Incorporating social-ecological complexities into conservation policy

Research on tourism ecological safety evaluation of Huizhou Cultural and ecological reserve based on entropy -TOPSIS

Tourism ecological security is the basic guarantee for the sustainable development of tourist sites, Huizhou Cultural and Ecological Reserve is an important area for the im-plementation of ecological protection in China, and it is of great significance to carry out research on tourism ecological security. The study adopted the DPSIR model to construct a comprehensive evaluation index system for tourism ecological security and used entropy value-TOPSIS and ArcGIS software to analyze the inter-annual changes and spatial change characteristics of tourism ecological security in the study area. The results show that: firstly, the comprehensive index of tourism ecological safety in the study area from 2010 to 2021 shows a trend of "decreasing-increasing" and an overall increasing trend; secondly, all the sub-systems show an increasing or stabilizing state in recent years during 2010-2021; the state and response sub-systems show an increas-ing or stabilizing state in recent years; and the state and response sub-systems show an increasing trend in recent years. Secondly, all the subsystems showed an increase or stabilization in recent years between 2010 and 2021, and the state and response sub-systems are the main systems to improve the ecological safety of tourism in the study area; thirdly, the difference in the level of ecological safety of tourism in each county of the study area increased and then narrowed from 2010 to 2021, and the change of safety level usually shifted between neighboring levels, and the probability of transfer-ring across the levels was relatively small. , Shexian County, Yixian County, Qimen County, Tunxi District, and the tourism eco-safety level of Huangshan District, Hui-zhou District, Jixi County, and Xiuning County increased at a faster rate than other counties. The study further extends the scale to the district and county level, tries to explore the relevant factors affecting the ecological security of tourism, and proposes countermeasures for the sustainable development of the study area based on the re-sults, which will bring some reference value to the ecological governance and policy formulation of this kind of research.

Analysis of Agro Alternatives to Boost Cameroon’s Socio-Environmental Resilience, Sustainable Development, and Conservation of Native Forests

Located in Central Africa, Cameroon is a country with strong social inequalities and fragile governance and institutions. This has a direct impact on the sustainable development of its territory, communities, and native forest, which are subject to constant socio-environmental and economic pressures due to overexploitation. This research has three purposes: (1) to conduct a comparative theoretical/empirical diagnosis on the quality of Cameroon’s institutional framework, governance, and public policies related to territorial sustainability; (2) to assess the impact of the three clusters identified among the 44 stakeholders interviewed (forestry companies/certifiers; NGOs/communities; and banks/public institutions) on each other; and (3) to analyze the contribution of the use of cassava (Manihot esculenta) as an agro alternative to Cameroon’s socio-ecological resilience, sustainable development, and conservation of native forests. The research found: (1) the need for mixed governance with joint accountability to find equitable and lasting sustainable solutions for the parties involved, making communities/ethnic groups visible in the decision-making process; and (2) the agro use of cassava has a positive impact on socio-ecological resilience by contributing to employment, the protection of devastated soils, and the provision of quality food, and by reducing pollution from the cement industry through using cassava waste as an input.

Multiple social network influences can generate unexpected environmental outcomes

Understanding the function of social networks can make a critical contribution to achieving desirable environmental outcomes. Social-ecological systems are complex, adaptive systems in which environmental decision makers adapt to a changing social and ecological context. However, it remains unclear how multiple social influences interact with environmental feedbacks to generate environmental outcomes. Based on national-scale survey data and a social-ecological agent-based model in the context of voluntary private land conservation, our results suggest that social influences can operate synergistically or antagonistically, thereby enabling behaviors to spread by two or more mechanisms that amplify each other's effects. Furthermore, information through social networks may indirectly affect and respond to isolated individuals through environmental change. The interplay of social influences can, therefore, explain the success or failure of conservation outcomes emerging from collective behavior. To understand the capacity of social influence to generate environmental outcomes, social networks must not be seen as 'closed systems'; rather, the outcomes of environmental interventions depend on feedbacks between the environment and different components of the social system.