Level Administrative Units Research Articles

Improving the sustainability of agricultural land use: An integrated framework for the conflict between food security and environmental deterioration

In rapidly developing countries, intensive agriculture faces the conflict between food security and environmental deterioration. To improve the sustainability of agricultural land use, this paper proposes an integrated framework for risk assessment and conflict coordination to cope with these salient challenges at the administrative unit level. This framework is demonstrated using a case study conducted in the Dongting Lake area in China. Drawing upon diverse sources of statistical data concerning agricultural inputs and outputs, water resources and natural hazards as well as questionnaire surveys conducted at the household level, this paper uses the Cobb-Douglas production function and the water environmental pressure index to assess food insecurity risk and environmental risk from food production, respectively. A double matrix method is used to characterize the degree of sustainability based on the risk assessment. The results indicate that the overall food security of the region can be maintained in the negligible-risk range. However, rising agro-environmental risks from grain production in the coming years are likely to threaten the sustainability of agricultural land use in most administrative units. It is suggested that optimization of land use patterns and mitigation of natural hazards could be effective approaches to improve the sustainability of local agricultural land use.

A spatially explicit method for identification of vulnerable hotspots of Odisha, India from potential cyclones

Anticipating future vulnerability to natural hazards requires assessment of present scenario of risk. In this context, identification of susceptible factors and its spatial mapping is essential for evaluation of vulnerable hotspots. The present study assesses societal elements (socioeconomic and infrastructural) of vulnerability from potential cyclones for administrative blocks (units) of Odisha. Principal component analysis was used for reduction of a large number of variables into few indicative factors of vulnerability. Factor scores were mapped, and proximity analysis ascertains highly vulnerable blocks located in contiguity to coast. Additionally, spatial analysis was done using Moran's I and Getis-Ord Gi* to identify hotspots of vulnerability. Results reveal a substantial spatial variation in the distribution of vulnerable factors over space. The exploratory spatial analysis shown in this paper is an attempt to study societal attributes of vulnerability at a block level administrative unit in the Indian context. Further, this method could be used by local authorities to identify existing vulnerable blocks and prepare them to cope with potential hazard threats.

Uncovering Spatial Structures of Regional City Networks from Expressway Traffic Flow Data: A Case Study from Jiangsu Province, China

On the basis of the “space of flows” theory, city networks emphasizing factor connectivity and spatial connection have become a core perspective for regional spatial relationships. They provide a context for discussing the spatial structures of city networks and a scientific basis for making regional development policies. Relying on expressway traffic flow data from Jiangsu Province in 2014, this study describes macro-spatial patterns and hierarchical structures of city networks, and uses the Walktrap algorithm of community detection to execute space divisions and elucidate potential spatial connection structures in the city networks. In comparison with other algorithms, the Walktrap algorithm demonstrates significant adaptation and stability to the short expressway traffic flows with the characteristics of strong network density and sparse node distribution. The results indicate that the macro-spatial patterns of Jiangsu’s city networks have clear regional differences. The cities with relatively dense spatial linkages are distributed along the Yangtze River banks, and many different sub-network systems have also developed internally. Cities and linkage axles have clear hierarchical structures. City hierarchies have certain spatial couplings with the cities’ intrinsic social economic attributes and geographical locations. The linkage axles hierarchy has clear spatial interactions and superposition with geographical distance. The community detection algorithm identified six spatially connected “city communities”, the Suzhou-Wuxi-Changzhou Community (SWCC), the Nanjing-Zhenjiang-Yangzhou-Taizhou Community (NZYTC), the Nantong-Yancheng Community (NYC), the Lianyungang Community (LYGC), the Huai’an-Suqian Community (HSC), and the Xuzhou Community (XZC). The community spatial metaphors had four aspects. First, trans-prefectural linkages were formed through spatially integrated effects of metropolis regions. Second, some communities share the same boundaries with their prefecture level administrative units; this reveals that significant administrative regional economies still exist in contemporary Jiangsu. Third, several cities located in the marginal areas of prefectures and captured by the powerful center cities in neighboring prefectures have been absorbed into the communities of neighboring prefectures. Fourth, the two cities Jiangyin and Jingjiang, divided into different administrative districts, have switched status opposite city community divisions.

Waste collection in rural communities: challenges under EU regulations. A case study of Neamt County, Romania

The paper aims to examine the changes in the rural waste management sector at regional scale since the Romania adhesion to the EU in 2007. Traditional waste management based on the mixed waste collection and waste disposal often on improper sites prevailed in municipal waste management options of transitional economies across the globe. The lack of formal waste collection services in rural areas has encouraged the open dumping or backyard burning. The paper analyses the improvements and challenges of local authorities in order to fulfill the new EU requirements in this sector supported by data analysis at local administrative unit levels and field observations. Geographical analysis is compulsory in order to reveal the local disparities. The paper performs an assessment of waste collection issues across 78 rural municipalities within Neamt County. This sector is emerging in rural areas of Eastern Europe, but is far from an efficient municipal waste management system based on the waste hierarchy concept.

Population genetics of an alien whitefly in China: implications for its dispersal and invasion success

Invasive genotypes may be associated with their ability to access the invasion habitat. The whitefly, Bemisia tabaci Q, has been an important agricultural pest in China since 2008. In order to identify the invasion routes and to provide insight into its invasion success in China, we analyzed the composition, distribution, and genetic diversity of mitochondrial haplotypes of B. tabaci Q. Samples were obtained from 23 provincial level administrative units in 2011, and analyses conducted based on the mtCOI. Our results revealed five haplotypes (abbreviated as Q1H1-Q1H5) were present in the Q1 subclade based on 773-bp mtCOI fragment analysis. The diversity of haplotypes indicated the B. tabaci Q populations were derived from multiple invasion sources originating from the western Mediterranean region. Among the haplotypes, Q1H1 was dominant, followed by Q1H2. The whitefly populations were generally characterized by low levels of genetic diversity based on the 773-bp mtCOI fragment. Similar results were obtained when the 657-bp fragment was analyzed using the procedure in a previous report. Potential mechanisms contributing to the dominance of the Q1H1 in China are also discussed. These results will be helpful in revealing the mechanisms that enabled the successful invasion of B. tabaci Q into the country.

Fine scale mapping of malaria infection clusters by using routinely collected health facility data in urban Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

This study investigated whether passively collected routine health facility data can be used for mapping spatial heterogeneities in malaria transmission at the level of local government housing cluster administrative units in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. From June 2012 to January 2013, residential locations of patients tested for malaria at a public health facility were traced based on their local leaders' names and geo-referencing the point locations of these leaders' houses. Geographic information systems (GIS) were used to visualise the spatial distribution of malaria infection rates. Spatial scan statistics was deployed to detect spatial clustering of high infection rates. Among 2407 patients tested for malaria, 46.6% (1121) could be traced to their 411 different residential housing clusters. One small spatially aggregated cluster of neighbourhoods with high prevalence was identified. While the home residence housing cluster leader was unambiguously identified for 73.8% (240/325) of malaria-positive patients, only 42.3% (881/2082) of those with negative test results were successfully traced. It was concluded that recording simple points of reference during routine health facility visits can be used for mapping malaria infection burden on very fine geographic scales, potentially offering a feasible approach to rational geographic targeting of malaria control interventions. However, in order to tap the full potential of this approach, it would be necessary to optimise patient tracing success and eliminate biases by blinding personnel to test results.

A practical approach for scaling up the alternative strategy for the elimination of lymphatic filariasis in Loa loa endemic countries - developing an action plan

BackgroundLymphatic filariasis (LF) is a vector-borne parasitic disease that is being targeted for elimination through mass drug administration (MDA). The co-distribution of Loa loa in Central Africa poses a significant barrier to the expansion of the MDA due to risk of severe adverse events (SAEs) associated with the drug ivermectin that is routinely used. National LF programmes are yet to significantly scale up in co-endemic areas and need a practical approach to make preliminary decisions based on the mapping status and potential treatment strategies.MethodsWe reviewed relevant data available to WHO and in the literature for LF-L. loa endemic countries to develop a simple method to support the scale-up of MDA to eliminate LF.ResultsA basic model for national LF programmes to work from at the administrative or implementation unit (IU) level has been developed for LF – L. loa co-endemic countries. The model includes five practical steps, which comprise the development of a national filarial database and a simple classification system to help determine the mapping status and most appropriate treatment strategy. Steps are colour-coded and linked to a general decision tree, which is also presented.ConclusionsThis IU-level model is simple to follow and will help LF elimination programmes develop an action plan and scale up the implementation of alternative treatment strategies in L. loa co-endemic areas. The model could be further developed to incorporate the additional complexity of IUs where an intervention is required to eliminate onchocerciasis, particularly in hypo-endemic areas where ivermectin has not been used.

The Management of Koryǒ: Local Administration (Kunhyŏn), and Its Operation

During its five-hundred-year history the Koryŏ’s local administration (kunhyǒn) system experienced a gradual evolution. By 1018 through a series of reforms its major contours emerged. Local administrations were subdivided into capitals, greater prefectures, districts, prefectures, counties, and garrisons. However, within the local administration the most important division was between the control counties that received officials dispatched from the central government and the subordinate counties that did not. From the middle of Koryǒ the role of the circuit gradually became more important, as it functioned as a superior administrative unit and became fully institutionalized by the end of Koryǒ. Lower level administrative units within the local administration were the ch’on, li, and tong, but special administrative units were divided among the stations, townships, pugok, so, chang, ch’ŏ, ch’ang, chin, and to. As the kingdom met new challenges the number of control counties expanded so that by the end of Koryŏ there were over 500 control counties and the number of subordinate counties decreased. The Chosŏn local administration system consolidated its regional governance into 330 counties together with a circuit administration of 8 circuits.

The Management of Koryŏ: Local Administration (Kunhyŏn) and Its Operation

During its five-hundred-year history the Koryŏ's local administration (kunhyŏn) system experienced a gradual evolution. By 1018 through a series of reforms its major contours emerged. Local administrations were subdivided into capitals, greater prefectures, districts, prefectures, counties, and garrisons. However, within the local administration the most important division was between the control counties that received officials dispatched from the central government and the subordinate counties that did not. From the middle of Koryŏ the role of the circuit gradually became more important, as it functioned as a superior administrative unit and became fully institutionalized by the end of Koryŏ. Lower level administrative units within the local administration were the ch'on, li, and tong, but special administrative units were divided among the stations, townships, pugok, so, chang, ch'ŏ, ch'ang, chin, and to. As the kingdom met new challenges the number of control counties expanded so that by the end of Koryŏ there were over 500 control counties and the number of subordinate counties decreased. The Chosŏn local administration system consolidated its regional governance into 330 counties together with a circuit administration of 8 circuits.

Executive–Legislative Relations, Party Defections, and Lower Level Administrative Unit Proliferation: Evidence From Kenya

Over the past 25 years, there has been a dramatic increase in the number of subnational administrative units within developing countries. Existing literature argues that presidents create new units to deliver patronage to citizens. But proliferation at lower tiers of the state, that are too administratively distant from the president to credibly serve as patronage, does not follow this logic. We build from the premise that the creation of a new lower level unit comes with the appointment of a local administrator who develops a neopatrimonial relationship with the legislator whose constituency subsumes their jurisdiction. Presidents leverage this neopatrimonial relationship and create lower level units for copartisan legislators to ensure legislative support and prevent party defections. We find evidence supporting this argument using new data from Kenya. These findings illuminate how leaders can use administrative reform to undermine legislative checks against executive power.

Socioeconomic and infrastructural vulnerability indices for cyclones in the eastern coastal states of India

Numerous disasters over the past several years have revealed the differential impacts due to social structure, economic conditions and level of infrastructure. This study investigates the vulnerability of eastern coastal states of India from potential cyclones. In this regard, a method is proposed for quantifying the socio-economic and infrastructural vulnerability to potential cyclone in the districts of the eastern coastal states. The variables included in the study are extracted from Census of India (2011) at district level administrative unit. In the analysis, a large number of variables are reduced to a smaller number of factors by using factor analysis, specifically principal component analysis that represents the socioeconomic and infrastructural vulnerability to potential cyclone. Subsequently, the factor scores have been mapped for spatial analysis using Jenk’s natural break technique. Utilizing socioeconomic and infrastructural vulnerability indices, the highly vulnerable districts are demonstrated, which are expected to face substantial amount of challenges in coping with cyclones. The highly vulnerable districts require strategies to address the various aspects of socioeconomic and infrastructural vulnerability. The indices and maps produced in this paper could not only be incorporated for multi-level governance but also to integrate it with the real-time weather forecasts to identify the predictive areas of vulnerability.

The Impact of Socio-Economic Determinants on the Vaccination Rates with Rotavirus and Human Papiloma Virus Vaccine.

BackgroundSocio-economic inequalities may have an impact on the uptake of selfpaid vaccines. The aim of the study was to identify the effect of some socio economic determinants on vaccination rates with self-paid human papilloma virus (HPV) and rotavirus (RV) vaccines.MethodsVaccination coverage data, available in electronic database cepljenje.net (administered by the National Institute of Public Health), were collected at administrative unit level. The socio-economic determinants (the average gross pay in euros, the unemployment rate, the educational and households structure, the population density, the number of inhabitants, the number of children aged from 0 to 4, the number of women aged from 15 to 30) were extracted from Statistical Office of the Republic of Slovenia web page. The strength of the correlation between socioeconomic variables and self-paid HPV and RV vaccination rates was determined.ResultsRotavirus vaccination rates show a slight negative correlation with the number of residents per administrative unit (ρ=−0.29, p=0.04), and no correlation with other socio-economic variables. Likewise, no correlation has been found between HPV vaccination rates and the selected socio-economic variables.ConclusionEcological study did not reveal any correlations between socio economic variables and vaccination rates with RV and HPV self-paid vaccines on administrative unit level.

Управління у сфері фізичної культури і спорту на рівні адміністративно-територіальних одиниць: традиції і новації

Purpose: to analyze the activity of subjects of management in the sphere of physical culture and sport at the level of territorial administrative units. Material & Methods: the legal analysis of a feature of management in the sphere of physical culture and sport of administrative and territorial units of the various levels. Results: the main activities of administrative structures of the governmental authorities and the local governments are allocated. Conclusions: it is revealed that the sphere of physical culture and sport needs the improvement in the conditions of decentralization; offers on its reforming are considered.

Tourism, Basic Functionality Versus Complementary Component of the Territorial Systems in Romania

The tourism is nowadays an economic component that must be taken into account, a complementary sub-branch for the economic development of some territorial systems, especially of those with specific resources. The hypothesis of the study is to reveal how tourism functionality of a territory is a dominant or a complementary one. On the other hand it also shows the role of the tourism phenomena in shaping the basic functionality of some local economies. The methodology consists in a series of statistical analysis of data, for a period of 13 years (2000-2012), containing at administrative unit level and NACE code, evolution of the number of companies, particularly those operating in Tourism, the number of employees, turnover and profit. The results are represented by a series of statistical and cartographic detailed analysis, showing some correlation variations. For example: how the variation of the total profit is influenced by the variation of the turnover, of the number of companies and of number of employees. This are able to widely conclude the present contribution of the tourism sector in the local economy, to show if the economic functionality of a territorial systems belong to the tourism sector or there is also other economic activities that contribute to the complexity of the economic profile.

ENGLISH

Many of the current wireline networks are digitalized, In Japan, a synchronous digital hierarchy (SDH) system is installed in the public switched telephone network, and appliance data are transferred with a synchronous transfer module (STM). In this system to put together the advanced STM-16 using the CMOS technology in the technique. The STMs are constructed hierarchically with a nested structure. When commerce with the data for high-speed digital services, a nested level of four is required for each STM; that is, the lowest level of container, virtual container, administrative unit (AU), AU group, and STM. The VLSI has two kinds of I/O ports; one serial port operating at 2.5 Gb/s/pin and sixteen 8-b parallel ports operating at 19.5 Mb/s/pin. The high-speed port is connected to the set of connections side, while the lowspeed ports are connected to the fatal sides including tool switches.Using CMOS technique with STM-16 frame termination VLSI, the power utilization during the sampled by is 34 mW, and that for 2.5Gb/s operation is 1.2w at 25 °C.the proposed Gate Diffusion Technique(GDI) allows reducing power consumption, delay and area of digital circuits, while maintaining low difficulty of logic design.A multiplicity of logic gates have been implemented in 0.35 μm technology to compare the GDI technique with CMOS and PTL. A prototype test chip of STM-16 has been fabricated, based on GDI and CMOS cell libraries, showing up to 45% reduction in power-delay product in GDI.

Mapping wood production in European forests

Wood production is an important forest use, impacting a range of other ecosystem services. However, information on the spatial patterns in wood production is limited and often available only for larger administrative units. In this study, we developed high-resolution wood production maps for European forests. We collected wood production statistics for 29 European countries from 2000 to 2010, as well as comprehensive sets of biophysical and socioeconomic location factors. We used regression analyses to produce maps indicating the harvest likelihood on a 1×1km2 grid. These likelihood maps were validated using national forest inventory plot data. We then disaggregated wood production statistics from larger administrative units to the grid level using the harvest likelihood as weights. We verified the resulting wood production maps by correlating predicted and observed wood production at the level of smaller administrative units not used for generating the wood production maps. We conclude that (i) productivity, tree species composition and terrain ruggedness are the most important location factors that determine the spatial patterns of wood production at the pan-European scale and that (ii) incorporating these location factors substantially improves the results of disaggregating wood production statistics compared to a disaggregation based on forest cover only. Our wood production maps give insight into forest ecosystem service provisioning and can be used to improve the assessment of potentials and costs of woody biomass supply.

Characterizing European urban settlements from population data: a cartographic approach

ABSTRACTThe cartographic identification and characterization of urban settlements is problematic, particularly in varied areas or in large geographical extensions. This is due to the divergence between morphological area structures and data attribution, which is generally available at the level of administrative units. Most existing experiences focus on small regions or use indirect data, from which only indirect information can be derived. This paper proposes an identification of urban settlements in the European Union space, which combines urban population and shape through geographic information system (GIS) techniques. For that purpose, 1 km2 cells with associated population data are used. A procedure is developed establishing three different types of urban settlements, according to population and population density values: high-density urban clusters, small and medium-sized towns, and very small towns. A validation of this procedure is performed using direct survey from local experts in 10 selected study areas. The final results show that 78,307 urban settlements can be identified: 88.17% of them are classified as “very small towns,” 10.75% as “small and medium-sized towns,” and 1.08% as high-density urban clusters. This exercise generates new information for the European Union and surrounding countries, and yields the basis for further research. All GIS operations are performed using vector layers, which is not usual in large-area regional studies.

Space-time clustering analysis performance of an aggregated dataset: The case of wildfires in Portugal

This study focuses on the use of space–time permutation scan statistics (STPSS) to assess both the existence and the statistical significance of clusters on aggregated datasets. The investigated case study is represented from the Portuguese Rural Fire Database (PRFD) where the fire occurrences are georeferenced to an administrative unit level. The main goals are: (i) assessing the robustness of the STPSS to correctly detect clusters on aggregated datasets; (ii) testing the existence of space–time clustering in the PRFD; and (iii) characterizing the detected clusters. A synthetic database was designed to assess the potential bias introduced by aggregation of the data on the performance of the STPSS method. Results confirmed the ability of the STPSS to correctly identify clusters, regarding their number, location, and spatio-temporal dimensions and provided recommendations about the parameters setting of the scanning window. Finally, a discussion of the identified clusters on the PRFD is presented.

Incorporating spatial non-stationarity to improve dasymetric mapping of population

Population data are traditionally obtained through censuses and aggregated up to the level of administrative units for reasons of privacy. This way, however, detailed information on the spatial distribution of the population within these units is masked. Dasymetric mapping techniques were developed to disaggregate population to a finer spatial level using ancillary data. However, a frequently recurring problem in dasymetric mapping studies relates to the overestimation of low-population-density areas and the underestimation of high-population-density areas. To tackle this issue, this research proposes a novel dasymetric mapping approach explicitly dealing with spatial non-stationarity. For this purpose, a comparative model building framework was set up. The impact of spatial non-stationarity on model performance was investigated by comparing global (OLS), regional (rule-based) and local (geographically weighted) regression. Also, the impact of model complexity was considered through stepwise inclusion of information on address type and location, household size and demographic and residential characteristics in the dasymetric model. The approach was tested in the highly complex environment of the Flanders–Brussels region. It was found that the regional model that incorporates address type and household size information performs best and overcomes the structural over- and underestimation issue in dasymetric mapping.

Medijska percepcija prostornih identiteta: konstrukcija imaginativne karte dalmatinske unutrašnjosti

Koristeći odabrani informativni medij kao izvor podataka o percepciji prostora, u radu se istražuju imena korištena u svakodnevnoj komunikaciji za identitet pet područja dalmatinske unutrašnjosti: Zagoru, Bukovicu, Ravne kotare, Zabiokovlje i Neretvanski kraj. Analizom i pretragom arhive odabranoga medijskog izvora uz detaljno razrađen skup kriterija te izdvajanjem i prostornom klasifikacijom geografskih imena nastoje se prepoznati i definirati prostorni obuhvati percepcije pojedinih regija kao misaonih modela (koncept vernakularne regije). Dobivenim rezultatima za pet vernakularnih regija, standardiziranim na razini službenih upravnih jedinica, konstruira se imaginativna karta dalmatinskoga zaobalja kao odraz kolektivne predodžbe njihova prostornog obuhvata.