PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

Telecoupling science shows China's forest sustainability packs global impact

2013-12-20
(Press-News.org) Contact information: Sue Nichols
nichols@msu.edu
517-432-0206
Michigan State University
Telecoupling science shows China's forest sustainability packs global impact

As China increases its forests, a Michigan State University (MSU) sustainability scholar proposes a new way to answer the question: if a tree doesn't fall in China, can you hear it elsewhere in the world?

In this week's journal Asia and the Pacific Policy Studies, MSU's University Distinguished Professor Jianguo "Jack" Liu dissects the global impact of China's struggle to preserve and expand its forests even as its cities and population balloon.

Because China's supersized global role makes each domestic decision a world event, Liu shows how China's efforts to sustain forests influence other countries, and in turn how those changes may rebound to China. He is the author of "Forest Sustainability in China and Implications for a Telecoupled World."

"For a long time, many scientists have focused specifically on one place to understand environmental impact, but that no longer is enough," said Liu, the director of MSU's Center for Systems Integration and Sustainability and the Rachel Carson Chair in Sustainability. "Economic development and environmental conservation in one place are increasingly having substantial influence elsewhere, and spill over into places we don't consider."

Deforestation that eases in China tends to reappear in the countries that sell them lumber and food to meet their ravenous appetite for housing and furniture as well as food. But Liu notes that that's just the beginning. He deploys the telecoupling framework – a new multidisciplinary research tool that embraces the minutia of give and take. Telecoupling is socioeconomic and environmental interactions over distances. It goes beyond the idea of connection, as telecoupling factors in actions and reactions over distances.

In the past three decades, China has succeeded in increasing its forest cover. Sweeping policies that limit logging or encourage returning farmland to forest are credited with some of the success. Importing food, such as soybean and meat, and forest products like timber or wood furniture, also contributes. But that seems to have caused forests to decline in the countries selling the forest goods to China, as well as a spray of other impacts.

Importing food to China can allow more land to be returned to forest in China, yet when food demand from China becomes higher, farmers in other countries such as Brazil have more incentive to mow forests down or intensify agriculture by applying more fertilizers and pesticides.

Liu has introduces the telecoupling framework as an integrated way to understand how distance is shrinking and connections are strengthening between nature and humans.

Liu also shows there's more to this than trade. He points out how growing foreign investment in China has led to more houses, factories and infrastructure, all of which carve into forests. Even getting smarter – and sharing knowledge and technology more freely – can benefit or harm forests. Spreading the message of environmental protection can be a forest's friend, while spreading knowledge of technology can make powerful, efficient machinery available that harvests forests more efficiently.

And telecoupling science also allows scientists to consider "spillover" systems – the countries that are left out of the direct equations of trade between China and its partners in food and forest goods, but who produce the machinery to harvest and transport timber, or process timber, or even are home to routes for smugglers.

"The days of simply looking at sustainability at one place are over," Liu said. "We need to understand how the world really works and acknowledge that the world isn't as big and disconnected as we sometimes treat it."



INFORMATION:

The research was supported by the National Science Foundation, NASA and Michigan State University AgBioResearch.



ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

New ways to promote fitness for urban girls proposed by Rutgers-Camden nursing professor

2013-12-20
New ways to promote fitness for urban girls proposed by Rutgers-Camden nursing professor Most people know that one of the keys to reducing or preventing health problems is to get more exercise, but determining how to best integrate physical activity into their ...

Disabled shoppers confront holiday shopping barriers

2013-12-20
Disabled shoppers confront holiday shopping barriers Before chestnuts roast on the fire and sugarplums dance in the dreams of youngsters, the holiday season elicits visions of crowded parking lots and malls overrun by shoppers while retailers try to keep up with ...

Bullying in academia more prevalent than thought, says Rutgers-Camden scholar

2013-12-20
Bullying in academia more prevalent than thought, says Rutgers-Camden scholar CAMDEN — Bullying isn't only a problem that occurs in schools or online among young people. It can happen anywhere to anyone, and a Rutgers–Camden nursing scholar is shedding some ...

CCNY chemists use sugar-based gelators to solidify vegetable oils

2013-12-20
CCNY chemists use sugar-based gelators to solidify vegetable oils Mannitol and sorbitol dioctanoates could provide alternatives to trans fats linked to obesity, coronary artery disease and diabetes Researchers at The City College of New York have reported the ...

Oh, the places you'll go -- if you're an Atlantic slipper shell

2013-12-20
Oh, the places you'll go -- if you're an Atlantic slipper shell New research reveals the biomechanics of how marine snails swim Walk the beach or peer into a tidepool anywhere along the northeastern U.S. coast, and you'll find shells stacked on top of one another. ...

Saving fertility not priority at most cancer centers

2013-12-20
Saving fertility not priority at most cancer centers Lack of policies to protect cancer patients' fertility at top cancer centers CHICAGO --- Infertility is consistently listed as one of the most distressing long-term side effects of cancer treatment for adolescents ...

Ancient cranial surgery

2013-12-20
Ancient cranial surgery UCSB bioarchaeologist studies trepanation -- a practice of drilling holes in the cranium that dates back thousands of years Cranial surgery is tricky business, even under 21st-century conditions (think aseptic environment, ...

Dual catalysts help synthesize alpha-olefins into new organic compounds

2013-12-20
Dual catalysts help synthesize alpha-olefins into new organic compounds Boston College researchers combine two catalytic reactions to produce highly reactive compounds CHESTNUT HILL, MA (Dec. 19, 2013) – Boston College chemists have developed a new chemical synthesis methodology ...

A micro-muscular breakthrough

2013-12-20
A micro-muscular breakthrough Berkeley Lab researchers make a powerful new microscale torsional muscle/motor from vanadium dioxide Vanadium dioxide is poised to join the pantheon of superstars in the materials world. Already prized for its extraordinary ...

Inside the Bloomberg public health toolbox

2013-12-20
Inside the Bloomberg public health toolbox Health policy insiders reveal details of the data-driven process behind the city's public health successes; approach can be a model for other cities nationwide December 19, 2013 —As Mayor ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

SwRI-built instruments to monitor, provide advanced warning of space weather events

Breakthrough advances sodium-based battery design

New targeted radiation therapy shows near-complete response in rare sarcoma patients

Does physical frailty contribute to dementia?

Soccer headers and brain health: Study finds changes within folds of the brain

Decoding plants’ language of light

UNC Greensboro study finds ticks carrying Lyme disease moving into western NC

New implant restores blood pressure balance after spinal cord injury

New York City's medical specialist advantage may be an illusion, new NYU Tandon research shows

Could a local anesthetic that doesn’t impair motor function be within reach?

1 in 8 Italian cetacean strandings show evidence of fishery interactions, with bottlenose and striped dolphins most commonly affected, according to analysis across four decades of data and more than 5

In the wild, chimpanzees likely ingest the equivalent of several alcoholic drinks every day

Warming of 2°C intensifies Arctic carbon sink but weakens Alpine sink, study finds

Bronze and Iron Age cultures in the Middle East were committed to wine production

Indian adolescents are mostly starting their periods at an earlier age than 25 years ago

Temporary medical centers in Gaza known as "Medical Points" (MPs) treat an average of 117 people daily with only about 7 staff per MP

Rates of alcohol-induced deaths among the general population nearly doubled from 1999 to 2024

PLOS One study: In adolescent lab animals exposed to cocaine, High-Intensity Interval Training boosts aversion to the drug

Scientists identify four ways our bodies respond to COVID-19 vaccines

Stronger together: A new fusion protein boosts cancer immunotherapy

Hidden brain waves as triggers for post-seizure wandering

Music training can help the brain focus

Researcher develop the first hydride ion prototype battery

MIT researchers find a more precise way to edit the genome

‘Teen’ pachycephalosaur butts into fossil record

Study finds cocoa extract supplement reduced key marker of inflammation and aging

Obesity treatment with bariatric surgery vs GLP-1 receptor agonists

Nicotinamide for skin cancer chemoprevention

Novel way to ‘rev up’ brown fat burns calories, limits obesity in mice

USC Stem Cell-led team makes major advance toward building a synthetic kidney

[Press-News.org] Telecoupling science shows China's forest sustainability packs global impact