Around the Bloc: Ancient Forest Axed in Poland
Officials say the operation aims to prevent “forest degradation,” while activists counter with charges of violating EU law for ulterior motives.
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Officials say the operation aims to prevent “forest degradation,” while activists counter with charges of violating EU law for ulterior motives.
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This essay summarizes the research and recommendations resulting from a Sustainable Food and Farming project in Koprivnica, Croatia, in the spring and summer of 2014.1 A collaborative effort between researchers at Arizona State University and scholars, government officials, business leaders, farmers, and other stakeholders in Koprivnica and the larger Podravina region, this project assessed the historical foundations and current conditions of the local food and farm system and made recommendations for how to build resiliency and sustainability into that system over the next 30 years. Developing a sustainable local food system involves far more than good farming with strong environmental protection measures; it includes considerations of quality of life, the economics of the food system, policy and governance, cultural heritage, and social justice. We start by characterizing the contemporary food system sustainability challenges in Podravina; then we assess obstacles and opportunities for building a sustainable and resilient farm and food system in the region; and we end with practical recommendations for strengthening sustainable farming and food systems in Koprivnica-Križevci County and the broader Podravina region.
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Today the school gardens, beside city gardens raise the attention and are regarded because they bring children and citizens closer to nature. Every year since 1996 there is competition for the most beautiful school garden and many schools in north and south Croatia won the title, although those gardens are often specialized and cultivate a variety of plants. Within Croatian educational system the school gardens are treated as the student’s farm. But they are more than that. It is where the students learn to cultivate and preserve autochthonous / traditional sorts, some forgotten ones such as pyrethrum in Kašet Sućurac, mulberry in Sibinj and many others endanger sorts of trees. Many primary and high schools created authentic botanical gardens and thus make a certain profit beside they receive a support of Croatian Ministry of Science and education. Some of them even receive the professional support from Croatian Botanical Society, specifically from the section of Croatian botanical gardens and arboretums, but also from other professionals and botanists. The most diligent among them is the Agricultural school in Vinica, near Varaždin. The school gardens have the multiple purposes. It can be esthetical, for the embellishment of the environment and educative as well for they offer a better insight and knowledge about nature and flora. They can be a space where children socialize, play games and do practice. It is not negligible their ecological function as a protection of unpolluted species and old or endangered species of flora. The school gardens are the legacy of a new era, but their development is based on fostering of ancient church gardens, as well as the royal and aristocratic gardens in the Age of Enlightenment. The »Dalmatian Academies« are the examples of such endeavor. Simultaneously with the regulation on children obligatory education, Empress Maria Theresa had determined in 1774 that the children had to be educated in the matters of economy. This policy continued in the first half of 19th century thus in 1816 the regulation passed on the school gardens. The first known school garden, mentioned by the school historian Antun Cuvaj, was in Vrbovec in 1840. The Croatian-Slavonic Economic Society was funded in 1841 and under its tutorship in the Society`s affiliates was encouraged school gardening, and silkworms breeding especially the later because it required many hands and lots of space and those had only schools and military institutions. During the second half of the 19th century and the raise of civil society great number of schools was built. Ban Josip Šokčević, originally from Vinkovci, in Slavonia (the region known for extensive agriculture in Croatia) passed one more regulation on obligatory school gardening, apiculture/beekeeping and silkworms breeding. The first course books were published on this matter, such as for example Josip Partaš`s Poučnik vrtlarstvu i pčelarstvu za porabu početnih seoskih učionah / The manual for Gardening and Beekeeping for Primary Schools in Country, Wien 1860. The school supervisors had obligation beside their regular work to monitor school gardens as an important educational tool in agricultural environments and their observations were published in the school annuals. Thus there are numerous records on the school gardening in Croatia from this period. However, when the Habsburg Monarchy was transformed into the Austria-Hungarian Dual Monarchy in 1867, the northern Croatia and Slavonia was placed under Hungarian and Dalmatia and Istria under Austrian jurisdiction. Although bisected and exposed to divisions and limitations the first and only school of agriculture in southeast Europe was founded in Križevci in 1869. The great Croatian reformist, ban Ivan Mažuranić reformed the educational system as well. Until then the schools were under the church jurisdiction and he subordinated them to Country Government. It is believed that the educational system thus grew with more quality. In October 14th 1874 Mažuranić passed the new law on education and in each subcounty he appointed the school supervisors who supervised the schools and counseled teachers on school gardening. Franjo Klaić published the translation of Erasmo Schwab`s School garden in Zagreb in 1877. Although the book was not officially approved for use in schools Mažuranić disobeyed the Country Government Education Council and distributed the book to schools. Mažuranić closely monitored the work of school gardens and journals Napredak / The Progress and Školski vrt / The School garden have published numerous articles on vegetable cultures. Gospodarski list / Economic Newspaper, as a bulletin of The Croatian-Slavonic Economic Society, which until 1892 leads Farkaš Vukotinović gives helpful suggestions for small farms. Very popular were the articles of Vilim Švelec, the vicar from Martinska Ves, the manual for planting the crops written by Mijat Stojanović, the school teacher who worked in Sriem and Senj, and the manual on viticulture by Stražimir, the vicar from Zelina. It is interesting that in the school gardens vines were not planted but students learned grafting fruit trees and grape. Obviously it was a precautionary measure and protection from the harmful effects of alcohol. The agriculture and especially the gardening require great attention and constant work. Many school gardens were planed and created but were not maintained therefore Mažuranić brought a new regulation in 1878 which allowed teachers to keep the half of income garden brought if he maintains the garden with the students. This has given new impetus to school gardening and school supervisor and landowner Janko Bedeković published instructions »Kako da se urede školski vrtovi / How to organize the school gardens,« suggesting first to draw a plan and then in consultation with experts to plant the cultures adapted to the climate. The positive effects were visible very soon which encouraged the vegetable and fruit growing and beekeeping in school gardens. Although limited due to official state policy towards the periphery of the Monarchy, Croatia has still managed to raise and maintain a large number of school gardens. Until 1914 almost every school had its garden and those were pride of every school principle who became promoters of gardening. Although the fate of the school gardens was later very different and many have experienced the devastation and were turned into construction sites or pastures, though some school gardens have survived the entire twentieth century, gaining now in the 21st century new impetus and importance.
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Existing research shows that political representatives use public resources to reward their allies while punish their rivals. In region of Central Europe such literature is rather underdeveloped and this article aims to fill this gap. It analyzes distribution of environmental grants in Slovakia between 2005 and 2015. The results show that grants are primarily given to towns led by mayors supported by governmental parties. In case of coalition governments a better access to public resources is found for towns led by mayors supported by the party controlling the distribution process than for municipalities with mayors supported by other governmental parties.
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In a novel approach to disaster resilience that embodies a multidisciplinary problem solving process in determining the value of damaged property, a framework has been developed for determining the economic value of damages to property due to contamination from human-caused oil spill disaster in the Niger Delta. The framework will result in a reduction of the recovery process of affected communities following an oil spill as they know in advance what will be done and result in standardisation of the valuation process. it will enable the polluter to know the cost of their malfeasance and provide the property owners with the economic value of their polluted property to enable them to continue their livelihood. Professional valuers and property owners are very dissatisfied with the current practice without a standard framework and oil company operators hardly realise the economic cost of disasters imposed on the communities. Reviewing the theory and practice of economic value and ecosystem valuation, a mixed-methodology was employed using questionnaires and expert interviews to ascertain how contaminated wetland property is valued, the professionals involved and their respective roles. The proposed framework will provide a systematic process leading to the determination of the economic value of damages due to contamination of wetlands property.
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The research was developed linking the impact of flood risk on utility, desirability and marketability related to vulnerability of commercial property value. Likert style questionnaire survey was conducted to obtain data from flood affected and un-affected respondents across different designated flood risk zones on key business and perception variables among two groups of business property holders in England. The responses were analysed through a spatial vulnerability model to illustrate the distribution of the vulnerability of value of properties among flood plain business holders on a GIS platform. Majority of respondents perceived that utility of properties may be hampered by flooding and subsequently have an impact on value for property at risk. Those with flood experience gave greater weight to their specific business needs such as the prime location and expected income level than those without flood experience. The implication of the study lies in understanding that flood risk perceptions can shape actions of people at risk towards future increase in resilience having strategic impact on value of property saleability in the future.
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Large scale projects tasked with designing infrastructures and urban networks resilient to disasters face a common challenge, i.e. the need to address concomitant technological issues and social problems. What is more, conflicting technologies and the diverse philosophical underpinnings of distinct academic disciplines pose difficulties in the collaboration among experts of different fields. These difficulties and possible ways to tackle them have been highlighted by a questionnaire developed in the framework of an EU project named ANDRDD (Academic Network for Disaster Resilience to optimize Educational development). More specifically, the project investigated the level of interdisciplinary work in current research and educational projects within the field of disaster resilience. findings illustrate the number and types of disciplines involved in disaster resilience projects and suggest that a higher degree of integration between different disciplines in tertiary education could promote a transdisciplinary approach to disaster resilience, resulting in design efficiency and innovation.
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Two earthquakes of magnitude 6.1mb occurred at the Ahar and around 16000 residential buildings were destroyed. one of the conspicuous issues in the earthquake is property management to reconstruct and confront the crisis. in this regard, since the most damage inflicted on the buildings occurs in the exterior walls, therefore, the most financial resources must be spent on reconstructing this part of damaged buildings. Thus, this paper was conducted in order to reduce expenditure and increase the resistance of the walls. The urban fabric of the area didn’t sustain much damage and only the exterior walls of the buildings were collapsed. Thus, the main aim of this article is to study different types of exterior walls for renewal and reconstruction of buildings in earthquake area. To approach this aim, using group decision-making method. This paper presents the comparison of FUZZY and AHP. in this regard, this research is centralized on types of exterior walls to reconstruct iran earthquake areas (Ahar, Heris, Varzeqan). five main methods have been chosen by asking experts in the related fields and to evaluate and select the best of exterior walls. finally 3D panel wall was selected as the optimal wall for reconstruction of earthquake area.
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Pollution is the most likely cause for the biblical hue of water in notoriously polluted Norilsk.
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The article presents Arvydas Šliogeris’ unique philosophical approach which treats creativity as a form of nihilism and thus suggests a need to reformulate the existing concept of nihilism. The unique approach towards creativity takes its shape as a reaction to the ecological consequences brought about by immoderate creation. However, it is argued that the uniqueness of Šliogeris’ position lies not as much with the view which treats creativity as negativity, but more with the unique division of human and non-human. This division eliminates the possibility to speak of the “human against the world” dichotomy, but rather directs one to see the interplay of human versus non-human in a human being himself or herself. Such position eliminates the controversy among the theories of environmental ethics in their search for the intrinsic value of things. It also encourages us to choose a moderate form of nihilism – not in order to protect human values or the world, but as a means to find his or her own inner balance between the human and the non-human.
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The paper deals with the issue of creative ecology in academic environment. The theses have been developed as follows. 1. Certain environmental disorder is a way towards better order, the agents of which are the individuals. 2. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Epicurus, and Seneca have influenced certain academic environment developed for ages. 3. We can speak about the niches of academic ecology since science should be developed in respect of life to be created and vice versa an important factor of life is scientific truth to be reached even if it is a utopian one. 4. Human fears and aspirations could be treated as the engines of science that is oriented beyond them. 5. The creative niches change the cultural environment that is as much sustainable as changeable. 6. Creativity in education means rich enough environment for mutual communication between the students and the teachers who learn from each other. 7. The result of scientific specialization is not only the loss of the united academic body at a university but also the stratification of academic society in general. 8. The creative activity is possible not thanks to the specialization of the sciences but despite it. 9. We can speak neither about academic ecology nor about academic virtues without having any continuum of the academic relief.
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The world development shows that global problems are still not being solved adequately. If we maintain this way of development the survival of humanity on the Earth will be impossible in future. In this context, the environmental awareness, disseminative global responsibility as well as environmental dimension of citizenship, are discussed today with the raising importance. In this paper we are going to examine and analyse the concept of environmental awareness. These empirically based facts will be reflected, analysed and put into the context with the environmental citizenship concepts. At the end we are going to present the results of the Eurobarometer surveys focused on the relationship of the EU citizens to environment and their environmental awareness and evaluate the current state in this area. The main findings have shown that environmental awareness of European citizens is raising, but it still does not have the appropriate level. This can have highly negative impact on the environment in this era of environmental crises and deepening environmental problems. Therefore, it is necessary to make serious steps to improve current situation, as environmental awareness is the precondition to achieve the change, which has to start from each individual.
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The fluvial anthropospheres cover the river and its floodplains. They arise due to modifying or replacing natural processes with human-dominated ones. Fluvial anthropospheres are the legacy of past human activity. The article determines the beginning of the formation of fluvial anthropospheres in the Skawa catchment and the conditions of its functioning. The effects of anthropopressure were researched using a comparative analysis of maps from the 19th - 21st centuries. The impact on the natural environment was assessed on the basis of written sources and literature. Indirect causes of interference with the environment have changed over time, ranging from milling and rafting to water retention for municipal purposes. On the other hand, the immediate causes resulted from socio-economic and political changes. Technological progress and demographic development were responsible for the development of the milling industry. Periods of stagnation or regression have been caused by natural disasters and wars. Navigation development plans were part of the Habsburg imperial policy. The pro-industrial policy of the 1980s dictated the construction of the retention reservoir. Therefore, the directions of development of the fluvial anthropospheres can be treated as a result of national and international politics.
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Wadowice współcześnie nie są kojarzone w żaden sposób z węglem. Z tego powodu prezentowana od czerwca do października 2023 r. wystawa mogła być uznana za nieco egzotyczną. W rzeczywistości jednak zaledwie 5 km na północ od miasta znajdują się udokumentowane złoża węgla kamiennego Górnośląskiego Zagłębia Węglowego, a do najbliższej czynnej kopalni tego surowca jest zaledwie 20 km. W rzeczywistości, jeśli spojrzymy na węgiel w znaczeniu pierwiastkowym, to okazuje się, że jest znacznie bliżej. Związki zawierające węgiel są podstawą życia na Ziemi, a cykl węglowo-azotowo-tlenowy dostarcza część energii wytwarzanej przez Słońce i inne gwiazdy. Ilość węgla w przyrodzie jest stała. Mówiąc kolokwialnie, oznacza to, że każda osoba „ma w sobie węgiel”, który pochodzi z recyklingu.
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This article is of a theoretical nature and concerns social movements working for environmental protection, described here from a sociological perspective. Environmental movements are gaining popularity, and their division and types are presented using two classifications proposed by: 1) the sociologist M. Castells and 2) the socio-environmental organization Earth5R. The choice of the topic was dictated by the fact that, in the face of the deteriorating state of the world’s environment, environmental movements contribute to the development of environmental awareness among other members of society. Their message reaches a wide audience.
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Krakatau (Krakatoa) je nenaseljeni vulkanski otok u Sundskom prolazu, između otoka Jave i Sumatre u Indoneziji u pokrajini Lampung. Otok je površine 10,5 km2 . Najviša nadmorska visina je 813 metara. Sundski tjesnac povezuje Javansko more s Indijskim oceanom. Njegova je širina od 26 do 110 kilometara. Djelovanje i tutnjava iz unutrašnjosti otoka Krakataua čula se u svibnju 1883. godine. Posade brodova i čamaca, koji su plovili u njezinoj blizini, vidjeli su oblake dima i čuli zaglušujuću buku. Pomorci su javljali svojim prepostavljenim na kop nu da slušaju svkodenevnu tutnjavu s otoka i da se nešto loše sprema. M nogima su pucali bunjići u ušima, a pepeo, koji je padao na brodove, morali su svakodnevno skidati. I taj 27. kolovoza 1883. godine, pamtit će cijeloga života. Nešto prije podneva dogodila se eksplozija koja je razorila cijeli otok Krakatau.
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The paper presents the results of dendrochronological dating of wood fragments from a well frame discovered in Wysoka. Oak wood for the well frame was obtained from trees harvested in the first half of the 14th century. The presence of sapwood in one of the samples permits the conclusion that the well was built in the 1430s. The dendrochronological analysis and visual assessment of the wood fragments show that wood from two oak trunks was used.
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The current planetary crisis and the changes in the Spanish curriculum of Early Childhood Education require teacher training that enables future teachers to respond to these situations. This paper describes a constructivist teaching-learning sequence framed within the University Ecological Garden through an enquiry-based strategy. This educational intervention was carried out with thirdyear students of the degree in Early Childhood Education at the Universidad de Cádiz (Spain). Its outcome was a science dissemination event in which research workshops related to one or several sustainable development goals were organised. The validity of using real contexts like the garden space to achieve sustainability in the curriculum and of contributing to the scientific training of future teachers for them to be able to transfer educational interventions within the framework of sustainability was verified. Future proposals for improvement for a second implementation in the classroom were analysed.
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The intensive use of non-renewable production resources and the associated growing environmental pollution forces us to look for new methods of halting these negative trends. Circular economy is one such method. This phenomenon is the subject of numerous studies attempting to assess its condition at both the micro and macro levels, the implementation of circular economy strategies, its environmental impact, the context of waste generation, etc. On the other hand, little attention is paid to assessing its efficiency. Technological efficiency, i.e., the relationship between material footprint and waste generation, is of particular importance, since the amount of waste generated primarily depends on the technology used at the time of production. Thus, this paper aims to analyse and assess the development of technological efficiency over a certain period of time. Further, it is necessary not only to build on the results of development at the end of this period, but also to assess the extent of the changes that have taken place during it in order to reflect the actual state of affairs. Thus, the final result takes into account both the intensity of the development of technological efficiency and the importance of its current state to the overall development process.
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Education institutions are thought to be largely responsible for environmental pollution even though businesses of all shapes and sizes contribute to this issue. This research explores how important factors might help government universities in Jordan develop and implement green innovation. It seeks also to examine whether the academic citizenship behaviour is a mediating variable that explains the connection between green training and development, green recruitment and selection, and organization environmental performance. Accordingly, an email survey was conducted to collect responses from 404 employees in the Jordanian Government universities. The study used contemporary variance-based structural equation modelling (Amos-SEM) for data analysis and hypothesis testing. The obtained results indicated a positive association between green training and development and two variables, namely academic citizenship behaviour, and organization environmental performance. They also indicated a positive association between green recruitment and selection and two variables, namely, academic citizenship behaviour and organization environmental performance. As well as between academic citizenship behaviour and organization environmental performance. Furthermore, they showed mediating effects of academic citizenship behaviour in the relationship between green training and development and organization environmental performance and between green recruitment and selection and organization environmental performance. This paper helps to provide insights to HRM practitioners, shedding light on the importance of Green HRM practices and their role in enhancing organization environmental performance.
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