In the early 1990s, the United Nations (UN) recognized water as a finite resource to the entire ecosystem with an economic value that should be developed and managed based on the participatory approach using the Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM) strategy. Many studies on water management practices have thus emerged in the developing world. Of particular interest to this work is the management of water through metering, price-setting, and rule enforcement in the rural setting in piped, community-owned water systems. There is very little published information regarding metering, enforcement experiments, and experiences in these systems. This is because metering and enforcement mechanisms are not typically included in rural piped community-managed water supply system design and water committee training schemes. Along with an increase in population growth and changing climate patterns, there is a burgeoning interest to manage demand and reduce non-revenue water (NRW) in urban utilities in developing countries. Metering is often the demand management tool considered because it has been reported to increase customer payment rates as well as social equity. Rural, community-managed systems often suffer high failure rates due to the lack of preventative maintenance, which maybe closely linked to customer dissatisfaction and non-payment of tariffs. The inclusion of a metering and enforcement program to such systems may help to address the problem of high rates of premature failure. An inclusion of a metering program for rural community-managed water supply systems is a non-trivial task in terms of cost as well as the system designer’s time, thus there is significant interest in ensuring such a program’s success. Many field workers may have familiarity with water system design but not specifically in the area of water flow metering and currently no beginner-level resources are publicly available. This work is ultimately intended to facilitate the inclusion of metering into rural, piped, community-managed water supply systems through: 1) compilation of technical information regarding metering which would be accessible to field practitioners and relevant to the rural community-managed setting, 2) a proposed decision-making tool to facilitate the selection of the most appropriate meter for the community, 3) proposed installation tips, and 4) suggested strategies for including metering into the community-management model. Objectives 1, 3, and 4 were pursued via review of industry, peer-reviewed, and field literature along with the author’s personal experience. Multiple criteria decision analysis (MCDA) was the method proposed for aiding in the selection of the most appropriate meter type. It was determined that four types of meters are used for residential metering in developed and developing urban utility-managed systems: the nutating disc, oscillating piston, multi-jet, and single-jet. The nutating disc and oscillating piston meters operate through a volumetric or displacement mechanism, while the single- and multi-jet meters function through a velocity or non-displacement mechanism. While a lot of variation between models of meters exists, there are fewer characteristics that can be used to differentiate between mechanisms. After applying the multiple-criteria decision analysis to aid in the selection of the most appropriate meter for a rural, community-managed systems, the nutating disc and oscillating piston types of meters were most preferred under the set of criteria chosen by the author for the purpose of example in this analysis. It is recommended that meter selection be performed on a site-specific basis with local stakeholder involvement for criteria determination. Meter installation is similar for all four types of meters and whichever type of meter is chosen, it should be protected from tampering. Increasing-block pricing is recommended to accompany metering in order to motivate water conservation. The size and price of the initial block of water should be determined according to the system’s operation and maintenance costs as well as users’ willingness to pay information. Field practitioners should prepare the community to take over the metering program by providing basic training to the users and selected meter readers/technicians.

The year 2015 is a big milestone in the history of United Nations development projects. The Millennium Development Goals, which were agreed on by United Nations member states in 2000, are followed by the Sustainable Development Goals. This thesis, using development projects of the United Nations and more specifically the indicator of extreme poverty, analyses the Chinese economy and discusses it´s persistent negative factors affecting progress towards sustainable development. The thesis is divided into four chapters. The first part focuses on the historical background of the adoption of the Millennium Development Goals. The second chapter then in particular studies extreme poverty, which is the fundamental component of the first target of the Millennium Development Goals. The third chapter provides an analysis of four thematic areas of the Chinese economy, which negatively affect economic development and which should become a government priority when speaking of further reduction of extreme poverty. The last part builds on the previous findings and presents specific sub-areas of the Sustainable Development Goals that address the defined problematics.

The aim of the project was to make a detailed risk assessment using Swedish guidelines for a factory site in Kodaikanal, South India, and a nearby village called Vellagavi. The study areas were chosen due to previous records of mercury contamination on the factory site and a possible spread to Vellagavi. A comparison between Indian and Swedish guidelines for risk assessment of contaminated areas was performed. The purposes of comparing the two systems were to locate if there were any differences in the legislation, or guidelines, and to find ways of improving the processes. The project also included an evaluation of possible remedial actions that could reverse or prevent environmental damage that might be caused by the former factory. Methods used for the project were literature studies, semi-structured interviews and surveys. The results from the risk assessment were that the Swedish Computer Program for Calculation of Guideline Values (CPCGV), with some adjustments, could be used in order to calculate site specific guideline values for mercury concentrations on sites similar to Swedish conditions, such as climate. The site specific guideline values in soil rangedfrom 0.1-2.4 mg/kg. An Indian court decision had stated that a guideline value of 20 mg/kg should be used for remediation at the factory site. The result from the forward dose calculation showed that when a soil contains 20 mg/kg,the tolerable daily intake of mercury would be exceeded, and therefore pose a risk to human health. The comparison of legislation systems between India and Sweden showed several differences. India did not have any legislation relating directly to polluted soil. Risk assessments in India commonly relied on several different international standards even though the standards were not regulated by law. The results from the remedial evaluation showed that there were several possible remediation methods that could beused on the factory site. Limited remedial actions were suggested for Vellagavi since there were no measurements taken on site. Preferably, remediation should take place at the source of the contamination, i.e. the factory site. / Det övergripande målet med projektet var att genomföra en detaljerad riskbedömning för en fabriksplats i Kodaikanal, södra Indien, samt för en närliggande by, Vellagavi. Tidigare genomförda mätningar uppvisade förhöjda halter av kvicksilver i området, varför det ansågs vara ett lämpligt område för studien. Studien innehöll en jämförelse av riktlinjer för riskbedömningar för förorenad mark mellan Indien och Sverige där syftet var att identifiera skillnader i lagstiftning och riktlinjer samt lokalisera eventuella förbättringsmöjligheter. Studien innefattades även av en åtgärdsutredning för fabriksplatsen och Vellagavi, vars syfte var att utreda vilka åtgärder som skulle kunna minska risken för fortsatt miljöförstöring eller återställa området. Metoderna som användes i studien var litteraturstudier, semi-strukturerade intervjuer och en enkätundersökning. Resultatet från riskbedömningen visade att beräkningsverktyget för platsspecifika riktvärden från Naturvårdsverket kunde användas på platser som liknar Sverige klimatmässigt, efter att diverse justeringar hade gjorts. Beräkningsverktyget användes för att ta fram ett platsspecifikt gränsvärde för kvicksilverkoncentrationen i marken. Det framtagna platsspecifika gränsvärdet för koncentrationen kvicksilver i jord varierade mellan 0,1-2,4 mg/kg. Ett beslut utfärdat av indisk domstol angav att fabriksplatsen skulle saneras så att kvicksilverkoncentationen i marken inte skulle överskrida 20 mg/kg. Resultatet från den här studien visade att den nivån av förorening i marken skulle innebära att det tolerabla dagliga intaget av kvicksilver skulle överskridas. En jämförelse av de juridiska systemen som anknöt till förorenad jord i Indien respektive Sverige visade på flertalet skillnader mellan länderna. Indien hade ingen lagstiftning som speficikt reglerade förorenad jord medan det i Sverige reglerades av Miljöbalken. Riskbedömningar i Indien baserades ofta på internationella standarder, med det fanns ingen lagstifting som reglerade vilka standarder som skulle användas. Resultatet från åtgärdsutredningen var att det fanns flera olika åtgärdsmetoder som skulle kunna användas för att sanera fabriksplatsen. Åtgärdsutredningen för Vellagavi var begränsad eftersom det inte fanns tillräckligt mycket mätdata för området. Företrädesvis bör saneringsåtgärderna vidtas vid föroreningskällan, vilket i detta fall är fabriksplatsen.

The master thesis focuses on the process of implementation of global strategies to the national policy of the Czech Republic. The thesis is a case study. Its subject is global strategy the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Czech strategic framework Czech Republic 2030. The first part of the thesis presents current knowledge of the sustainable development and dealing with global strategies in this field in the Czech Republic. The theoretical background of the own research is a theory of politics network and a theory of global governance. The aim of the thesis is not only to describe and explain the process of implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development to the Czech national policy, but also to define roles of groups of actors and to evaluate the participatory approach which was newly chosen for the Czech Republic 2030. The second part of the thesis is focused on the own research which was based on the analysis of relevant documents and semi-structured interviews with eleven experts (representatives of the Public administration, private sector, trade union, academic community and NGOs). One of the main contributions of this thesis is a comparison of the process of creating the Czech strategic framework for sustainable development from 2010 and the new system that was...

The world is jeopardized by several social and environmental threats. The limited resources are being used at a rapid rate which contributes to negative effects on global warming. Along with increased poverty, human rights are being violated and labor is exploited. Therefore, sustainability is perhaps a more urgent topic than ever. CSV is proposed as an answer to these environmental and social threats, which is identified by a gap in the concept of CSR. Sweden is a leading country in terms of sustainability, and therefore the purpose is to gain knowledge on how Swedish companies work with shared value creation in their sustainable practices. This study follows an interpretive philosophy through a qualitative study, and semi-structured interviews are conducted with six companies. The empirical data is analyzed through coding where four themes are evolved. This study develops existing concepts through an inductive approach and further proposes that the companies pursue CSV by the mediating role of CSR. Sustainable innovation, innovative raw materials, and digitalization are the major contributors to shared value creation. Sustainable development goals and science-based targets are essential tools to guide companies toward a sustainable future. However, two barriers to pursuing shared value creating activities are being a small company and adapting to the local context.

In 2015, the United Nations (UN) put forward 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to beachieved by 2030. Each member state should spare no effort to fulfill the goals for better lives. Thefirst objective of this study was to explore how Big Data could be used to monitor the progress,including the opportunities and challenges that such novel technologies brought. Previous studieswere reviewed critically for the first objective. The second objective was to find out what datainfrastructures were helpful in monitoring the achievement of SDG 7. A systematic mapping studywas performed to accomplish the second objective. 53 SDG-related academic papers were obtained.Their research data and where they were sourced from were manually analyzed and categorized togenerate data infrastructures for SDG 7. Besides, the automated qualitative coding was conductedbased on the manual structure to verify the manually identified data infrastructures and comparetheir frequencies in the selected papers. The methodology of combining manual and automatedqualitative analysis proposed in this study helped find a list of SDG 7 related data infrastructures.Although there were differences between the manual and automated results, the World Bank, UNdatabases, Eurostat, and IEA were considered the most frequently referred data sources; electricitydata and satellite imagery were regarded as the most commonly used data types.

This research was a minor field study that took place during eight weeks in Kathmandu, Nepal, with a research focus on the country’s dyeing industry. Methods like qualitative interviews, observation, and analyses through the connections to the UN’s sustainable development goals was used to meet the research aim and objectives. The objectives of the research were to clarify what areas that are slowing down and what areas are creating opportunities for sustainable development within the industry. To identify these areas could be one part of knowing how and where change has to be made to achieve a more sustainable dyeing industry in Nepal. There are mainly three different ways to work with dyeing in Nepal; AZO dyeing, AZO free dyeing, and natural dyeing. Each technique comes with different issues and benefits connected to them, some on a more socio-economic level and some health-related. The established industry is more or less a lawless industry, with an absence of knowledge about the connected environmental and health effects. Due to a rough history of poverty and natural disasters, the industry is until today neglected and the issues connected has not been prioritised.  Today the industry is driven by the market and at the same time anchored by governmental corruption and outdated methods, which makes it hard for the industry to build its value and to develop sustainably. This sector is connected to the UN’s sustainable development goals 4,6,9 &amp; 12 and their targets. However, today the industry awareness about the goals are low, and the lack of defined action in the government's plan for implementing the sustainable development goals states that they will not be a driving force towards a more sustainable dyeing industry. Awareness and customer demand is what is expected to move the industry towards a more sustainable future, according to the interviews. Nepal's dying industry does not have the bad reputation that other countries nearby have, which opens up for opportunities. But for the industry to be able to handle this opportunity, more accurate and a more in-depth research has to be made, to more clearly appreciate what the industry looks like today, since it is missing data. It would also mean that the government has to acknowledge the situation and clean up its act to make it easier for businesses to grow in a sustainable way. / <p>2018-06-08</p>

The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by all United Nations Member States in 2015 and consists of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Sustainable development was adopted in 2003 as an overall objective of Swedish government policy. This study focuses more closely on gender-equal parenting as an aspect of social sustainability. According to the Swedish government’s national policy on gender equality, the work of family centers must be characterized by a gender equality perspective as a step towards creating social sustainability. However, several studies show that female dominance in family centers, together with traditional norms linked to parenthood, entails a challenge related to the pursuit of equal parenthood. For example, fathers tend to feel excluded and not welcome in the center. Hence, this study especially aims to find out how family centers and their professionals work to create conditions for including fathers in their activities and thereby stimulate equal parenting. The study used a qualitative method with semi-structured interviews with a total of six interviewees at two family centers. The result shows that the personnel at the family centers are working for social sustainability diligently, in this case, gender-equal parenting. Still, the execution of the work varies between professionals and family centers. Therefore, it is safe to say that a national effort is needed to create greater equality in family centers' approach to gender-equal parenting.

The study seeks to explore the assigned role of culture in the discourse of sustainable development. It combines a conceptual-historical analysis of the concept of cultural sustainability and sustainable development with an analysis of ideas with cultural policy models as a theoretical tool as ideal types. It addresses cultural sustainability as an essentially contested concept, maps a context of leading contributions to the meaning and conceptual history of cultural sustainability and sustainable development and applicates Fornäs four cultural concepts to address different meanings of cultural sustainability. The concept is then explored in its absence in A New European Agenda for Culture by the European Commission. The study also explores how the agenda is implemented in projects throughout the Swedish participation in the Creative Europe program and how it effects the meaning of cultural sustainability. The role of culture in A New European Agenda for Culture seems to be an instrumental view of the capacity culture possesses in bringing people together and to bring creativity into businesses, which also is represented in Creative Europe. The instrumental view of culture and the esthetic cultural concept that permeate cultural policy, may influence the ability for cultural sustainability to be accepted as the fourth pillar of sustainability.

[pt] A degradação de paisagens em diferentes escalas espaciais e temporais têm ameaçado a vida humana e não humana na Terra. O conceito dos serviços ecossistêmicos (SE) surge para contribuir na transformação desse cenário, buscando promover a gestão sustentável de paisagens. Diversas estruturas conceituais sobre os SE foram desenvolvidas nos últimos anos. Contudo, a definição de serviços do solo foi pouco discutida, bem como o reconhecimento do amplo papel desse recurso na prestação de serviços essenciais à vida humana. A apropriação deste conceito é ainda menos frequente em pesquisas nos países da região tropical, devido ao baixo número de estudos, projetos e iniciativas dedicadas ao tema, quando comparados com a região temperada. Essa situação coloca importantes domínios biogeográficos, como a Mata Atlântica, em maiores dificuldades de transformar o atual cenário de degradação e recuperar sua biodiversidade. Nesse contexto, este estudo busca aprofundar a discussão sobre o papel dos solos como provedores de SE, com foco na região tropical, além de aplicar métodos de avaliação de tais serviços em uma área de restauração ecológica na região da Mata Atlântica Brasileira. Para isso, se avaliou e discutiu como os solos foram relatados e percebidos ao longo do tempo, sua relação com o conceito de paisagem e como são vistos nas estruturas de SE. Ainda, este trabalho esclarece e diferencia o conceito de SE do solo de outros conceitos associados, tais como, propriedade, processo e função do solo, e também a sua relação com os Objetivos para o Desenvolvimento Sustentável. Em seguida, realizou-se uma revisão sistemática para avaliar o estado da arte dos SE do solo em regiões tropicais. Por fim, avaliou-se o efeito de diferentes técnicas no plantio de mudas para a recuperação ambiental e sua consequente influência na qualidade do solo e provisão do serviço de estoque de carbono, em uma região tropical brasileira dentro do domínio Mata Atlântica. Além disso, o SE de estoque de carbono foi valorado. Uma estrutura conceitual atualizada foi desenvolvida, sintetizando os SE do solo e sua relação com os Objetivos para o Desenvolvimento Sustentável, útil à academia e aos tomadores de decisão. Além disso, os resultados demonstraram baixo número de publicações e uma grande lacuna de conhecimento referente às abordagens de SE do solo na região tropical. Com relação às técnicas de plantio analisadas, observou-se que mesmo com a baixa sobrevivência das plântulas, o manejo com o plantio das mudas apresentou efeito positivo para a qualidade do solo, ao longo de quatros anos. Essas mudanças podem gerar benefícios ambientais e econômicos aos proprietários, considerando o fortalecimento de um mercado de carbono no país. Este trabalho preenche algumas lacunas de conhecimento relacionadas à temática dos SE do solo na região tropical e oferece informações úteis para a gestão sustentável de paisagens. / [en] Landscapes degradation at different spatial and temporal scales have threatened human and non-human life on Earth. The Ecosystem Services (ES) concept and framework appears to contribute to the transformation of this scenario, seeking to promote the sustainable management of landscapes. Several conceptual frameworks on ES have been developed in recent years. However, the definition of soil services was little discussed and the recognition of the broad role of this resource in the provision of essential services to human life. The appropriation of this concept is even less frequent in research in the countries of the tropical region due to the low number of studies, projects and initiatives dedicated to the theme compared to the temperate region. This situation places important biogeographic domains, such as the Atlantic Forest, in greater difficulties in transforming the current degradation scenario and recovering its biodiversity. In this context, this study seeks to deepen the discussion on the role of soils as providers of ES, focusing on the tropical region and applying methods of evaluation of such services in an ecological restoration area in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest region. We evaluated and discussed how soils were reported and perceived over time, their relationship with the concept of landscape and how they are seen in ES structures. Furthermore, this work clarifies and differentiates the concept of soil ES from other associated concepts, such as soil property, process and function, and its relationship with the Sustainable Development Goals. Then, a systematic review was carried out to assess the state of the art of of soil ES in tropical regions. Finally, the effect of different techniques in planting seedlings for environmental recovery and their consequent influence on soil quality and provision of carbon stock service in a Brazilian tropical region within the Atlantic Forest domain was evaluated. In addition, the valuation of the carbon stock service was done. An updated conceptual framework was developed, synthesizing the soil ES and their relationship with the Sustainable Development Goals, useful to academia and decision-makers. In addition, the results showed a low number of publications and a large knowledge gap regarding soil ES approaches in the tropical region. Regarding the planting techniques analyzed, it was observed that even with the low survival of the seedlings, the management with the planting of seedlings had a positive effect on soil quality over four years. These changes can generate environmental and economic benefits for the owners, considering strengthening a carbon market in the country. This work fills in some knowledge gaps related to the soil ES theme in the tropical region and offers helpful information for the sustainable management of landscapes.