1,721,516 research outputs found
How national forest funds can support small-scale forest businesses to deliver ecosystem services
No full textNational Forest Funds (NFFs) represent an increasingly relevant funding source for the forest sector at the global level. With the increasing role of NFFs, their structures and operational procedures are becoming more complex and diversified. While many of these funds are State-driven and often support projects that include public goods with a focus on social and environmental benefits, some also support privately managed small-scale “for profit” businesses related to wood and non-wood forest-based value chains. This paper describes some the recent developments of NFFs and presents the results of a research effort that analyzed how NFFs' funding targeting small-scale forest enterprises can contribute to the provision of forest ecosystem services. For this analysis, five case studies from Costa Rica, Guatemala, Luxembourg, Portugal, and Tanzania have been selected. In specific, the Forest Financing Fund (FONAFIFO), the FONABOSQUE, the Forest and Climate Change Fund (FCCF) of Luxembourg, the Floresta Atlantica Fund, and the Tanzania Forest Fund (TaFF) are reviewed. The research addressed several key research questions, including: How are NFFs operations conceived to support small-scale forest businesses? What type of funding windows are targeting small-scale enterprises? What are the current practices of NFFs supporting ES provision through small-scale forest businesses? How could NFFs further support small-scale enterprises while unleashing contributions to the provision of ES?
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
From constrain to opportunity: win-win public-private partnership for financing sustainable poplar plantations and biodiversity conservation in Lombardy (northern Italy)
Full text linkFinancing the creation and maintenance of biodiversity conservation areas is a major challenge in times of constraints in public spending. In this context, Payment for Ecosystem Services are considered innovative and effective market approaches to conservation finance. We analyzed the objectives, the contents of the negotiated agreement, and the main outcomes of a Payment for Biodiversity Conservation Scheme (ECOPAY Connect) in the Lombardy Region in northern Italy, which brings together Regional Park authorities, timber industry, and private poplar growers as partners involved in complying with the requirements connected to an FSC® (Forest Stewardship Council) certification initiative. This scheme represents a win-win solution and transforms a certification compliance requirement, i.e. the set-aside of the 10% of the productive area for ecological restoration, into an opportunity, where a public-private partnership led to reduction of costs for both partners, and more functional restoration interventions within the park. The scheme now runs by its own, making ECOPAY Connect one of the few functioning PES schemes in Italy and in EU. The scheme was launched with a grant from the Bank Foundation and this partnership is now used as a best practice in many EU projects such as Gestire 2020, an integrated LIFE project by Lombardy Region, and Sincere, a Horizon 2020 project
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
A low-cost workstation for the MRI laboratory:applications to time domain data processing and to parametric imaging
No full textA low-cost workstation for the MRI laboratory:applications to time domain data processing and to parametric imagin
A PC-based workstation for processing and analysis of MRI data
No full textThe present work demonstrates that a low cost, flexible and user- friendly workstation for the MRI laboratory can be implemented by using a personal computer and public-domain software. The workstation is based on a Pentium® personal computer, operating under the Linux operative system, and uses the software Khoros® (Khoral Research, Albuquerque, NM). This software is a general purpose package for handling signals and we here report its suitability for MR images analysis. Khoros® allows to create workspaces where different procedures (also written by the users) can be combined for implementing more complex procedures. We created workspaces for obtaining 2D and 3D images from time domain data which also allow for apodization and zero-filling. The time required for a 3D-FFT (matrix size 128 x 128 x 128) is about 12 min with the presently used microprocessor. We have also created workspaces for calculating apparent diffusion coefficient maps and for segmentation of MR images. Our results demonstrate that a personal computer equipped with public-domain software can represent a powerful tool to fulfil the MRI laboratory common needs
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
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