A multi-scaled approach to vegetation and landscape assessment in the Barents region: Reindeer habitat in a climate of change

The circumpolar Arctic is predicted to be particularly affected by global change, including climate change. Likely ecological vulnerabilities include flora and dependent fauna. Reindeer (Rangifer tarandus), a keystone Arctic herbivore, are of particular importance, ecologically, as well as culturally and socio-economically. Many Arctic regions, particularly in Russia, lack critical data thereby limiting current understanding and the ability to assess consequences of change. This research develops new botanical and spatial vegetation data for a much understudied region, increases understanding of the landscape and its relationships to reindeer habitat and climate change through multi-scale assessments, and creates the potential for analysing consequences of change. Three primary scales of vegetation analysis and their limitations, uses and value are compared within the Barents region. More detailed examinations are undertaken within study regions in the Nenets Autonomous Okrug, Russia. Plant communities, community structure and environmental influences are described. The most detailed level of analysis uses new data derived from traditional field-based, species-level botanical assessment. Statistical analyses show distinct community divisions and the importance of particular vegetation species or species groupings in defining these communities. The intermediate scale of analysis defines vegetation communities through development of a thirty-metre resolution map, based on Landsat ETM+ satellite sensor imagery. The study region is unusually heterogeneous, complicating classification development. The third and coarsest scale comprises existing regional and global land-cover assessments, with resolutions of one to five kilometres. Multi-scale comparison shows that the intermediate level is the most suitable for reindeer pasture and habitat assessment, and that climate-related shifts could be observed on any of the three scales, depending on the objectives, enabling assessment of patterns of change in species, communities or landscape. Long-term monitoring, however, is currently limited to coarser-scale analysis. Replication and broad regional expansion of finer-scale analysis, as developed here, are restricted by data availability, computing power, logistics and cost, amongst other factors. The thesis ends with a discussion of the potential for habitat assessment that includes additional environmental factors critical to reindeer habitat. All botanical and vegetation-mapping data and about 500 vegetation species, community and landscape photographs, geo-referenced and with metadata, should be archived in DSpace@Cambridge under the Scott Polar Research Institute archive

Poorer without It? The Neglected Role of the Natural Environment in Poverty and Wellbeing

The relationship between sustainable development’s prime goal, human wellbeing, and the natural environment has been narrowly conceived. This paper focuses on the possibility and the implications of treating the natural environment as a ‘constituent’, or internal element, of the concepts of wellbeing and poverty, as opposed to a ‘determinant’, or instrumental, external factor. Our review of philosophical accounts and conceptual frameworks of wellbeing and poverty suggests that treating the environment as a constituent element is philosophically sound, conceptually robust and empirically grounded. We argue that failing to consider these missing environmental aspects can result in an incomplete capturing of the multiple dimensions of wellbeing and poverty, and their underlying drivers. This broader framing of the environment– wellbeing relationship has the potential to inform a new generation of individual level wellbeing and poverty indicators, creating measures of multidimensional poverty that reflect the broadened scope ambitiously articulated in the Sustainable Development Goals

Climate-Related Perceptions of Young People with Lived Experience of Disasters in Regional and Rural Victoria, Australia

The experiences of young people, particularly young women, in regional and rural communities and their perceptions of, and responses to, the climate crisis are under-researched. This research focuses on young people outside of urban centres. These young people are largely absent from the broader climate conversation, despite the impact of climate-related disasters in their everyday lives. Their experiences sit within the concept of rural as being deficit, disadvantaged and backward when contrasted with the experiences of urban young people and emerging calls to challenge this bias. This paper reports on a small-scale study investigating how young people who have experienced climate-related disasters in regional and rural Victoria perceive the climate crisis, the relationship between climate change and climate-related disasters, and climate action. Qualitative data was collected from interviews with young women aged 18–23 (n = 7) from six different councils/shires in rural and regional Victoria, Australia, which were impacted by bushfires in 2019–2020. The analysis is attentive to the particularities of “place”. The findings provide insight into regional and rural young people’s perceptions of the climate crisis, the connection (or otherwise) to climate-related disasters and climate action. They also reveal their perception of an urban/rural divide concerning climate action tactics and climate mitigation policy. The research highlights the social and material realities of young people’s everyday lives and feelings of stigma and fear, particularly where they perceived a conflict between climate action and the social and economic relations that shape their regional and rural communities

Preferences for deinfibulation (opening) surgery and female genital mutilation service provision: A qualitative study

© 2022 The Authors. Published by Wiley. This is an open access article available under a Creative Commons licence. The published version can be accessed at the following link on the publisher’s website: https://doi.org/10.1111/1471-0528.17358Objective To explore the views of female genital mutilation (FGM) survivors, men and healthcare professionals (HCPs) on the timing of deinfibulation surgery and NHS service provision. Design Qualitative study informed by the sound of silence framework. Setting Survivors and men were recruited from three FGM prevalent areas of England. HCPs and stakeholders were from across the UK. Sample Forty-four survivors, 13 men and 44 HCPs. Ten participants at two community workshops and 30 stakeholders at a national workshop. Methods Hybrid framework analysis of 101 interviews and three workshops. Results There was no consensus across groups on the optimal timing of deinfibulation for survivors who wished to be deinfibulated. Within group, survivors expressed a preference for deinfibulation pre-pregnancy and HCPs antenatal deinfibulation. There was no consensus for men. Participants reported that deinfibulation should take place in a hospital setting and be undertaken by a suitable HCP. Decision making around deinfibulation was complex but for those who underwent surgery it helped to mitigate FGM impacts. Although there were examples of good practice, in general, FGM service provision was suboptimal. Conclusion Deinfibulation services need to be widely advertised. Information should highlight that the procedure can be carried out at different time points, according to preference, and in a hospital by suitable HCPs. Future services should ideally be developed with survivors, to ensure that they are clinically and culturally appropriate. Guidelines would benefit from being updated to reflect the needs of survivors and to ensure consistency in provision.This study is funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Health Technology Assessment (project reference 16/78/04)

Potential muskox habitat in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska: a GIS analysis

Thesis (M.S.) University of Alaska Fairbanks, 2000Muskoxen (Ovibos moschatus), reestablished in northern Alaska in recent decades, have been increasing in number and distribution. However, their selection of habitat within the landscape, historically and presently, remains inadequately documented. This project produced maps of predicted muskox habitat in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A), that provide a basis for management of muskoxen and protection of their habitat in relation to proposed oil, gas and mineral exploration. Vegetation analyses showed compositional differences and interactions between vegetation and terrain. Within a geographical information systems (GIS) database, muskox locations, satellite-based vegetation maps and terrain data for the Kuparuk River drainage basin were assimilated, and a maximum likelihood classification developed to produce a habitat selection model incorporating the interactive effects of these characteristics. Using NPR-A GIS data, the model was extrapolated to produce maps showing suitable summer habitat in lower-lying drainages and wetter areas, and suitable winter habitat in drier, more rugged, exposed areas

Potential impact of climate change and reindeer density on tundra indicator species in the Barents Sea region

Climate change is expected to alter the distribution of habitats and thus the distribution of species connected with these habitats in the terrestrial Barents Sea region. It was hypothesised that wild species connected with the tundra and open-land biome may be particularly at risk as forest area expands. Fourteen species of birds were identified as useful indicators for the biodiversity dependent upon this biome. By bringing together species distribution information with the LPJ-GUESS vegetation model, and with estimates of future wild and domestic reindeer density, potential impacts on these species between the present time and 2080 were assessed. Over this period there was a net loss of open land within the current breeding range of most bird species. Grazing reindeer were modelled as increasing the amount of open land retained for nine of the tundra bird species.</p