Rural Fields Research Articles

Inclusive, Responsive, Democratic Local Government Institution and Active Citizens

Reform in decentralization and village democratization can be seen in the involvement of villagers in the policy-making process, both in the economic, political and rural development fields. In the community planning process there is widespread (participatory) community involvement. The involvement of citizens in village development is one part of the development goals. Equality, justice, non-violence, tolerance, inclusiveness, transparency, accountability and responsiveness are principles that must be put forward in the village development planning process. The involvement of citizens in village development planning and budgeting aims to ensure and identify what should be the development priorities, policies, programs and activities that require budget or resources. By using a descriptive qualitative approach, this research is expected to be able to understand more deeply about inclusive and responsive democracy carried out by village government institutions and the involvement of villagers' participation. This is one of the first steps that should be taken by the village government in building democracy at the village level.

Enhanced Geographic Routing with Two-Hop Neighborhood Information in Sparse MANETs

The advance of wireless and mobile communications and networking technologies enables networked nodes to transmit and receive data in ad hoc manners without resorting to dedicated network infrastructures. When nodes arbitrarily move in a geographic area, they carry data and attempt to exchange data during encountering each other in one-hop or multi-hop transmission range. Such a basic data delivery model is practical in many emerging application environments, like disaster, military and rural fields, etc., which turns out to be the research of routing in sparse mobile ad hoc networks (MANET). In sparse MANETs with lower node population or node density relatively, the performance of data delivery is highly affected by communication voids that arise from unpredictable transmission failure while no neighbors exist in mutual transmission ranges. This paper proposes a new geographic routing scheme to deal with critical communication voids in sparse MANETs. The proposed scheme exploits the geographic location and two-hop neighborhood information, and then devises a forwarding node selection policy for determining appropriate relay candidates that move towards target nodes in a network. To this end, this geographic routing scheme is able to reduce transmission overhead and end-to-end delay against communication voids in infrastructure-less environments. In addition, this paper examines the proposed scheme using synthetic studies on a dedicated opportunistic networking simulator. Simulated results show that this scheme obtains considerable performance in terms of successful delivery ratio and transmission overhead under the random waypoint mobility models in synthetic contexts of sparse MANETs.

Rural settlement spatial patterns and effects: Road traffic accessibility and geographic factors in Guangdong Province, China

Based on land use classification data of remote sensing images, using kernel density, the minimal cumulative resistance model of road traffic accessibility, and a logistic regression model, the characteristics of the spatial pattern and the main factors influencing it were quantitatively examined in Guangdong Province from 1990 to 2013. The framework of the research concerning rural settlement evolution and its effect mechanisms were also discussed and generalized for the future. The results are as follows: (1) The spatial distribution of rural settlements showed spatial directivity of low altitude, low slope, and adjacent to rivers, as well as to villages and towns; thus a special pattern was formed, which was dense on the plains, sparse in mountainous areas, and included two core high density regions of rural settlements in the Chaoshan plain in the east and the Zhanjiang plain tableland region in the west. The spatial distribution of rural settlements was located along the rivers, valleys, and roads with traffic in the mountainous regions surrounding the Pearl River Delta region. (2) In addition to the spatial orientation of the open road, it was important to show that the accessibility of road traffic to the township has had the greatest influence on the spatial distribution of the rural settlements. The connected transport network between towns and villages is significant for rural transformation as a comprehensive increase in township production and service capacity will be the key to optimizing the town-village system in rural areas. (3) Elevation and slope were two basic but influential factors that have affected the distribution, scale, and form of rural settlements. The attributes of the physical geography are the first elements in optimizing village layout and planning spatial reconstruction. (4) In the current Internet and social media era, the reconstruction of market network system orders connects with the global market network system in rural areas. The rural life service circle will be constructed with the township at its core to explore the theory and practice of spatial reconstruction, including its production, life and ecology, and socio-cultural heritage and protection. It will also allow for exploration of the rural settlements’ evolution, rural spatial production, rural social networks, group behavior, social autonomy, and social and cultural fields, which will be the core focus of China’s rural spatial reconstruction research against a background of globalization.

Coupling analysis of landscape pattern and thermal fields after the afforestation in Beijing plain area

Under the positive human land use regulation (e.g. afforestation), understanding the impacts of landscape pattern changes on urban and rural thermal fields can provide reference data for future construction and optimization of urban afforestation projects and bring new insights for future landscape patterns and thermal fields environment related research. Under the context of "One Million Mu Plain Afforestation Project" in Beijing plain area, we applied remote sensing technology and geographic information system and used transfer-matrix method and coupling analysis to evaluate the impacts of plain afforestation on thermal field environment and to explore the correlation between changes in landscape patterns resulted from urban afforestation projects and urban land surface temperature. Our results showed that the percentage of landscape (PLAND) of forests and parks increased by 7.6% and 0.5% after the afforestation project in Beijing plain area, respectively. The heat island intensity decreased by 19.2% of entire plain area, and by 23.3% of suburban area, however, it increased by 23.5% of city area. Spanning urban to urban-rural interface, the PLAND of forests and parks, the mean patch size (MPS) of forests and wetlands were significantly negatively correlated with the changes in landscape surface temperature (LST). In city area, the area-weighted mean shape index (AWMSI) of forests was significantly positively correlated with the changes of LST. In suburban area, the MPS and AWMSI of forests showed significantly negative correlation with changes of LST, which was contrary to parks. After the implementation of afforestation project in Beijing plain area, the increased urban forests and urban parks had mitigated thermal fields to some extent. The scale of mitigation was limited and most areas with decreased heat island intensity were concentrated in newly planted sites in suburban area. The more connected the forests and wetlands, the better the relief of the thermal fields in the plain area. Impacted by the grain size, time, topography, human activities and other factors, the change in landscape patterns caused by the control of land use structure showed non-linear correlation with the change of LST.

Detection of toxoplasma-specific immunoglobulin G in human sera: performance comparison of in house Dot-ELISA with ECLIA and ELISA.

In the current study, performance of electrochemiluminescence immunoassay (ECLIA) in detection of anti-toxoplasma IgG in human sera was compared with that of enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Furthermore, performance of an in house Dot-ELISA in detection of anti-toxoplasma IgG was compared with that of ECLIA and ELISA. In total, 219 human sera were tested to detect anti-toxoplasma IgG using Dynex DS2® and Roche Cobas® e411 Automated Analyzers. Discordant results rechecked using immunofluorescence assay (IFA). Then, sera were used in an in house Dot-ELISA to assess toxoplasma-specific IgG. Of the 219 samples, two samples were found undetermined using ECLIA but reactive using ELISA. Using IFA, the two sera were reported unreactive. Furthermore, two samples were found reactive using ECLIA and unreactive using ELISA. These samples were reported reactive using IFA. The overall agreement for the two former methods was 98% (rZ0.98.1; P< 0.001). The intrinsic parameters calculated for in house Dot-ELISA included sensitivity of 79.5, specificity of 78.2, and accuracy of 78.9%, compared to ECLIA and ELISA. Positive and negative predictive values included 82.9 and 74.2%, respectively. A 100% sensitivity was found in in house Dot-ELISA for highly reactive sera in ECLIA and ELISA. ECLIA is appropriate for the first-line serological screening tests and can replace ELISA due to high speed, sensitivity, and specificity, particularly in large laboratories. Dot-ELISA is a rapid, sensitive, specific, cost-effective, user-friendly, and field-portable technique and hence can be used for screening toxoplasmosis, especially in rural fields or less equipped laboratories.

Microbiological Quality of Wheat Cultivated in Many Different Regions of Iraq

Microbiological quality (total plate count, yeast and molds, coliform, and E. coli ) of wheat cultivated in seven provinces of Iraqi were determined and compared to Standard Quality of Iraq (IQS) and to the standardization of Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The samples were collected from fields, and some samples taken from near of a street (reachable by people) and far of a street as well as rural fields. The regulation has two limits, which are good and acceptable limits, and the samples within the acceptable limit should be two samples of five. The results showed that all analyzed samples were within the acceptable limit that approved by IQS and FDA. There was one field exceed IQS regulation and there were several fields exceed the FDA regulations related to the number of samples within the good limit. The main reason for exceeding was total plate count (APC) followed by yeast and molds. Enhancing the microbiological quality of wheat cultivated in Iraq should be truly considered to be within IQS and FDA regulations.

Biodegradation of rice straw under anaerobic digestion

Abstract To mitigate environmental impacts caused by illegal burning of rice straw in rural fields, anaerobic digestion of rice straw could be an excellent alternative for the treatment of this sub-product of paddy rice harvest. The effect of inoculum/substrate ratio (I/S) on biogas yield and biodegradation of rice straw was carried out in batch reactor under room temperature (25° to 27 °C) and for 60 days of digestion. Results demonstrate a high biogas production (410 L/kgVS) at 0.8 of I/S ratio, with methane content over 70%. The modified Gompertz model was utilized to simulate the cumulative biogas yield from different I/S ratios. Degradation of volatile solids (VS), cellulose, hemicellulose, lignin, silica and cellular content indicated that rumen content is an efficient degrader for lignocellulosic material. This study provides useful parameters to evaluate the biogas production via anaerobic digestion of rice straw, as a promising alternative energy in rural areas.

Between Bare Life and Everyday Life: Spatializing Europe’s Migrant Camps

The migrant and refugee camps that proliferated in Europe over recent years reflect extreme, if not bipolar, architectural conditions. While fenced carceral camps with prefabricated units were created top-down by state and municipal authorities, informal makeshift camps of tents and self-made shelters were formed bottom-up along Europe’s migration routes. These contrasting spatial typologies often appear side by side in the open landscapes of rural fields, in urban landscapes at the heart or in the fringes of cities, and in the architectural landscapes of abandoned institutions and facilities such as factories, prisons, airports, and military barracks. The different ways in which camps are created, function, and are managed by multiple and changing actors and sovereignties, substantially influence the form of these spaces. So far, however, the radically different spatial typologies of the camp and the intersections between them have not been comparatively analysed. Based on empirical studies of the recently created migrant camps in Europe, this paper sets out to investigate their various configurations, what they reflect, and how they correspond with the culture and politics that shape them. While this paper mainly focuses on three particular camps in northern France – the container camp in Calais, the makeshift camp in Calais known as the “Jungle,” and La Linière camp in Grande-Synthe – it offers observations and analytical strategies relevant to camp spaces in other spaces and contexts and to camp studies more broadly.

In Memoriam: Steve Wing

In Memoriam: Steve Wing

Pharmaceutically-Made Men: Masculinities in Chad’s Emergent Oil Economy

This article explores masculinities and changes in men’s lives in the rural oil fields of Chad during the period of an oil and pipeline project described by the World Bank as a “model” for oil-as-development. In many parts of Africa, private sector investment is concentrated in the extractive industries, especially oil and gas projects. Africa’s emerging oil economies entail new institutional configurations, or what Michael Watts called an “oil complex,” that challenge antecedent norms and forms of identity. In this article, I describe the expectations, desires, and experiences of three distinct groups of men—those who found temporary employment on the project, those who continued to make a living from farming while contending with land expropriation, and those who migrated to oil field towns in search of work—to make three general points about the oil complex and masculinities in Chad. The structure of the global oil industry meant that local men who found jobs on the project could act as breadwinners and patriarchs, but only temporarily; local workers struggled post-employment with their exclusion from the possibilities associated with the project. Men who never found jobs continued to eke out a living from the land, but state-of-the-art policies governing land expropriation led simultaneously to conflict in families and greater economic interdependence among family members. Finally, in the low-media environment of the oil field region, ideas and images about sex, sexuality, and love emanating from the transient and hyper-masculine global oil industry workforce served as models for landless young men who migrated to oil field towns and who, in the absence of work, sought to transform themselves into objects of desire through the mediation of pharmaceuticals.

The impact of abandoned/disused marble quarries on avifauna in the anticline of Estremoz, Portugal: does quarrying add to landscape biodiversity?

Although the extractive operations of quarrying are often considered environmental threats, there is some evidence that abandoned quarries may have a significant positive impact on biodiversity by enhancing habitat quality for several species. In Estremoz Anticlinal, SE Portugal, many of the existing marble quarries have been inactive for decades and were abandoned without any restoration project in progress. The impact of quarry abandonment on avifauna diversity was assessed relative to reference conditions using adjacent rural fields as control areas. No significant differences were found in within-community diversity (alpha diversity) between abandoned quarries and reference sites. However, several dissimilarity indices showed a clear divergence in species composition between abandoned quarries and reference sites. Furthermore, statistically significant differences in species compositions were found between quarries abandoned for different periods. Over time, species composition becomes more similar to that observed in reference sites, reflecting ecological succession and landscape resilience to quarrying. Nevertheless, the studied quarrying landscape exhibited higher gamma and beta diversity than the former traditional landscape; thus, our results suggest that abandoned quarries, rather than damaging and destroying niches, can promote new ecological niches and significantly diversify rural landscapes.

Effects of Religious Tourists on Rural Development of Rural Settlements from the Perspective (Case Study: Nodeh-e-Enghelab Village in Khushab County)

Purpose: Religious beliefs of the distant past, had a major role in the establishment and development of human settlements. In order to earn religious tourism and the preservation of cultural heritage is taken into consideration. This paper attempts to influence of presence of religious tourists on the development of rural settlements must be examined from the perspective of the villagers. Methodology: Research methods in this study, the target application and the method is analytical. The research community, including the f households of the Novdeh-e-Enghelab Village, shoots the census of 2011, with 1050 households and 3469 people are, Cochran formula required sample size was 165 households. Finding: Presence of religious tourists in rural areas in the field of social and cultural were most affected by the development of rural settlement has left out 3.4. In addition, Friedman test statistic shows that this index is 3.24 for the villager's highest priority. Research limitation: One of the main challenges in this study is to access the information of religious tourists. Practical implications: Based on the findings, suggestions and advertising tourist attractions include Shrine of Ibrahim (AS), the provision of space for parking and accommodations, in compliance with the Privacy religious monument wall of green space, coordination of services in the field of tourism organizations, etc. have been proposed. Original/value: This study is important in the sense that possible to detect traces of religious tourism, rural development fields provided.

Concentrations and origins of nitro-polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and oxy-polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in ambient air in urban and rural areas in northern China

Twelve nitro-PAHs (nPAHs) and four oxy-PAHs (oPAHs) were measured in air samples for 12 months at 18 sites in urban settings, rural villages, or rural fields in northern China. The nPAH concentrations were higher in urban areas (1.3 ± 1.3 ng/m3), and nPAH/parent PAH ratios were higher (suggesting important contributions from motor vehicles and secondary formation) in urban sites than in rural villages. oPAHs are primarily emitted from solid fuel combustion and motor vehicles, and similar oPAH concentrations were found in urban areas (23 ± 20 ng/m3) and rural villages (29 ± 24 ng/m3). The high numbers of motor vehicles in Beijing and intensive industrial activity in Taiyuan and Dezhou caused higher nPAH concentrations. No spatial trend in oPAH concentrations was found in the rural villages, because similar oPAH mixtures are emitted from solild fuel combustion. The nPAH and oPAH concentrations were higher in the winter, and correlated with residential energy consumption and precipitation.

Migrant by josé Manuel Mateo (review)

Reviewed by: Migrant by josé Manuel Mateo Thaddeus Andracki Mateo, José Manuel. Migrant; illus. by Javier Martínez Pedro; tr. from the Spanish by Emmy Smith Ready. Abrams, 2014. 22p ISBN 978-1-4197-0957-9 $17.95 R Gr. 5-8. Recently arrived in Los Angeles, a nameless young narrator recounts the journey of his or her family from their life working on privately owned ejido land in Mexico to hopping a freight train bound for the U.S. and hiding from the “men who looked like the police.” The story of undocumented migration is told in an easygoing but insistent voice, reflecting a child’s-eye view of leaving home for a bewildering new one. The draw here will be the book’s format: a single, black and white, Aztec-inspired ink illustration on amate paper, in an accordion-folded codex. The intricate image unfolds slowly, pulling the reader along from rural fields to the streets of L.A., and makes a breathtaking feast for eyes to carefully examine in full when opened completely. The smallness of the hundreds of individuals in the whole spread effectively conveys the helplessness of children caught in transnational flows, even as the narrator’s strong voice conveys migrant children’s agency, ordinariness, and love of play. Curricular uses here abound: beyond a brief examination of the causes and effects of North American migration (facilitated by a factual authors’ note and perhaps a pairing with Tonatiuh’s Pancho Rabbit and the Coyote, BCCB 7/8/13), this would also be an interesting component to add to an examination of the book as a physical object. [End Page 584] Copyright © 2014 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Atmospheric polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in rural and urban areas of northern China

Air pollution in rural China has often been ignored, especially for the less developed west China. Atmospheric polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) were measured monthly at 11 rural sites (5 rural villages and 6 rural fields) together with 7 urban stations in northern China between April 2010 and March 2011. PAH concentrations at rural village sites were similar to those in urban areas and significantly higher than those in rural fields, indicating severe contamination in rural villages. PAH concentrations in the west were similar to those in the more developed North China Plain, and higher than those along the coast. Such a geographical distribution is mainly caused by the differences in residential energy consumption and meteorological conditions, which can explain approximately 48% of the total variation in PAH concentrations. With heavy dependence on biofuel combustion for heating, seasonality in rural areas is more profound than that in urban areas.

Real-time landing place assessment in man-made environments

We propose a novel approach to the real-time landing site detection and assessment in unconstrained man-made environments using passive sensors. Because this task must be performed in a few seconds or less, existing methods are often limited to simple local intensity and edge variation cues. By contrast, we show how to efficiently take into account the potential sites’ global shape, which is a critical cue in man-made scenes. Our method relies on a new segmentation algorithm and shape regularity measure to look for polygonal regions in video sequences. In this way, we enforce both temporal consistency and geometric regularity, resulting in very reliable and consistent detections. We demonstrate our approach for the detection of landable sites such as rural fields, building rooftops and runways from color and infrared monocular sequences significantly outperforming the state-of-the-art.

Diversity and community structure of dung beetles (Coleoptera: Scarabaeinae) associated with semi-urban fragmented agricultural land in the Malabar coast in southern India

An evaluation of the diversity and community structure of dung beetles associated with semiurban agricultural land in the Malabar coast of southern India revealed that urbanization has led to decreased diversity compared to regional forests, and has affected the community status of dung beetles. However, contrary to expectations, species richness was observed to be equivalent to rural agricultural fields in the region. Low abundance of prominent agricultural habitat species indicates that the study area has changed as a result of habitat modification/urbanization, and the prevailing conditions are not ideal for the establishment of the most common species in agriculture belts. Prominence of two less common species, Tiniocellus spinipes and Caccobius vulcanus, indicates these generalist urban adaptable (synanthropic) species have become increasingly widespread and locally abundant. The low abundance of tunnelers and rollers is attributed to fragmentation of the urban agricultural belt, low mammalian diversity and dung availability, and the hard nature of the laterite soil in the Malabar coast region.

The Assessment of Three Straw Utilization Project of Rural Energy

As a large agricultural country, China ranks first in the world of the output of crop residues. However, due to the decreasing requirement of rural living energy usage for straw, the surplus of straw is extremely severely in rural area. Recently, the central government encouraged greatly the straw utilization, and the large-scale straw utilization is the main content of the rural energy now. As for three modes of large-scale straw utilization in rural energy fields such as: straw gasification, straw biogas and straw molding fuel (solidification/carbonization), these modes are planned to be compared, analyzed and evaluated in this paper to capably provide selection reference for large-scale utilization of straw and boost the development of straw resource utilization in rural China.

Potential Health Effects Related to Pesticide Use on Athletic Fields

Children come in contact with athletic fields on a daily basis. How these fields are maintained may have an impact on children's potential exposure to pesticides and associated health effects. This is a cross-sectional, descriptive study that utilized a survey to assess playing field maintenance practices regarding the use of pesticides. Athletic fields (N=101) in Maryland were stratified by population density and randomly selected. A survey was administered to field managers (n=33) to assess maintenance practices, including the use of pesticides. Analysis included descriptive statistics and generalized estimating equations. Managers of 66 fields (65.3%) reported applying pesticides, mainly herbicides (57.4%). Managers of urban and suburban fields were less likely to apply pesticides than managers of rural fields. Combined cultivation practice was also a significant predictor of increased pesticide use. The use of pesticides on athletic fields presents many possible health hazards. Results indicate that there is a significant risk of exposure to pesticide for children engaged in sports activities. Given that children are also often concurrently exposed to pesticides as food residues and from home pest management, we need to examine opportunities to reduce their exposures. Both policy and practice questions are raised.

The synchronized electromagnetic impulsive source

Land seismic acquisition can be challenging, even in the best conditions and terrains. When the terrain changes from rural fields to industrial, urban, or environmentally sensitive areas, the challenges become more significant. A major factor that influences the difficulty and cost of seismic acquisition is the seismic source.