Promoting Biodiversity in Food Systems


Book Description

Biodiversity of the food system is crucial for food production and loss of biodiversity is a pressing issue. This book focuses on biodiversity’s crucial role in food systems, health and well-being, and fate of the natural environment. It provides practical recommendations on how proper food systems can sustain a healthier planet and protect biodiversity. Sections provide a comprehensive understanding of the urgent need for promoting biodiversity-promoting food systems that help maintain planetary boundaries that are at risk; mimic the natural processes of highly integrated ecosystems; and improve human/planetary health while providing a wholesome and sufficient food supply.







Sustaining Places


Book Description

Planning for sustainability is the defining challenge of the 21st century. More than any other single endeavor, it confronts the critical perils to our future, from energy shortages and environmental stress to climate shifts and population surges. That's the argument of a forward-looking new report from the American Planning Association. In plain language, authors David R. Godschalk, FAICP, and William R. Anderson, FAICP, show how cities, towns, and regions can work together to meet the challenge. These leading planners put forward eight principles for developing comprehensive plans that address today's needs without compromising the needs of the next generation. Case studies demonstrate sustainability planning at work in cities including Seattle and San Diego and smaller communities like Keene, New Hampshire, and Union County, Pennsylvania. Sustaining Places gives planners, local officials, and involved citizens a practical framework for understanding today's concerns and a roadmap for moving toward a better future. The report culminates the American Planning Association's multiyear, multifaceted Sustaining Places Initiative.







Spatial Planning and Fiscal Impact Analysis


Book Description

The Spatial Fiscal Impact Analysis Method is an innovative approach to measure fiscal impact and project the future costs of a proposed development, recognizing that all revenues and expenditures are spatially related. The Spatial Method focuses on estimating existing fiscal impacts of detailed land use categories by their location. It takes advantage of readily available data that reflect the flows of revenues and expenditures in a city, using the tools of Geographic Information Systems (GIS). The result is a comprehensive yet transparent database for measuring existing fiscal impacts and projecting the impacts of future development or redevelopment. This book will provide readers with guidance as to how to conduct the Spatial Method in their own cities. The book will provide an overview of the history of fiscal analysis, and demonstrate the advantages of the Spatial Method to other methods, taking the reader step by step through the process, from analyzing city financial reports, determining and developing the factors that are needed to model the flows of revenues and expenditures, and then estimating fiscal impact at the parcel level. The result is a summary of detailed land use categories and neighborhoods that will be invaluable to city planners and public administration officials everywhere.