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The Hunjiang River, a vital water system in northeastern China, has suffered severe ecological damage due to overexploitation. This study analyzes the basin's environmental conditions from 2016 to 2020, identifies key restoration factors, and examines practical restoration projects. Investigating five major pollutants (permanganate index, chemical oxygen demand (COD), biochemical oxygen demand, ammonia nitrogen, total phosphorus) in eight sections, the study finds the Xicun section most polluted, mainly from Baishan City's industrial and domestic discharges. The ammonia nitrogen concentration at the Zian section also shows deterioration. Using a DPSIR (Driving forces, Pressures, State, Impacts, Responses) framework, the study elucidates the relationship between environmental and socio-economic issues. Results indicate that population changes, industrial development, and water resource management have complex ecological impacts. Evaluating the urban water resource carrying capacity with the entropy weight method and correlation coefficient weighting method, the study finds that increasing forest coverage, improving wastewater treatment efficiency, and reducing COD emissions are crucial. Quantitative assessment of integrated protection and restoration projects involving mountains, rivers, forests, farmlands, lakes, and grasslands demonstrates their positive impact. This research reveals the interplay between the ecological environment and social factors, proposes practical restoration measures, and clarifies project effects, providing reliable decision-making schemes for policymakers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the new era, coordinating the relationship between population flow and forestry ecological security has become an important challenge. In this study, we take Heilongjiang Province in China as an example, and through the combination of macro data and micro in-depth interviews, we explore whether population mobility really affects the intrinsic mechanism of forestry ecological security from the perspective of population exodus from forest areas. Based on the DPSIR model, we constructed a forestry ecological security evaluation index system, used the TOPSIS multi-objective decision analysis method to quantify the forestry ecological security status from 2000 to 2022, and utilized the impulse response function of the VAR model to explore the dynamic response relationship between population outflow and forestry ecological security. The results of this study show that, firstly, the comprehensive index of forestry ecological security level in Heilongjiang Province exhibits a fluctuating upward trend from 2000 to 2022. Second, forestry ecological security has a lagged effect on population outflow, and population outflow has almost no effect on forestry ecological security at present. Third, while the population outflow of Luobei County reduces the interference of human activities on the natural environment, it also brings about the pressures of insufficient forestry ecological resource management and forestry personnel. The Dongfanghong Forestry Bureau has effectively improved the efficiency of ecological construction and ecological security through the introduction of digitalized and intelligent equipment, which has effectively compensated for the negative impact of population outflow on the reduction in ecological management personnel. These findings will help realize the coordinated development of population, economy and society, and ecology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research has highlighted the role of green infrastructure (GI) in addressing climate change impacts and other societal and environmental challenges in semi-arid urban areas. Regardless of this potential, GI implementation and research in arid climate zones is limited. Accordingly, using Amman, Jordan as a case study, this research aims to investigate the barriers that impede and prevent GI implementation in semi-arid urban areas. The GI barriers are conceptualized using the Driving–Pressure–State–Impact–Response (DPSIR) framework which was applied on data collected from semi-structured interviews with GI stakeholders in the city. The findings highlighted 17 general implementation barriers grouped into 6 categories. The DPSIR framework specifically highlighted the role of natural and human drivers (e.g. rapid urbanization, institutional capacities, and lacking financial resources) in creating significant barriers to GI implementation. It also illustrated the focus on open spaces and green cover in GI planning in Amman, lacking performance data on GI best practices in semi-arid contexts, and the need of integrated pathways to overcome the identified barriers. The DPSIR framework presents an easy-to-communicate picture of the state of GI implementation in the city that can be utilized by decision-makers, particularly those lacking access to diverse resources. The outcomes of this study enhances our understanding of GI planning in semi-arid urban areas and are beneficial for policymakers and practitioners looking for pathways to promote resilient urban development strategies. Overall, the study calls for further GI research on semi-arid developing contexts.

Managing trans-boundary water and its watershed areas is a challenging task. The riparian countries sharing the boundary may have different economic and national goals that can dictate the pressures exerted on water bodies and their catchments areas. The pressure will have dire consequences on the environment, the climate and the sustainability of the Volta River. This paper seeks to apply the Driving Forces-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework as a model to ascertain the driving forces and their impacts on the Black and the White sub-basins of the Volta River. The research was carried out through desk study of literature, reports and policies on the Volta basin as well as information from international bodies such as World Bank, United Nations, and European Union among others. The DPSIR framework thus established the state of the ecosystem, pressure exerted, impact and the responses to provide scientific basis for decision-making and address the impacts on the Volta River. The DPSIR framework was focused on Ghana and Burkina Faso due to their large share of the basin. Burkina Faso's share of the Volta basin area is 43 %, whereas, that of Ghana is 41.6 %. The use of DPSIR model will help stakeholders and policy makers in proper decision making. It was therefore recommended that there should be policy regulations to reduce the impact on the environment.

Wetlands are present within intricate ecological settings, exhibiting dynamic changes over time and across different areas with regard to their functional and structural diversity. Several approaches have been introduced for ecosystem analysis and management since 1990s, where Driver – Pressure – State – Impact – Response (DPSIR) framework is one of the widely used approaches for assessing and managing environmental problems. In this study, we proposed a DPSIR framework as a model in the Sebkhates of Aures wetland complex (SAWC, Northeast of Algeria), in order to create a regional wetland observatory to deliver ecosystem services within current state of changes resulted from socioeconomic drivers. DPSIR facilitates the identification of essential indicators to detect threats to the Sebkahtes of Aures wetlands complex (SAWC), influencing policymakers to enhance the protection and management of these wetlands. In line with the established DPSIR framework. This same approach and methodology could be applied to the other 15 wetlands complexes known in Algeria, culminating in the creation of a national wetland observatory. Furthermore, DPSIR can be employed as an analytical tool for policy making in the context of sustainable management of wetland ecosystems and can serve as a model in the establishment and development of various observatory programs in Algeria.

Wetlands are present within intricate ecological settings, exhibiting dynamic changes over time and across different areas with regard to their functional and structural diversity. Several approaches have been introduced for ecosystem analysis and management since 1990s, where Driver -- Pressure -- State -- Impact -- Response (DPSIR) framework is one of the widely used approaches for assessing and managing environmental problems. In this study, we proposed a DPSIR framework as a model in the Sebkhates of Aures wetland complex (SAWC, Northeast of Algeria), in order to create a regional wetland observatory to deliver ecosystem services within current state of changes resulted from socioeconomic drivers. DPSIR facilitates the identification of essential indicators to detect threats to the Sebkahtes of Aures wetlands complex (SAWC), influencing policymakers to enhance the protection and management of these wetlands. In line with the established DPSIR framework. This same approach and methodology could be applied to the other 15 wetlands complexes known in Algeria, culminating in the creation of a national wetland observatory. Furthermore, DPSIR can be employed as an analytical tool for policy making in the context of sustainable management of wetland ecosystems and can serve as a model in the establishment and development of various observatory programs in Algeria. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The United Nations adopted 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to address societal, economic and environmental sustainability issues. The efficiency of SDGs monitoring could be improved by essential variables (EVs), which can help to better deal with massive data, interdisciplinary knowledge and workloads. However, in practice, effectively combining EVs with SDGs monitoring remains challenging. In this paper, we proposed a refining method of essential SDGs variables (ESDGVs) to land degradation. Firstly, we selected northwest China as our experimental region and extracted a group of variables related to land degradation from SDG indicators based on the DPSIR framework. Next, we identify the essential ones using a combined qualitative and quantitative methods with the criteria of feasibility, spatialization, and relevance which considered the issues of data acquisition, monitoring scale, and closeness to the land degradation. Finally, we analysed the monitoring role of ESDGVs. Results show that, compared to conventional observations, ESDGVs facilitate the monitoring and evaluation of regional SDGs with reduced efforts. And both climate and human activities have a facilitating or inhibiting effect on land degradation processes. In the future, we hope to have more mature data sets and consider adding more SDG indicators for ESDGVs’ refinement.

Water security is crucial for the sustainable development of regional water resources. Here, we utilize the Driver-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework to construct an indicator system for assessing water security in the Lancang–Mekong River Basin (LMRB). This study also delves into the level of development in the coupling coordination between the economic and social systems and the water resources systems in the basin. The findings reveal that the overall water security situation in the LMRB is satisfactory, with three countries (China, Laos, and Vietnam) surpassing the "safe" threshold and three countries (Thailand, Cambodia, and Myanmar) "Basically safe". However, water security issues persist, particularly in relation to water pollution and scarcity. Seasonal water shortages and water-related disasters arise due to uneven rainfall distribution throughout the year and inadequate regulating facilities such as wetlands and reservoirs. In addition, the overall coupling coordination level in the LMRB is low, ranging between 0.3 and 0.4, corresponding to a moderate imbalance level in the assessment criteria system. Specifically, Laos and China exhibit the highest coupling coordination level, with a degree of 0.36, whereas Thailand and Myanmar demonstrate the lowest level, with degrees of 0.33 and 0.31, respectively. Overall, our results offer a scientific foundation for the sustainable development of countries within the LMRB. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The land resources in the main grain-producing areas (MGPAs) provide a solid foundation for grain production, and promotion of the sustainable utilization of land resources in these areas is crucial for ensuring national food security. To comprehensively assess the land resource carrying capacity (LRCC) in China's MGPAs, we utilized the driver-pressure-state-impact-response (DPSIR) framework and applied the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and entropy weight (EW) method to analyze the spatial–temporal evolution of LRCC in China's MGPAs from 2000 to 2020. By establishing a coupling coordination model, we explored the coupling coordination relationships among LRCC subsystems and identified key factors hindering the balanced development of LRCC using an obstacle degree model. The research results indicate that the LRCC in China's MGPAs generally shows an increasing trend with a continuously growing rate, with the LRCC in the southern regions surpassing that in the northern regions. The overall coupling coordination of LRCC demonstrates an increasing trend, although the growth rate is decreasing. The coupling coordination level of LRCC in the southern regions is generally higher than that in the northern regions, and the gap in coordination levels between various regions is narrowing. The state and pressure subsystems significantly influence the balanced development of LRCC. Indicators such as arable land area per capita, grain production yield per unit area of arable land, grain production yield per capita, forest land area per capita, and grassland area per capita play vital roles in the development of LRCC. Based on these findings, we have put forward targeted recommendations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban ecosystem health threats and natural disasters have a prominent influence under the rapid urbanization process, and high urban resilience (UR) is the key to response to human-natural disasters. This study attempts to construct a comprehensive index system of UR based on the DPSIR (Driving—Pressure—State—Impact—Response) framework to explore the coupling coordination relationship and driving factors of UR in ecologically fragile areas, using panel data of 39 cities in the Loess Plateau from 2010 to 2019. The empirical results have shown that most cities present low and medium levels of urban resilience, indicating that the UR of the Loess Plateau is not ideal, that there is a significant spatial difference between the urban resilience and coupling coordination degree (CCD), and the spatial characteristics are represented by "central depression". Additionally, there are significant discordant relationships among the five subsystems of UR, which means that the pressure subsystem has the highest score, while the driving force subsystem and state subsystem have the lowest score. Regarding the driving factors, institutional quality, scientific and technological expenditure, and industrial upgrading have a significant positive impact on UR, while gross industrial output, urban carbon emissions, and urban population density have a significant negative impact on UR. This study provides a new index system and information and decision-making reference for UR exploration, which is also conducive to the future urban sustainable development planning in ecologically sensitive areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rapid growth of developing countries has placed unprecedented pressure on water resources, severely hindering the realization of sustainable development goal 6 (SDG 6) in river basins. In this study, sustainable water resource utilization (SWRU) in the Yellow River basin (Shaanxi section) from 2005 to 2019 is evaluated through an analysis of water resource overload combined with the water footprint (WF) and the water planetary boundary (WPB) and an analysis of water resource utilization quality combined with the WF and city development index (CDI) based on the coupled coordination model. Then, the results are incorporated into the drive-pressure-state-impact-response framework to analyze the impacts of the socioeconomic system on SWRU and the feedback effect of related policies. The results show that there were obvious differences in the spatiotemporal evolution characteristics of the WF in different geographical units. The WF of Guanzhong first increased and then decreased, and the WF of Northern Shaanxi grew continuously. The water deficit state is increasing. Although the coordination level between the WF and CDI in the basin increased by 500.31%, it was characterized by nonequilibrium and volatility. Compared to water resource endowment, socioeconomic development and government policies have greater impacts on SWRU; furthermore, the influencing factors demonstrate spatial variability, revealing the complexity of achieving SDG 6 in the basin. As policy implications, adaptive water resource policies should be formulated on the basis of strengthening the overall basin management. This study provides a scientific basis for promoting the realization of SDG 6 through watershed water management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

River basins perform the crucial role of providing water resources, especially in arid regions. Due to the nature of interconnection, human interventions and natural events will cause cumulative impacts on the downstream parts of river basins. The aim of this research is to identify and evaluate the impacts of interventions and changes occurring in the upstream of the TigrisEuphrates River Basin on the downstream parts and provide strategies to reduce and control those effects. To achieve this purpose, multi-scaled investigation of the changes and dynamics of the land cover was performed and the causes and consequences of these changes were investigated using the Driving force-Pressure-Sate-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework. The results displayed an increase in the area of artificial lakes and agricultural lands and a decline in the area of rangelands and natural wetlands, especially in the downstream of the basin. The state of the ecosystem was under the influence of Driving forces such as population and industrial growth and political competitions of the littoral states, which led to pressure on the limited water resources and development of water management and control projects. The overall trends of changes in the state of the environment had created impacts on the ecosystem and communities that required urgent responses from the riparian countries. Finally, to foster water cooperation instead of non-constructive completions in this region, a framework was developed with an emphasis on creating a union of riparian countries and using their scientific potentials to provide effective and impartial solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent drought events in Europe have highlighted the impact of hydrological drought and low-flow events on society, ecosystems, and the economy. While there are numerous publications about flood risk management and the socio-economic consequences of floods, these have hardly been systematically dealt with in the scientific literature regarding low flows. This paper fills this gap by summarizing the current state of research in the form of a systematic literature review combining the criteria of the drivers–pressures–state–impacts–responses (DPSIR) framework with the propositional inventory method. In particular, the driving forces of low-flow events, their pressures, and the impacts on different economic sectors such as navigation, fisheries, industry, agriculture, forestry, energy, and tourism and recreation as well as resulting competitive usage claims for water and responses are presented and validated through expert interviews. In doing so, the study examines the causal chain of low-flow events and serves as a fundamental base for the future development of a damage cost database for low-flow events by preparing literature data on the socio-economic consequences of low-flow events for parameterization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the inception of the concept, sustainability has been interpreted as encompassing social, economic, and environmental dimensions of it. It is now rapidly shifting from a concept to a measurable state of the human-ecological dynamic system. Recent research is focusing on an integrated approach, due to the absence of a perfectly defined sustainable condition with the presence of some driving forces in the environmental system as a reference. In the recent world, severe natural hazards are increasingly having a fatal impact on societal and economic strata. The islands of Indian Sundarban Delta are the focus of this study as their sustenance is highly at stake due to climate change induced sea level rise, cyclone, tidal surge, and severe land erosion. The main objective of this study is to design a model for obtaining a composite sustainability index of three adjacent islands of western part of Indian Sundarban Delta (ISD) Sagar, Mousani and Ghoramara which are facing severe hazard impact based on the ‘Driving Force-Pressure-State-Impact-Response’ (DPSIR) framework integrating all three dimensions. Indicators have been categorised into state indicators and driving forces under ten profiles chosen from three dimensions of sustainability. The impact score of driving forces over any profile has been considered as a product of values of drivers and states from that profile. The total sustainability score was attained by summarizing the impact scores assigning the same weights and different weights respectively, to the sustainability indicators. The sustainability score shows that Sagar is in a better position than the other two islands.

River Basin areas provide ecosystem services. These areas are decreasing due to natural and anthropogenic activities. With the effects of climate change, anthropological effects and urbanization, environmental issues are continuously increasing in the basins. One of the approaches to analyze and report environmental problems is the DPSIR (Drivers, Pressures, States, Impacts and Responses) model used as a a global to local scale. Using the DPSIR model to analyze anthropogenic factors and environmental pressures helps to analyze, identify and evaluate complex environmental problems. This study was carried out in the Tersakan sub-basin, which is one of the biggest sub-basins of the Yeşilırmak basin, which has a high rate of deterioration due to socio-economic, anthropogenic, and nature-related factors. The study aims to detect the changes in ecosystem services in the Tersakan sub-basin with the DPSIR model and to develop suggestions for the application of applying the model. As a result of the study, it has been found that the degradation in the sub-basin is more in providing(Food, water, freshwater, biological material, decorative resources, genetic resources, biochemicals and medicinal products) ecosystem services and cultural (cultural diversity, moral and ethical values, information system, educational value, inspirational value, aesthetic values, social relations, sense of place and space, cultural heritage value, recreation and ecotourism) ecosystem services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cultural heritage often mirrors the evolution of the social and economic dynamics of territories. In Taranto, a city in Apulia in southern Italy, cultural heritage represents the synthesis of the profound environmental and economic crisis that has characterised the city over the last century. Its loss is the order of the day following repeated collapses and static instability. Probably, this is the result of the strong conditioning that large industrial groups and military institutions have been exercising over the city's environment and economy since the end of the 19th century. This paper focuses on the analysis of aspects related to the management and enhancement of the cultural heritage in the area, in the broader scenario of territorial heritage management. Using the DPSIR (Driver-Pressure-State-Impact-Response) spiral logic scheme, the aim of the research is to highlight causal links between the impoverishment of Taranto's cultural heritage and the management and socio-economic drivers present there. In this perspective, the study aims to contribute to the implementation of the scientific literature on the topic of the application of the spiral DPSIR model to the theme of built cultural heritage and not only to the management of the naturalistic factors of the territories. Furthermore, it aims to stimulate policy makers to initiate specific analyses of the risks threatening cultural heritage in order to implement protective measures before irreversible damage occurs. The results of the analysis promote the need for a subversion of the area's development dynamics with a view to a 'culture of sustainability'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The United Nations adopted 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to address societal, economic and environmental sustainability issues. The efficiency of SDGs monitoring could be improved by essential variables (EVs), which can help to better deal with massive data, interdisciplinary knowledge and workloads. However, in practice, effectively combining EVs with SDGs monitoring remains challenging. In this paper, we proposed a refining method of essential SDGs variables (ESDGVs) to land degradation. Firstly, we selected northwest China as our experimental region and extracted a group of variables related to land degradation from SDG indicators based on the DPSIR framework. Next, we identify the essential ones using a combined qualitative and quantitative methods with the criteria of feasibility, spatialization, and relevance which considered the issues of data acquisition, monitoring scale, and closeness to the land degradation. Finally, we analysed the monitoring role of ESDGVs. Results show that, compared to conventional observations, ESDGVs facilitate the monitoring and evaluation of regional SDGs with reduced efforts. And both climate and human activities have a facilitating or inhibiting effect on land degradation processes. In the future, we hope to have more mature data sets and consider adding more SDG indicators for ESDGVs' refinement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban ecosystem health threats and natural disasters have a prominent influence under the rapid urbanization process, and high urban resilience (UR) is the key to response to human-natural disasters. This study attempts to construct a comprehensive index system of UR based on the DPSIR (Driving—Pressure—State—Impact—Response) framework to explore the coupling coordination relationship and driving factors of UR in ecologically fragile areas, using panel data of 39 cities in the Loess Plateau from 2010 to 2019. The empirical results have shown that most cities present low and medium levels of urban resilience, indicating that the UR of the Loess Plateau is not ideal, that there is a significant spatial difference between the urban resilience and coupling coordination degree (CCD), and the spatial characteristics are represented by “central depression”. Additionally, there are significant discordant relationships among the five subsystems of UR, which means that the pressure subsystem has the highest score, while the driving force subsystem and state subsystem have the lowest score. Regarding the driving factors, institutional quality, scientific and technological expenditure, and industrial upgrading have a significant positive impact on UR, while gross industrial output, urban carbon emissions, and urban population density have a significant negative impact on UR. This study provides a new index system and information and decision-making reference for UR exploration, which is also conducive to the future urban sustainable development planning in ecologically sensitive areas.

In this article, we have reviewed how the women of Bangladesh are negatively exposed to the COVID-19 pandemic in terms of quality education, employment loss, labour market contribution, domestic violence, and health and wellness, thus putting their lives at more significant risk. We have employed the Drivers-Pressures-States-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework to analyze the gendered effects of COVID-19 on some specific Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in Bangladesh. We have purposively selected five SDGs, SDG 1 (no poverty), SDG 3 (good health and well-being), SDG 4 (quality education), SDG 5 (gender equality), and SDG 8 (decent work & economic growth), those have direct effects on women's livelihood and well-being. Our DPSIR framework analysis has shown that gendered vulnerabilities have been exacerbated due to the COVID-19 situation with multiple pre-existing socio-cultural norms and various state policies like patriarchal values, stay-home policies etc. As SDG 1 focuses on poverty reduction, and SDG 8 focuses on decent work and economic growth, unemployment, losing job opportunities and economic downturn due to the pandemic have slowed down national growth as well as increased poverty in the country. With excessive pressure on the health sector to deal with COVID-19, women’s essential maternal, sexual and reproductive health (SRH) services were neglected and health disparities were also observed. Thus, many women and adolescent girls could not access SRH services when needed that led to a myriad of consequences for SDG 3 achievements. The prolonged shutdown of educational institutes resulted in mass school dropouts, mental health problems, and higher risks of child labour and child marriage among girl children which has significant negative impacts on the achievement of SDG 4. Due to COVID-19-related preventive measures, such as social distancing, and lockdown, women have been involved to do more care and household job following traditional gender roles, experienced work from home, and a ‘shadow pandemic’ domestic violence amidst the COVID-19. Consequently, the overall gender gap has increased (SDG 5). We have argued that the existing neoliberal market economy has failed to save the global society from a pandemic, therefore, it is important to rethink its development targets and indicators. Moreover, a paradigm shift is recommended by deconstructing present economic systems to build a resilient society based on the caring relationships among nature, humans, and society embracing an ecofeminist perspective.

The relationships between ecosystem services and farmers’ livelihoods are important for ecological and livelihood sustainability. In this paper, Chongqing was picked up as a case to elucidate the contribution of ecosystem services to farmers’ livelihoods. First, we constructed a DPSIR (driver, pressure, state, impact and response) framework of ecosystem services and farmers’ livelihoods through participatory farmers’ livelihoods surveys and empirical data from the literature. Then, a 48-node Bayesian network model were used to explore the explicit and implicit impacts of both ecosystem services and farmers’ livelihoods, and to determine the key factors. Finally, we analyzed the contribution of ecosystem services to different types of farmers’ livelihoods. The results showed that ecosystem services have a significant impact on the farmers’ livelihoods. The probabilities of high state for ecosystem services and livelihood outcomes were 17.6% and 30.7%, respectively. While the probabilities of medium state were 51.2% and 45.4%, respectively. Particularly for low-income farmers, the impact on them increased with the increasing of ecosystem services (such as esthetic landscapes and food production). For different types of farming households, the most important contributor of ecosystem services-related income were pure farming households, part-time farming households and nonfarming households, accounting for 77.3%, 36.3%, and 14.8% of the total average annual household income, respectively. Our findings suggested that in promoting sustainable management of ecosystems, the contribution of ecosystem services to farmers’ livelihoods and their impact on farm income and the ecosystem services value should be considered.

Urbanization is the main force of the global environmental as well as land use land cover changes (LULC). Urbanization is caused by prompt increase in population growth, migration, and urge for employment. In this study, Geographic Information System (GIS) was applied for the analysis and representation of spatio-temporal changes in LULC in Peshawar district and these results were linked with environmental aspects and Driver-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework approaches. For LULC classification, the Landsat freely available satellite imageries were used. The analysis revealed that the vegetation cover has increased from 37.8% of the total area to 71.3% during 1990–2020 and this change in vegetation is attributed to the government initiatives of Billion Tree Tsunami afforestation project after 2014 which has substantially decreased the barren land (from 66% in 1990 to 19% in 2020) in southeastern part of Peshawar district. Although, there was reduction in the vegetation cover in the past but due to extensive plantation between 2014 and 2020 resulted rapid increase in vegetation cover in the study area. The results of the present study detected a remarkable increase in built-up area which has increased almost 224.6% from 1990 to 2020. The study area population has increased from 2.12 million during 1998 to 4.26 million in 2017. The DPSIR results revealed that drivers and pressure have adverse effects on the carrying capacity of natural resources which have resulted deterioration of ecosystem. The resulted reduced capacity leading towards land degradation, loss of agricultural land, decline the groundwater level and resulted in pluvial flooding in Peshawar district. Government and environmental protection agency should implement the land use bylaws to reduce the rapid and unplanned urban growth and its negative impacts on natural environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, China has attached great importance to pollution control, and national and many provinces have introduced water pollution management policies in the hope that improvements can be made. However, there is currently a lack of objective and adequate assessment of the effectiveness of water pollution management (WPM) at the regional level, especially a lack of in-depth research on the causes of improvement, key measures, and pathways of action. This paper constructs an evaluation index system based on the driver, pressure, state, impact and response (DPSIR) model and evaluates the WPM performance of Tianjin based on the five aspects comprising the DPSIR model. The results show that WPM performance in Tianjin has been commendable, improving from 76.15 points out of 100 in 2014 to 90.93 points out of 100 in 2018. The score increased more rapidly from 2016 to 2018 after the regional policy was implemented. The main reason for this encouraging phenomenon is the significant improvement in water quality. From 2016 to 2020, the closure of high pollution industrial enterprises and the regulatory management of aquaculture have significantly reduced pollutant emissions. At the same time, under the constraints of the river chief system, pollutant discharge permits, discharge standards, ecological compensation agreements on water pollution and other policies in Tianjin, the effect of pollution source control is obvious, with improved water quality and high public satisfaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This manuscript aims to present the framework for the development of a four-stage tool for sustainable groundwater management as one of the highly interactive three-day workshop products. The four stages in the tool are (1) representing the target system, (2) description of the target system using components of DPSIR framework (drivers, pressures, state, impact, responses), (3) development of causal chains/loops, and (4) identifying knowledge gaps and articulating next steps. The tool is an output from the two-day Indo-US bilateral workshop on "Integrated Hydrochemical Modeling for Sustainable Development and Management of Water Supply Aquifers". Four case studies from the invited talks, panel discussions, and breakout sessions were selected to demonstrate the developed four-stage framework to a coastal aquifer (India) and in high plains in Floridian, Piedmont, and Blueridge aquifers (United States of America). The developed tool can be practically used in the development of strategies for the sustainable use of groundwater in various regions around the world (e.g., planning/building/maintaining groundwater recharging structures). Continued work can result in establishing a center for excellence as well as developing a network project. The recommendations from the workshop were: (1) developing vulnerability analysis models for groundwater managers; (2) treatment and new ways of using low-quality groundwater; (3) adopting groundwater recharge; (4) mitigating pollutants getting into the aquifer; and (5) reducing groundwater use. This study provides a framework for future researchers to study the groundwater table related to the effectiveness of water recharging structures, developing a quantitative model from the framework. Finally, recommendations for a future study are more data collection on groundwater quality/recharge as well as enhancing outreach activities for sustainable groundwater management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Green port governance is an emerging and recent port restructuring process influencing port authorities regarding adopting recurring sustainable governance practices within their business models. However, contemporary academic bias towards a particular aspect of port sustainable governance practice leads to publication results fragmentation and difficulty in a collective assessment of the conclusions. The lack of holistic research endeavors to port sustainable governance practices hinders the identification of organized, specific, and goal-oriented factors indispensable for coherently directing ports to sustainable and green transitions. In order to bridge the identified gap, this paper conducts a bibliometric analysis of 278 scientific articles on the emerging green port governance concept in the maritime industry, published in 113 academic outlets, authored by 695 scholars, and obtained from the world's most reputable scientific database—ISI Web of Science. The conducted meta-analysis via HistCite software revealed the most prestigious academic institutions, the most prominent scientific journals, the most impactful scientific articles, and the most influential scholars. The bibliographic coupling methodology via Bibliometrix tool in R software indicated five concurrent research streams on the basis of the top 10% of the scientific articles: (1) Adoption of contextualized models of port governance reform as a consequence of port multi-scalar embeddedness forces and institutional stretching; (2) Fostering port sustainability competitiveness via extended resource pools in terms of dry ports coupling; (3) The digitalization role of information systems regarding the interaction between transport, infrastructure, and institutional management in ports; (4) Assessment and innovation in seaport competition policies for the integration of green and sustainable operations; and (5) Conceptual development and awareness raising of port management practices on account of CO2 evidence-based policies regarding port terminals. The application of co-citation analysis methodology revealed future research directions within the five concurrent research streams on the basis of the top 5% trending scientific articles. The detailed content analysis assesses the scientific mapping of future research directions via the structural associations of the Driver-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework. The cause-and-effect relationships of the structural associations of the DPSIR framework possess the possibility of providing substantial insights into the most influential factor identification regarding the development of green port governance models and self-assessment toolkits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the process of promoting economic development, carbon peaks and carbon neutrality have gradually received more attention. The question of how to steadily and rapidly improve the carbon neutrality capacity of each province and excavate the key factors hindering the carbon neutrality capacity has become particularly important. In this study, the DPSIR (driving, pressure, state, influence, response) framework was used to construct an index system of the provincial carbon neutrality capacity of the middle and lower Yellow River Basin, which included 37 indices. Based on the entropy weight matter-element model, the time evolution, regional differences, and restriction indicators of the carbon neutrality capacity of four provinces in the middle and lower Yellow River Basin from 2008 to 2021 were analyzed. The results showed that the carbon neutrality capacity of the four provinces in the middle and lower Yellow River Basin has significantly improved over time and has gradually reached a grade of "good". Differences in carbon neutrality capacity among the provinces still exist but are gradually shrinking. the per capita car ownership, urban population density, and other factors have hindered the improvement of the carbon neutrality capacity in each province, but with the reduction in restriction indicators and increase in positive indicators such as urbanization rate, forest grass coverage, and others, the overall development direction tended to be promising. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The establishment of a standard and unified evaluation system model and its application to a cross-regional eco-environmental quality evaluation and analysis are required for identifying patterns of change in eco-environmental quality in different regions and the driving factors. This knowledge is important for achieving sustainable development. This study used remote sensing (RS) data and geographic information science (GIS) to construct a unified eco-environmental quality evaluation index system based on the Driving Forces, Pressure, State, Impact and Response (DPSIR) framework and the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP), the Entropy method, and Grey Relational Analysis (GRA). The index system was applied to evaluate the eco-environmental quality of central Yunnan Province (CYP) and eastern South Africa (ESA) at the county scale and to identify driving factors. The results showed that: (1) The mean ecological quality index of all counties (districts/cities) in the ESA in 2019 was 0.3696, which was slightly higher than that of 0.3449 in the CYP, indicating similar total ecological quality between the CYP and ESA. (2) The Moran's I value of eco-environmental quality in the CYP and ESA both exceeded 0, with significant spatial agglomerations. (3) The strongest correlations were between state class indicators and eco-environmental quality in both study areas. The grey relational coefficients exceeded 0.9, representing state indicators (such as vegetation coverage, habitat quality index, remote-sensed vegetation water supply index, vegetation net primary productivity, and annual mean precipitation) as the main driving forces of eco-environmental quality.

• An evaluation system for industrial ecology was established with the DPSIR framework. • Spatio-temporal dynamic characteristics and coupling correlation of industrial ecology and green technology innovation in the Yellow River Basin were presented. • The impact and influence mechanism of green technology innovation on industrial ecology with spatial econometric analysis were quantitative analyzed. • A plan was proposed from the perspective of overall planning to better leverage the role of green technology innovation capabilities to industrial ecology. Green technology innovation (GTI) has become an engine of driving industrial ecology (IE), whereas the impact process and mechanism remain poorly understood. In this work, an IE evaluation system is established with the DPSIR framework, followed by the elucidation of the spatial-temporal dynamic evolution of IE and GTI as well as their correlation and heterogeneity at the Yellow River Basin during 2001–2020. Furthermore, the impact process and mechanism of GTI on IE are explored from the global and different city-level scales with the feasible generalized least squares (FGLS) model. It is revealed that GTI exerts a significant and persistent promoting effect on IE, but the promoting effect and influencing factors are distinct in regions with different IE development levels. The "local-neighborhood" effect by GTI driving IE is mainly achieved through innovation infrastructures. [Display omitted] [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Land ecological security (LES) is an important part of China's ecological civilization construction, which plays a vital role in ensuring the sustainable development of its society and economy. Based on the Driving force-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework, this study quantified the spatiotemporal changes of LES in 28 counties of the southern Shaanxi Province from 2009 to 2018. The influencing factors of LES in Yangxian County were explored to clarify the mechanisms that rely on the land ecological advantages to develop organic agriculture and boost poverty alleviation. Results show that the LES of Yangxian always ranked in the top six in 28 counties of the southern Shaanxi region during 2009–2018. The LES in Yangxian increased from 0.385 in 2009 to 0.533 in 2018, and the LES level changed from relatively unsafe to safe. The indicators of rural per capita net income, grain output per unit area of arable land, and grazing intensity could explain 99.8% of the LES variance in Yangxian. Relying on ecological resources, Yangxian increased farmers' income and boosted alleviation of poverty through innovative land policies, developing organic agriculture, and rural tourism. These findings will provide theoretical support and model reference for balancing ecological protection and poverty alleviation in restricted development zones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Green finance is an emerging topic which is broadly discussed in context of adapting and mitigating environmental deterioration due to climate change. As an effective incentive mechanism, it provides strong support for carbon emission reduction. However, a limited review articles investigate the specific combination of green finance and carbon emission reduction. Here, we apply a bibliometric analysis to review research on green finance and carbon emission reduction based on the literature from 2010 to 2021 in the Web of Science core database. The results indicate that countries with the most publications were those with high economic development, salient environmental problems, and a strong demand for ecological protection. Top publishing journals include Climate Policy, Journal of Cleaner Production, and Energy Policy. The author collaboration is fragmented, mostly less than three researchers. Based on analyses of keyword frequency and centrality, deforestation, carbon markets, and financial development were the most significant research topics. The research hotspots included clean development mechanism, adaptation, carbon market, and sequestration. Finally, the DPSIR framework is applied to explore driving forces, state, pressure, impact and response of current research. We hope our work provides a systematic review of green finance for carbon emission reduction to boost the research in this field.

Managing trans-boundary water and its watershed areas is a challenging task. The riparian countries sharing the boundary may have different economic and national goals that can dictate the pressures exerted on water bodies and their catchments areas. The pressure will have dire consequences on the environment, the climate and the sustainability of the Volta River. This paper seeks to apply the Driving Forces-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework as a model to ascertain the driving forces and their impacts on the Black and the White sub-basins of the Volta River. The research was carried out through desk study of literature, reports and policies on the Volta basin as well as information from international bodies such as World Bank, United Nations, and European Union among others. The DPSIR framework thus established the state of the ecosystem, pressure exerted, impact and the responses to provide scientific basis for decision-making and address the impacts on the Volta River. The DPSIR framework was focused on Ghana and Burkina Faso due to their large share of the basin. Burkina Faso's share of the Volta basin area is 43 %, whereas, that of Ghana is 41.6 %. The use of DPSIR model will help stakeholders and policy makers in proper decision making. It was therefore recommended that there should be policy regulations to reduce the impact on the environment., Competing Interests: The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (© 2024 The Authors.)

The rapid global increase in Special Economic Zones (SEZs) raises concerns regarding potential impacts on the environment, especially water use intensity, an increased risk of natural disasters, and an elevated greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. However, studies examining these impacts are limited. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to examine the influence of SEZ development factors on flooding, water scarcity, and GHG emissions using Tak SEZ in Thailand as a case study. A Driver-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework, together with structural equation modeling (SEM) through the partial least squares (PLS) approach, has been used to examine the interrelationships between these factors. The results revealed that economic, industrial, and urban development are key drivers associated with flooding, water scarcity, and GHG emissions in the zone. The increased population density, water consumption, waste generation, and vehicular traffic are all significantly put pressure on climate change impacts. The integration of DPSIR framework together with PLSSEM technique to explore the relationship among multiple sustainability indicators contributes to the existing sustainability assessment methodology. Future research can utilize the presented indicators to identify potential factors for the evaluation of other types of development zones that have a variety of socio-economic activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dehesas and montados are Mediterranean agroforestry systems characterized by scattered oak trees with an understory grazed extensively by livestock and, in some cases, periodically cropped. A long history of traditional management practices has created an open woodland widely recognized for rich biodiversity and multiple ecosystem services. Concerns about challenges to their longterm viability have motivated many disparate scientific studies in recent decades. We provide a synthesis of this growing body of international literature, focusing on the links between land use and management practices, biodiversity, and policy, from a "high nature value farming systems" perspective. The present review comprises 128 empirical studies carried out in Spain and Portugal. Conservation trends were assessed according to categories adapted from the DPSIR (Drivers - Pressures - State - Impacts - Responses) framework. Socio-cultural factors, economic dynamics, and agricultural policies were found to be key drivers of change, resulting in intensification of livestock production and land use simplification, among other effects. Insufficient tree regeneration and a broad range of other factors were identified as pressures that have often negative impacts on biodiversity and ecosystem services, moving the system away from its archetypical ecological state. A variety of management and policy responses were suggested, ranging from specific conservation techniques to landscape-level initiatives. Ecosystem components and management practices were typically studied separately, and mainly from an ecological science perspective, while inter- and transdisciplinary approaches including examination of the role of people were less common. This points to a need to move from single-topic to landscape-level approaches with a broader integration of different disciplines and perspectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Green port governance is an emerging and recent port restructuring process influencing port authorities regarding adopting recurring sustainable governance practices within their business models. However, contemporary academic bias towards a particular aspect of port sustainable governance practice leads to publication results fragmentation and difficulty in a collective assessment of the conclusions. The lack of holistic research endeavors to port sustainable governance practices hinders the identification of organized, specific, and goal-oriented factors indispensable for coherently directing ports to sustainable and green transitions. In order to bridge the identified gap, this paper conducts a bibliometric analysis of 278 scientific articles on the emerging green port governance concept in the maritime industry, published in 113 academic outlets, authored by 695 scholars, and obtained from the world’s most reputable scientific database—ISI Web of Science. The conducted meta-analysis via HistCite software revealed the most prestigious academic institutions, the most prominent scientific journals, the most impactful scientific articles, and the most influential scholars. The bibliographic coupling methodology via Bibliometrix tool in R software indicated five concurrent research streams on the basis of the top 10% of the scientific articles: (1) Adoption of contextualized models of port governance reform as a consequence of port multi-scalar embeddedness forces and institutional stretching; (2) Fostering port sustainability competitiveness via extended resource pools in terms of dry ports coupling; (3) The digitalization role of information systems regarding the interaction between transport, infrastructure, and institutional management in ports; (4) Assessment and innovation in seaport competition policies for the integration of green and sustainable operations; and (5) Conceptual development and awareness raising of port management practices on account of CO2 evidence-based policies regarding port terminals. The application of co-citation analysis methodology revealed future research directions within the five concurrent research streams on the basis of the top 5% trending scientific articles. The detailed content analysis assesses the scientific mapping of future research directions via the structural associations of the Driver-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework. The cause-and-effect relationships of the structural associations of the DPSIR framework possess the possibility of providing substantial insights into the most influential factor identification regarding the development of green port governance models and self-assessment toolkits.

In the process of promoting economic development, carbon peaks and carbon neutrality have gradually received more attention. The question of how to steadily and rapidly improve the carbon neutrality capacity of each province and excavate the key factors hindering the carbon neutrality capacity has become particularly important. In this study, the DPSIR (driving, pressure, state, influence, response) framework was used to construct an index system of the provincial carbon neutrality capacity of the middle and lower Yellow River Basin, which included 37 indices. Based on the entropy weight matter-element model, the time evolution, regional differences, and restriction indicators of the carbon neutrality capacity of four provinces in the middle and lower Yellow River Basin from 2008 to 2021 were analyzed. The results showed that the carbon neutrality capacity of the four provinces in the middle and lower Yellow River Basin has significantly improved over time and has gradually reached a grade of “good”. Differences in carbon neutrality capacity among the provinces still exist but are gradually shrinking. the per capita car ownership, urban population density, and other factors have hindered the improvement of the carbon neutrality capacity in each province, but with the reduction in restriction indicators and increase in positive indicators such as urbanization rate, forest grass coverage, and others, the overall development direction tended to be promising.

Atmospheric environment is an important resource for human survival. However, existing studies on air pollution often focus on one aspect of occurrence, impact, or prevention while neglecting dynamic mechanism inside. Besides, previous literature neither explores the influencing paths of this mechanism nor lacks the simulation analysis on the prevention and treatment of air pollution. To prevent the environment from deteriorating further, this paper first explores the causal path of air pollution under the framework of DPSIR model. Results show that the path coefficients of driving force to pressure, pressure to state, and state to influence are 0.696, −3.165, and 0.871, respectively. And the adjustment coefficient of the response layer to “pressure to state” is −0.918 at 10% significant level. Then, BP artificial neural network model is established to simulate and analyze the changes of air pollution state and influence in different scenarios in Jiangsu province. The results indicated that air pollution has a causal path of “Driver-Pressure-State-Influence.” Jiangsu should take measures to adjust the regulation intensity reasonably and avoid air pollution accompanied by industry GDP growing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lessons of local-scale climate change adaptations through indigenous techniques and knowledge practices (ITKPs) are imperative for climate adaptation policies. This study focused on the benefits of ITKPs and the potential of integrating them into climate adaptation and development activities through focus group discussions (FGDs) (n = 4) (involving persons over 18 years old, had recent disaster experience, and had lived at least 12 years in the area) and household surveys (n = 130) in the southern coastal areas of Bangladesh. We used household surveys to examine the importance of the ITKPs in terms of livelihood development and climate change adaptations, and qualitative syntheses of the FGDs information to reveal the causality of the ITKPs and development activities. Our study revealed that households perceived ITKPs to have higher economic security (64%), livelihood risk reduction (75%) and food security (62%). The majority of households (70%) in the agriculture profession perceived the higher economic potential of ITKPs, depending on the climate-adaptive co-benefits and taking into account their dependencies on climatic events. Agriculture dependent households who perceived the higher benefits of ITKPs were willing to pay 300 BDT/person/year for the improvement and restoration of those in the study areas. Our proposed DPSIR (driver, pressure, state, impact and response) framework implies the potentials of the incorporation of ITKPs into the national climate change adaptation policy in order to ensure sustainable climate change adaption for the coastal community of Bangladesh. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban air pollution, especially in the form of haze events, has become a serious threat to socio-economic development and public health in most developing countries. It is of great importance to assess the frequency of urban air pollution occurrence and its influencing factors. The objective of our study is to develop consistent methodologies for constructing an index system and for assessing the influencing factors of the urban air pollution occurrence based on the Driver-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework by incorporating spatial analysis, geographical detector, and geographically weighted regression models. The 27 influencing factors were selected for assessing their influences on the urban air pollution occurrence in 337 Chinese cities. The results indicate that the spatial pattern of the urban air pollution in China was mostly consistent with the Chinese population-based Hu Line. Urban air pollution frequently occurred in North China, Central China, Northeast China, and East China, and displayed strong seasonality. The influencing factors of urban air pollution were complex and diverse, varying from season to season. Influencing factor analysis also shows that the explanatory power between any two influencing factors was greater than that of a single influencing factor of the urban air pollution. Furthermore, most influencing factors had both positive and negative effects and local effects on urban air pollution. Finally, we put forward five suggestions on reducing urban air pollution occurrence, which can provide the basis and reference for the government to make policies on urban air pollution control in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Agricultural water sustainability in a basin environment experiencing climate change has become a critical issue in the past few decades. This study used the DPSIR (Driver–Pressure–State–Impact–Response) framework as a conceptual basis to explore the relationship between water footprint (WF) trends and climate change and agricultural-economic variation. With the aim of mitigating water crisis and ensuring robust responses to the uncertainty of the future, an uncertainty-based multivariate statistical approach was proposed for WF prediction by using various scenarios combined with multiple linear regression and Monte Carlo simulation. Lake Dianchi in China was used as the case study area. The results indicate that (1) the total WF had an increasing trend of 394.39 m3 ton−1 year−1; the WFgreen (the precipitation used in the crop production process) had a decreasing trend, while the WFblue (the irrigation water withdrawn from the ground or surface water) and WFgrey (the water used to dilute the load of pollutants, based on existing ambient water quality standards) exhibited an increasing trend; (2) the total WF showed a distinct increasing trend under climate change and agricultural-economic variation due to the increase of the WFgrey during 1981–2011; and (3) the impact of agricultural-economic factors on WF trends, especially on the WFblue and WFgrey, far outweighed the impact of climatic factors under the alternative scenarios. Our results suggest that adaptive management of anthropogenic activities should be prioritized to mitigate water stress under climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An objective understanding of the current situation and influencing factors of rural green development in China is an important prerequisite for effective formulation making of green development policies. Based on the panel data of 31 provinces of China from the year 1997 to 2017, this paper constructs and measures the rural green development efficiency (RGDE) based on Driving-Force, Pressure, State, Influence, Response (DPSIR) model and super-efficiency slacks-based measure (SBM) model. The results show that, the overall RGDE in China is fluctuating and rising from 1997 to 2017, and there are some differences between and within regions. The RGDE in developed areas is higher than that in developing areas, and coastal areas are higher than that in inland areas. The entire country, eastern, central, and western regions show σ convergence, which indicates that the RGDE is getting better, but there is no absolute β convergence, that means there is no "catch-up effect" between regions, but the gradient divergence showed central > eastern > western. At the same time, there is no conditional β convergence; the initial RGDE has a positive impact on the growth rate of RGDE, and the financial self-sufficiency rate promotes the growth of RGDE of the whole country and the western region, but inhibits the improvement of RGDE of the eastern region. The per capita GDP, mechanization degree, and agricultural industrial structure in rural areas did not promote the growth of RGDE. Based on the results, this paper puts forward some policy suggestions, such as promoting the classified implementation of rural green development policies, strengthening the top-level design, optimizing the existing agricultural mechanism and system, and guiding and standardizing the farmers' green production behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]