The coastal zones of Small Island States are hotspots of human habitation and economic endeavour. In the Pacific region, as elsewhere, there are large gaps in understandings of the exposure and vulnerability of people in coastal zones. The 22 Pacific Countries and Territories (PICTs) are poorly represented in global analyses of vulnerability to seaward risks. We combine several data sources to estimate populations to zones 1, 5 and 10 km from the coastline in each of the PICTs. Regional patterns in the proximity of Pacific people to the coast are dominated by Papua New Guinea. Overall, ca. half the population of the Pacific resides within 10 km of the coast but this jumps to 97% when Papua New Guinea is excluded. A quarter of Pacific people live within 1 km of the coast, but without PNG this increases to slightly more than half. Excluding PNG, 90% of Pacific Islanders live within 5 km of the coast. All of the population in the coral atoll nations of Tokelau and Tuvalu live within a km of the ocean. Results using two global datasets, the SEDAC-CIESIN Gridded Population of the World v4 (GPWv4) and the Oak Ridge National Laboratory Landscan differed: Landscan under-dispersed population, overestimating numbers in urban centres and underestimating population in rural areas and GPWv4 over-dispersed the population. In addition to errors introduced by the allocation models of the two methods, errors were introduced as artefacts of allocating households to 1 km x 1 km grid cell data (30 arc-seconds) to polygons. The limited utility of LandScan and GPWv4 in advancing this analysis may be overcome with more spatially resolved census data and the inclusion of elevation above sea level as an important dimension of vulnerability.
Matched MeSH terms: Population Density*; Population Dynamics*; Rural Population; Urban Population
Analysis of histories and genealogies from seven relatively unacculturated, swidden-farming Semai settlements shows that the composition of local groups fluctuates through time. This instability is similar to a pattern which Neel and his colleagues have suggested is typical of primitive society, the fission-fusion model. In addition, the individuals comprising Semai fission groups are kinsmen which implies that the number of independent genomes represented is markedly less than the number of individual migrants (the lineal effect). Fission groups may form new villages or fuse with an established settlement. In either case, the genetic effects of such migration are more pronounced than would be expected on the basis of founder effect or random migration. Despite several conspicuous differences in social organization between the Semai and the South American Indians (e.g., bilateral vs. unilineal descent) whose population structure provided the empirical basis for the fission-fusion, lineal effect model, the basic similarities are striking. The Semai case thus lends support to the proposition that this pattern may be of some generality in technologically primitive populations.
Minuartia nifensis Mc Neill belongs to Caryophyllaceae family. It is distributed only on Nif Mountain. In order to prepare the basis for the ex-situ and in-situ protection principles, ecological data was collected as well as population size and distributon areas were recorded in an earlier study. Present study investigates the M. nifensis anatomically, morphologically and cytologically, with the aim of improving the description of this endemic species and establishing the basic information for future biosystematic studies.
BACKGROUND:
Dengue infection has been an important and serious public health concern in Malaysia ever since its first reported case here in 1902. Nevertheless, to our knowledge, no nationwide investigation has been carried out to determine the actual magnitude of dengue endemicity in the Malaysian population. In this study, we describe a cross sectional seroepidemiology study of dengue IgG seroprevalence in the Malaysian adult population.
FINDINGS:
From 1000 subjects (35-74 years old), 91.6% subjects were found to be dengue seropositive. Age is found to be a significant risk factor associated with dengue seroposivity, where the seroprevalence increased with every 10 year increase in age. Nevertheless, gender and ethnicity did not have an effect. Interestingly, there were similar seroprevalence rates between urban and rural samples, showing that dengue is presently not confined to urban areas in Malaysia.
CONCLUSIONS:
High dengue IgG seropositivity found in the population is an indication that dengue might be endemic in Malaysia for a long time into the future. Public awareness, proper vector control and vigilant surveillance are critical to keep the infection rates low and to prevent outbreaks.
Matched MeSH terms: Rural Population; Urban Population
This paper discusses the outcome of a research that examines the relationships between vulnerability and adaptation of urban dwellers to the slope failure threat in the Klang Valley Region. Intense urban landuse expansions in the Klang Valley Region have increased urban dwellers vulnerability to slope failures in recent years. The Klang Valley Region was chosen as the study area due to the increasing intensities and frequencies of slope failures threat. This paper examines urban dwellers vulnerability based on their (1) population and demographics characteristics, (2) the state of physical structures of dwellings and (3) the situation of the immediate environment threatened by slope failures. The locations of slope failure incidents were identified, mapped and examined followed with a detailed field study to identified areas. The results identified significant relationships between vulnerability indicators and slope failures in the Klang Valley Region. The findings of the study are envisaged to give valuable insights on addressing the threat of slope failures in the Klang Valley Region.
"This paper examines how and to what extent the three demographic components of urban change, urban reclassification, natural increase and net migration, operated in Malaysia between 1980 and 1991.... Since there is a spatial dimension to urban demographic changes, another emphasis of the paper is to differentiate the areal patterns of such changes. The analysis is conducted at both the national level and sub-national levels." Data are from the Malaysian Department of Statistics. The author finds that "the important role of natural increase in urban population change is remarkable considering that a rapid fertility transition had been unfolding in Malaysia up to the mid-1970s."
Matched MeSH terms: Population; Population Characteristics; Population Dynamics*; Population Growth*; Urban Population*
The author examines migration trends in Malay villages. "This report deals with the case of Galok, a settlement opened in the last decade of nineteenth century about 40 kilometers up the Kelantan River, based on field data collected in 1970/71 and 1984." The low rate of population growth due to migration is analyzed, with a focus on the impact of rural-urban migration and changes in household composition. (SUMMARY IN ENG)
Matched MeSH terms: Population; Population Characteristics; Population Dynamics*; Population Growth*; Rural Population*
The first occurrence of the cyanobacteriosponge Terpios hoshinota was reported from coral reefs in Guam in 1973, but was only formally described in 1993. Since then, the invasive behavior of this encrusting, coral-killing sponge has been observed in many coral reefs in the West Pacific. From 2015, its occurrence has expanded westward to the Indian Ocean. Although many studies have investigated the morphology, ecology, and symbiotic cyanobacteria of this sponge, little is known of its population genetics and demography. In this study, a mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase I (COI) fragment and nuclear ribosomal internal transcribed spacer 2 (ITS2) were sequenced to reveal the genetic variation of T. hoshinota collected from 11 marine ecoregions throughout the Indo-West Pacific. Both of the statistical parsimony networks based on the COI and nuclear ITS2 were dominated by a common haplotype. Pairwise F ST and Isolation-by-distance by Mantel test of ITS2 showed moderate gene flow existed among most populations in the marine ecoregions of West Pacific, Coral Triangle, and Eastern Indian Ocean, but with a restricted gene flow between these regions and Maldives in the Central Indian Ocean. Demographic analyses of most T. hoshinota populations were consistent with the mutation-drift equilibrium, except for the Sulawesi Sea and Maldives, which showed bottlenecks following recent expansion. Our results suggest that while long-range dispersal might explain the capability of T. hoshinota to spread in the IWP, stable population demography might account for the long-term persistence of T. hoshinota outbreaks on local reefs.
Matched MeSH terms: Genetics, Population; Population Dynamics
China can effectively promote urban-rural integration and economic and social modernization through new urbanization, which also serves as a strong driver and supporter of the growth of rural tourism. This paper examines the new urbanization and the growth of the rural tourism industry based on the rural revitalization strategy. It does so by using the techniques of literature research, field investigation, information technology retrieval, and excavation. We list the accomplishments of the rural tourism sector at its current stage of development and identify the issues and factors that will affect the sector's future growth. In addition, a coordinated development evaluation index system is built based on a theoretical analysis of rural revitalization strategies and new urbanization, and the corresponding comprehensive score is obtained using the entropy method for research. The index weight of the subsystem for rural revitalization in province A is computed using the entropy weight method. According to the findings, the wealth of life has the smallest weight (0.1117), followed by the prosperity of industry (0.2618), which is the largest on a criterion level. The effective weight of governance is the largest, at 0.2801. This study can serve as a useful resource for fostering rural tourism and advancing rural business.
Matched MeSH terms: Rural Population; Urban Population