Environmental Friendly Practices Research Articles

Quick Overview of Extension Programs to Educate Homeowners about Environmentally-Friendly Landscape Practices in Florida, South Carolina, and Tennessee

Nationwide, landscape irrigation accounts for more than 7 billion gallons of water per day. But up to 50 percent of this water is wasted due to overwatering, poor irrigation system design, evaporation, or other factors. Additionally, excessive or poorly timed fertilizer application can cause pollution runoff and deterioration of surface and ground water. This 8-page fact sheet presents a quick overview of the Yards and Neighborhoods program that educates homeowners about nine core principles for landscape management. Written by Tatiana Borisova, Katie Giacalone, Ruth Anne Hanahan, and Esen Momol, and published by the UF Department of Food and Resource Economics, August 2011. (UF/IFAS Photo Thomas Wright) FE892/FE892: Quick Overview of Extension Programs to Educate Homeowners about Environmentally Friendly Landscape Practices in Florida, South Carolina, and Tennessee (ufl.edu)

Scatter Search Applied to the Vehicle Routing Problem with Simultaneous Delivery and Pickup

Though its origins can be traced back to 1977, the development and application of the metaheuristic Scatter Search (SS) has stayed dormant for 20 years. However, in the last 10 years, research interest has positioned SS as one of the recognizable methodologies within the umbrella of evolutionary search. This paper presents an application of SS to the problem of routing vehicles that are required both to deliver and pickup goods (VRPSDP). This specialized version of the vehicle routing problem is particularly relevant to organizations that are concerned with sustainable and environmentally-friendly business practices. In this work, the efficiency of SS is evaluated when applied to this problem. Computational results of the application to instances in the literature are presented.

‘Going Green’ in Food Services: Can Health Care Adopt Environmentally Friendly Practices?

Sustainability and the environment are issues influencing individual and organizational choices on purchasing, waste management, and energy-saving practices. The food service industry and related stakeholders have reported active pursuit of initiatives to reduce environmental impacts. We examine reported environmentally friendly practices being implemented in the food service industry and consider ways in which health care or hospital food services can adopt some of these programs. Building and equipment, waste management, food, and non-food supplies and procurement are considered. Suggestions are made for small changes to start the green initiative in each of these areas. A health care food service department is a large consumer of resources, and therefore food service workers, managers, dietitians, and administrators can make a significant difference by supporting and adopting environmentally friendly practices. Further studies are needed to determine which practices are currently being implemented in health care facilities in Canada, as well as perceived facilitators and barriers to these practices in the food service area.

Acting as a Change Agent in Supporting Sustainable Agriculture: How to Cope with New Professional Situations?

ABSTRACT How do change agents deal with the diversity of farmers' attitudes towards the future of agriculture? How do they themselves cope with change and understand their role as change agents? We chose a comprehensive, action-training approach to answer such questions and worked with agents belonging to two different extension networks. The agents acknowledged their historically built professional models and discussed their professional situations in relation to the need to develop new skills and to address new audiences. Some dimensions of these situations were pointed out as crucial in the change process: (1) the agent's position among farmers and those who act to change farming practices at local level; (2) the tension between the agent's engagement in promoting more environmentally-friendly practices, and the role that managers and farmers assign to the agent; and (3) the way of combining scientific and technical knowledge with farmers' own knowledge. Our work also highlighted the diversity of the agents' points of view on change at farm level (discontinuity versus continuity) and the way to handle it: respectively by making the discontinuity visible and manageable at farm level, or by supporting a step-by-step management of change at cropping-system level. The added value has been to develop a method which enables advisers to learn together from their professional situations, and thus to show the need to investigate how the agent's subjectivity is a key driver of a change intervention.

Controversial issues in an environmental science course: how do students respond?

This qualitative study described non-science majors’ responses to environmental case studies and news events embedded in an introductory level environmental science course. A phenomenological approach was used for this descriptive emergent design study. Sixty-six participants were enrolled in a 12-week course, structured to reflect science education reform principals, at a liberal arts college. Examples of environmental issues included the CHEERS pesticide study on children; use of depleted uranium in military conflicts; a homeowner’s plastic lawn; and local cases of environmental racism. According to the emergent model, a controversial issue must have an element of injustice to affect a student’s moral code or value system, thus, provoking feelings of cognitive dissonance. An environmental issue may be deemed controversial if the injustice exhibits elements of inequality, absence of freedom, or intentional affliction or abuse. To reduce the dissonance, some students sought participation in environmentally-friendly practices beyond the classroom.

Assessment of a model of pollution disaster in near-shore coastal waters based on catastrophe theory

In this study, a model for assessing of environmental disasters in near-shore areas was developed using a multi-criteria evaluation method of catastrophe theory. The assessment model involved scenarios of eutrophication, pollution with heavy metals and organic compounds. An evaluation system of the model was composed of seven mesosphere indicators and twenty underlying indicators including water chemistry, water physics, water biology, heavy metals and organic pollutants in water and surface sediments. The model was applied to possibility assessment of environmental disasters in different functional regions of the Dalian Bay in 2001 and 2006. Results showed that the environmental disaster indicators in 2001 were equivalent to the Level 4 standard values of marine functional areas, but the eutrophication disaster indicators were lower than the Level 4 standard values. It is consistent with the occurrence of a large-scale red tide in Dalian Bay in 2001. In 2006, eutrophication remained the dominant problem of the region but organic pollutants, such as oil, were reduced remarkably. This coincided with ongoing local environmental-friendly practices for industries.

Foreign direct investment (FDI), added value and environmental-friendly practices in furniture manufacturing: the case of Malaysia and Vietnam

Malaysia as a low-cost wooden furniture production hub has attracted substantial foreign direct investment (FDI) over the last two decades. However, globalization of the worldwide furniture industry has increased the competitive pressure from newly emerging furniture-producing nations, especially Vietnam, which has displaced Malaysia as the largest exporter of furniture in the South East Asian region. Based on this state of facts a study was undertaken to analyze the FDI trends in the Malaysian furniture industry from 1986 to 2005, using secondary published data and questionnaire based survey. The results were compared against the characteristics of FDI in Vietnam. The results of the study point out that although Malaysia offered greater political stability, better infrastructure, amenities, industrial-relation practices, a more stable exchange rate and greater adoption of environmental-friendly practices; the lower production cost and favorable investment policy appear to be the strengths of Vietnam in attracting foreign direct investments. Therefore, Malaysian policy-makers need to formulate policies based on creativity and innovation that would pave the way for the manufacture of higher added-value products that would ensure the continued attractiveness of Malaysia as a furniture FDI destination.

Willingness of upstream and downstream resource managers to engage in compensation schemes for environmental services

Providing compensation for agricultural conservation practices adopted by upstream farmers is still an alien concept in the Thai political context. The governance of common-pool natural resources, such as forest and water, has traditionally been under the control of powerful government line agencies, while the contribution of local communities to natural resource conservation have been hardly recognized by policy-makers. Drawing on a case study in Mae Sa watershed, Chiang Mai province, northern Thailand, this paper discusses the potential of developing compensation schemes in a socio-political context where upland farmers – mostly belonging to ethnic minority groups – tend to be considered a threat to the natural resource base rather than providers of environmental services. Based on data obtained from 371 households in the upstream communities and 151 households in the downstream communities of the watershed, upstream resource managers’ willingness to accept compensation for the conservation measures and downstream resource managers’ willingness to pay for water resource improvements were estimated through the use of choice experiments. Results from the study suggest that downstream resource managers would be willing to provide on average nearly 1% of their annual income for a substantial improvement of the quantity and quality of water resources, which could be achieved by compensating upstream farmers’ change of their agricultural systems towards more environment-friendly practices. Both willingness to pay of downstream respondents and willingness of upstream resource managers to accept compensation were positively correlated with age, education, participation in environmental conservation activities and previous experiences with droughts and/or erosion. The paper concludes that there is a clear potential for establishing compensation schemes for provision of environmental services in northern Thai watersheds. The important policy implication is to get both upstream and downstream resource managers involved in the institutional design of compensation schemes.

Willingness of upstream and downstream resource managers to engage in compensation schemes for environmental services

Providing compensation for agricultural conservation practices adopted by upstream farmers is still an alien concept in the Thai political context. The governance of common-pool natural resources, such as forest and water, has traditionally been under the control of powerful government line agencies, while the contribution of local communities to natural resource conservation have been hardly recognized by policy-makers. Drawing on a case study in Mae Sa watershed, Chiang Mai province, northern Thailand, this paper discusses the potential of developing compensation schemes in a socio-political context where upland farmers – mostly belonging to ethnic minority groups – tend to be considered a threat to the natural resource base rather than providers of environmental services. Based on data obtained from 371 households in the upstream communities and 151 households in the downstream communities of the watershed, upstream resource managers’ willingness to accept compensation for the conservation measures and downstream resource managers’ willingness to pay for water resource improvements were estimated through the use of choice experiments. Results from the study suggest that downstream resource managers would be willing to provide on average nearly 1% of their annual income for a substantial improvement of the quantity and quality of water resources, which could be achieved by compensating upstream farmers’ change of their agricultural systems towards more environment-friendly practices. Both willingness to pay of downstream respondents and willingness of upstream resource managers to accept compensation were positively correlated with age, education, participation in environmental conservation activities and previous experiences with droughts and/or erosion. The paper concludes that there is a clear potential for establishing compensation schemes for provision of environmental services in northern Thai watersheds. The important policy implication is to get both upstream and downstream resource managers involved in the institutional design of compensation schemes.

Multi-Objective Evolutionary Optimization of Biological Pest Control with Impulsive Dynamics in Soybean Crops

The biological pest control in agriculture, an environment-friendly practice, maintains the density of pests below an economic injury level by releasing a suitable quantity of their natural enemies. This work proposes a multi-objective numerical solution to biological pest control for soybean crops, considering both the cost of application of the control action and the cost of economic damages. The system model is nonlinear with impulsive control dynamics, in order to cope more effectively with the actual control action to be applied, which should be performed in a finite number of discrete time instants. The dynamic optimization problem is solved using the NSGA-II, a fast and trustworthy multi-objective genetic algorithm. The results suggest a dual pest control policy, in which the relative price of control action versus the associated additional harvest yield determines the usage of either a low control action strategy or a higher one.

THE IR-4 PROGRAM: HELPING THE U.S. BLUEBERRY INDUSTRY CONTROL HIGH-PRIORITY INSECT, DISEASE, AND WEED PESTS

THE IR-4 PROGRAM: HELPING THE U.S. BLUEBERRY INDUSTRY CONTROL HIGH-PRIORITY INSECT, DISEASE, AND WEED PESTS

The innovation of policy making in rural areas: the Milan case study

In the last years, rural policies definition has been evolving for the acknowledgment that agriculture could offer a wide range of environmental services. The paper aims at discussing the planning implications of such evolution, by arguing that innovation in policy making is necessary to get more environmental friendly land use practices. In particular, it discusses the role farmers could play in delivering environmental services, their attitudes towards such programmes and the factors that could ease or hinder this participation through a qualitative policy analysis. The Milan rural suburb is considered as case study. The paper's main conclusion is that the main problem to be tackled is the introduction of incentives to boost stakeholders' participation. In the last part of the paper, we will describe the difficulties encountered by policy makers in the considered case, to give some policy insights.

Green Suppliers with Environmental Performance in the Supply Chain Perspective

This study examines the relationships found in supplier involvement in the course of operational life-cycle stages, environmentally-friendly practices, and environmental performances. Using sampling data gathered from 157 managers of automotive firms, obtained via a benchmarking questionnaire, three hypotheses are tested employing a Structural Equation Modeling analysis. The findings are generally consistent with the literature, with three hypotheses supported. In addition, this study explores the criteria of selecting or assessing alternative green suppliers. The major contribution of this research lies in its suggestions for decision makers to improve environmental performance using green supply chains.

An Empirical Study of Environmental Awareness and Practices in SMEs

With increasing awareness of environmental issues, there has been rising demand for environmental-friendly business practices. Prior research has shown that the implementation of environmental management practices is influenced by existing and potential stakeholder groups in the form of external pressures from legislators, environmental groups, financial institutions and suppliers, as well as internally by employees and owner/manager attitudes and knowledge. However, it has been reported that despite business owner/managers having strong “green” attitudes, the level of implementation of environmental-friendly practices is low. In order to explore the connection between pressures for improved practices and the management actions taken, this article examines how influence from various stakeholders is related to awareness of environmental issues, and how this awareness relates to actions taken within the businesses to reduce the environmental impact of their operations. The results indicate that legislation does result in general environmental awareness, and that organizations are then willing to␣change their business processes and environmental strategies. However, despite their actions they have little awareness of the benefits that might arise from cost reductions from their environmental-friendly practices. Those influenced by their suppliers act to reduce waste, but do not put into place formal environmental management systems, or use environmental messages to market their goods or services. Nevertheless, it can be argued that they have a real commitment to environmental issues, as evidenced by a willingness to voluntarily contribute to environmental organizations.

Monitoring catchment scale agricultural pollution in Norway: policy instruments, implementation of mitigation methods and trends in nutrient and sediment losses

Abstract Agricultural management and losses of nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P) and suspended sediments (SS) from eight small (85–2830 ha) catchments in Norway were analysed. The catchments represent areas with different agricultural production systems, soils and climate. Results from the long-term (9–16 years) in-stream monitoring show (i) large differences in levels of losses between the catchments, (ii) large interannual variability and (iii) few time-trends in losses. These results are discussed in relation to changes in agricultural policies and the implementation of soil management practices, such as reduced autumn-ploughing, catch crops, constructed wetlands and changes in nutrient application. Overall, these data demonstrate changes in farmer behaviour driven by economic incentives in combination with active extension services stimulating environmental friendly management practices. However, despite the increased implementation of mitigation methods by farmers, improvements in water quality at the catchment scale can be attenuated. More long-term monitoring programmes are clearly required.

Does an Endogenous Relationship Exist between Environmental and Economic Performance? A Resource-Based View on the Horticultural Sector

The aim of this paper is to analyse the relationship between environmental and economic performance from the resource-based theory within firms of the fresh fruit and vegetables sector. This study considers that the adoption of environment-friendly practices has a greater influence on firms’ opportunities and abilities in the agricultural sector than in manufacturing sectors and leads to closer links between performance variables. The reference for this empirical analysis is a panel data of horticultural farming-marketing firms in Spain. The voluntary environmental programmes and the heterogeneity of their application lead us to regard acquiring a competitive advantage as a relevant driver to improve environmental performance in this sector. A simultaneous equations model is suggested reflecting the differential environmental effect and the assumption of endogeneity among variables. The results show a positive impact of environmental differentiation on profitability and market share, also suggesting that the perception of this positive experience implies greater environmental performance.

INFLUENCE OF RESOURCE QUALITY OF ORGANIC INPUTS ON RICE-BARLEY DRYLAND AGRO-ECOSYSTEM: VARIATIONS IN BIOLOGICAL PRODUCTIVITY, GRAIN YIELD AND EFFICIENCY OF NITROGEN USE

A two-year study was undertaken in a tropical dryland agro-ecosystem to evaluate the effect of the application of soil amendments with contrasting chemical natures on crop productivity, grain yield, N-uptake and N-use efficiencies. The treatments involved the addition of equivalent amounts of N (80 kg N ha−1) through chemical fertilizer and three organic inputs at the beginning of the annual cycle: Sesbania aculeata shoots (high quality, C/N 16), wheat straw (low quality, C/N 82) and Sesbania+wheat straw (high and low quality combined, C/N 47), together with a control treatment. Test crops consisted of an annual sequence of rice and barley, sown in the rainy and winter seasons, respectively. Fertilizer and Sesbania inputs resulted in higher total net productivity (TNP) for the rice crop (47 % and 32 % increases over the control, respectively) than the combined (+28 %) and wheat straw treatments (+10 %). During the succeeding barley crop, maximum TNP was recorded in the Sesbania+wheat straw treatment (+52 %), followed by wheat straw (+43 %), fertilizer (+19 %) and Sesbania (+17 %). The TNP and grain yields of both crops added together were higher in Sesbania+wheat straw and fertilizer treatments compared to a single applications of either Sesbania or wheat straw. The Sesbania+wheat straw and fertilizer treatments resulted in more efficient utilization of N compared to the other treatments. Crop roots played a pivotal role in N-recovery from the soil and their N concentrations differed significantly (p < 0.05) due to the application of soil amendments. Across different treatments, crop root biomass was strongly correlated with crop N-uptake (r = 0.81, n = 10, p < 0.05), recovery efficiency (r = 0.81, n = 8, p < 0.05) and agronomic efficiency (r = 0.81, n = 8, p < 0.05). It is suggested that the combined application of high and low quality resources modulated N release, resulting in relatively higher productivity through the annual cropping cycle. Such combined inputs may prove useful in developing low input, environment friendly soil management practices in tropical dryland agro-ecosystems.

Land Tenure Management: A Key Determinant of Sustainable Farming in Martinique

ABSTRACT For the past 15 years, the notion of sustainable farming has become a constant reference in defining rural development policies. For many years, “sustainable farming” was limited to the reproducibility of eco-systems without considering social and economic factors. Yet, in Martinique, as in many other insular states in the Caribbean, control over the way farmland is managed is a prerequisite in defining any so-called sustainable farming policy. The analysis of changes in the use of farmland shows that the inter-generational transfer of land is not assured: the usable agricultural area has decreased by 38% in less than 30 years, with, nevertheless, substantial spatial variations. In the same way, it appears that because of their size, more than 50% of farms are today economically not viable. In addition, different studies on farming practices show that the land tenure structures of the farms may constitute an obstacle to the application of environment-friendly practices. To address this problem, many regulations–instruments–have been adopted and institutional bodies created in recent decades at different levels of local government. In spite of all these initiatives, and owing to lack of political will and the paradoxical attitudes of farmers and their representatives (who, “in the name of the farming profession,” call for the preservation of farmland but whose interests at the individual level are to have their land developed to permit construction), most of these measures have not had the desired effect. In the last three or four years, new initiatives have been adopted (implementation of the control of land tenure structures and local-level planning for sustainable development). The future of agriculture in Martinique–and therefore its sustainability–will probably depend on the rigour with which these measures are applied.

The Sustainable Newsroom of the Future: Can Media Newsrooms Become Sustainable and Still Break the News?

This article is a case study examining the media's commitment to sustainability in one southern state. The researchers surveyed both broadcast and print newsroom managers in South Carolina and observed student run newsrooms within the School of Journalism and Mass Communications at the University of South Carolina. Interestingly, both print and broadcast news managers indicated that their organizations were committed to sustainability in the workplace. However, data suggest that sustainability appears to be basically disregarded in South Carolina newsrooms both professionally and student driven. However, the data did reveal results that could aid in the implementation of environmental friendly practices in a newsroom environment. Based upon their findings, researchers suggest a basic ten point plan for newsroom sustainability.

Benchmarking adaptive reuse: a case study of Georgia

Holistic construction approaches are needed to move from Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certified new buildings to adaptive reuse of existing buildings. Adaptive reuse is an opportunity to recycle and manage the deconstruction process in a more responsible manner with focus towards the new occupancy requirements. The objective of this paper is to benchmark the architectural reuse practices in Georgia and to review three adaptive reuse projects. Three case studies, where adaptive reuse was applied to existing buildings, are also included for demonstration purposes. This paper is intended for architects and constructors interested in environment-friendly construction practices.