temperature, humidity, wind ranges or patterns, and seasons. These papers also discuss the effects of topography on water drainage and loss, the basic soil types, holding capacity, water runoffs, and the availability of water (surface and subsurface), The book examines the current and projected growth rates for relevant countries and dry regions in each continent. These papers discuss the economic output from arid lands, the balance of trade, current or developing resources, as well as the prospects of these countries with dry regions. The book also focuses on the types of plants found in these regions whether these are used for food, forage, medicine or for industry. This collection is suitable for environmentalists, ecologists, sociologist, anthropologists, and researchers involved in biological and environmental conservation.

Extractive Industries in Arid and Semi-arid Zones

Extractive Industries in Arid and Semi-arid Zones PDF Author: Joachim Gratzfeld
Publisher: IUCN
ISBN: 2831707412
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 122

Get Book Here

Book Description
This publication aims to contribute to planning and management approaches that minimize land degradation and desertification in arid and semi-arid zones as a result of extractive industries operations. Both operational and policy guidance are included to help those government departments responsible for the licensing, planning and monitoring of extractive industries activities to take account of environment and development issues in their decision-making.