UMD Theses and Dissertations

Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/3

New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a given thesis/dissertation in DRUM.

More information is available at Theses and Dissertations at University of Maryland Libraries.

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    Effectively evaluating environmental, social, and economic outcomes in voluntary sustainability programs: Lessons from Laos
    (2022) Traldi, Rebecca; Silva, Julie A; Geography; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Voluntary sustainability programs (VSPs) are a subset of environmental interventions which rely on participants’ willingness to engage, rather than mandatory regulation. VSPs have been a central component of sustainable development and environmental mitigation strategies for decades, with significant investments from nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), multilaterals, and the private sector. VSPs typically aim to positively influence environmental, economic, and social outcomes, although program-specific priorities often result in an uneven focus across these three domains (also known as the three pillars of sustainability). Despite their popularity, questions regarding the value of VSPs remain unanswered. Assessments of VSPs typically do not eliminate rival explanations for program outcomes when evaluating their successes and failures, thus limiting our understanding of their effectiveness.This dissertation addresses this gap by investigating socioeconomic and environmental outcomes for agriculture and forestry VSPs. Mixed methods including systematic review, inverse probability-of-treatment weighted regression (IPWR), and inequality and polarization decomposition provide insights both at a global level, and for two national case studies in Lao People’s Democratic Republic (hereafter Laos). A wide range of datasets inform the analysis, including nationally representative poverty and expenditure surveys and land-use land cover estimates derived from remotely sensed imagery. By exploring a variety of VSPs – including agricultural and forestry voluntary sustainability standards and sustainable development projects – the study acknowledges the context-specific nature of VSP impact, while also drawing generalizable insights relevant for different types of interventions. The research findings presented in this dissertation elucidate the degree to which VSPs deliver on stated goals and objectives. First, a systematic literature review reveals that the evidence base for VSP impact remains limited, with some geographies, sustainability outcomes, and project types receiving more inquiry and evaluation than others. Second, an IPWR analysis suggests that agriculture and forestry VSPs have achieved some success in generating positive outcomes – specifically, for poverty and forest cover. However, variations in project focus and design bring different results. For example, food security and livelihoods programs which prioritize local socioeconomic well-being can generate significant co-benefits for environmental outcomes, and resource management projects can positively impact forest cover. Conversely, the forest management projects considered here do not achieve significant benefits for poverty or forest cover – presumably due to challenges like land tenure insecurity, insufficient participant incentives, and persistent drivers of deforestation (illegal logging, large-scale concessions). Finally, an assessment of economic inequality and polarization associated with the Laos rubber boom demonstrates the importance of assessing how VSPs influence economic inequality. It also indicates that VSPs must address inequality’s systemic drivers – including dispossession from land and forest resources, lacking worker protections, livelihood vulnerability, and barriers for smallholders – to maximize potential benefits. Overall, this dissertation research provides an example of how evidence synthesis, quasi-experimental methods, and consideration of economic, social, and environmental sustainability can deepen our understanding of VSPs.
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    HISTORICAL AND COMPUTATIONAL ANALYSIS OF LONG-TERM ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGE: FORESTS IN THE SHENANDOAH VALLEY OF VIRGINIA
    (2005-08-01) Wilson, James W.; Geores, Martha E; Geography; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    The increase and decrease of forests is a major factor of land cover change. This study of forest change in the Shenandoah Valley builds upon the rich historiography of the region through the analysis of generalized and spatially explicit primary and secondary sources covering the period of 1700 to 2000. Combining geo-historical and geo-computational approaches produced a more robust picture of land cover change than would be possible using only one method. Comparing modern and historical reports on the timing of forest clearance and re-growth revealed that a discrepancy existed between the spatially explicit sources and existing historical interpretations regarding the timing and location of forest clearance and re-growth. Understanding this discrepancy is important for the interpretation of forest change and its implications in the Shenandoah Valley and beyond. Two main aspects of the study are the thorough interrogation and comparison of different data sources, and the subsequent analysis and interpretation of the data. Historic maps (1864, 1906, and c. 1945) and digital data sets derived from remotely sensed images (c. 1974 and c. 1992) were analyzed in a geographic information system (GIS) and compared to agricultural census data and published reports of land use and land cover change. Three major findings came out of this study. First, the spatially explicit sources produced values for the amount of cleared area that were within 0.5 to 2.7% of the same information derived from the agricultural census. Second, the maximum amount of forest clearance occurred 25 - 50 years later than existing published reports indicated. Third, the commonly held explanations of federal land acquisition and the abandonment of farms on steep slopes did not account for the observed patterns of forest re-growth. The documented variations in spatial and temporal patterns and reasons for the variations have impacts on our understanding of cultural and physical processes that took place in the region.
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    MODELING WATER QUANTITY AND WATER QUALITY WITH THE SWMM CONTINUOUS STREAMFLOW MODEL UNDER NON-STATIONARY LAND-USE CONDITION USING GIS
    (2004-05-04) Medina, William; Moglen, Glenn E.; Civil Engineering
    GIS data widely available today can be used to better estimate watershed parameters for the SWMM model. An interface was developed to create SWMM input files from spatial data. The interface delineates watersheds and allows update of land-use parameters. SWMM performs continuous simulation but it assumes a time-invariant land use. A "hot-start" technique was developed that uses end values from one year's simulation to initialize state variables for the next year. This technique allows for dynamically changing the land use model parameters to reflect changes in time. Based on the simulation results, three regression models were developed to adjust constant land-use model results to account for land use changes in peak discharges, baseflow, and total phosphorus loads. These adjustments use imperviousness as an index of land use changes. The regression equations adjust streamflow and water quality results from a constant land use SWMM simulation to conditions with time-varying land use.