Spatial Diversity and Dynamics in Resources and Urban Development Volume 1: Regional Resources

This double-volume work focuses on socio-demographics and the use of such data to support strategic resource management and planning initiatives. Papers go beyond explanations of methods, technique and traditional applications to explore new intersections in the dynamic relationship between the utilization and management of resources, and urban development.

International authors explore numerous experiences, characteristics of development and decision-making influences from across Asia and Southeast Asia, as well as recounting examples from America and Africa. Papers propound techniques and methods used in geographical research such as support vector machines, socio-economic correlates and travel behaviour analysis.

In this volume the contributions examine issues such as natural resource and environmental management, livelihoods issues in the context of climate change, land markets and land trusts, adaptive management of wildlife sanctuaries, ground water scarcity, flood hazards and flood plain management, non-conventional energy resources, community forestry and management and land use and land cover change.  The significance of these topics lie in the pace and volume of change as is reflected through continued development within established fields of inquiry and the introduction of significantly new approaches during the last decade.

Readers are invited to consider the dynamics of spatial expansion of urban areas and economic development, and to ex

plore conceptual discussion of the innovations in and challenges on urbanization processes, urban spaces themselves and both resource management and environmental management.

Together, the two volumes contribute to the interdisciplinary literature on regional resources and urban development by collating recent research with geography at its core. Scholars of urban geography, human geography, urbanism and sustainable development will be particularly interested in this book.

Section I:  Introduction: Regional Natural Resources.- Introduction.- Baleshwar Thakur – Professional Career and Contributions.- Section II: Methodology.- Spectral Unmixing with Estimated Adaptive Endmember Index using Extended Support Vector Machine.- Natural Resource Management- Why Micro Matters? Experience from Kerala.- Section III: Global Perspective.- Natural Resource based Livelihoods in the context of climate change: Examining the Stance of Decision-makers in India.- Innovations and Challenges Related to Resource and Environmental Management.- Section IV: Economic Perspectives.- Inherited Land: The Evolution of Land Markets and Rights Before Independence.- The Geographic Distribution of Land Trusts activities in the United States: An Analysis Based on 2005 National Land Trust Census Report Data.- Poverty Reduction and Social Development: Experiences from Bangladesh.- Mineral Resource Potential and Prospects in Chotanagpur Region.- Section V: Ecological Perspective.-Land, Life and Environmental Change in the Himalaya.- Adaptive Management of India’s Wildlife Sanctuaries.- Nutrition and Nutritional Deficiency Diseases in Sonbhadra District.- Section VI: Water Management.- Measurement of Water Scarcity.- Nonlinear Groundwater and Agricultural Land Use Change in Rajasthan, India.- Political Ecology of Groundwater Depletion in North -Western India.- Assessment

of Human Vulnerability and Risk of Flood Hazards in Orissa, India.- Irrigation Water Demand for the Hindon Basin.- Section VII: Energy and Forest Resources.- Non-conventional Energy Resources in India. Joint Forest Management in India.- Community Forestry and Management of Forest Resources in Bhutan.- Section VIII: Land Cover and Rural Planning.- Land Cover Pattern and Road Types in Lop Buri Province, Thailand, 1989-2006.-Assessment of Capacities of TAOs and CBOs for Local Development in Thailand.- Nature of Land Use and Agricultural Change in Peripheral Regions: A Case Study of Arunachal Pradesh, India.

Dr. Ashok Dutt is Professor Emeritus, Department of Geography, Planning and Urban Studies, University of Akron, Akron. He is the leading exponent of urban and regional development and planning and has contributed nearly 350 research papers. He is the editor/author of 27 books.

Dr. Allen G. Noble is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Geography and Planning at the University of Akron, Akron. He is a cultural geographer with interest in urban studies and South
Asia. He has authored several books including Barns in the Midwest.

Dr. Frank J. Costa is Professor Emeritus, Department of Geography, Planning and Urban Studies, University of Akron, Akron. He has published in a wide variety of planning, urban studies and geography journals worldwide. He has edited and co-authored several books.

Dr. Sudhir Thakur is Associate Professor at the College of Business Administration, California State University, Sacramento. He has research interests in the areas of regional economic systems, technological change and regional development, location and land use and spatial econometrics. He has published among others with the Structural Change and Economic Dynamics and UNU-WIDER.

Dr. Rajiv Thakur is Assistant Professor of Geography at the Department of Geosciences, Missouri State University, West Plains. He is an Economic Geographer with research interest that centers on regional innovations and cluster-based economic development. His publications are in the field of regional economic development.

Dr. H. S. Sharma is a former Professor of Geography at the Department of Geography, University of Rajasthan, Jaipur. His research interests lie in environmental geography and has
published widely in geography journals.