Inshore marine resources play an important role in the livelihoods of Pacific Island coastal communities. However, such reliance can be detrimental to inshore marine ecosystems. Understanding the livelihoods of coastal communities is important for devising relevant and effective fisheries management strategies. Semi-structured household interviews were conducted with householders in Langalanga ...

Urban agriculture involves the production of food in space that is within and immediately surrounding cities. There are many motivations for this kind of production. These encompass environmental advantages (reducing ̳food miles‘ and the impact of ̳urban heat islands‘), social benefits (increasing food security and agricultural education of city-dwellers), and human health perks (eating fresher...

This article describes results from an investigation of the health impacts of community gardening, using Toronto, Ontario as a case study. According to community members and local service organizations, these gardens have a number of positive health benefits. However, few studies have explicitly focused on the health impacts of community gardens, and many of those did not ask community gardener...

BACKGROUND Physical activity is one of the leading health indicators. The objective was to study the prevalence and patterns of physical activity among young adults. METHODS 259 Medical students (Men: Women = 116:143) in the age group of 18-22 yrs were interviewed using the official English long version of the International Physical Activity Questionnaire (IPAQ). The total level of physical a...

The natural abundance of 13C was used to estimate the turnover of the soil organic matter in a vertisol re-grassed with Digitaria decumbens (C4 plant) following intensive market gardening (C3 plants). In addition, the experimental design allowed us to determine the respective roles of roots and earthworms (Polypheretima elongata) in soil C stock restoration in D. decumbens pasture. The C stock ...

A 68-year-old male retired non-atopic school librarian was referred for suspected plant contact dermatitis. The patient had taken up gardening as a hobby when he retired from work: mowing the lawn, cutting hedges and weeding in his garden. For 6–10 years, he had suffered from transient dermatitis on his eyelids, which he attributed to a habit of wiping his eyelids with his hands during gardenin...

Reef restoration activities have proliferated in response to the need to mitigate coral declines and recover lost reef structure, function, and ecosystem services. Here, we describe the recent shift from costly and complex engineering solutions to recover degraded reef structure to more economical and efficient ecological approaches that focus on recovering the living components of reef communi...

Native plants and animals are a natural heritage threatened by one of the six greatest extinction events in Earth’s history. Humans, through habitat transformation, exploitation, and species introductions, are driving this extinction event. To turn this tide, Speziale et al. (2014) suggest reducing human dependence on non-native species by increasing the use, harvest, planting, and raising of n...

Since a g r i c u l t u r a l development i n Mexico has largely f a i l ed to a l l ev i a te poverty and hunger, there i s growing interest i n development s t rategies which have a direct effect on the well-being of the poor. Household gardens are one such strategy which has f requen t l y i f spo rad ica l l y been attempted. I recently spent two weeks i n Mexico as a member of a small team...

BACKGROUND We studied the prevalence and aetiology of penetrating ocular injuries, in particular ones that were sustained whilst undertaking Do It Yourself (DIY) or gardening in the domestic environment. We also examined the extent of eye safety promotion in DIY stores and garden centres and on their websites. METHODS We conducted a case note review of patients who underwent surgery for penet...