Abstract This research aimed to apply the theory of environmental benefits valuation to assess the plan of reformation in Tanbian village¡¦s wetland. Environmental change affects economy. Therefore, through people¡¦s feedback and tourists¡¦ participation of ecotourism, this paper discussed the economic benefits in transforming Tanbian village¡¦s wetland into an eco-garden. Thus, the research adopted the Payment-card method of the Contingent Valuation Method (CVM), categorized under the Non-market Valuation Techniques (NVT), analyzing the economic benefits of eco-tourism¡¦s virtual market at Tanbian village. That is, the amount of people¡¦s Willingness to Pay (WTP) was analyzed to discover the project¡¦s multiple values. Further more, by comparing and contrasting people¡¦s background information, people¡¦s data and differences among other facets were discovered. Finally, in responding to the urgent need in tourism development, this paper integrated tourists and residents¡¦ data to discover the amount of WTP. Such research mode provided a tourism benefits assessment of Tanbian village¡¦s eco-garden project, and its conclusion supplied some suggestions to government control and also future plans of the eco-garden. There are 239 respondents (including 122 residents and 117 tourists) willing to take the questionnaire survey assuming the correspondence among people¡¦s background information (resident or tourist), attitude and other variables and WTP. After analysis, the result demonstrates that sex and age have little effect on many variables. On the other hand, people¡¦s background (resident or tourist), education level, average income do have obvious influence. However, the both results are valid, showing the principle this research applied is reliable. The CVM results included: 1. Up to 91.4% People shows positive attitude toward the ten facets of Tanbian eco-garden tour. 2. The average accommodation rates for visitors willing to pay for Tanbian eco-tour is 1,100 NT dollars. And each year, 250NT dollars donation per person can be expected. 3. The average amount of willingness to pay for people to join in an eco-tour is: 118.2NT dollars for eco-tour; 105.5NT dollars for fishing village experience; 60.8NT dollars for farm life experience, 284NT dollars in total. 4. The potential tourism benefits of Tanbian eco-garden are about: 22,098,000NT/year for tourists and 4,236,000NT/year for residents, that is, 26,334,000NT dollars in sum. 5. The eco-garden is around 20 hectares. And the average annual economic benefits per hectare of the wetland were 1,316,000 NT dollars. The estimated benefits were more than the expected value of 250,000NT dollars that the landowners can gain from the wetland today. Therefore, it is feasible to develop ecotourism at this area. In the end, this research hoped to tribute some advices to Tanbian eco-garden¡¦s management, turning ecological resources into financial sources, for Penghu County to be an ecotourism paradise. Keywords: wetland, eco-garden, ecotourism, benefits assessment, Contingent Valuation Method

The Port of Kaohsiung is the biggest port of Taiwan. Because South Taiwan is full of industries, the port of Kaohsiung ranked world number three. And as the production industry moved to Mainland China, the port of Kaohsiung regressed to the sixth container harbor in the world in 2008. The president, Ma Ying-jeou, elected in 2008, proposed that the port of Kaohsiung would become Eco-port in the future. There are many migratory birds visiting the port of Kaohsiung every April and May. This research referred to the development module in other countries¡¦ eco-ports, and tried to do the feasibility study on the development of Eco-port Kaohsiung. The method includes documents study, expert interview, sites investigate and sum up. This research hopes to let the port of Kaohsiung become the first Eco-port of Taiwan. And let the human development and ecosystem conservation coexists, reach the win-win situation.

The sea transport is a foundation of world¡¦s development that has driven the development of industrialization at the surrounding area of the port. However, the excessive use and development have caused the port environments of a lot of countries to face the awkward situation of great pollution. The harbor of Kaohsiung is one of Taiwan¡¦s large international commercial ports, while becoming Asian-Pacific Operation Centre, but it is facing the challenge for being a port in achieving the sustainable industrialization as well as a clean environmental harbor city. The present research is initiated to collect the data information of international major ports on their organization related to environmental protection measures in achieving their targets to develop the Green port and Eco-port. These consists of the methodology development and strategy on fulfilling the green policy of the environmental obligation and building the goal of sustainable environment to reduce the impact of environment, life and ecology owning to the development of port. The case studies include long beach and Los Angeles of USA, Hong Kong, Amsterdam and Rotterdam of Holland, Yokohama and Osaka of Japan, Tianjin of China. Our objective is to summing up and analyzing these case studies for suggestions that can provide the direction to Kaohsiung plan to become a Green port and Eco-port. Comparing to Marine Environmental Protection Committee (MEPC) guidelines on demanding the continuously decrease of the sulfurous content of fuels to prevent port environment from more pollution, Taiwan government is lack of stipulating policies about the environmental measures for the port, but blindly pursuing economic growth and unlimitedly to enlarge the ships. These cause the deterioration of environment to an irreversible situation. For the long-term development of the harbor, Taiwan government should take advantage of IT to improve the service-quality, integrate the harbor and regenerate the river bank for achieving the goal of coexistence between development and conservation in order to reform the port of Kaohsiung to be the first Green Harbor in Taiwan.

This thesis argues that an effective way to curb the significant problem of environmental degradation in Nigeria‘s Niger Delta region and preserve its environment for posterity is by changing the ethic underlying environmental protection laws in Nigeria to a less anthropocentric one. The wanton degradation has several causes including an overly anthropocentric view of law, life and the natural world. The Nigerian environmental legal order is flawed in the following ways: non-justiciability of Constitutional provisions on environmental matters; insufficient deterrence of some sanctions or inadequate enforcement of others; inadequate compensation; insufficient use of injunctive relief; and difficulty of victims of environmental degradation in the region to be availed by relevant foreign regimes due to lack of financial resources, ignorance, poor education, insufficiency of legal and scientific resources and inadequate action by Government law officers. The thesis explores some improvements that have been suggested in existing literature which should be adopted to make the extant system work better. It however argues that the impact of such reforms would be enhanced if the ethic underlying the Nigerian environmental protection laws is changed to a less anthropocentric one; and one way of doing so is to constitutionalize nature‘s right to exist for posterity. This right will be enforceable by individuals, Non-Governmental Organisations and Environmental Protection Agencies, any or all of whom will act as a ‘guardian’ for nature in a specialist environmental court. This is the ‘new’ contribution of this thesis as regards Nigeria. This proposal will however not be a ‘magic bullet’ but can help promote social change so long as there is genuine involvement of all categories of stakeholders - government and non-governmental institutions, communities and private sector organizations.

Roundup is a commonly used pesticide applied to agriculture and forest habitats. In Canada and parts of the North Eastern United States, these areas are generally optimal for amphibians due to the presence of small, ephemeral water bodies. While Roundup has been shown to have no adverse effects on a number of species, amphibians are one of the few groups who show high sensitivity to Roundup. My research aims to determine how an acute sub-lethal dose of Roundup affects several different facets of larvae development in wood frogs (Lithobates sylvaticus). In Chapter 2 I examined the effect of Roundup on amphibian development. Groups of tadpoles were treated with Roundup (0.5 mg a.e./L) for four days at three different times in their development (Gosner stage 26, 31-32 and 37-38), while a control group was maintained in similar conditions without Roundup. Pictures were taken every four days until tadpoles reached metamorphosis. Changes in development, body area or length were assessed, along with metamorphic endpoints, such as timing of metamorphosis and weight. Although there was no differential effect of Roundup on tadpole growth or weight, there was a slight, non-ecologically relevant, delay in development in tadpoles treated with Roundup at stage 26. The delay was not detectable in the second half of the experiment, indicating that compensatory mechanisms allowed those individuals to recover. Neither time to metamorphosis or weight at metamorphosis were affected by an environmentally relevant exposure to Roundup. In Chapter 3 I focused on the effect of Roundup on crucial behaviours related to the ability of larval amphibians to detect and avoid predation threats. I demonstrated that being exposed to Roundup for one hour eliminated the response of larval wood frogs to cues from injured conspecifics (i.e. cues known to elicit dramatic anti-predator responses in a wide variety of aquatic species). Tadpoles that were maintained in clean water and exposed to a combination of injured conspecific cues and Roundup, did not exhibit a decrease in movement, when compared to control tadpoles. This result indicates that Roundup deactivates the alarm function of the injured conspecific cues. However, it is possible that both the cues and the animal would be affected by Roundup. In Chapter 3 I also demonstrated that tadpoles that were exposed to Roundup as embryos had reduced basal movement rates. The results of this thesis illustrate that an environmentally relevant concentration of Roundup (0.5 mg a.e./L), does not negatively affect the development of tadpoles. The studies outlined in this thesis suggest that at this exposure concentration, behaviour acts as a more sensitive endpoint, than more traditional morphologic endpoints.

Recently, one of the more significant measures on the part of the Cuban government to enhance resiliency of the existing economy was the announcement of a series of economic and social policy proposals referred to as lineamientos. These emphasize the importance of achieving long-term solutions for sustainable development, including, among other things, a need to improve food and energy self-sufficiency for the country. This research explores the possibility that an eco-industrial development approach could support these goals with a focus in the agricultural and agro-industrial sectors. Two concepts were applied to this intended new paradigm; namely integrated food and energy systems (IFES) and industrial symbiosis (IS). Three municipalities of the eastern province of Santiago de Cuba provided the regional basis for the research and were explored using an asset mapping approach to identify key facilities, material inputs, outputs and flows, infrastructure, and skills sets. Consultations with various stakeholder groups were conducted to gain insight in the current relationships and existing operational conditions that could inform the types of barriers and opportunities related to undertaking exchange and collaborative activities. The findings show that residues and by-products flows from various agricultural and agro-industrial operations can provide the basis for symbiotic networks that enable the generation of energy and added -value products of use to the region. The symbiotic linkages among agricultural and agro-industrial actors can give rise to an integrated food and energy production network (IFEPN) in the region where existing agricultural cooperatives, along with other emerging forms of social enterprise can support the development of this network. Considered a vital approach to solve problems in Cuba, collaboration is their most valuable asset for the successful development of the network.

No description available.

Under the background of worldwide transition towards sustainability, Chinese government has begun to advocate nationwide sustainable-industrialization through initiating Eco-industrial Parks (EIPs) since last decade. While EIP projects are widely carried out by both central and local governments, the standards for EIP planning and management promulgated in China are considered to be inefficient and incomprehensive in this study. Due to the challenge of economy-environment conflict China confronts and the consequent narrow definition of China's EIPs which focuses mainly on environmental performance, a main limitation of the standards is the unbalanced considerations between the three basic foundations of sustainable development (SD) concept - economic growth, social development, and environmental protection and restoration. By reviewing several leading assessment tools being used internationally, as well as analyzing the specific issues existing during industrial development in China, this research intends to develop a synthetic and advanced indicator system, to evaluate China’s EIP performance. This system comprises 34 indicators that integrate four broad aspects of 'economic development', 'social development', 'environmental management', and 'administration'. For each indicator, detailed measurement and criterion are proposed for evaluation and implementation. Additionally, a case study of Tianjin Economic and Technological Development Area (TEDA), a certificated EIP, is conducted to illustrate the application of this assessment system. The proposed indicator system is supposed to fill in the gap in EIP performance evaluation in China, from a view of the internationally perceived understandings of EIP and SD concepts. Although future studies are still needed to test and improve its feasibility and accuracy in terms of both indicator selection and criteria setting, this system provides a generic framework for EIP assessment work in China and is expected to drive China's EIP movement towards a more sustainable approach.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Oregon, 1999. / Typescript. Includes vita and abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 141-147). Also available for download via the World Wide Web; free to University of Oregon users. Address: http://wwwlib.umi.com/cr/uoregon/fullcit?p9948020.

The entire thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file; a non-technical public abstract appears in the public.pdf file. Title from PDF of title page (University of Missouri--Columbia, viewed on November 18, 2009). Thesis advisor: Dr. Glenn Leshner Includes bibliographical references.