Environmental studies (EVS or EVST) is a multidisciplinary academic field which systematically studies human interaction with the environment. Environmental studies connects principles from the physical sciences, commerce/economics, the humanities, and social sciences to address complex contemporary environmental issues. It is a broad field of study that includes the natural environment, the built environment, and the relationship between them. The field encompasses study in basic principles of ecology and environmental science, as well as associated subjects such as ethics, geography, anthropology, public policy (environmental policy), education, political science (environmental politics), urban planning, law, economics, philosophy, sociology and social justice, planning, pollution control and natural resource management. There are many Environmental Studies degree programs, including a Master's degree and a Bachelor's degree. Environmental Studies degree programs provide a wide range of skills and analytical tools needed to face the environmental issues of our world head on. Students in Environmental Studies gain the intellectual and methodological tools to understand and address the crucial environmental issues of our time and the impact of individuals, society, and the planet. Environmental education's main goal is to instill in all members of society a pro-environmental thinking and attitude. This will help to create environmental ethics and raise people's awareness of the importance of environmental protection and biodiversity.
The New York State College of Forestry at Syracuse University established a BS in environmental studies degree in the 1950s, awarding its first degree in 1956. Middlebury College established the major there in 1965.
The Environmental Studies Association of Canada (ESAC) was established in 1993 "to further research and teaching activities in areas related to environmental studies in Canada". ESAC was officially integrated in 1994, and the first convention for ESAC was held at the Learned Societies Conference in Calgary the same year.
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Protected areas or conservation areas are locations which receive protection because of their recognized natural, ecological or cultural values. Protected areas are those areas in which human presence or the exploitation of natural resources (e.g. firewood, non-timber forest products, water, ...) is limited. The term "protected area" also includes marine protected areas and transboundary protected areas across multiple borders. As of 2016, there are over 161,000 protected areas representing about 17 percent of the world's land surface area (excluding Antarctica).
The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. It is involved in data gathering and analysis, research, field projects, advocacy, and education. IUCN's mission is to "influence, encourage and assist societies throughout the world to conserve nature and to ensure that any use of natural resources is equitable and ecologically sustainable".
Natural resource management (NRM) is the management of natural resources such as land, water, soil, plants and animals, with a particular focus on how management affects the quality of life for both present and future generations (stewardship). Natural resource management deals with managing the way in which people and natural landscapes interact. It brings together natural heritage management, land use planning, water management, bio-diversity conservation, and the future sustainability of industries like agriculture, mining, tourism, fisheries and forestry.
This course examines growth from various angles: economic growth, growth in the use of resources, need for growth, limits to growth, sustainable growth, and, if time permits, population growth and gro
This course examines the supply of energy from various angles: available resources, how they can be combined or substituted, their private and social costs, whether they can meet the demand, and how t
Cette Unité d'Enseignement ENAC vise à présenter et mettre en oeuvre de nouvelles notions de planification durable de quartiers urbains.
Organisé en deux parties, ce cours présente les bases théoriques et pratiques des systèmes d’information géographique, ne nécessitant pas de connaissances préalables en informatique. En suivant cette
Organisé en deux parties, ce cours présente les bases théoriques et pratiques des systèmes d’information géographique, ne nécessitant pas de connaissances préalables en informatique. En suivant cette
Ce cours constitue la seconde partie d'un enseignement consacré aux bases théoriques et pratiques des systèmes d’information géographique. Il propose une introduction aux systèmes d’information géogra
An ecosystem (or ecological system) consists of all the organisms and the physical environment with which they interact. These biotic and abiotic components are linked together through nutrient cycles and energy flows. Energy enters the system through photosynthesis and is incorporated into plant tissue. By feeding on plants and on one another, animals play an important role in the movement of matter and energy through the system. They also influence the quantity of plant and microbial biomass present.
Sustainable forest management (SFM) is the management of forests according to the principles of sustainable development. Sustainable forest management has to keep the balance between three main pillars: ecological, economic and socio-cultural. Sustainable forestry can seem contradicting to some individuals as the act of logging trees is not sustainable. However, the goal of sustainable forestry is to allow for a balance to be found between ethical forestry and maintaining biodiversity through the means of maintaining natural patterns of disturbance and regeneration.
Environmental sociology is the study of interactions between societies and their natural environment. The field emphasizes the social factors that influence environmental resource management and cause environmental issues, the processes by which these environmental problems are socially constructed and define as social issues, and societal responses to these problems. Environmental sociology emerged as a subfield of sociology in the late 1970s in response to the emergence of the environmental movement in the 1960s.
Covers the transition from sustainable development to planetary boundaries, exploring weak and strong sustainability concepts, international agendas, and global socio-economic trends.
By Prof. Julia Steinberger delves into the impact of climate change on societal well-being, emphasizing the need for radical transformations to combat planetary crises.
Explores intergenerational responsibility, emphasizing the impact of current actions on future generations and the evaluation of a country's wealth in terms of different types of capital.
Active in nutrition innovation, bioactive ingredients and sustainability. Embion Technologies develops breakthrough platform technology for extracting bioavailable oligomers from plant biomass, addressing global food challenges with sustainable and affordable solutions.
Patterns in nature arise from processes interacting across a continuum of spatial scales, where new relationships emerge at each level of investigation. These patterns are nested features encompassing fine-scale local patterns, such as topography and geolo ...
Allowing companies to damage ecosystems and pay for restoration is unsuitable as a governance mechanism in the current biodiversity crisis, and is highly unlikely to restore genetic and functional biosphere integrity, At the same time, restoring previously ...
2024
Social media is increasingly being employed to develop Cultural Ecosystem Services (CES) indicators. The image-sharing platform Flickr has been one of the most popular sources of data. Most large-scale studies, however, tend to only use the number of image ...