Impacts of information about COVID-19 on pig farmers'production willingness and behavior:Evidence from China

This paper examines the impacts of information about COVID-19 on pig farmers'production willingness by using endorsement experiments and follow-up surveys conducted in 2020 and 2021 in China.Our results show that,first,farmers were less willing to scale up production when they received information about COVID-19.The information in 2020 that the second wave of COVID-19 might occur without a vaccine reduced farmers'willingness to scale up by 13.4%,while the information in 2021 that COVID-19 might continue to spread despite the introduction of vaccine reduced farmers'willingness by 4.4%.Second,farmers whose production was affected by COVID-19 were considerably less willing to scale up,given the access to COVID-19 information.Third,farmers'production willingness can predict their actual production behavior.

Characterization of Small-Scale Farmers and Assessment of Their Access to Crop Production Information in Selected Counties of Kenya

Small-scale farming accounts for 78% of total agricultural production in Kenya and contributes to 23.5% of the country’s GDP. Their crop production activities are mostly rainfed subsistence with any surplus being sold to bring in some income. Timely decisions on farm practices such as farm preparation and planting are critical determinants of the seasonal outcomes. In Kenya, most small-scale farmers have no reliable source of information that would help them make timely and accurate decisions. County governments have extension officers who are mandated with giving farmers advisory services to farmers but they are not able to reach most farmers due to facilitation constraints. The mode and format of sharing information is also critical since it’s important to ensure that it’s timely, well-understood and usable. This study sought to assess access to geospatial derived and other crop production information by farmers in four selected counties of Kenya. Specific objectives were to determine the profile of small-scale farmers in terms of age, education and farm size;to determine the type of information that is made available to them by County and Sub-County extension officers including the format and mode of provision;and to determine if the information provided was useful in terms of accuracy, timeliness and adequacy. The results indicated that over 80% of the farmers were over 35 years of age and over 56% were male. Majority had attained primary education (34%) or secondary education (29%) and most farmers in all the counties grew maize (71%). Notably, fellow farmers were a source of information (71%) with the frequency of sharing information being mostly seasonal (37%) and when information was available (43%). Over 66% of interviewed farmers indicating that they faced challenges while using provided information. The results from the study are insightful and helpful in determining effective ways of providing farmers with useful information to ensure maximum benefits.

The Customer Requirements Analysis Method of Engineering Products Based on Multiple Preference Information

To effectively evaluate the fuzziness of the market environment in product planning,a customer requirements analysis method based on multiple preference information is proposed.Firstly,decision-makers use a preferred information form to evaluate the importance of each customer requirement.Secondly,a transfer function is employed to unify various forms of preference information into a fuzzy complementary judgment matrix.The ranking vector is then calculated using row and normalization methods,and the initial importance of customer requirements is obtained by aggregating the weights of decision members.Finally,the correction coefficients of initial importance and each demand are synthesized,and the importance of customer requirements is determined through normalization.The development example of the PE jaw crusher demonstrates the effectiveness and feasibility of the proposed method.

Landfill Site Suitability Assessment Using Geographic Information System (GIS) and Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) in Butuan City, Philippines

Landfilling is one of the most effective and responsible ways to dispose of municipal solid waste(MSW).Identifying landfill sites,however,is a challenging and complex undertaking because it depends on social,environmental,technical,economic,and legal issues.This study aims to map the optimal sites that were environmentally suitable for locating a landfill site in Butuan City,Philippines.With reference to the policy requirements from DENR Section I,Landfill Site Identification Criteria and Screening Guidelines of National Solid Waste Management Commission,the integration of a Geographic Information System(GIS)model builder and Analytical Hierarchy Process(AHP)has been used in this study to address the aforementioned challenges related to the landfill site suitability analysis.Based on the generated sanitary landfill suitability map,results showed that Barangay Tungao(1131.42967 ha)and Florida(518.48 ha)were able to meet and consider the three(3)main components,namely economic,environmental,and physical criteria,and are highly suit­able as landfill site locations in Butuan City.It is recommended that there will conduct a geotechnical evaluation,involv­ing rigorous geological and hydrogeological assessment employing a combination of site investigation and laboratory techniques.In addition,additional specific social,ecological,climatic,and economic factors need to be considered(i.e.including impact on humans,flora,fauna,soil,water,air,climate,and landscape).

Side-Channel Leakage Analysis of Inner Product Masking

The Inner Product Masking(IPM)scheme has been shown to provide higher theoretical security guarantees than the BooleanMasking(BM).This scheme aims to increase the algebraic complexity of the coding to achieve a higher level of security.Some previous work unfolds when certain(adversarial and implementation)conditions are met,and we seek to complement these investigations by understanding what happens when these conditions deviate from their expected behaviour.In this paper,we investigate the security characteristics of IPM under different conditions.In adversarial condition,the security properties of first-order IPMs obtained through parametric characterization are preserved in the face of univariate and bivariate attacks.In implementation condition,we construct two new polynomial leakage functions to observe the nonlinear leakage of the IPM and connect the security order amplification to the nonlinear function.We observe that the security of IPMis affected by the degree and the linear component in the leakage function.In addition,the comparison experiments from the coefficients,signal-to-noise ratio(SNR)and the public parameter show that the security properties of the IPM are highly implementation-dependent.

Locating Global System for Mobile Communication(GSM)Base Stations Using Geographic Information System(GIS)

The global system for mobile communication(GSM)is planned to meet the needs of the whole subscribers.The number of subscribers increased as the population increased due to the acceptance of GSM services by the subscribers.Thus,there should be a way to monitor base stations that will meet the increasing demand of subscribers in any area as a population surge will lead to more subscriptions.This will allow GSM network operators to serve their subscribers better and ease network congestion.This work presents a review of mobile evolution from the first generation to the fifth generation.A review of global positioning system(GPS)technology and its applications to geographic information systems(GIS)was done.The coordinates of these base stations were taken using a GPS device.These base station coordinates were then exported to QGIS for the design of the map.Thereafter,the output map was then integrated into the website.The discussions on the results followed and some useful suggestions given will go a long way to help the operators of GSM in Nigeria and in general.If the propositions given are adhered to,it will go a long way to help the operators reduce congestion on their network and thereby increase the satisfaction of the subscribers.

Prototype Geographic Information Systems Mapping of Crop Products Featured Local

Local featured program in Indonesia cannot be separated entirely from commodity strategic bases. Until in 2006, agricultural development formulation showed indicative targets for featured crops commodity production. The problem of food security is forming of farmer’s independence to protect local resources in efficiently and optimally, so these resources can be more utilized. It can be achieved by assist of information technologies and communication in forming of Geographic Information System (GIS) to support consistency of food security in Indonesia. This research designs prototype geographic information system in order to conduct the accurate mapping and to know the local featured crops production in Indonesia. This level is conducted for documentation and mapping of agricultural products which is the local featured production. This documentation requires the usage of potential physical, economic, social and cultural environment by the utilization of information technology and communication, which have the ability of relevancy and accessibility of reliable information.

Research on Mobile-Based Logistics Information System for Hainan Agricultural Products

The current situation,information technology and problems of logistics for agricultural products were summarized.Some key technologies involved in mobilebased logistics information system for Hainan agricultural products were analyzed,such as information classification and retrieval,user information authentication via QR code,and logistics information services based on WEB and mobile devices.Emphasis was given to study the design idea,content,method for the system.

The Operation Mechanism of Agricultural Products Supply Chain and Profit Allocation Model in the Context of Asymmetric Information

The research performed analysis on causes of asymmetric information of agricultural product supply chain and made conclusion on operation mechanism and characteristics of supply chain based on asymmetric information. Finally, the research detailed profit sharing of agricultural product supply chain in the context of asymmetric information and proposed suggestions, providing references of pricing and profit sharing of supply chains of agricultural products.

Application of Remote Sensing and Geographic Information System in Land Use and Land Cover Change

The integration and application of remote sensing （RS） and geographic in-formation system （GIS） in the study of the Land Use and Land Cover Change （LUCC） were summarized, as wel as researches on the monitoring dynamic changes in LUCC, driving force and application examples of the integration and the application of RS and GIS in simulation research. The methods and technical ap-proaches of RS and GIS in LUCC research were discussed. Views on the existing problems of the integration and the application of RS and GIS were put forward, and the future developing direction of LUCC technology was forecasted.

Classification Method for Dongting Lake Wetland Based on Geographic Information

[Objective] This study aimed to improve the accuracy of remote sensing classification for Dongting Lake Wetland.[Method] Based on the TM data and ground GIS information of Donting Lake,the decision tree classification method was established through the expert classification knowledge base.The images of Dongting Lake wetland were classified into water area,mudflat,protection forest beach,Carem spp beach,Phragmites beach,Carex beach and other water body according to decision tree layers.[Result] The accuracy of decision tree classification reached 80.29%,which was much higher than the traditional method,and the total Kappa coefficient was 0.883 9,indicating that the data accuracy of this method could fulfill the requirements of actual practice.In addition,the image classification results based on knowledge could solve some classification mistakes.[Conclusion] Compared with the traditional method,the decision tree classification based on rules could classify the images by using various conditions,which reduced the data processing time and improved the classification accuracy.

Basic theory and key technologies for marine geographic information system

Marine geographic information system （MGIS） has great ability to deal with the spatio-temporal problems and has potential superiority when it is applied to oceanography. Using the feature extraction of oceanic phenomena as a case study, the functions of the MGIS are analyzed, and thus the position of MGIS in the oceanography is defined. Comparing the requirement of MGIS with that of the traditional GIS which has been developed in the terrestrial applications in the past four decades, the frame for the functions of MGIS is constructed. According to the established MGIS, some key technologies are discussed in detail with emphasis on the specialities which can distinguish the MGIS from the traditional GIS.

Geographical Information System-Based Assessment of Ecological Security in Changbai Mountain Region

Ecological security defined as the creation of a condition where the physical surroundings of a community provide for the needs of its inhabitants without diminishing its natural stock,which is important for regional security and social stability.In recent years,land use patterns in the Changbai Mountain region have changed significantly with intensive human activities,and consequently led to increasing problems in regional ecological security.Based on the Pressure-State-Impact-Response(PSIR) model and the mathematical method of catastrophe progression supported by geographical information system(GIS),the ecological security situation of the study area under land use and cover change(LUCC) was evaluated.The results indicated that the ecological security in Changbai Mountain region varied nonlinearly,which got better from 1990 to 2000 but became worse from 2000 to 2007,the ecological security levels in Changbai Mountain region were mainly medium and medium to low during the past 17 years,with higher values of Ecological Security Index(ESI) in the central region and lower values in the east and west,the ecological security situation was more serious in the settlements and river valleys,where the LUCC was most remarkable.

Hazards Assessment of Regional Debris Flows Based on Geographic Information Science

Supported by the spatial analysis feature of geographic information science and assessment model of regional debris flows, hazards degrees of the debris flows in the Upper Yangtze River Watershed （UYRW） are divided into five grades based on grid cell. The area of no danger, light danger, medium danger, severe danger and extreme severe danger regions respectively are 278 000, 288 000, 217 000, 127 000, 15 000 km^2. Furthermore, the counties in the UYRW are classified into four classes based on the hazards degrees in each county. The number of severe danger, medium danger, light danger and no danger counties respectively are 49, 82, 77 and 105. The assessment results will be provided for the hazards forecasting and mitigation in the UYRW and ongoing regionalization of Main Function Regions in China as data and technique framework.

Spatial variations of aluminum species in drinking water supplies in Xi'an studied applying geographic information system

This article aimed to investigate the variation of aluminum species and the effects of coagulant type and water quality on aluminum speciation in drinking water. Statistical analysis showed that the concentration of total aluminum （AlT） of drinking water in Xi＇ an ranged from 0.051 to 0.417 mg/L and the concentration of A1T in about 24.7% studied samples was higher than the currently recommended value （0.2 mg/L）. The areas fed by surface water plants had a larger portion （39.4%） of samples over the recommended value. In drinking water treated by alum coagulant, the average concentration of monomeric aluminum （Ala） was higher than that in water treated by poly aluminum chlorine （PACl） and poly aluminum ferric chloride （PAFC）. The average concentrations of polynuclear aluminum （Alb） and colloidal/suspended aluminum （Ale） in the drinking water treated by alum were lower than those in water treated by PACl and PAFC. There was a notable decrease in AlT along with the delivery pipeline away from the plants, with an average decline of about 36 μg/（L-km）. Besides coagulant type, water quality also could affect aluminum speciation. In drinking water without orthophosphate, the concentrations of Ala and AlT were positively correlated with pH; while, in drinking water with orthophospbate, the concentrations of Ala and AlT were negatively correlated with pH. The addition of orthophosphate salts in the drinking water treatment process would be an effective method for aluminum control in pH range 6.5-8.2.

Research on Development of Agricultural Geographic Information Ontology

This paper first analyzes the reason that agricultural geographic information gives rise to semantic heterogeneity and solution thereof. Although OWL （web ontology language） is the standard of ontology representation language in semantic web, it is insufficient in representing spatial characteristics, especially spatial relationship. Consequently it is pointed out to build geo-ontology by virtue of three theories such as mereology, location theory and topology in this paper. This paper introduces mereology, location theory and topology, and then discusses how to adopt these three theories to build geo-ontology. The outcome of experiment shows that solution put forward by this paper is feasible.

Chaining Distributed Geographic Information Web Services Based on Ontology

To solve the problem of chaining distributed geographic information Web services （GI Web services）, this paper provides an ontology-based method. With this method, semantic service description can be achieved by semantic annotation of the elements in a Web service description language（WSDL） document with concepts of geographic ontology, and then a common under-standing about service semantics between customers and providers of Web services is built. Based on the decomposition and formalization of customer requirements, the discovery, composition and execution of GI Web services are explained in detail, and then a chaining of GI Web services is built and used to achieve the customer＇s requirement. Finally, an example based on Web ontology language for service （OWL-S） is provided for testing the feasibility of this method.

Remote sensing and geographic information systems techniques in studies on treeline ecotone dynamics

We performed a meta-analysis on over 100 studies applying remote sensing(RS)and geographic information systems(GIS)to understand treeline dynamics.A literature search was performed in multiple online databases,including Web of Knowledge(Thomson Reuters),Scopus(Elsevier),BASE(Bielefeld Academic Search Engine),CAB Direct,and Google Scholar using treeline-related queries.We found that RS and GIS use has steadily increased in treeline studies since 2000.Spatialresolution RS and satellite imaging techniques varied from low-resolution MODIS,moderate-resolution Landsat,to high-resolution WorldView and aerial orthophotos.Most papers published in the 1990s used low to moderate resolution sensors such as Landsat Multispectral Scanner and Thematic Mapper,or SPOT PAN(Panchromatic)and MX(Multispectral)RS images.Subsequently,we observed a rise in high-resolution satellite sensors such as ALOS,GeoEye,IKONOS,and WorldView for mapping current and potential treelines.Furthermore,we noticed a shift in emphasis of treeline studies over time:earlier reports focused on mapping treeline positions,whereas RS and GIS are now used to determine the factors that control treeline variation.

The Development of a Geographic Information System(GIS) Database for Jiuzhaigou National Nature Reserve and Its Application

The objective of this paper is to develop a GIS(Geographic Information System) database for Jiuzhaigou National Nature Reserve(Jiuzhaigou,hereafter) in China and demonstrate its application as a research tool.A cost-effective procedure was developed to compile a variety of geographical and biological data of the study area in terms of popular GIS format such as shape files.These files were further calibrated and validated using field surveys data.The developed GIS database was used to quantify the distributions of the wildlife(amphibians,mammals,and birds) using the distances of the wildlife to the centerline of the bus-tour routes.The Pearson correlation coefficient was used to quantify the correlation in space between pairs of different wildlife using the number of habitats for given space contexts.An ArcObject-based macro was developed to perform the analysis.The results showed the majority of the habitats of wildlife are located in the proximity of the tour-bus routes with an average distance ranging from 564 to 894 m depending on types of wildlife.This indicates a possibility of the disturbance to the wildlife by human activities.The correlation coefficient of the wildlife ranged from 0.36 to 0.64 depending on pairs of wildlife,indicating some correlations in space.However,due to the limited sample size,the statistical significances need to be further investigated.This paper has successfully demonstrated the use of the GIS-based database as a research tool for environmental study.

THE MANAGEMENT AND RESEARCH OF GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES USING GEOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION SYSTEM

Based on the combination of Geographical information system(GIS)with the research ofToponymy,some foundational problems of the Geographical Name Information System(GINS)are discussed in this paper.The present situation of Toponymical research is anal-ysed and the necessity of introducing the GIS tools to the research of Toponymy is demon-strated.The conceptual model of the GNIS and the structure of Geographical name Database(GND)are discussed.The basic functions of the GNIS software for management and re-search of geographical name are suggested.Some issues are stated such as the applicationand potential of the combination of GIS with CAD in the management and research of To-ponymy,the combination of GNIS with other spatial information system and sharing the in-formation with each other,the research and development of GNIS, etc.