New Studies on Former and Recent Landscape Changes in Africa
New Studies on Former and Recent Landscape Changes in Africa

Author: Juergen Runge

Publisher: CRC Press

Published: 2013-11-15

Total Pages: 240

ISBN-13: 1138001163

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Volume 32 (2013) of the internationally recognized and acclaimed yearbook series ‘Palaeoecology of Africa’ publishes 9 new interdisciplinary scientific papers on former and recent landscape evolution and on past environments of the African continent (e.g. climate change, vegetation dynamics and growing impact of humans on ecosystems). These papers expand horizons and interconnections to various types and methodologies of research on environmental dynamics from the Pliocene up to the present: review articles and regional case studies cover Nigeria, Cameroon, selected areas of the Congo basin, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia and South Africa. This volume also gives space to researchers from Africa to present their findings to a wider international audience. Today, by growing awareness of the worldwide impact of Global Change, it has become obvious that aside of the northern and southern hemisphere Polar region also the environmental setting in Africa was subject to considerable changes over time. Natural shifts in climate at least since the Pliocene have caused repeated and strong modification in the area dynamics of ecosystems located in lower latitudes. By a variety of so-called ‘proxies’ – researched and applied by the different authors from numerous disciplines – an attempt is made to reconstruct the evolution of landscapes over space and time. Besides such spatio-temporal oscillations in forested and savanna areas of Africa this volume of ‘Palaeoecology of Africa’ also focuses on possible relationships between environmental change and human impact, also on the perception of this phenomenon of recent ‘climate changes’ by different stakeholders. This book will be of interest to all concerned with low latitudes ecosystem changes and their respective interpretation in the framework of natural climate and vegetation change evidenced by a variety of methods that allow us to read and learn from ‘proxy data’ archives. Archaeologists, Palynologists, Palaeobotanist, Geographers, Geologists and Geomorphologists will find this edition equally useful for their work.

Plants and People in the African Past
Plants and People in the African Past

Author: Anna Maria Mercuri

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2018-07-31

Total Pages: 577

ISBN-13: 3319898396

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There is an essential connection between humans and plants, cultures and environments, and this is especially evident looking at the long history of the African continent. This book, comprising current research in archaeobotany on Africa, elucidates human adaptation and innovation with respect to the exploitation of plant resources. In the long-term perspective climatic changes of the environment as well as human impact have posed constant challenges to the interaction between peoples and the plants growing in different countries and latitudes. This book provides an insight into/overview of the manifold routes people have taken in various parts Africa in order to make a decent living from the provisions of their environment by bringing together the analyses of macroscopic and microscopic plant remains with ethnographic, botanical, geographical and linguistic research. The numerous chapters cover almost all the continent countries, and were prepared by most of the scholars who study African archaeobotany, i.e. the complex and composite history of plant uses and environmental transformations during the Holocene.

Carbon Conflicts and Forest Landscapes in Africa
Carbon Conflicts and Forest Landscapes in Africa

Author: Melissa Leach

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2015-06-05

Total Pages: 251

ISBN-13: 1317579984

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Amidst the pressing challenges of global climate change, the last decade has seen a wave of forest carbon projects across the world, designed to conserve and enhance forest carbon stocks in order to reduce carbon emissions from deforestation and offset emissions elsewhere. Exploring a set of new empirical case studies, Carbon Conflicts and Forest Landscapes in Africa examines how these projects are unfolding, their effects, and who is gaining and losing. Situating forest carbon approaches as part of more general moves to address environmental problems by attaching market values to nature and ecosystems, it examines how new projects interact with forest landscapes and their longer histories of intervention. The book asks: what difference does carbon make? What political and ecological dynamics are unleashed by these new commodified, marketized approaches, and how are local forest users experiencing and responding to them? The book’s case studies cover a wide range of African ecologies, project types and national political-economic contexts. By examining these cases in a comparative framework and within an understanding of the national, regional and global institutional arrangements shaping forest carbon commoditisation, the book provides a rich and compelling account of how and why carbon conflicts are emerging, and how they might be avoided in future. This book will be of interest to students of development studies, environmental sciences, geography, economics, development studies and anthropology, as well as practitioners and policy makers.

Misreading the African Landscape
Misreading the African Landscape

Author: James Fairhead

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1996-10-17

Total Pages: 392

ISBN-13: 9780521564991

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An intriguing 1996 study showing how Africans enrich their land, while scientists believe they damage it.

Southern African Landscapes and Environmental Change
Southern African Landscapes and Environmental Change

Author: Peter J. Holmes

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2018-07-04

Total Pages: 336

ISBN-13: 1134972393

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This volume provides a textbook and reference work on the physical and biotic landscapes of Southern Africa. It examines the links between these environments and the ways in which they have been, are and will likely be subject to change. It covers the geomorphology, soils, vegetation and land use across a range of landscapes, including mountains, coasts, savannah, drylands and wetlands, and identifies the impacts of current and potential climate change and other factors on these environments. The geographical focus is on the region defined by Namibia, South Africa, Botswana, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Lesotho and Swaziland. Illustrated throughout in full colour, the book will serve as a reference volume for researchers and environmental professionals internationally, as well as a textbook for senior undergraduate and graduate-level students of geography, ecology and environmental studies in Southern Africa.

Livelihood and Landscape Change in Africa: Future Trajectories for Improved Well-Being under a Changing Climate
Livelihood and Landscape Change in Africa: Future Trajectories for Improved Well-Being under a Changing Climate

Author: Sheona Shackleton

Publisher: MDPI

Published: 2019-10-08

Total Pages: 246

ISBN-13: 3039214691

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This book is based on a Special Issue of the journal LAND that draws together a collection of 11 diverse articles at the nexus of climate change, landscapes, and livelihoods in rural Africa; all explore the links between livelihood and landscape change, including shifts in farming practices and natural resource use and management. The articles, which are all place-based case studies across nine African countries, cover three not necessarily mutually exclusive thematic areas, namely: smallholder farming livelihoods under new climate risk (five articles); long-term dynamics of livelihoods and landscape change and future trajectories (two articles); and natural resource management and governance under a changing climate, spanning forests, woodlands, and rangelands (four articles). The commonalities, key messages, and research gaps across the 11 articles are presented in a synthesis article. All the case studies pointed to the need for an integrated and in-depth understanding of the multiple drivers of landscape and livelihood change and how these interact with local histories, knowledge systems, cultures, complexities, and lived realities. Moreover, where there are interventions (such as new governance systems, REDD+ or climate smart agriculture), it is critical to interrogate what is required to ensure a fair and equitable distribution of emerging benefits.

The Geography of South Africa
The Geography of South Africa

Author: Jasper Knight

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2018-10-03

Total Pages: 317

ISBN-13: 3319949748

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This edited collection examines contemporary directions in geographical research on South Africa. It encompasses a cross section of selected themes of critical importance not only to the discipline of Geography in South Africa, but also of relevance to other areas of the Global South. All chapters are original contributions, providing a state of the art research baseline on key themes in physical, human and environmental geography, and in understanding the changing geographical landscapes of modern South Africa. These contributions set the scene for an understanding of the relationships between modern South Africa and the wider contemporary world, including issues of sustainable development and growth in the Global South.

Land Change Science, Political Ecology, and Sustainability
Land Change Science, Political Ecology, and Sustainability

Author: Christian Brannstrom

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2014-01-23

Total Pages: 288

ISBN-13: 1136262059

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Recent claims regarding convergence and divergence between land change science and political ecology as approaches to the study of human-environment relationships and sustainability science are examined and analyzed in this innovative volume. Comprised of 11 commissioned chapters as well as introductory and concluding/synthesis chapters, it advances the two fields by proposing new conceptual and methodological approaches toward integrating land change science and political ecology. The book also identifies areas of fundamental difference and disagreement between fields. These theoretical contributions will help a generation of young researchers refine their research approaches and will advance a debate among established scholars in geography, land-use studies, and sustainability science that has been developing since the early 2000s. At an empirical level, case studies focusing on sustainable development are included from Africa, Central and South America, and Southeast Asia. The specific topics addressed include tropical deforestation, swidden agriculture, mangrove forests, gender, and household issues.

The African Neogene - Climate, Environments and People
The African Neogene - Climate, Environments and People

Author: Jürgen Runge

Publisher: CRC Press

Published: 2017-10-12

Total Pages: 410

ISBN-13: 1351666398

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During the Neogene – covering the last 23 Million years – the evolution of the environmental setting in Africa was subject to considerable changes. Natural shifts, slow and rapid, evidenced by modifications in palaeogeography, geodynamics, climate, and vegetation have caused repeated and strong changes of ecosystems in the lower latitudes. Using a variety of proxy data – researched and applied by many authors from numerous disciplines – an attempt is made to reconstruct African landscapes over space and time. Besides such spatio-temporal oscillations in recently humid, semi-humid, and dry areas of Africa, this volume of Palaeoecology of Africa (PoA) focuses on long term interrelationships between ecosystem dynamics and climate change, not ignoring the ever growing and ongoing influence of humans on natural ecosystems since the Quaternary. Regionally, this volume lays a strong focus on Nigeria (Niger Delta). Facing the omnipresent challenges of Global Change, an increasing number of African scientists is involved in palaeoenvironmental and palaeoclimatic research, both theoretical and applied. PoA systematically supports established as well as junior African scientists in the field of sustainable cooperation and academic capacity building. This book will be of interest to all concerned with or interested in up-to-date research on Neogene to Quaternary low latitudes ecosystem changes and their respective interpretation in the framework of natural climate and vegetation change evidenced by a variety of methods that allow to read and learn from the past by following the motto, "The geologic foretime as the key to the present, and possibly to the future." Palynologists, Geologists, Geographers, Archaeologists, and Geomorphologists will find this edition equally useful for their work.

Power and Landscape in Atlantic West Africa
Power and Landscape in Atlantic West Africa

Author: J. Cameron Monroe

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2012-02-13

Total Pages: 411

ISBN-13: 1107378451

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This volume examines the archaeology of precolonial West African societies in the era of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Using historical and archaeological perspectives on landscape, this collection of essays sheds light on how involvement in the commercial revolutions of the early modern period dramatically reshaped the regional contours of political organization across West Africa. The essays examine how social and political transformations occurred at the regional level by exploring regional economic networks, population shifts, cultural values and ideologies. The book demonstrates the importance of anthropological insights not only to the broad political history of West Africa, but also to an understanding of political culture as a form of meaningful social practice.