Rimjhim M. Aggarwal

A support vector machine to identify irrigated crop types using time-series Landsat NDVI data

Abstract Site-specific information of crop types is required for many agro-environmental assessments. The study investigated the potential of support vector machines (SVMs) in discriminating various crop types in a complex cropping system in the Phoenix Active Management Area. We applied SVMs to Landsat time-series Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) data using training datasets selected by two different approaches: stratified random approach and intelligent selection approach using local knowledge. The SVM models effectively classified nine major crop types with overall accuracies of >86% for both training datasets. Our results showed that the intelligent selection approach was able to reduce the training set size and achieved higher overall classification accuracy than the stratified random approach. The intelligent selection approach is particularly useful when the availability of reference data is limited and unbalanced among different classes. The study demonstrated the potential of utilizing multi-temporal Landsat imagery to systematically monitor crop types and cropping patterns over time in arid and semi-arid regions.

Possibilities and Limitations to Cooperation in Small Groups: The Case of Group-Owned Wells in Southern India

This study examines the incidence of collective action for a range of activities associated with the use and management of group-owned wells in India. We find that while activities such as everyday allocation of water and routine maintenance are managed well by almost all sample groups, group members prefer to undertake large-scale investments individually in spite of the advantages of pooling capital and sharing risks. The paper attempts to explain why this is so by looking at the transaction costs associated with these activities. By distinguishing between different activities, the study provides sharper insights into the workings of informal mechanisms of cooperation.

Access to natural resources and the fertility decision of women: the case of South Africa

Previous studies have examined the impact of an exogenous increase in population on the local resource base. In some recent theoretical work it has been proposed that resource scarcity, in turn, may affect fertility, and hence population growth rates. However, the sign and magnitude of this effect remains an open empirical question. In this paper we examine the impact of fuelwood and water scarcity on fertility rates using household data from rural South Africa. An individual choice model of fertility is estimated in which resource scarcity affects the demand for children through its effect on child mortality and productivity of children as resource collectors. Several alternative measures of resource scarcity are used, such as average distance traveled and time per trip for collecting water and fuelwood. We find wood scarcity to have a positive and significant effect on fertility. The effect of water scarcity is also positive, but not significant in general.

Does Inequality Lead to Greater Efficiency in the Use of Local Commons? The Role of Strategic Investments in Capacity

This paper examines the impact of inequality in access to credit on efficiency in extraction from a common resource. A dynamic model is developed, where agents strategically choose the level of sunk capacity and the consequent extraction path. Sunk capacity is a function of cost of credit and serves as a commitment device to deter entry or force exit. Contrary to previous studies based on static settings, our results show that greater inequality does not necessarily lead to greater efficiency in extraction. In particular, we show that under moderate inequality, the resource stock is lower than that under perfect equality.

The Impact of Subregional Variations in Urban Sprawl on the Prevalence of Obesity and Related Morbidity

This article examines the relationship between urban sprawl and health using a new methodological approach that accounts for the subregional variation in the different attributes of sprawl in metropolitan regions. We have developed several indicators of sprawl at the neighborhood level, including compactness, land use mix, automobile dependency, transportation connectivity, and walkability. We then use multinomial logistic models to estimate the contribution of these characteristics to the formation of high- and low-disease-prevalence clusters. Results indicate the significant role of walkability, percentage open space, and commute burden in explaining the prevalence of obesity and related diseases.

Cognitive and institutional influences on farmers’ adaptive capacity: insights into barriers and opportunities for transformative change in central Arizona

The prospect of unprecedented environmental change, combined with increasing demand on limited resources, demands adaptive responses at multiple levels. In this article, we analyze different attributes of farm-level capacity in central Arizona, USA, in relation to farmers’ responses to recent dynamism in commodity and land markets, and the institutional and social contexts of farmers’ water and production portfolios. Irrigated agriculture is at the heart of the history and identity of the American Southwest, although the future of agriculture is now threatened by the prospect of “mega-droughts,” urbanization and associated inter-sector and inter-state competition over water in an era of climatic change. We use farm-level survey data, supplemented by in-depth interviews, to explore the cross-level dimensions of capacity in the agriculture–urban nexus of central Arizona. The surveyed farmers demonstrate an interest in learning, capacity for adaptive management and risk-taking attitudes consistent with emerging theory of capacity for land use and livelihood transformation. However, many respondents perceive their self-efficacy in the face of future climatic and hydrological change as uncertain. Our study suggests that the components of transformational capacity will necessarily need to go beyond the objective resources and cognitive capacities of individuals to incorporate “linking” capacities: the political and social attributes necessary for collective strategy formation to shape choice and opportunity in the future.

Strategic Bundling of Development Policies with Adaptation: An Examination of Delhi's Climate Change Action Plan

A growing number of cities in the global South are taking proactive action on climate change. Their plans provide insights into the potential for strategically bundling long-term development policymaking with the climate agenda. In this article I study the case of Delhi, the first city in India to adopt a climate change action plan. Drawing on the literature on urban ecological security, I examine: (1) the adaptation challenges that Delhi faces; (2) the multiple motivations that underlie early action; (3) the key actors, strategies, and associated action domains outlined in the plan; and (4) the extent to which the plan seeks to bring about systemic change. Proactive action at the city level serves multiple strategic goals. Delhis case is significant in illustrating how it has leveraged emergent opportunities to advance its short-term development agenda, given the tight fiscal constraints and governance challenges it faces. The plan has been strategically formulated to enhance competiveness, facilitate image-building, garner support for pet projects and access alternative sources of funding. But the short-term orientation of the plan and its limited mechanisms for citizen engagement have severely restrained its capacity to address underlying social vulnerabilities or bring about transformative change.

Awareness and quality of knowledge regarding HIV/AIDS among women in India

Abstract This paper examines the determinants of womens knowledge regarding HIV/AIDS using data from a nationally representative survey in India. Although around 45 per cent of sample women had heard about the disease, their knowledge regarding its modes of transmission and prevention is found to be limited. To explore the possibility that there may be a different process that determines awareness as opposed to quality of knowledge regarding HIV/AIDS, a negative binomial hurdle model and a two-stage ordered probit model are estimated. The results show that the effect of several covariates, such as education and mass media, on awareness is different from their effect on quality of knowledge.

Test of Our Progress: The Translation of Economic and Social Rights Norms Into Practice

The application of the language of “rights” to the economic and social conditions of the worlds impoverished populations has gained a great deal of momentum in recent years. Yet, given the continuing pervasiveness of basic deprivations for the worlds poor, there is a pressing need to examine precisely how economic and social rights norms (as reflected in international treaties and other multilateral documents) are translated into practices. This article seeks to synthesize the theoretical literature on economic and social rights (ESR) and to examine the variety of legal, institutional, and political mechanisms that facilitate their realization. We utilize legal, anthropological, and sociological theory to identify institutional and cultural factors that affect norm translation, as well as adaptive, processual, and emergent dynamics that may alter outcomes. In moving from theory to method, we conceptualize a number of factors that contribute to rights realization, operationalize them by describing how translation mechanisms of each might manifest in real-world settings where rights are at stake and compile a list of questions and indicators that can be used to measure them. We hope this overview will assist in expanding and enriching human rights theory, facilitate the empirical study of economic justice and thereby contribute to efforts for making economic and social rights a reality.

Effect of infrastructure design on commons dilemmas in social−ecological system dynamics

Significance Recent years have witnessed an explosion of interdisciplinary research on social−ecological systems (SESs), which has typically viewed SESs as self-organized systems. This view, however, may be incomplete in that many modern SESs are in fact part designed and part self-organized, i.e., the coupled processes in most SESs are mediated by consciously designed infrastructure. We examined how design features of infrastructure shape the long-term dynamics of SESs, using a model of an irrigation system (an exemplary case of a partly designed SES). We show that two design features common to many SESs—the structure of benefit flows and the scale of effort needed to maintain infrastructure—can induce fundamental changes in qualitative behavior as well as altered robustness characteristics. The use of shared infrastructure to direct natural processes for the benefit of humans has been a central feature of human social organization for millennia. Today, more than ever, people interact with one another and the environment through shared human-made infrastructure (the Internet, transportation, the energy grid, etc.). However, there has been relatively little work on how the design characteristics of shared infrastructure affect the dynamics of social−ecological systems (SESs) and the capacity of groups to solve social dilemmas associated with its provision. Developing such understanding is especially important in the context of global change where design criteria must consider how specific aspects of infrastructure affect the capacity of SESs to maintain vital functions in the face of shocks. Using small-scale irrigated agriculture (the most ancient and ubiquitous example of public infrastructure systems) as a model system, we show that two design features related to scale and the structure of benefit flows can induce fundamental changes in qualitative behavior, i.e., regime shifts. By relating the required maintenance threshold (a design feature related to infrastructure scale) to the incentives facing users under different regimes, our work also provides some general guidance on determinants of robustness of SESs under globalization-related stresses.