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Policy development for environmental licensing and biodiversity offsets in Latin America.

ABSTRACT: Attempts to meet biodiversity goals through application of the mitigation hierarchy have gained wide traction globally with increased development of public policy, lending standards, and corporate practices. With interest in biodiversity offsets increasing in Latin America, we seek to strengthen the basis for policy development through a review of major environmental licensing policy frameworks in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Peru and Venezuela. Here we focused our review on an examination of national level policies to evaluate to which degree current provisions promote positive environmental outcomes. All the surveyed countries have national-level Environmental Impact Assessment laws or regulations that cover the habitats present in their territories. Although most countries enable the use of offsets only Brazil, Colombia, Mexico and Peru explicitly require their implementation. Our review has shown that while advancing quite detailed offset policies, most countries do not seem to have strong requirements regarding impact avoidance. Despite this deficiency most countries have a strong foundation from which to develop policy for biodiversity offsets, but several issues require further guidance, including how best to: (1) ensure conformance with the mitigation hierarchy; (2) identify the most environmentally preferable offsets within a landscape context; (3) determine appropriate mitigation replacement ratios; and (4) ensure appropriate time and effort is given to monitor offset performance.

SUBMITTER: Villarroya A

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4156437 | biostudies-literature | 2014

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Policy development for environmental licensing and biodiversity offsets in Latin America.

Villarroya Ana A Barros Ana Cristina AC Kiesecker Joseph J

PloS one 20140905 9

Attempts to meet biodiversity goals through application of the mitigation hierarchy have gained wide traction globally with increased development of public policy, lending standards, and corporate practices. With interest in biodiversity offsets increasing in Latin America, we seek to strengthen the basis for policy development through a review of major environmental licensing policy frameworks in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Peru and Venezuela. Here we focused our review on an ex ...[more]

PMID: 25191758

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Project description:BackgroundPromotion of biomedical research along with the development of evidence-based prevention policies have been suggested as an effective way to reduce environmental risks for children's health in Latin America. However, there is little information on the current state of childhood environmental health research, which might help identify its strengths and limitations, as well as to design a strategy to improve the future of child environmental health research in the region.ObjectiveTo describe the current state of environmental health research on children exposed to environmental pollutants in Latin America.MethodologyWe performed a comprehensive search of published peer-reviewed environmental health articles (1994-2014), dealing with the exposure of Latin American children to chemical compounds. We described the type of studies and their research topics, and identified networks of co-authors. We also analyzed the relationship between research funding sources and the impact factor (IF) of the journal where research was published.ResultsThe average number of publications was about 20 per year. Mexico and Brazil produced almost 70% of the 409 identified papers. The most studied contaminant was lead, but research on this element has declined since 2005. Retrospective studies were the most frequent, and also showed a decreasing trend. Most studies did not assess health effects. Four groups of leading investigators and two collaboration models for scientific production were identified. Except for Mexico, there was very little collaboration with North American and European countries. Compared to articles that did not report financial support, those that received international funding had on average an IF around 7, and those with national funding reached a mean IF near 3.ConclusionThere is a limited number of publications and insufficient collaboration between Latin-American scientists. It is necessary to identify strategies to stimulate South-South-North alliances and strengthen the scarce research on the environmental health of children in the region.

Project description:The Global Horizon Scanning Project (GHSP) is an innovative initiative that aims to identify important global environmental quality research needs. Here we report 20 key research questions from Latin America (LA). Members of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (SETAC) LA and other scientists from LA were asked to submit research questions that would represent priority needs to address in the region. One hundred questions were received, then partitioned among categories, examined, and some rearranged during a workshop in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Twenty priority research questions were subsequently identified. These research questions included developing, improving, and harmonizing across LA countries methods for 1) identifying contaminants and degradation products in complex matrices (including biota); 2) advancing prediction of contaminant risks and effects in ecosystems, addressing lab-to-field extrapolation challenges, and understanding complexities of multiple stressors (including chemicals and climate change); and 3) improving management and regulatory tools toward achieving sustainable development. Whereas environmental contaminants frequently identified in these key questions were pesticides, pharmaceuticals, endocrine disruptors or modulators, plastics, and nanomaterials, commonly identified environmental challenges were related to agriculture, urban effluents, solid wastes, pulp and paper mills, and natural extraction activities. Several interesting research topics included assessing and preventing pollution impacts on conservation protected areas, integrating environment and health assessments, and developing strategies for identification, substitution, and design of less hazardous chemicals (e.g., green chemistry). Finally, a recurrent research need included developing an understanding of differential sensitivity of regional species and ecosystems to environmental contaminants and other stressors. Addressing these critical questions will support development of long-term strategic research efforts to advance more sustainable environmental quality and protect public health and the environment in LA. Integr Environ Assess Manag 2018;14:344-357. © 2018 The Authors. Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of Society of Environmental Toxicology & Chemistry (SETAC).

Project description:Environmental risk assessments and interventions to mitigate environmental risks are essential to protect public health. While the objective measurement of environmental hazards is important, it is also critical to address the subjective perception of health risks. A population's perception of environmental health hazards is a powerful driving force for action and engagement in safety and health behaviors and can also inform the development of effective and more sustainable environmental health policies. To date, no instruments are available to assess risk perception of environmental health hazards in South America even though there are many concerning issues in the region, including mining. We aimed to adapt and validate an environmental health risk perception questionnaire in a Chilean population affected by mining activity among other risks frequently reported in Latin American countries and included the collection of information on trust on public information sources. We adapted an Australian risk perception questionnaire for validation in an adult population from a Chilean mining community. This adaptation included two blinded translations (direct, inverse), a pre-test study (n = 20) and a review by environmental health experts. Principal Component Analyses (PCA) was used to identify factors within major domains of interest. The Bartlett test of sphericity, Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) measure and the Cronbach α test were used to assess the instrument's validity and reliability. The instrument was pilot tested in 205 adults from a mining community in Chañaral. The final adapted questionnaire proved to be a good instrument to measure risk perception in a community chronically exposed to mining waste. For community risks, four factors explained 59.4% of the variance. "Global Issues" (30.2%) included air pollution, contamination of mining, ozone layer depletion and vector diseases. For personal risks, the first two components explained 59.5% of the variance, the main factor (36.7%) was "unhealthy behaviors within the household". For trust in information, the first factor (36.2%) included as main sources "Media and authorities". The Cronbach α ranged between 0.68 and 0.75; and the KMO test between 0.7 to 0.79 for community and personal risks and trust. The final questionnaire is a simple, reliable and useful instrument that can assist in evaluating environmental health risk perceptions in Latin American countries.

Project description:BackgroundA scarcely studied consequence of urbanization is the effect of temporal stabilization of the environment on bird communities. This alteration is thought to dampen environmental variations between day and night, seasons and years, promoting a temporal persistence of bird composition in urban areas. The aim of this study was to review current evidence of temporal stabilization of biotic and abiotic factors in urban environments and the potential effects of such stabilization on temporal variation of bird species presence at different temporal scales.MethodsI selected the literature by searching published articles and book chapters using Scopus and Google scholar. I only included articles that compared the temporal variation of bird composition or resources between different levels of urbanization.ResultsIn general, there is evidence of temporal stabilization of abiotic and biotic factors at the three time scales considered. At the diurnal scale, the main factor considered was artificial light in the context of light pollution. At the seasonal and interannual scales, several case studies found a smaller temporal variation of primary productivity in urban than in natural and rural areas. Bird species composition showed more stabilization in urban environments at the three temporal scales: (1) several case studies reported bird activity at night, associated with artificial light; (2) studies in urban parks and along urbanization gradients showed smaller seasonal variation of bird composition in the more urbanized areas; and (3) in general, case studies along urbanization gradients showed smaller interannual variation of bird composition in the more urbanized areas, although some studies showed no relationships or opposite trends than expected.DiscussionThe published evidence suggests that urban areas dampen the natural cycles at several temporal scales. The stabilization of biotic and abiotic factors, such as light, temperature, food and habitat structure, is desynchronized from natural diurnal, seasonal and interannual cycles. However, there is a dearth of long-term comparisons of bird composition and studies that simultaneously analyze the relationship between resources and bird composition stabilization at the seasonal and interannual scales. More research is needed in the Southern hemisphere, where there is a lack of studies dealing with the seasonal and interannual variations of primary productivity along urbanization gradients and nocturnal activity of bird species. A future research agenda should include differentiation of spatial and temporal homogenization of avifaunas.

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Policy development for environmental licensing and biodiversity offsets in Latin America.

Publications

Policy development for environmental licensing and biodiversity offsets in Latin America.

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