نشریه محیط زیست و توسعه
پیاپی 24 (پاییز و زمستان 1400)

The desire of states for economic development on the one hand and maintaining a healthy environment, on the other, raises the issue of conflict between the economy and the environment. States have concluded many treaties to protect the environment, as well as many treaties to support foreign investment. These two legal systems have caused a conflict of interest in the development of countries. To determine the position of environmental protection against the economic interests of foreign investors, it is necessary to examine the international precedent. One of the most important practices in which the conflict between the two can be observed is the precedent of the International Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID), which deals with disagreements between foreign investors and the host states in a specialized manner. Therefore, the main question is that in the arbitration precedent of the foreign investment center, to what extent the environment has been protected against the interests of foreign investors? The hypothesis is that ICSID, as an investment authority, takes side with foreign investors in this conflict. However, the descriptive-analytical study showed that inspite of the ICSID background i.e. the cases of Metalclad Corp. and Compañiá de Aguas del Aconquija S.A. and Vivendi Universal S.A. in which investors received priority in their conflict with environmental promoters, in recent cases the ICSID showed preference towards the environmental aspects. This change of precedent showed itself in two cases i.e. Compañía Del Desarrollo De Santa Elena, S.A. Pac Rim Cayman LLC. However, ICSID has determined the compensation for the benefit of the investor for the losses caused by the stoppage of investment, so that a part of the expected benefits of the investor is also compensated reconciling the two sides.

One of the basic tools for achieving sustainable development is the imposition of green taxes on polluting activities. In this regard, international institutions have proposed Environmental Tax Reform. Accordingly, if countries replace destruction taxes with green taxes, parallel with financing, the environmental sustainability is also ensured. Based on this hypothesis, the green tax provides two types of benefits: improving environmental quality, and economic efficiency. The purpose of this study is to test the validity of creating a double dividend after carrying out environmental tax reforms in countries. The method used in this study is descriptive-inferential. In order to test the double dividend hypothesis, two multivariate linear regressions were used. The first model tests the effect of green taxes and income taxes on final energy consumption. The second model considers the effect of the interaction of these two taxes. To estimate both models, panel data from EU member states for the period 2018-1995 were used. To estimate the models, data related to the European Union’s members for the time interval 1995-2018 were employed. The finding of this study showed that with 1% increase in green tax revenue, final energy consumption in the selected countries decreased by 0.12%, and the first dividend was confirmed. However, the estimation of the second model did not confirm the second dividend that claimed green taxes can be a replacement for environmental destruction taxes.

Effective and safe treatment of contaminated sediments in aquatic ecosystems has always been one of the most important environmental challenges in the world. Natural ecosystems are always threatened by likely accumulation of toxic pollutants. Therefore, rapid remediation of these valuable ecosystems is essential. Dredging and Capping are among the well-known methods in the world that have been used for clean and quick reduction of the concentration of toxic contaminants in sediments. Capping is a proven and common remediation technology for containment of contaminated sediments in order to reduce their contaminants mobility and contact with the environment. In capping, the contaminated sediments are covered by one or more layers of clean materials such as sand, gravel, clean dredged material, active or reactive materials and etc. This method provides the restoration of these ecosystems by rapidly reducing the amount of pollutants in surface waters through absorbing and reducing the mobility of toxic substances in contaminated sediments. This technology has less environmental hazards than the dredging method, while it has never been studied on a laboratory or field scale in Iran. This research intends to introduce the method involving activated carbon, as a background for the implementation of this technology in the country. This research is of practical type and documentary-libraries in terms of purpose and method of data collection, respectively.

Billions of tons of plastic waste reveal the need to pay more attention to this environmental challenge. The inefficiencies and complications of existing methods make the use of new methods inevitable. Insects with a life history of hundreds of millions of years, have established good coexistence with a variety of microorganisms during their evolutionary process and have become able to decompose a variety of hydrocarbon polymers similar to today's plastics. Beetles, moths and crickets are the most important orders of insects that have plastic-eating species. They can feed on common plastics such as polyethylene, polystyrene, polypropylene, polyvinyl chloride and polyurethane and convert them into valuable biomass. Barley beetles, yellow flour beetles, and wax moths can respectively feed on polyethylene by 4.3, 1.7, and 5.9 mg/g of their live weight per day without complementary foods. This amount for rice moth larvae is 42 mg per day. The two-spotted crickets are the only insects capable of degrading polyurethane at a rate of 0.28 mg per day. In this paper, the efficiency of superior species and their usefulness has been discussed.

The global outbreak of coronavirus (COVID-19) has led to a significant reduction in industrial, transportation and tourism activities in a short period of time, resulting in improved environmental conditions such as cleaner air, higher river water quality and better wildlife conditions. Although measures taken to control the spread of the virus have slowed or halted economic activity, it has led to more human interaction with nature at this critical time to the benefit of nature and the environment. The aim of this study was to demonstrate the indirect positive and negative effects of Covid-19 on the environment. The study showed that the coronavirus epidemic has significantly improved air quality in various cities around the world, while reducing greenhouse gas emissions, water pollution and noise, which may help rebuild the ecosystem. There are also negative consequences of Covid-19, including increased medical waste, improper use of disinfectants, disposal of masks and gloves, and loads of untreated waste that can increase environmental and health hazards. Thus, the spread of Covid-19 pandemic has several positive and negative effects on the environment, although it seems to have short-term positive effects and long-term negative effects.

Wetlands are among the most important ecosystems in the world with special value due to their unique biodiversity and multifaceted features. In recent decades, wetlands have faced many problems due to the lack of integrated management of water resources in their catchment basin and human activities and mismanagement. In this paper, the problems of Amirkelayeh Wetland based on the results of implementation of a participatory plan for integrated ecosystem management are divided into three main aspects including biodiversity, water-soil and socio-economic issues which are described by tree analysis technique and descriptive method. The most important biodiversity problems consisted of illegal hunting and fishing, introduction of invasive and non-native species, wildlife diseases, increased growth and decomposition of wetland plants. The water-soil problems consisted of release of agricultural wastewater (fertilizers and pesticides), water withdrawal, and clogged drains. Finally, in terms of the socio-economic issues, land-use changes, lack of awareness and training of managers and local communities about the functions of the wetland, lack of interaction among stakeholders and organizations, livelihood, and economic problems in the local community were the most important problems of Amirkelayeh Wetland. These problems have caused irreparable damages to the wetland’s environment and the loss of its potential biological, economic and social functions. These results showed that implementation of an integrated management plan can prevent irreparable and progressive destruction, and protect the values and function of Amirkelayeh Wetland.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the application of green schools’ components in schools. In this research, a descriptive-survey method was used. The statistical population was all primary school teachers in Zarghan (292 people) of whom 166 were selected by stratified sampling. The data collection tool was the questionnaire of Islamieh (Islamieh et al., 2019) whose validity was confirmed by researchers and its reliability was obtained by Cronbach's alpha method at 0.92. Data analysis was performed based on sample t-test and independent t-test. The main findings of the study showed that employment of design and architecture components, the use of technology in energy management, resorting to renewable energy, reform in consumption patterns, and waste management and green purchases in schools are below average. However, the average use of other components is slightly higher than the recommended mean level, but still far from the desired state. It is suggested that the institutions involved in environmental education try and adapt more with the green schools patterns, through proper training, design an action plans.

Due to the environmental problems caused by industrial activities in recent years, attention to the organizations’ green measures to solve environmental problems has increased. In this regard, the present study was conducted to investigate the impact of green management of human resources on sustainable development. This is an applied study conducted as a descriptive-survey research with a cross-sectional approach. The statistical population included 191 senior managers, deputies and employees of the human resources management department in the Headquarters of Iran Ministry of Oil, of whom a sample of 130 people were selected using the Cochran's formula. In this study, a standard questionnaire including 7 dimensions and 36 questions was used to collect information to test the hypotheses. The validity of the questionnaire was confirmed using content validity method and convergent validity and the reliability of the questionnaire was calculated by Cronbach's alpha coefficient and combined reliability. To test the hypotheses, the partial least squares technique and Smart PLS software were used. The results of testing the hypotheses showed that green management of human resources has a positive and significant effect on green attitude, environmental interests and green self-efficacy. It was also found that green communication modulates the relationship between green management of human resources and environmental interests, green attitude and green self-efficacy. We also showed that green self-efficacy, green attitude and environmental interests all have a positive and significant effect on green behavior. Finally, it was found that green behavior has a significant effect on sustainable development.

Landscape ecology has generated much excitement in the past two decades. One reason was that it brought spatial analysis and modeling to the forefront of ecological research. However, high expectations for landscape analysis to improve our understanding and prediction of ecological processes have largely been unfulfilled. We identified three kinds of critical issues: conceptual flaws in landscape pattern analysis, inherent limitations of landscape indices, and improper use of pattern indices. For example, many landscape analyses treat quantitative description of spatial pattern as an end itself and fail to explore relationships between pattern and process. Landscape indices and map data are sometimes used without testing their ecological relevance, which may not only confound interpretation of results, but also lead to meaningless results. In addition, correlation analysis with indices is impeded by the lack of data because of difficulties in large-scale experimentation and by complicated behavior of indices as a result of their varying responses to changes in scale and spatial pattern. These problems represent significant challenges to landscape pattern analysis, especially in terms of relating pattern to process. In this perspective paper, we examine the underlying problems of these challenges and offer some solutions.

The main purpose of this study was to bring tourists' experiences of nature and rural semi-natural spaces and their positive effects to the formal knowledge and discover important data and new categories of tourist’s experiences. This research seeks to complete a puzzle of categories that ultimately helps to understand and explain the quality of "nature experience in rural areas" and its positive effects in various dimensions. We used the contextual theory method in this qualitative research. The study population was tourists from Mashhad who had at least five rural trips in the years 2019 & 2020. To sample by the snowball method, semi-structured interviews were conducted involving 41 individuals using the two criteria of "diversity" and "reaching the theoretical saturation point". Findings showed that tourists have experienced a variety of direct nature experiences in rural environments with their senses, which have been associated with many positive effects such as improved physical and mental health, feeling of pleasure and self-esteem, creativity and finally a kind of satisfaction. Toward the end, suggestions were made to the relevant officials for development of the nature experience platforms and enrichment of the rural tourism trips. As the current research is an effort in line with academic discourse on the importance and dimensions of experiencing nature, its role and effects, the most important suggestion of this study to future researchers is to conduct more quantitative, qualitative and mixed metod research in this new and multidisciplinary field of study.