1. A perspective on the potential of using marine organic fertilizers for the sustainable management of coastal ecosystem servicesIraj Emadodin, Thorsten Reinsch, Ana Rotter, Martina Orlando-Bonaca, Friedhelm Taube, Jamileh Javidpour, 2020, review article Abstract: Agricultural production is predicted to double during the next century. To ensure food security in response to global population growth is a challenge and will require strategies that mitigate associated environmental damage in ways consistent with United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals. One possible approach is to utilize organic fertilizers from marine sources to improve soil structure by enhancing activities of soil organisms and restoring essential plant nutrients to the soil. Here we identify opportunities to develop organic fertilizers from two types of materials of marine origin: seagrass wrack and jellyfish biomass. Seagrass wrack often occurs as undesirable waste material on beaches. In many coastal areas around the world jellyfish bloom presents a nuisance because of negative impacts on marine ecosystem productivity. Several investigations have reported that organic fertilizers produced from seagrass and jellyfish could enhance coastal ecosystem services by reducing pollution, and by improving soil health and quality. Recent research indicates that seagrass litter improves soil water holding capacity and the nutritional value of crops; moreover, it can be used as multi-functional fertilizer, due to its content of valuable macro- and microelements. The application of jellyfish fertilizer increases soil contents of organic matter, nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium and enhances the growth and survival of seedlings significantly. In this overview we describe novel approaches regarding the utilization of seagrass and jellyfish as sources of fertilizer, and experimental studies on the influences of marine organic fertilizers on soil restoration, and implications for coastal management.
Keywords: seagrass, jellyfish, soil ecosystem, sustainable agriculture, soil fertility, blue economy
Published in DiRROS: 06.08.2024; Views: 168; Downloads: 83
 Full text (982,45 KB)
This document has many files! More... |
2. Characterization factors to assess land use impacts on pollinator abundance in life cycle assessmentElizabeth M. Alejandre, Laura Scherer, Jeroen B. Guinée, Marcelo A. Aizen, Matthias Albrecht, Mario V. Balzan, Ignasi Bartomeus, Danilo Bevk, 2023, original scientific article Abstract: While wild pollinators play a key role in global food production, their assessment is currently missing from the most commonly used environmental impact assessment method, Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). This is mainly due to constraints in data availability and compatibility with LCA inventories. To target this gap, relative pollinator abundance estimates were obtained with the use of a Delphi assessment, during which 25 experts, covering 16 nationalities and 45 countries of expertise, provided scores for low, typical, and high expected abundance associated with 24 land use categories. Based on these estimates, this study presents a set of globally generic characterization factors (CFs) that allows translating land use into relative impacts to wild pollinator abundance. The associated uncertainty of the CFs is presented along with an illustrative case to demonstrate the applicability in LCA studies. The CFs based on estimates that reached consensus during the Delphi assessment are recommended as readily applicable and allow key differences among land use types to be distinguished. The resulting CFs are proposed as the first step for incorporating pollinator impacts in LCA studies, exemplifying the use of expert elicitation methods as a useful tool to fill data gaps that constrain the characterization of key environmental impacts.
Keywords: pollinator abundance, ecosystem service, Delphi expert elicitation, agriculture, impact assessment
Published in DiRROS: 12.07.2024; Views: 154; Downloads: 136
Full text (3,85 MB)
This document has many files! More... |
3. Bio-solution for global sand crisis and sustainable organic agriculture in desert statesDarina Štyriaková, Iveta Štyriakova, Jaroslav Šuba, Felix Föhre, 2022, published scientific conference contribution Abstract: Sand is an important component of many everyday items, and currently sand is the second most extracted resource on earth after water, but it is not sustainable: we are running out of sand! The black market is booming, and the sand mafia is mining sand at any price. Desert sand is unusable, even Dubai must import it. The smooth surface and iron impurities prevent its industrial use. In this study, bacteria in the bioleaching test attacked the surface of the mineral grains and dissolved impurities including iron through organic acids. Furthermore, the liquid residue containing dissolved iron, organic acids and bacteria stimulated the growth plant what can be a valuable biofertilizer and biostimulant for organic agriculture. Desert states have fertility problems. Despite this, Qatar, for example, is aiming for self-sufficiency in vegetables “in five years”. Results showed that bioleaching combined with magnetic separation resulted in iron removal of 73.23%. The sand after treatment can be suitable to produce clear flat glass, coloured container glass, insulating glass fibres or ceramics. The integrated technology based ecological study revealed overall as utilization potential of the desert sand and the liquid residue could support glass and food production in desert states.
Keywords: materials, sand, bioleaching, sustainable organic agriculture, desert states
Published in DiRROS: 31.01.2024; Views: 393; Downloads: 237
Full text (443,33 KB)
This document has many files! More... |
4. Repository of drought event impacts across the danube catchment countries between 1981 and 2016 using publicly available sourcesJiří Jakubínský, Monika Bláhová, Lenka Bartošová, Klára Steinerová, Jan Balek, Petra Dížková, Daniela Semerádová, Daniel Alexandru, Galia Bardarska, Sabina Bokal, Gregor Gregorič, Gal Oblišar, Andreja Sušnik, 2019, original scientific article Abstract: Drought directly and indirectly affects human society in a number of ways. In many regions of the world climate change will exasperate the effects of droughts, affect national economies more intensely. The main aim of this article was to catalogue and analyze the drought impacts in the 11 Central and South Eastern European states located in the Danube river basin. The identification of dry episodes was based on information from publicly available sources, namely, newspaper and journal articles that reported drought impacts. Information on drought impact occurrences was classified into one of five defined categories in which the drought impact report was most clearly manifested (i.e., agriculture, forestry, soil systems, wildfires and hydrology). In terms of the spatial distribution of drought impacts, individual recorded events were analyzed at the level of EU NUTS regions (or their equivalent in non-EU countries). The analysis highlights country-specific vulnerability to drought. Furthermore, gradual increases in drought events and the number of reported impacts were identified, which was particularly evident in the agricultural sector.
Keywords: drought impact, Danube basin, agriculture, climate change, water stress
Published in DiRROS: 21.04.2022; Views: 1075; Downloads: 488
Full text (2,24 MB)
This document has many files! More... |
5. Farmers' preferences for result-based schemes for grassland conservation in SloveniaTanja Šumrada, Anže Japelj, Miroslav Verbič, Emil Erjavec, 2022, original scientific article Abstract: Government-funded payments for ecosystem services (PES) have increasingly been used to facilitate transactions between users of environmental services and their providers. In order to improve the link between payments and the service provided, some countries in the EU have promoted result-based schemes (RBS), which remunerate farmers for ecological results, as part of their agricultural policy. Since PES programs are voluntary, it is important to understand farmers’ responses before more large-scale implementations of RBS are initiated. Using a choice experiment and a mixed logit model, we elicited the preferences of farmers in two Natura 2000 sites in Slovenia for different design elements of a hypothetical scheme for dry grassland conservation. We found that the majority of farmers preferred the result-based approach over the management-based scheme both in terms of payment conditions and monitoring; one group of farmers preferred the RBS very strongly (average WTA of more than 500 EUR/ha/yr) and another group less strongly (average WTA about 200 EUR/ha/yr). Farmers also showed a higher preference for on-farm advise and training in small groups than for lectures, which would be offered to a larger audience. A collective bonus, which would incentivise coordination and could potentially increase participation rates in the scheme, significantly influenced the farmers’ willingness to adopt the scheme. However, the estimated average WTA was comparable or lower than the 40 EUR/ha annual bonus payment. Older farmers and those who managed small and semi-subsistent farms were significantly more likely to be highly resistant to scheme adoption no matter its design.
Keywords: agrarna politika, kmetijstvo, subvencije, ekosistemske storitve, plačilo za ekosistemske storitve, agricultural policy, agriculture, subsidies, payments for ecosystem services, abiodiversity conservation
Published in DiRROS: 04.02.2022; Views: 1063; Downloads: 765
Full text (2,14 MB)
This document has many files! More... |
