Changes In Distribution Of Land Research Articles

Monitoring the Impact of Land Cover Change on Urban Heat Island with Remote Sensing & GIS

The increasing need for land has resulted in a higher rate of land conversion and urbanization, leading to a rise in urban density and the occurrence of an Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect. The application of remote sensing and GIS can serve as a substitute for data collection in monitoring the UHI phenomena. This work utilizes Landsat 8 OLI satellite image data, namely band 10, to analyze Land Surface Temperature (LST). Bands 5 and 4 are employed to assess the distribution of Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) in Bekasi Regency during the years 2014 and 2020. The relationship between NDVI and LST is highly correlated as they can effectively forecast the influence of areas with sparse vegetation on temperature. The guided classification approach, employing the maximum likelihood algorithm and kappa validation, is utilized to evaluate alterations in land use. The kappa accuracy test yielded a score of 0.90% for 2014 and 0.99% for 2020. The research conducted between 2014 and 2020 revealed changes in land distribution. Specifically, the built-up land area increased by 99.92 Km2, empty land expanded by 280.82 Km2, bodies of water covered an additional 46.13 Km2, and vegetation expanded by 293.91 Km^2. According to the UHI research, it is evident that there has been a rise in surface temperature in Bekasi Regency from 2014 to 2020. In 2014, the minimum temperature reached 30 °C, and the maximum temperature reached 51 °C. In 2020, the minimum temperature was recorded at 34 °C, while the maximum temperature reached 52 °C.

Belonging and Agrarian Labour Exchanges in Zimbabwe: Navigating Between Communal Areas and Fast Track Villagised Settlements

This article examines the nature of labour exchange between A1 farmers with people in communal areas of origin based on kinship and friendship relations. While agrarian labour in Zimbabwe has attracted considerable interest in land reform debates, limited attention has been paid to agrarian labour exchange and livelihoods based on belonging to communal areas of origin under the Fast Track Land Reform Programme (FTLRP). Using a qualitative case study from Mashonaland West, Zimbabwe, I argue that belonging plays an important role in labour exchange and enabling livelihoods. This article illustrates that labour exchange in farm households still matter despite changes in land distribution and the economy. The article concludes that belonging-based labour exchange enhances agricultural production and livelihoods in a new land ownership and economic circumstances.

Global food systems transitions have enabled affordable diets but had less favourable outcomes for nutrition, environmental health, inclusion and equity

Over the past 50 years, food systems worldwide have shifted from predominantly rural to industrialized and consolidated systems, with impacts on diets, nutrition and health, livelihoods, and environmental sustainability. We explore the potential for sustainable and equitable food system transformation (ideal state of change) by comparing countries at different stages of food system transition (changes) using food system typologies. Historically, incomes have risen faster than food prices as countries have industrialized, enabling a simultaneous increase in the supply and affordability of many nutritious foods. These shifts are illustrated across five food system typologies, from rural and traditional to industrial and consolidated. Evolving rural economies, urbanization and changes in food value chains have accompanied these transitions, leading to changes in land distribution, a smaller share of agri-food system workers in the economy and changes in diets. We show that the affordability of a recommended diet has improved over time, but food systems of all types are falling short of delivering optimal nutrition and health outcomes, environmental sustainability, and inclusion and equity for all. Six ‘outlier’ case studies (Tajikistan, Egypt, Albania, Ecuador, Bolivia and the United States of America) illustrate broad trends, trade-offs and deviations. With the integrated view afforded by typologies, we consider how sustainable transitions can be achieved going forward.

Island Biogeography Revisited: Museomics Reveals Affinities of Shelf Island Birds Determined by Bathymetry and Paleo-Rivers, Not by Distance to Mainland.

Island biogeography is one of the most powerful subdisciplines of ecology: its mathematical predictions that island size and distance to mainland determine diversity have withstood the test of time. A key question is whether these predictions follow at a population-genomic level. Using rigorous ancient-DNA protocols, we retrieved approximately 1,000 genomic markers from approximately 100 historic specimens of two Southeast Asian songbird complexes from across the Sunda Shelf archipelago collected 1893–1957. We show that the genetic affinities of populations on small shelf islands defy the predictions of geographic distance and appear governed by Earth-historic factors including the position of terrestrial barriers (paleo-rivers) and persistence of corridors (Quaternary land bridges). Our analyses suggest that classic island-biogeographic predictors may not hold well for population-genomic dynamics on the thousands of shelf islands across the globe, which are exposed to dynamic changes in land distribution during Quaternary climate change.

Quaternary land bridges have not been universal conduits of gene flow.

Quaternary climate oscillations are a well-known driver of animal diversification, but their effects are most well studied in areas where glaciations lead to habitat fragmentation. In large areas of the planet, however, glaciations have had the opposite effect, but here their impacts are much less well understood. This is especially true in Southeast Asia, where cyclical changes in land distribution have generated enormous land expansions during glacial periods. In this study, we selected a panel of five songbird species complexes covering a range of ecological specificities to investigate the effects Quaternary land bridges have had on the connectivity of Southeast Asian forest biota. Specifically, we combined morphological and bioacoustic analysis with an arsenal of population genomic and modelling approaches applied to thousands of genome-wide DNA markers across a total of more than 100 individuals. Our analyses show that species dependent on forest understorey exhibit deep differentiation between Borneo and western Sundaland, with no evidence of gene flow during the land bridges accompanying the last 1-2 ice ages. In contrast, dispersive canopy species and habitat generalists have experienced more recent gene flow. Our results argue that there remains much cryptic species-level diversity to be discovered in Southeast Asia even in well-known animal groups such as birds, especially in nondispersive forest understorey inhabitants. We also demonstrate that Quaternary land bridges have not been equally suitable conduits of gene flow for all species complexes and that life history is a major factor in predicting relative population divergence time across Quaternary climate fluctuations.

The effects of Pleistocene climate change on biotic differentiation in a montane songbird clade from Wallacea

The role of Pleistocene Ice Age in tropical diversification is poorly understood, especially in archipelagos, in which glaciation-induced sea level fluctuations may lead to complicated changes in land distribution. To assess how Pleistocene land bridges may have facilitated gene flow in tropical archipelagos, we investigated patterns of diversification in the rarely-collected rusty-bellied fantail Rhipidura teysmanni (Passeriformes: Rhipiduridae) complex from Wallacea using a combination of bioacoustic traits and whole-genome sequencing methods (dd-RADSeq). We report a biogeographic leapfrog pattern in the vocalizations of these birds, and uncover deep genomic divergence among island populations despite the presence of intermittent land connections between some. We demonstrate how rare instances of genetic introgression have affected the evolution of this species complex, and document the presence of double introgressive mitochondrial sweeps, highlighting the dangers of using only mitochondrial DNA in evolutionary research. By applying different tree inference approaches, we demonstrate how concatenation methods can give inaccurate results when investigating divergence in closely-related taxa. Our study highlights high levels of cryptic avian diversity in poorly-explored Wallacea, elucidates complex patterns of Pleistocene climate-mediated diversification in an elusive montane songbird, and suggests that Pleistocene land bridges may have accounted for limited connectivity among montane Wallacean biota.

Intergenerational Land Transfer in Rural Cambodia since the Late 1980s: Special Attention to the Effect of Labor Migration

(ProQuest: ... denotes non-US-ASCII text omitted.)I IntroductionFarmland under family farming is generally transferred from parents to their children in societies where the private ownership of land is established. While the way in which land is transferred intergenerationally varies according to societies and times, inheritance is basically classified into partible and impartible. In the former, parents' land is divided among their children, while in the latter, land is given to only one heir. Scholars have argued that land inheritance rules exert an important influence on rural society and economy (Platteau and Baland 2001). How land is transferred between generations naturally affects agricultural production since it determines farm size (Ram et al. 1999) and brings about changes in land distribution and rural class structure (Khera 1973; Wiegandt 1977). It has also been found to shape family structure and social interaction among kin (Goldschmidt and Kunkel 1971; Khera 1972) and determine the rate and the timing of marriage (Emigh 1997) and birth rate (Habakkuk 1955). Furthermore, some scholars argue that land inheritance rules can influence the development of the manufacturing industry since it affects labor mobility from rural areas (ibid.; Wegge 1999).Although the empirical data on intergenerational land transfer1) in Cambodia is scarce, partible transfer seems to have been common practice. For example, Ebihara (1971) found that in a village in Kandal province in the late 1950s, farmland was divided among children in a basically equal manner (ibid.). Land became collective property under the Democratic Kampuchea (Khmer Rouge) regime and subsequently the People's Republic of Kampuchea in the early 1980s, but was distributed among households after the dissolution of collective farming groups (krom samokki) in the 1980s. Since then, parents distribute land to their children. In fact, some studies show that children who got married after the land distribution of the 1980s received land from their parents (Amakawa 2001; Yagura 2005; Kobayashi 2007). However, these studies do not examine whether partible (and equitable) land transfer is still a common practice in rural Cambodia because they do not use data from the parents' side.In this regard, we must note that socio-economic changes experienced in rural Cambodia since the 1980s have had a considerable influence on land transfer practice. First, population is increasing rapidly while unexploited land is diminishing-in other words, land is becoming a scarce resource. In fact, while there remains untapped land in some regions, such as the northwestern and the northeastern provinces, there seems to be little land left for agricultural use in regions with a high population density such as the provinces surrounding Phnom Penh.2) On the other hand, the baby-boomers of the 1980s have started to get married in the first decade of the twenty-first century. According to custom, parents should give land to all these married children, yet this may not be possible where land is becoming scarce. Second, labor migration from rural areas is increasing, which can also be regarded as a response to land scarcity. Since the middle of the 1990s, the migration of rural youth to urban areas, especially Phnom Penh, has increased with the development of sectors such as the garment industry, construction, and commerce in urban areas. Increased opportunities to earn a living outside rural areas make farmland less necessary.Both these changes ought to promote a transition from partible to impartible transfer of land. The change to impartible land transfer then raises the question of who will be deprived of access to land and how these landless children should make a living.On the other hand, increasing employment opportunities in non-agricultural sectors may actually make it possible to sustain partible land transfer because the non-agricultural income can compensate for a small agricultural income (Platteau and Baland 2001). …

Changes in Land Distribution of Polar Bears in Western Hudson Bay

We examined the capture locations of polar bears (Ursus maritimus) on land in western Hudson Bay over 19 years (1986–2004) to assess temporal trends in the distribution of the population. We found that the distribution of bears of most age and sex groups shifted northward and eastward over the study. The causes of these shifts may be related to an altered population structure, changing environmental conditions, or a combination of both factors. Segregation by age, sex, and reproductive status persisted over time as found in earlier studies, but more females with young were within 5 km of the coast after 2001 than before. The distribution changes were correlated with the timing of sea-ice breakup, which now occurs, on average, about three weeks earlier than it did 30 years ago. While environmental conditions may have influenced polar bear distribution, the reduction in the number of large adult males along the coast may also have affected distribution patterns, allowing adult females to remain closer to the coast in more recent times.

Environment, Land, and Rural Out-migration in the Southern Ecuadorian Andes

Out-migration, environmental degradation, and changes in land distribution are all key processes of rural transformation in the developing world, but few quantitative studies have investigated their interactions in migrant origin areas. This study uses survey data from the southern Ecuadorian Andes and an event history model to investigate the effects of land ownership and environmental conditions on out-migration to local, internal, and international destinations. The results indicate that the effects of land ownership and other factors differ strongly across migration streams. Also, negative environmental conditions and landlessness do not consistently increase out-migration as commonly assumed in the literature.

Estrutura fundiária das regiões Norte e Noroeste do Estado do Rio de Janeiro: 1972 a 1998

O trabalho procura verificar, a partir de informações das Estatísticas Cadastrais do INCRA, as alterações ocorridas na distribuição da posse da terra das regiões Norte e Noroeste fluminense, no período de 1972 a 1998. Para caracterizar a estrutura agrária dessas regiões, foram empregados o índice de Gini, a área média, o percentual da área correspondente aos 5% maiores imóveis e o percentual da área correspondente aos 50% menores imóveis. Os resultados permitiram constatar diferenças significativas entre as regiões, com a região Norte sobressaindo-se por apresentar estrutura fundiária mais concentrada. Observou-se ainda que a estrutura fundiária dos municípios analisados sofreu poucas alterações no período.

Food security and rural development in North Africa

This study focuses on the challenges facing governments of North Africa (Algeria Egypt Libya Morocco Sudan and Tunisia) in realizing the common development objective of food self-sufficiency from domestic production. There is a disequilibrium between the demand for food and domestic supply. Sustained high rates of agricultural growth and increases in the real income per person working in agriculture have not occurred. These conditions are likely to continue. The evidence suggests that reduced inequality of land distribution would increase the benefits of agricultural growth to poor farmers and would cause poverty to decline. The degree of inequality in the size distribution of land explains only 4% of the variation in agricultural gross domestic product growth rates in a sample of 20 developing countries. In Egypt land reform has contributed to a redistribution of property and the proportion living in poverty declined from 56.1% in 1951 to 17.8% in 1982. The decline is due to controls on the rent payments among 66% of landowners earnings from nonland assets (livestock) and nonfarm activities and remittances from labor migration. Quality of life is more likely to be improved with a more egalitarian structure. North African governments have not adequately solved the problems of food insecurity and rural development. The rising fundamentalist Islamic principles will probably influence policy through the application of moral human conduct. How ethical principles of social welfare will reform agricultural credit land mortgage property rights to land and protection of entitlements of the rural poor is yet to be seen. Over the past 40 years changes in land distribution have benefitted the fellaheen. Agricultural extension programs in North Africa aim to improve the role of women as housewives and mothers but not as farmers. Governments are committed to a public investment in agriculture. Limited information suggests that private investment in agriculture is constrained by cumbersome bureaucratic procedure. State power rests in control of irrigation and state farms which affect longterm gains. Foreign investment concentrates on high profit small risk endeavors and export crops.

On the Evidence of Glacial Action Over the South of Ireland During The Drift Period; And of a Subsequent Slight Elevation Followed By A Depression of the Land, to its Present Level

When “the waters were divided from the waters” and they were called “seas,” the level at which they were allowed to rest, being determined, has ever since remained immutably fixed. With the land, however, it is very different; its elevation above the sea, and consequent outline, has varied from the very moment it “appeared” or in other words arose from beneath the “waters,” and each successive geological era comprised within itself countless changes in this relative distribution of Land and Water, and many marked variations in the climatal agencies effecting the one, and in the tides and currents which sorted the shingle, sands, and finer sediments formed by the other. If proof of the truth of this be required we have but to pause before any bed of conglomerate, in any strata from the lowest to the most recent, and we have there presented to us a clear evidence of a period of local destruction in rocks previously formed and consolidated, and a consequent reproduction out of their disintegrated masses; but should we find in that conglomerate a block of a still older conglomerate, and this, on examination, was found to contain pebbles derived from ancient fossiliferous rocks in which we discover the remains of shells and corals, we clearly see that the process of formation, consolidation, destruction and reproduction has been going on during countless ages before the formation of the conglomerate we first examined.