Category Archives: Resource Based Economy

Like Earth, planetary bodies such as the Moon, Mars, asteroids, and comets contain substantial deposits of valuable resources. This has caught the attention of both researchers and industry, with hopes of one day mining them to support a space economy.

But setting up any kind of off-Earth mining industry will be no small feat. Lets look at what were up against.

When you think of off-Earth mining, you might imagine extracting materials from various bodies in space and bringing them back to Earth. But this is unlikely to be the first commercially viable example.

If we wanted to establish a permanent human presence on the Moon, as NASA has proposed, we would need to resupply astronauts living there. Resources such as water can only be recycled to an extent.

At the same time, resources are extremely expensive to launch from Earth. As of 2018, it cost about A$3,645 to launch one kilogram of material into low Earth orbit, and more to launch it higher, or onto the Moon. Its likely materials mined in space will be used in space, to help save on these costs.

Harvesting materials required on-site is called in-situ resource utilization. It can involve anything from mining ice to collecting soil to build structures. NASA is currently exploring the possibility of constructing buildings on the Moon with 3D printing.

Mining in space could also transform satellite management. Current practice is to de-orbit satellites after 1020 years when they run out of fuel. One lofty goal of space companies such as Orbit Fab is to design a type of satellite that can be refueled using propellant collected in space.

Even for low-Earth orbit satellites, the energy required to reach them from the Moon is less than that needed to reach them from Earth.

When it comes to off-Earth mining opportunities, there are a few resources that are both abundant and valuable. Some asteroids contain vast amounts of iron, nickel, gold, and platinum group metals, which can be used for construction and electronics.

Lunar regolith (rock and soil) contains helium-3, which may become a valuable resource in the future if nuclear fusion becomes viable and widespread. British company Metalysis has developed a process that could extract oxygen from lunar regolith.

Ice is expected to exist on the Moons surface, at permanently shadowed craters near its poles. We also think theres ice beneath the surface of Mars, asteroids, and comets. This could be used to support life, or be broken down into oxygen and hydrogen and used as propellant.

My (Michaels) Ph.D. thesis involved testing how exploration techniques would operate on the Moon and Mars. Our other work has included economic modeling for ice mining on Marsand computer modeling on the stability of tunnels on the Moon.

Some proposals for off-Earth mining are similar to mining on Earth. For instance, we could mine lunar regolith with a bucket-wheel excavator, or mine an asteroid using a tunnel boring machine.

Other proposals are more unfamiliar such as using a vacuum-like machine to pull regolith up a tube (which has seen limited use in excavation on Earth).

Researchers from the University of New South Wales Sydney and the Australian National University propose using biomining. In this, bacteria introduced to an asteroid would consume certain minerals and produces a gas, which could then be harvested and collected by a probe.

Our work at UNSWs Australian Centre for Space Engineering Research involves finding ways to reduce risks in a space resources industry. Needless to say, there are many technical and economical challenges.

The same launch costs that have so many eager to begin off-Earth mining also mean getting mining equipment to space is expensive. Mining operations will have to be as light as possible to be cost-effective (or even feasible).

Moreover, the further something is from Earth, the longer it takes to reach. There is delay of up to 40 minutes when sending a command to a Mars rover and finding out whether it was successful.

The Moon only has a 2.7 second delay for communications and may be easier to mine remotely. Near-Earth objects also have orbits similar to Earth, and occasionally pass by Earth at distances comparable to the Moon. Theyre an ideal candidate to mine as they require little energy to reach and return from.

Off-Earth mining would need to be mostly automated, or remotely controlled, given the additional challenges of sending humans to space such as needing life support, avoiding radiation, and extra launch costs.

However, even mining systems on Earth arent fully automated yet. Robotics will need to improve before asteroids can be mined.

While spacecraft have landed on asteroids several times and even retrieved samples which were returned to Woomera in South Australia, during the Hayabusa 1 and 2 missions our overall success rate for landing on asteroids and comets is low.

In 2014, the Philae lander sent to comet 67P/Churyumov/Gerasimenko famously tumbled into a ditch during a failed landing attempt.

There are also environmental considerations. Mining in space may help reduce the amount of mining needed on Earth. But thats if off-Earth mining results in fewer, and not more, rocket launches, or if the resources are returned to and used on Earth.

Although collecting resources in space might mean not having to launch them from Earth, more launches may inevitably take place as the space economy grows.

Then theres the question of whether proposed mining techniques will even work in space environments. Different planetary bodies have different atmospheres (or none), gravity, geology, and electrostatic environments (for example, they may have electrically charged soil due to particles from the Sun).

How these conditions will affect off-Earth operations is still largely unknown.

While its still early days, a number of companies are currently developing technologies for off-Earth mining, space resource exploration, and for other uses in space.

The Canadian Space Mining Corporation is developing the infrastructure required to support life in space, including oxygen generators and other machinery.

US-based company OffWorld is developing industrial robots for operations on Earth, the Moon, asteroids, and Mars. And the Asteroid Mining Corporation is also working to establish a market for space resources.

Article by Michael Dello-Iacovo, Casual academic, UNSW Sydney and Serkan Saydam, Off Earth Mining, Future Mining, Mining Systems, UNSW Sydney

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Humans have big plans for space mining, but its not gonna be easy - The Next Web

Alexandria, Va. Today, the SHRM Foundation announced that it is partnering with WorkHands to provide its Human Resource Registered Apprenticeship Program (HR RAP) employers a tool to manage the progress of their apprentice. The program, which launched in 2021, allows individuals to earn wages while receiving hands-on training to successfully fill high-skilled, in-demand HR specialist positions.

An apprenticeship is a well-proven talent development program that allow employers to provide customized training and a way to tap into a more diverse pool of job candidates, such aspeople with disabilities, career changers, people who were formerly incarcerated, veterans and older workers or to upskill incumbent workers.

"At the SHRM Foundation, we support efforts to provide the experience, training and credentials employees need to develop the skillsets for today's economy," said SHRM Foundation President Wendi Safstrom. "Apprenticeships give employers a cost-effective way to develop and retain the diverse talent they need."

WorkHands is an apprenticeship progress tracking website for managers and their apprentices. The website allows managers to select and assign their apprentice's SHRM Foundation HR RAP online coursework, track coursework completion, monitor the apprentice's on-the-job learning (OJL) hours and view the apprentice's overall program progression all in one location. Apprentices will be able to access their SHRM Foundation HR online coursework and view their program progression. A mobile app is available as well.

"Apprenticeships are an incredible opportunity for learners and employers to meet their respective goals," said Patrick Cushing, CEO of WorkHands. "We feel privileged to be a part of supporting the SHRM Foundation as they develop a nationally recognized apprenticeship program for human resource professionals."

To learn more about the SHRM Foundation's Human Resource Registered Apprenticeship Program, please visit http://www.hrapprentice.org/.

About SHRM Foundation

Founded in 1966, the SHRM Foundation is the 501(c)(3) philanthropic arm of the world's largest HR professional society, SHRM. SHRM represents more than 300,000 HR professionals across the globe, impacting 115 million workers and their families. The SHRM Foundation mobilizes the power of HR for positive social change in the workplace. Its robust resources, meaningful partnerships, and evidence-based programming educate and empower HR professionals to hire diverse talent, build inclusive workplaces, prioritize workplace mental health and wellness, develop, and support the next generation of HR professionals, and help employees find purpose at work and beyond. Learn more at shrmfoundation.org.

About WorkHands

WorkHandssimplifies running an apprenticeship for any industry from traditional construction programs to newer apprenticeship-focused industries like healthcare and IT.WorkHandskeeps apprentices, supervisors, and administrators on the same page from a single app showcasing apprentice progress in on-the-job training, related instruction, wage progression, and more. To learn more, visitworkhands.us.

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SHRM Foundation Announces New Partnership with WorkHands - SHRM

The European Steel Association (EUROFER) has warned that the current Waste Shipment Regulation proposal lacks effective measures to tackle environmental challenges of waste exports and to enhance EU resiliency on valuable secondary raw materials.

This threatens to undermine the EUs Circular Economy and Green Deal objectives, the association has said. EUROFERs statement followed the presentation of a draft report on the proposals by the Environment Committee at the European Parliament.

Today, 48 per cent of EU steel production is based on scrap, and according to EUFOFER, more will be needed in the coming years as the transition to low carbon steel production accelerates. Yet, the EU is increasingly exporting waste to third countries with lower environmental, climate, labour and social standards.

As reported by Eurostat, in 2021 the EU total export of ferrous metals scrap reached 19.5 million tonnes constituting 48 per cent of all exported recyclable materials. It recorded Turkey as the most popular export destination, with 13.1 million tonnes of ferrous metal exported from the EU.

Based on reports evidencing the serious shortcomings in the waste treatment of third countries, EUROFER states that the Waste Shipment Regulation should not automatically grant equivalence of strict EU standards to those with OECD status.

As a result, the association is urging the introduction of a country level assessment for all export destinations. It is hoped that this assessment will ensure a level-playing field across operators and jurisdictions.

Speaking on this, Axel Eggert, Director General of the European Steel Association, said: Why should countries get a free ride only because they have OECD status? This does not make any sense.

To successfully oblige waste exporters to conduct an audit depends on how those audits are carried out, EUROFER says. It is for this reason the association recommends an effective and reliable procedure, to ensure trustworthiness and transparency.

As well as environmental requirements, EUROFER has urged that social standards be included, as health, safety and labour conditions are important aspects of the Environmentally Sound Management principle.

The steel association also presented the importance of minimising the risk of circumvention and illegal waste shipments by avoiding the reclassification of exports as end-of-waste, stating that this would undermine the entire legislative proposal.

Axel Eggert also said: The current provisions on waste export are clearly insufficient and bound to become a missed opportunity for climate, industry, citizens and the EU as a whole.

We are in an absurd situation where the EU sets very high environmental standards and circular economy objectives for the internal market that the EU steel industry fully shares while millions of tons of valuable secondary raw materials are being exported to jurisdictions where these same standards and objectives are not met.

We cannot afford to give away a key secondary raw material such as scrap, if we want to fulfil the circular economy and climate objectives as well as ensuring EU strategic autonomy and social standards.

Mr. Eggert concluded: Todays draft report is a first step, especially regarding the facilitation of intra EU shipment of waste and the support for research and development. However, we encourage the Environment Committee to consider significant improvements also with regard to waste exports to third countries, supporting a sound environmental policy.

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EUROFER warns of the shortcomings to current Waste Shipment Regulations - Resource Magazine

Governor Kathy Hochul today announced that $30 million in additional federal grant funding will be availablestarting on June 30, 2022, to existing child care programs in areas of the state without sufficient child care offered, known as child care deserts. The funds, which are part of the $100 million child care desert initiative approved in the 2022 Enacted Budget, are being made available through the American Rescue Plan Act and will be administered by the New York State Office of Children and Family Services. The Governor announced the previous $70 million in funding for new providers on April 11 and more than 1,100 applications have been submitted to date.

"As a mother who had no choice but to leave her job because of the lack of accessible child care, boosting child care availability for working New York families is an effort that is deeply personal to me," Governor Hochul said. "All parents deserve access to high-quality child care, regardless of where they live, and this funding will help address critical child care shortages in underserved areas. My administration will continue to prioritize this critical lifeline for working families as part of our overall economic recovery efforts."

The grants will help existing child care providers in underserved areas, and the request for applications (RFA) will have two parts. The first focuses on expanding child care in existing day care centers and school-age child care programs, with bonus funding for those slots specifically designated for infants/toddlers and/or children with special needs. The second part of the RFA focuses on expanding specific types of child care in existing small child care centers, family child care programs and group family child care programs - whose current enrollment is under capacity - specifically for infants/toddlers or children with special needs, or if the program wants to expand to include nontraditional hours.

Allowable expenses include program development costs and short-term program operating expenses, including:

Providers may click herefor more information on the RFA. Grant applications will begin to be accepted June 30, 2022 and will be accepted until August 4, 2022, with award announcements slated for September.

The FY 2023 budget includes a historic investment to expand access to high-quality child care to support children and families and help stimulate New York State's continued economic recovery. It includes an unprecedented $7 billion investment over four years and increases the income eligibility threshold for child care subsidies in August 2022 to 300% of the Federal Poverty Level ($83,250 for a family of four)extending eligibility to more than half of New York State's young children.

Office of Children and Family Services Commissioner Sheila J. Poole said, "These grants further support our existing base of child care providers, who are the backbone of the industry, by providing them with the funding necessary to expand their service footprint and increase access for families with infants, toddlers and children with special needs, and those who need coverage during untraditional hours."

Senator Charles Schumer said, "Affordable child care is a right and essential to our economic recovery. That is why when I wrote the American Rescue Plan, I made sure to include robust funding to not only help our day care and child care programs survive, but also to invest in filling the gaps in our rural and underserved communities that need child care the most. Now $30 million in federal funding that I secured will go directly to eliminating child care desserts, create jobs, and provide real help for struggling parents and children."

Representative Jamaal Bowman said, "I am pleased to see American Rescue Plan funding I worked to pass in Congress get dedicated to child care, which is critical for our youngest learners at a formative period of brain and physical developments. This additional $30 million will go a long way towards supporting children and working families. I am proud to see critical funds from the American Rescue Plan being used to support our youth and look forward to supporting our youth through more federal pushes and dollars."

Representative Adriano Espaillat said, "Child care is essential, particularly our family-based providers which were critical during the height of COVID-19. If families are to truly recover from the impact of the pandemic, they need our full commitment and support along this journey. I commend Governor Hochul for allocating this federal funding to expand child care programs to help support families most in need and encourage all eligible providers to apply and take full advantage of this funding opportunity to build programs to meet the needs of more families around the state."

Representative Joe Morelle said, "New Yorkers pay over twenty-three percent of their income on childcare coststhat places an enormous financial and emotional burden on parents, and it must change. Providing affordable, quality care will help set our children up for success from an early age. I'm proud to have delivered this funding through the American Resue Plan, and grateful to be working with Governor Hochul to support the needs of working families."

Early Care and Learning Council Executive Director Meredith Chimento said, "Early Care and Learning Council and our network of Child Care Resource and Referral agencies are very pleased to see this additional funding become available to existing child care providers that would like to expand their businesses to serve more children. We stand ready to support these providers throughout the state as they educate and nurture our young people and allow more of the workforce to return to the workplace, filling critical care gaps and bolstering the strength of our state economy."

For this funding opportunity, child care deserts are defined as census tracts where there are three or more children younger than five for each available child care slot, or there are no available child care slots in the tract. Based on this criteria, more than 60 percent of New York State is considered a child care desert. All census tracts in New York State have been mapped depending on the number of available slots, and potential child care providers can review the child care desert mapto discern appropriate locales. Additional details on eligibility and requirements of the grant can be found in the RFA.

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Governor Hochul Announces Applications Now Open for $30 Million in Federal Funding to Address Child Care Deserts - ny.gov

In an effort for government to position itself to take advantage of anticipated economic tailwinds that could potentially propel Namibia towards renewed growth and opportunity, the country launched its first sovereign wealth fund, known as the Welwitschia Fund.

Government said the launch of the fund is a testament to its commitment to uplift the lives of Namibians and guarantee socio-economic progress.

The Welwitschia Fund is established for two objectives, namely saving for future generations, and fiscal and official reserve stabilisation.

The fund is envisaged to be a repository of the investment of a portion of defined proceeds from the present utilisation of natural resources and returns from divestiture in state assets. On the second objective, the fund aims to provide insulation to and stabilisation of the economy, the national budget and the countrys stock of international reserves against excess volatility in commodity prices and shocks on the fiscal accounts and the balance of payments.

Launching the fund yesterday, President Hage Geingob said a sovereign wealth fund can be a potent tool in achieving economic growth. Similarly, it can also act as an important fallback and stabiliser during times of extreme shocks.

Since 2016, Namibia has faced tough economic times with a decline in commodity prices, devastating droughts and recently the emergence of the Covid-19 pandemic, which Namibia is still reeling from.

Geingob affirmed that there will be operational independence in the fund to make sure it serves its purpose. Ownership of the fund is vested in the Namibian government, while the Bank of Namibia will be the funds primary custodian, responsible for its administrative function.

The President said the country is now progressing beyond maintaining only foreign exchange reserves for meeting international payment obligations. With enough international liquidity in hand in the countrys reserves, Namibia can now expand its official asset holdings to investments that are less liquid but yielding higher returns over the long run.

Furthermore, Geingob said the Welwitschia Fund will commence with money estimated around N$262 million.

The road that led to today was not an easy one. In fact, it took endless hours of research and the necessary groundwork, as narrated by the Minister of Finance. The work started in earnest with the appointment in March 2019 of the High-Level Panel on the Namibian Economy and its impactful recommendations.

Namibia is a country with a rich natural resources endowment, both minerals and other non-renewables, as well as diverse wealth in fauna and flora. These resources all contribute significantly to the development of the Namibian economy. Since independence, the successive administrations have used Namibias non-renewable resources to the benefit of its people through the provision of essential services, and the dividend has been evident in socio-economic outcomes such as the reduction of poverty and inequality, provision of affordable housing, education and healthcare services, amongst others.

The funding sources for the sovereign wealth fund, he stated, comprises a combination of streams, including a portion of royalties collected from the sales of natural, renewable and non-renewable mineral resources, taxes, divestiture from public investment holdings as well as contributions from identified state-owned enterprises and other parties.

The President added that government is looking forward to the prospects and opportunities that will emanate from the recent discoveries of oil and the green hydrogen energy, which have the potential to further boost the funds capital and ultimately contribute to the development of the Namibian economy.

Geingob said the funds mission and mandate must be clearly defined in legislation from the outset, with distinct lines of accountability and independent oversight to avoid deviation and the misuse of resources at a later stage. This sets the parameters for the operation and risk appetite of the investment function, while aligning it with its policy objective. In turn, the investment function requires processes and systems that guarantee independence from direct and undue external influences.

The President further suggested that the governing board needs to be composed of independent directors, based on their experience and area-specific expertise. For this reason, the process of establishing the fund was informed by vigorous research and consultation with domestic, regional and international stakeholders to ensure that we have a fund that has clearly set objectives, supported by the necessary regulatory and institutional frameworks.

At the launch, Bank of Namibia governor Johannes !Gawaxab said the creation of the Welwitschia Fund will, without doubt, strengthen Namibias fiscal stability and resilience to the external shocks that stem from Namibias interconnectedness with the global economy.

Sovereign wealth funds have shown that they can play a shock-absorbing role in global financial markets by dampening short-term market volatility, and financially aiding countries in times of crises. They stabilise both fiscal outcomes and the balance of payments. The Welwitschia Fund will facilitate the transfer of wealth sourced from Namibias abundant natural resources so that generations to come also benefit, even long after the current resource base is depleted, he stated. !Gawaxab said the Welwitschia Fund will comprise two independent investment accounts or portfolios, namely the stabilisation account and the intergenerational savings account. Each of these portfolios will have different risk and return characteristics, commensurate with their investment objectives and constraints.

The stabilisation account will be invested in offshore fixed income assets with a focus on low risk, liquidity and a medium-term investment horizon of three years. The intergenerational savings fund facilitates the investment of a portion of defined proceeds from the present utilisation of natural resources and proceeds from divestiture in state assets.

In this regard, the foreign asset class mix will have a bias towards riskier asset classes such as equity and infrastructure over a longer investment horizon of 10 years. Provision is also made to invest in domestic infrastructure projects with socio-economic benefits for future generations.

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Government pins hopes on sovereign wealth fund - Truth, for its own sake. - New Era

Upcoming marketing campaigns from Department of Health and Human Services and Department of Labor will focus on attracting and retaining health care workers

Augusta, MAINE The Mills Administration today announced the launch of twin campaigns aimed at promoting health care careers in Maine, as part of a series of initiatives from the Governors Maine Jobs and Recovery Plan to bolster Maines health care workforce and attract and retain health care workers.

The Departments of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and Labor (DOL) are collaborating on the campaigns to promote entry-level and other health care jobs as stepping stones to rewarding careers, particularly among young people in Maine.

The combined investment in the campaigns is $1.5 million, part of a broader $20 million initiative under the Governors Jobs Plan to promote health care jobs.

A strong, high-quality health care system is essential to the health of Maine people and the health of our economy, said Governor Janet Mills. This new campaign is the next step in my Administrations work with our health care providers to recruit more Maine people especially young people into the health care workforce and move them up the career ladder. Health care provides meaningful, important work, and, as the pandemic has shown us, its work thats more crucial than ever before. I encourage Maine people to explore whether a career in health care is right for you. We, and our terrific health care providers, stand ready to help.

Jobs in the health care field offer rewarding work and opportunities to pursue a lifelong career helping people in Maine communities, with free and low-cost education and training available under the Governors Maine Jobs and Recovery Plan, said Jeanne Lambrew, Commissioner of the Maine Department of Health and Human Services. This new campaign aims to attract more skilled and compassionate people to these valuable professions to care for the people of Maine.

There are many great entry points into the healthcare sector, leading to rewarding careers doing critical work, said Laura Fortman, Commissioner of the Maine Department of Labor. These statewide initiatives will help Mainers decide whether health care is the right career for them, and provide a connection to resources, education, and training in an easy-to-access website.

DHHS has partnered with health care employers, associations, and Live and Work in Maine, a not-for-profit that markets Maine as a career destination, to launch a comprehensive marketing and outreach campaign to highlight entry level positions throughout the health care field, such as phlebotomy, certified nursing assistants, EMS, and medical office assistants.

The campaign promotes health care careers as diverse and rewarding and includes new website content that connects individuals with health care jobs in Maine, including through job openings, information about career paths, and personal stories of those in the field.

Live and Work in Maine is already promoting the website with employers and will launch radio and streaming audio ads next week as part of a broad outreach effort that also includes social media, digital, mobile and television ads and in-person events. The campaign will be aimed at Maine youth, including current high school students, with components reaching out of state to young people in greater Boston.

At MaineHealth, we have seen positive results from the statewide efforts driven by Live and Work in Maine and this will be another crucial tool in attracting and retaining the talent needs of today, as well as of tomorrow, said Helene Kennedy, Vice President of Talent at Maine Health.

Northern Light Health is proud to partner with the Mills Administration, educators, and employers in our state to support these initiatives to increase awareness of the many rewarding careers available in health care in Maine, said Paul Bolin, Senior Vice President and Chief People Officer, Northern Light Health.

As an employer partner of Live and Work in Maine, we welcome the opportunity for continued collaboration with our health care colleagues to raise awareness of the career opportunities within our industry in communities we serve, said Steve Amendo, Chief Marketing Officer at Martins Point. There has never been a more important time to start a career in health care, and we look forward to the spotlight that this effort will bring.

In a more targeted effort to attract and develop direct care and behavioral health workers in Maine, DOL, in partnership with DHHS, DECD and Pulse Marketing, has launched Caring for ME, a complementary campaign that includes social media advertising, in-person events, and a new website where individuals can explore careers, find job openings from the Maine Department of LaborsMaine JobLink directory, and read stories that highlight the importance and meaningful nature of direct care and behavioral health work in Maine.

Informed by recommendations from the Commission to Study Long-Term Care Workforce Issues, an industry advisory council, and a survey of more than 700 current and potential future direct care workers in Maine, the Caring for ME campaign aims to attract more employees into a variety of settings within the field, such as Home and Community Based settings, long term care, and skilled nursing facilities, while educating workers about available training courses and multiple pathways to a long-term health care career.

The Administrations investment in promoting health care careers was welcomed as essential for addressing worker shortages and creating entry points for more people to pursue opportunities in these critical fields.

The pandemic has taken its toll on the health care workforce at a time when more caregivers are needed to meet demand. Maine is at a pivotal time in terms of our response to the staffing crisis,said Angela Westhoff, President and CEO of the Maine Health Care Association. These recruitment campaigns rest on the foundation that it takes a special person to be a caregiver and work in the healthcare field. Our caregivers are not only providing an important service, but are often the eyes, ears and voices of those for whom they care. MHCA is pleased to partner with the Administration on tangible recruitment and retention solutions, like the Caring For Me campaign and partnership with Live and Work in Maine, that will encourage more people to enter this noble field and provide clear pathways for advancement as well.

Caringforme.org is a great resource and guide for anyone interested in pursuing a meaningful career in direct care or behavioral health while the partnership with Live and Work in Maine ensures young people learn about the great opportunities in healthcare more broadly, said Brenda Gallant, RN, Executive Director, State Long-Term Care Ombudsman. These campaigns put Maine on the map as a state committed to workforce development for these critically needed professionals.

The Caring For ME website, messaging, and outreach campaign are just right, and will be a critical part of building a strong care workforce able to deliver compassionate care to every Mainer who needs it, said Jess Maurer, Executive Director of the Maine Council on Aging. We are deeply grateful to the Legislature, Governor Mills, and Commissioners Fortman and Lambrew for prioritizing this workforce in the Maine Jobs & Recovery Plan.

At a time when provider agencies are struggling to maintain vital services for thousands of Mainers due to critical staffing shortages, we see promise in the Caring For ME campaign, said Laura Cordes, Executive Director, Maine Association for Community Service Providers. We hope that it will help reach and inspire new and possibly returning Mainers to find meaningful pathways to a career in supporting people with disabilities to live full lives in the community.

"It is exciting to see another one of the recommendations from the Commission to Study Long-Term Care Workforce Issues come to fruition, said Representative Jessica Fay. The Caring for ME campaign was developed with input from stakeholders across the care economy, with particular attention paid to input from direct care workers themselves. The support and services provided by our direct care and behavioral health professionals is deeply important and rewarding work. It is critical that we raise awareness about how essential this work is and how pursuing jobs in this field can lead to a satisfying career, all while helping to alleviate the workforce crisis."

These campaigns are part of a series of initiatives from Governor Mills Maine Jobs & Recovery Plan to invest in the states health care workforce.

Earlier this month, Governor Mills announced Healthcare Training for ME, an initiative to connect individuals and employers with training resources, such as adult education programs, community colleges, and universities. Individuals and employers may then apply to receive tuition assistance to enroll in training programs, or offer training to their employees, at little or no cost.

Upcoming programs include scholarships and student loan relief for individuals in health care professions and the creation of health care career navigators to help people interested in health care fields determine the right career path for them.

Separate from the Maine Jobs & Recovery Plan, Governor Mills worked with the Legislature to invest more than $700 million in this biennium in Maine Care rates, including rate increases to support paying direct care workers 125 percent of minimum wage.

Additionally, the Administration has provided $121 million to providers for bonus payments for recruitment and retention of home- and community-based care providers.

The Maine Jobs & Recovery Plan is the Governors plan, approved by the Legislature, to invest nearly $1 billion in Federal American Rescue Plan funds to improve the lives of Maine people and families, help businesses, create good-paying jobs, and build an economy poised for future prosperity.

It draws heavily on recommendations from the Governors Economic Recovery Committee and the States 10-Year Economic Development Strategy, transforming them into real action to improve the lives of Maine people and strengthen the economy.

For more about Maine Jobs & Recovery Plan, visit maine.gov/jobsplan.

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Mills Administration Launches $1.5 Million Maine Jobs & Recovery Plan Initiative to Promote Health Care Careers | Office of Governor Janet T....

~Under Project Akanksha, in association with CGF Samhita, the brand plans to impart skill-based trainings to 25,000+ commercial vehicle drivers in India over the next 3 years, in line with National Skill India Mission New Delhi (India), May 13: Tata Motors Finance, a leading Non-Banking Financial Company, and Indias largest financier of Tata commercial vehicles, has always believed in empowering the driver community one of the key pillars of Indias vast transport and logistics industry. The brand recently took yet another step in this endeavour with the launch of Project Akanksha its flagship skilling program that aims to impart relevant skill-based trainings to over 25000 drivers across the country, by collaborating with Collective Good Foundation (CGF), Samhita. The project is designed as a holistic and comprehensive upliftment program that covers critical aspects like financial literacy, entrepreneurship, occupation-related skills as well as life skills. The project involves conducting a comprehensive multi-city upliftment and cash flow maintenance program for safeguarding the financial future of the drivers. The program is a combination of academic and practical sessions to help the drivers gain relevant expertise. The Indian Commercial Vehicle industry is anticipated to grow at a CAGR of 18%, to reach 11,80,000 units by FY2025. With consumer demand bouncing back to pre-pandemic levels, a host of infrastructure projects lined up especially in Tier2 & Tier 3 cities, coupled with a massive government spending on capex projects, the demand for commercial vehicles is expected to surge in the next 2-3 years. Through Project Akanksha, Tata Motors Finance aims to equip the driver community with the requisite arsenal to leverage the upcoming opportunities. The focus is to ensure high impact by not only increasing the scale of training year-on-year, but also enhancing the quality of trainings in order to ensure that the drivers are not just prepared but are more than ready to thrive in any environment. So far trainings have been carried out in 15 cities viz Ambala, Anuppur, Bhojpur, Guwahati, Gwalior, Hyderabad, Lakhimpur, Lucknow, Mumbai, Muzaffarpur, Nammakkal, Patna, Pune, Vizag and Vijayawada, covering over 8000 drivers. Punit Puri, Chief Human Resources Officer, Tata Motors Finance shared, Thanks to the rapidly expanding road network and fast pace of highway construction, along with a booming e-commerce sector, the Indian Commercial Vehicle Market is all set to witness a massive bull-run in the next few years. Increasing urbanization and growth of SMEs are further substantiating the rise of Indian CV industry and we want to ensure that the driver community is able to make the most of the opportunities ahead. As per ASDC and EYs recent report, there are numerous skills required by drivers like basic mechanics, financial management, vehicle detailing, transport management, etc., as a complementary skill to driving. The report also highlights that road transport segment would require an incremental human resource of 26.36 million to meet its requirements by 2026. On the occasion of International Professional Drivers Day, we are happy to share that Tata Motors Finance has pledged to train 25,000 Indian drivers under Project Akanksha in the next 3 years, bridging the financial literacy and skill gap in the driver community, carrying forward the National Skill India Mission. The Indian commercial vehicle driver community is severely underserved and vulnerable to safety issues. Equipping them with skills that can help them build sustainable enterprises is a high priority in our country. By focusing on crucial aspects of their lives - professional, health and financial, we are confident that we can change their attitude and practices with regard to their profession, peers and the industry at large. This partnership will immensely benefit the driver community, empower them through the acquisition of relevant skills and potentially lead to entrepreneurship or community enterprise. Priya Naik, Co-Founder, Samhita. Project Akanksha aims to enhance knowledge, address growth barriers and strengthen the driver community through the following focus areas Financial Literacy: Sensitize and train them on developing financial acumen and discipline Entrepreneurial skills Soft Skills for Business and enhancing Employability Digital Literacy: Enable them to track and manage their expenses through digital tools.

Occupation related: Road safety, Substance abuse, Health & Wellness. Established in 1957, Tata Motors Finance is a Non-Banking Financial Company and one of the pioneers in the vehicle financing industry. Headquartered in Thane (Maharashtra), the brand has a strong footprint across India and operates through its own 250+ branch networks and 700+ channel partners in addition to Tata Motors dealers sales outlets. Currently, the brand is servicing over 17000+ pin codes across the country and touched over 2 million customers since its inception. Its portfolio includes loans for new and used vehicles, vehicle and customer lifecycle products like refinancing, working capital, fuel loans, tyre loans, fastag, insurance and many more, along with loans to vendors and suppliers of Tata Motors, all to benefit Tata Motors and its strategic partners.

PWR PWR

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

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Tata Motors Finance - Empowering the Drivers of the economy - Devdiscourse

Introduction

Futures and Derivatives Law of the People's Republic of China (hereinafter referred to as the Futures and Derivatives Law or the Law), as adopted at the 34th Session of the Standing Committee of the Thirteenth National People's Congress (NPC) on April 20, 2022, shall come into force on August 1, 2022.

Futures and Derivatives Law is the fundamental law in Chinas futures market. It fills in the gap in the field of Chinese futures and derivatives law and provides the legal basis for regulating trading in futures and derivatives, protecting the lawful rights and interests of traders, and promoting futures and derivative markets to serve the real economy. The Law is a significant milestone in the law-making of the futures and derivatives industry and marks a new chapter in the development of the futures and financial derivatives market in China.

Futures legislation has been deliberated for five times. It was part of the legislative plan of the NPC Standing Committee in its Eighth, Tenth, Eleventh, Twelfth, and Thirteenth sessions. The legislative process was lengthy and difficult. I have personally participated in the futures legislation seminar of the Twelfth NPC Standing Committee. I believe that the legislation is forward-looking and realistic. As I once said in an interview of Securities Times, Chinas futures market has rich resources with huge trading volumes of both commodity futures products and financial futures products. China is leading the world in the trading volumes of several futures products, but its trading price are not influential in the international market. Futures and derivatives play an important role in the financial markets due to its price discovery and risk management functions.

The Law summarizes past historical experience and draws lessons from international practices. It lays down the top-level design, clarifies the legal positioning and behavioral norms of various participants in futures and derivatives markets, and introduces a series of institutional arrangements.

Based on our long-term practice in the field of futures and financial derivatives, as well as my personal practical experience as the legal advisor and professional committee member of Chinese futures exchanges, we hereby analyzes the following legislative highlights of the Futures and Derivatives Law for your reference.

1. The Law aims to serve the real economy and safeguard national economic security.

After more than 30 years of development, China now has a sizable futures market. In addition to the orderly development of financial futures, Chinas trading volume of commodity futures has led the world for many years. China's futures market has accumulated some effective and well-run principles and regimes regarding futures trading, settlement and delivery, and trading exchange operation. Futures and Derivatives Law provides effective rules and regimes for establishing a risk prevention system in all aspects of futures trading, such as the trader eligibility regime, margin requirements, risk reserve system, position limit system, actual control account management system, large trader reporting system, forced position reduction, daily mark-to-market system, central counterparty system, futures market risk monitoring system, and emergency handling mechanism in abnormal situations .

Meanwhile, the rules and regimes derived from Chinas futures market practice have been recognized at the national legislative level, such as the real-name account regime, one account one code regime, margin depository monitoring regime, and the five-in-one regulatory regime. The Law safeguards the fairness and openness of the futures market and prohibits the behavior of fraud, insider trading, and market manipulation. The Law also states that its legislative purpose is to promote the development of the futures and derivative market to serve the national economy, prevent and dissolve financial risks, and safeguard the security of the national economy.

2. The Law defines derivatives trading for the first time, establishes the basic derivatives trading system and clarifies the basic regulatory framework of derivatives

Firstly, Futures and Derivatives Law not only regulates the futures market but also covers the derivatives market. In addition to defining futures trading, it defines derivatives trading for the first time at the legislative level and brings derivatives trading into the scope of legal regulation. Meanwhile, in addition to defining futures contract and option contract, the Law also defines that swap contract and forward contract shall be deemed as financial contract according to the Basel Committee and IOSCOs definition of derivatives.

For the purposes of the Law, trading in derivatives means the trading activities other than futures trading, which take swap contracts, forward contracts, and non-standard option contracts, as well as their portfolios as the subject matter of transactions.

For the purposes of the Law, swap contract means a financial contract under which the specific subject matter shall be exchanged as agreed upon on a given future date. For the purposes of the Law, forward contract means a financial contract other than a futures contract, under which a certain quantity of the subject matter shall be delivered as agreed upon on a given futures date at a specified location.

Moreover, after the global financial crisis, the G20, including China, reached a consensus to strengthen the supervision of derivatives markets. However, the basic regimes of global derivatives trading, such as Single Master Agreement, Close-out Netting, and Centralized Settlement, have not been recognized in Chinese law, which may conflict with the PRC Civil Code and Business Bankruptcy Law to some extent. This greatly hinders the development of China's derivatives market.

By learning from the international mature experience and absorbing the derivatives regulatory consensus reached by the G20, Futures and Derivatives Law recognizes the regimes of the Single Master Agreement, Close-out Netting, and Centralized Settlement. The trading will not be suspended, invalid, or canceled if one party entered bankruptcy proceedings. This is in line with the mature international market, which is conducive to promoting the opening-up of China's futures market and enhancing the internationalization level of the Chinese futures market.

Furthermore, Futures and Derivatives Law expressly states that the derivatives market shall be subject to the supervision and administration of the futures regulatory agency of the State Council or the department authorized by the State Council according to the division of duties. To conduct derivative trading, a financial institution shall obtain approval or confirmation in accordance with the law, perform its trader suitability management obligations, and comply with the relevant regulatory provisions of the state. The department authorized by the State Council and the futures regulatory agency of the State Council shall establish a derivative trading report database. Performance guarantee may be legally provided for derivative transactions in such forms as pledge.

Where derivative trading is settled in a centralized manner by a clearing institution as a central counterparty approved by the department authorized by the State Council or the futures regulatory agency of the State Council, netting may be terminated in accordance with the law.

For the derivatives market, the practical and forward-looking provisions of the Law demonstrates the status and development opportunities of the derivatives market in China, which will attract extensive attention from the financial sector.

3. The Law supports the futures markets functions in discovering prices, managing risks, and allocating resources and encourages hedging

Firstly, the Law expressly demonstrates that the state supports the sound development of futures markets and plays the functions of the futures market in discovering prices, managing risks, and allocating resources. Meanwhile, the Law stipulates that the state shall take measures to promote the development of the futures market and derivatives market of agricultural products and guide the production and operation of domestic agricultural products. The newly added function of allocating resource will further serve the real economy and adjust the supply and demand.

Secondly, the Law defines hedging for the first time and encourages enterprises to engage in hedging activities. It also clarifies that whoever engages in hedging and other risk management activities may apply for the exemption of the position limit. Meanwhile, the Law restricts excessive speculation. The administrative measures for position limit and hedging shall be developed by the futures regulatory agency of the State Council.

In addition, the Law changes the current approval system into registration system for listing of new futures contract products. The suspension and resumption of listing and delisting of futures contract products and standard option contract products shall be decided by futures trading venues and filed with the futures regulatory agency of the State Council for recordation. Futures contract products and standard option contract products shall have economic value, be difficult to be manipulated, and conform to the public interest. By optimizing the listing system of futures contracts products, market players may launch more futures products that meet the requirements.

4. The Law allows extraterritorial application and provides for cross-border regulatory mechanisms

At present, China has allowed certain commodities futures products to be traded by foreign investors. There is an urgent need for Chinese enterprises, traders, and brokers to participate in overseas futures and derivatives markets. However, there has been a lack of legal provisions to support the internationalization. Now the Law fills in this gap.

Firstly, in response to China's futures market opening-up, the Law clarifies its effect of extraterritorial application. Where any trading in futures or derivatives and relevant activities outside the PRC disrupt the order of the domestic market of the PRC and cause any damage to the lawful rights and interests of domestic traders, such activities shall be handled, and the violators shall be held legally liable according to the applicable provisions of the Law.

Secondly, the Law provides a special chapter regarding cross-border trading and regulatory cooperation, clarifying the registration requirements for overseas future exchange in providing service to domestic traders, the rules of foreign institutions to set up representative offices and carry out marketing activities in China, the rules for domestic entities to participate in overseas futures trading, and registration requirements for overseas futures operating institutions.

In addition, the Law stipulates the reciprocal bilateral and multilateral cross-border regulatory cooperation mechanisms and procedural requirements for investigation and evidence collection, providing strong legal support for cracking down on cross-border violations and dealing with cross-border market risks.

5. The Law provides rules for traders classification and suitability management and strengthens the protection of ordinary traders

Based on the principles of openness, fairness, and impartiality, the Law establishes traders classification mechanism and suitability management rules to strengthen the protection of ordinary traders.

Firstly, traders shall be divided into ordinary traders and professional traders according to their asset status, financial asset status, trading knowledge and experience, professional capability, and other factors. The Law seeks to protect ordinary traders by stipulating burden of proof in case of disputes between ordinary traders and futures trading institutions. Where any ordinary trader is in dispute with a futures trading institution, the futures trading institution shall prove that its conduct complies with laws and administrative regulations, without misleading, fraudulent, and other circumstances. The futures trading institution shall be liable in damages correspondingly, if it is unable to prove it.

Secondly, The Law makes it clear that traders have the right to know, right to query and confidentiality right. The Law enriches the settlement mechanism of futures disputes by introducing a mediation system and the priority of civil compensation, improving the civil compensation litigation system and establishing a national security fund for futures traders. The behavior that disrupts the market order will be cracked down on severely, such as market manipulation, insider trading, false statements, and providing misleading information. The Law increases the cost of violations of laws and regulations by raising the amount of fines in order to protect the legitimate rights and interests of traders.

6. The Law expands the business scope of futures companies, and clarifies the duties of intermediary service agencies

Firstly, Chinese futures companies currently mainly focus on single brokerage business, which accounts for a high proportion of their commission income. This results in single profit source and serious homogeneous competition. According to the Law, in addition to the futures brokerage business, futures companies may operate investment trading consulting, market-making transactions, asset management and other related businesses. The above provisions broaden the existing business scope and allow more room for new business models business development of futures companies, which will enhance the business capacity and risk management ability of futures companies. Meanwhile, according to the Law, futures companies should abide by the law and act with diligence, responsibility, honesty. Otherwise, they may face punishments such as revocation of business licenses, cessation of business operation, warning, confiscation of illegal income, fines, etc.

Secondly, the Law regulates the operation and management of intermediary service agencies. Intermediary service agencies such as accounting firms, law firms, asset appraisal institutions, futures margin depository institutions, delivery warehouses, and information technology service providers shall act with due diligence, adhere to their duties, provide services for futures trading and related activities according to the relevant business rules, and provide relevant materials according to the requirements of the futures regulatory agency of the State Council.

In addition, the institutions that provide information technology system services for futures trading and relevant activities shall comply with the technical management provisions and standards relating to information security of the state and the futures industry, and make record-filing with the futures regulatory agency of the State Council.

Also, in the process of supervision and administration of the futures market, the futures regulatory authority of the State Council should perform the duties of risk monitoring and prevention according to the Law, supervise the fintech and information security of the futures industry, and investigate and punish illegal futures activities.

Conclusion

The enactment and promulgation of the Futures and Derivatives Law provides a solid legal basis for the development of China's futures and derivatives market and fills in the gap of financial markets legislations. The Law forms a complete financial legal system together with existing commercial banking laws, securities laws, securities investment fund laws, insurance laws, and trust laws. The provisions of the Law on cross-border transactions and regulations are forward-looking and practical for dealing with the cross-border market risks.

In the long run, the Law will certainly bring huge development opportunities to the futures and derivatives industry, greatly promote the sound development of China's futures and derivatives market, and facilitate the interconnection and bilateral circulation between Chinese market and the international market, and further improve the marketization, legalization and internationalization of Chinas futures market.

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Six Highlights of Futures and Derivatives Law - Lexology

The North Wests agenda has been sidelined for too long. A 60-year campaign for our own university is too long.

The islands fourth largest city cannot afford to wait another minute. This is a civil rights issue - the last of the 1960s demands, still unresolved.

A Derry wage is less than half a Belfast one and our economy is continuing to shrink.

If we want to educate our young people to help us turn around and regenerate our failing region, we need to get moving today.

For the first time in generations, there is a real opportunity. We have increasing support in London and Dublin.

Crucially, we also have a blueprint, published by an all-island panel of experts convened by the Royal Irish Academy, outlining how university provision can and should be delivered in the North West.

This paper, The role of regions and place in higher education across the island of Ireland, is one of a series produced in November by the RIAs Higher Education Futures Taskforce but focuses largely on the North West.

The taskforce recognises the glaring need for a realignment of the islands resources towards the North West, citing a clear need to reduce the regional disparities that still exist in the distribution and availability of tertiary education.

It argues that this must be done on a cross-border basis, through focused regional planning and oversight distinct from the current Belfast- and Dublin-centric models and, in the former case, without the planning constraints of jurisdictional boundaries.

The report points to historic underinvestment in the northwest region and to recent comments by the British government that this should be addressed under the levelling up agenda.

It states: Such strategies must be based on equity and fairness in the distribution of resources including infrastructure, services and communication facilities and should take due account of the value of place, such as to ensure that each regions character, culture and opportunities are built upon to enable it to develop to its full potential. Policies geared towards this end will ultimately be to the overall benefit of the island of Ireland and help to ensure peaceful and prosperous outcomes for its inhabitants.

The RIA has two key recommendations regarding university provision in the North West:

A co-ordinated and independent Planning Body supported by funds from PEACE PLUS, the Shared Island Unit and a major joint UK-EU-Ireland-NI initiative involving sustained commitment, including in transport (road, rail, air) and broadband/digitalisation infrastructure, should be established to plan future tertiary education and research provision, including cross-border provision, in the northwest of the island of Ireland. Such a body is necessary to oversee the development of the collaborative institutional structures, governance and funding necessary to redress the effects of historic under-resourcing and achieve the essential upscaling of economic, social and cultural development in the North West.

A separate tertiary education Oversight Body for Northern Ireland should be established to advise the Department for the Economy NI, help define sectoral mission and ensure greater co-ordination, regional distribution and efficiency within the University and Further Education (FE) sectors.

The new Planning Body, ideally taking the form of a Cross-Border institution, would

drive the economic, social and cultural development of the north-west of the island, underpinning a north-west economic corridor with unique strengths and opportunities. It would also demonstrate that, notwithstanding the difficulties that have emerged over Brexit, the UK, EU, Ireland and NI remain committed to continued peace and prosperity across the island of Ireland, and to collaborative and synergistic links between Ireland, the UK and Europe.

The taskforce further states that, with 80 percent of the Norths HE students currently located in Greater Belfast, the Oversight Body should be a high priority for the Executive.

Given the critical nature of tertiary education in determining the economic, social and cultural welfare of NI, the establishment of such a body warrants high priority within the NI Executives agenda.While recognising the significance of the proposal to establish a NI Skills Council, it is not believed that such a council, in the absence of a dedicated tertiary education oversight body, would have the specificity or focus to establish greater co-ordination, regional distribution, resource distribution and oversight within and between the HE and FE sectors across all of Northern Ireland.

In the throes of the recent elections, it became increasingly apparent that there was an urgent need to tackle what has been called the Derry deficit. Our candidates, to a woman and man, stressed the importance of university expansion, more and more of them now favouring an independent, Derry-centred model.

The RIA tells us that, besides being an economic driver, the presence of a university in a region automatically elevates it to a region of learning: They attract enterprise, improve public discourse, provide world-class research facilities and researchers and act as a nurturing space for the arts and humanities, including their important interaction with the sciences in dealing with the intellectual and practical challenges of todays world.They provide a site for students, academics and policymakers to come together to discuss and analyse societal questions and to attempt to drive progress for allWe must never cease endeavouring to improve our universities and to increase the beneficial impact they have on the regions they serve.

Our new generation of public representatives for the first time has the opportunity, the support (from London and Dublin) and the roadmap (from the RIA) to deliver a new university for the North West and for the island.

We respectfully ask them to begin the process immediately by enacting the RIA recommendations as policy within their new programme for government and, specifically, that they establish an independent cross-border HE Planning Body for the North West, and an Oversight Body for the North.

The Derry University Group would welcome meetings with all parties to discuss this position.

The full RIA paper is available for download from: https://www.ria.ie/sites/default/files/he_futures_-_regions_and_place_discussion_paper_0.pdf

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Parties can now unite to build the North West University - Derry Journal

Study area

Harbin is located in the centre of Northeast Asia, between 4404'46 40 N and 125 42130 10 E24,26. The site has a mid-temperate continental monsoon climate, with an average annual temperature of 3.6 C and an average annual precipitation is 569.1mm. The main precipitation months being from June to September, accounting for about 60% of the annual precipitation, the main snow months are from November to January24,25. The overall topography is high in the east and low in the west, with mountains and hills predominating in the east and plains predominating in the west27. In this study, we identified the central district of Harbin, where urban construction activities are frequent and the population is dense, as the study area. According to the Harbin City Urban Master Plan (20112020) (revised draft in 2017), the specific scope includes Daoli District, Daowai District, Nangang District, Xiangfang District, Pingfang District, Songbei District's administrative district, Hulan District, and Acheng District part of the area, with a total area of 4187km2 (Fig.2). The bluegreen space in this study included woodland, grassland, cultivated land, wetland and water that permeate inside and outside the construction sites. They all have integrated functions such as ecology, supply, beautification, culture, and disaster prevention and avoidance, and have a decisive influence on the urban ecological environment.

Schematic of study area. The Figure is created using ArcGIS ver.10.2 (https://www.esri.com/).

The data used in this research included the following: land-cover date (30m30m) of two periods (2011, 2020) spported by the China Geographic National Conditions Data Cloud Platform (http://www.dsac.cn/), Meteorological datasets (1 km1 km) were obtained from the Resource and Environmental Science Data Center of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (http:www.resdc.cn/), including air temperature, precipitation, and surface runoff. ASTER GDFM elevation data (30 m30 m) came from the Geospatial Data Cloud (http:www.gscloud.cn), from which the slope was extracted. Soil data (1km1km) were from the World Soil Database (HWSD) China Soil Data Set (v1.1). The normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and modified normalized difference water index (MNDWI) data (30m30m) came from the National Comprehensive Earth Observation Data Sharing Platform (http://www.chinageoss.org/), ET datasets (30m30m) were drawn from the NASA-USGS (https://lpdaac.usgs.gov/). Social and economic data were mainly obtained through the Harbin statistical yearbook and the Harbin social and economic bulletin.

Urban bluegreen space is a politically defined man-land coupling region composed of ecological, economic, and social systems, which is greatly disturbed by human activities11. The essence of urban bluegreen space LEH is that the landscape ecological function sustainably meets human needs28,29. The landscape ecological function reflects the value orientation of human beings to bluegreen space, and to a large extent affects the bluegreen landscape ecological pattern and process. The interaction between the bluegreen landscape ecological pattern and process drives the overall dynamics of bluegreen space. Meanwhile, presenting certain landscape ecological function characteristics, which provide ecological support for various human activities30,31,32. While the pattern and process of bluegreen space both profoundly influence and are influenced by human activities33,34. This influence is long-term, the standard of LEH should not be fixed in real-time health, but should fully consider the sustainability of the health state.

In summary, the landscape ecological pattern, process, function, and sustainability are not separate, but a complex of mutual integration, and organic unity. In this study, we constructed an integrated assessment framework of bluegreen space LEH that included four units: pattern, process, service, and sustainability (Fig.3). In the assessment framework, the LEH of urban bluegreen space involves two dimensions: the first is the health status of the urban bluegreen space itself, emphasizing the maintenance of the ecological conditions, thereby potentially satisfying a series of diversity goals. The other is that urban bluegreen space, as a part of social and economic development, could sustainably provide the ability to meet (subject) needs and goals.

Key units, interactions of urban bluegreen space LEH.

The landscape ecological pattern of urban bluegreen space is a spatial mosaic combination of landscape elements at different levels or the same level. Affected by human activities interference31, the landscape ecological pattern shows the changing trend of landscape structure complexity, landscape type diversification, and landscape fragmentation. The assessment of urban landscape ecological pattern should be a comprehensive reflection of this changing trend1. Landscape pattern indexes are the most frequently applied which could reflect the structural composition and spatial configuration characteristics of the landscape4,35. This study took landscape ecology as the entry point and selected the landscape pattern indexes that can quantitatively reflect the change characteristics of landscape structural composition and spatial configuration under the disturbance. In this way, the landscape disturbance index (U), landscape connectivity index (CON), and landscape adaptability index (LAI) were used as the indexes for the assessment of landscape ecological pattern health.

Landscape disturbance index (U)

There are two kinds of relationships between the landscape ecological pattern and the external disturbance: compatibility and conflict. As the landscape ecological pattern has accommodating characteristics, the disturbance beyond the accommodating capacity will degrade the landscape ecological pattern36,37. The landscape disturbance index (U) could characterize the degree of fragmentation, dispersion, and morphological changes in landscape pattern38. The index is a comprehensive index that can reflect the health of the landscape pattern by quantifying the ability of ecosystems to accommodate external disturbances. It consists of the landscape fragmentation index, the inverse of the fractional dimension, and the dominance index. They measure the response of the landscape pattern to external disturbance from the perspective of different landscape types, the same landscape type, and landscape diversity, respectively36,38, and their weights were determined by the entropy weight method. The formula is as follows:

$$ U = alpha N_{{{Fi}}} + bD_{{{Fi}}} + cD_{{{Oi}}} $$

(1)

where NFi is the landscape fragmentation index, DFi is the inverse of the fractional dimension, DOi is the dominance index, and a, b, and c are the corresponding weights, which were 0.20, 0.5, and 0.3 in this study, respectively.

Landscape connectivity index (CON)

The most direct result of landscape ecological pattern degradation caused by external disturbance is that the flow of energy, material, and information among ecological patches is reduced or even blocked, ultimately the stability of the landscape pattern is decreased. The connectivity could characterize the ability of landscape ecological pattern to mitigate risk transmission, which is significant for the dynamic stability of landscape ecological pattern39,40. The landscape connectivity index (CON) could measure the connectivity between ecosystem components through the aggregation or dispersion trend of patches41. The better the connectivity, the stronger the stability of landscape ecological pattern. The formula is as follows:

$$ CON = frac{{100sumlimits_{s = 1}^{q} {sumlimits_{h ne l}^{p} {C_{{{shl}}} } } }}{{sumlimits_{s = 1}^{s} {left[ {q_{{s}} (q_{{s}} - 1)/2} right]} }} $$

(2)

where qs is the number of plaques of patch type s, Cshl is the link between patch h and patch l in s within the delimited distance.

Landscape Restorability Index (LRI)

The ability to recover to its original structure when subjected to disturbances is an important criterion for the landscape ecological pattern42. Research confirmed that the restorability of the landscape ecological pattern is closely related to the structure, function, diversity, and uniformity of distribution. The landscape restorability index (LRI) combines the above landscape information and could indicate the restorability of the landscape ecological pattern in response to disturbance43. The index consists of the patch density, Shannon diversity index, and the landscape evenness, the patch density is the number of patches per square kilometer. The Shannon diversity index reflects the change in the proportion of landscape types. The landscape evenness index shows the distribution evenness of patches in terms of area. The larger the LRI index, the more complex and evenly distributed the structure is, and the more recovery ability of the landscape pattern against disturbance is. The formula is as follows:

$$ LRI = PD times SHDI times SHEI $$

(3)

where PD is the patch density, SHDI is the Shannon diversity index, and SHEI is the landscape evenness index.

The landscape ecological process of urban bluegreen space is extremely complex for it involves multiple factors such as natural ecology, economy, and culture. Landscape ecological process assessment is the measure of the self-organized capacity and the efficiency of ecological processes within and among patches44. A bluegreen space with a healthy landscape ecological process should have the ability to adapt to conventional land use under human management and maintain physiological integrity while maintaining the balance of ecological components. Specifically, the landscape ecological process could quickly restore its balance after severe disturbances, with strong organization, suitability, recoverability, and low sensitivity45,46. A single model hardly to gets good research on landscape ecological process under the urban scale. The comprehensive application of multidisciplinary methods is effective means to solve the problem. Regarding this, we selected ecological indexes and models from four aspects: organization, suitability, restoration, and sensitivity to assess the landscape ecological process of urban bluegreen space.

Organization index (O)

The organization of the landscape ecological process is the maintenance ability of stable and orderly material cycling and energy flow within and between landscapes47. The normalized vegetation index (NDVI) and the modified normalized difference water index (MNDWI) could reflect the efficiency and order of ecological processes. Such as accumulation of organic matter, fixation of solar energy, nutrient cycling, regeneration, and metabolism13. The indexes are the external performance of the internal dynamics and organizational capabilities of the ecological process. In recent years, it has been widely used in the assessment of related to landscape ecological process. The formulas are as follows:

$$ NDVI = frac{NIR - R}{{NIR + R}} $$

$$ MNDWI = frac{p(green) - p(MIR)}{{p(green) + p(MIR)}} $$

(4)

where (NDVI) is the normalized vegetation index, (MNDWI) is the modified water body index, (NIR) is the reflectance value in the near-infrared band, (R) is the reflectance value in the visible channel, (p(green)) and (p(MIR)) are the normalized values in the green and mid-infrared bands.

Suitability index (Q)

The suitability of the landscape ecological process is a measurement of the self-regulating ability of the landscape ecosystem. That is, to effectively maintain the ecological process in a state of being protected from disturbance during the occasional changes caused by the external environment2. The water conservation amount index (Q) can measure the operating capacity of ecosystems to maintain ecological balance, water conservation, climate regulation, and other ecological processes by integrating the water balance of rainfall, surface runoff, and evaporation41. It could reflect the suitability of landscape ecological process to regional environment and developmental conditions. The formula is as follows:

where Q is the water conservation amount, R is the annual rainfall, J is the surface runoff, ET is the evapotranspiration.

Recoverability index (ECO)

The recoverability of the landscape ecological process refers to the ability of an ecosystem to return to its original operating state after being subjected to external impacts. Land-use types play an essential role in landscape ecological recoverability48. The ecological recoverability index (ECO) uses the resilience coefficients of land-use types to reflect the level of ecosystem resilience38. Based on previous studies, the resilience coefficient of land-use types was assigned (Table 1).

Sensitivity index(A)

The sensitivity index (A) could be used to indicate landscape ecological process formation, change, and vulnerability to disturbance31. We started from the physical effects of bluegreen space on sand production, water confluence, and sediment transport, introduced the Soil Erosion Modulus to characterize the sensitivity of landscape ecological processes to disturbance. The index effectively combines landscape ecology, erosion mechanics, soil science, and sediment dynamics49. The formula is as follows:

$$ begin{gathered} A = R_{{i}} cdot K cdot LS cdot C cdot P hfill \ L = (l/22.1)^{m} hfill \ S = left{ begin{gathered} 10.8sin theta + 0.03,theta < 5^{ circ } hfill \ 16.8sin theta - 0.50,5^{ circ } le theta < 10^{ circ } hfill \ 21.9sin theta - 0.96,theta ge 10^{ circ } hfill \ end{gathered} right. hfill \ C = left{ begin{gathered} 1,c = 0 hfill \ 0.6508 - 0.3436lg c,0 < c le 78.3% hfill \ 0,c > 78.3% hfill \ end{gathered} right. hfill \ end{gathered} $$

(6)

where A is the soil erosion modulus. Ri is the rainfall erosion factor, K is the soil erosion factor, L and S are slope the length factor and the slope factor respectively, C is the vegetation coverage and management factor, P is the soil and water conservation factor, l is the slope length value, m is the slope length index, and the is slope value.

The landscape ecological function determines the ability of ecological service50,51,52, the ecological service of urban bluegreen space depends on the human value orientation48. It includes four categories: supply, support, regulation, and culture. Based on Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs and Alderfers ERG theory, scholars have summarized the three major needs of human beings for urban bluegreen space. Namely, securing the living environment to meet the survival needs, improving social relationships to meet the interaction needs, and cultivating cultural cultivation to meet the development needs53. Specifically corresponding to the landscape ecological function of urban bluegreen space, supply is not the main function, only plays a subsidiary role, support is the basic guarantee, regulation is the basic need for urban environmental construction, and culture is an important element of high-quality social life. Ecosystem service value (ESV) can realize the measurement of ecological service function by calculating the specific value of life support products and services produced by the ecosystem54,55,56. Considering the human value orientation of the urban bluegreen space landscape ecological function, the weights were given by consulting 16 experts, with supply, regulation, support, and culture weights of 0.2, 0.3, 0.3, 0.2, respectively. The formula is as follows:

$$ ESV = sumlimits_{k = 1}^{n} {S_{k} times V_{k}^{{}} } $$

(7)

where Sk is the area of landscape type k, Vk is the value coefficient of the ecosystem service function of landscape type k .

Wu (2013) proposed a research framework for landscape sustainability based on a summary of related studies, stating that landscape ecological sustainability is the ability to provide ecosystem services in a long-term and stable manner34. The framework emphasized that landscape sustainability should focus on the analysis of ecosystem service trade-offs effect34,57. In the process of dynamic change of urban bluegreen space ecosystem, there are complex trade-offs among various ecosystem services. This is important for promoting the optimal overall benefits of various ecosystem services and achieving sustainable development of urban ecology58. In addition, as a special type of human-centered ecosystem developed by humans based on nature, human well-being is also very important for the landscape ecological sustainability of urban bluegreen space. For this reason, we introduced ecosystem service trade-offs (EST) and ecological construction input (IEC) as assessment indexes of landscape ecological sustainability.

Ecosystem service trade-offs (EST)

This study applied the root mean square deviation of ecological services to quantify ecosystem service trade-offs (EST). The index could effectively measure the average difference in standard deviation between individual ecosystem services and the average ecosystem services. It is a simple and effective way to evaluate the trade-offs among ecosystem services. The formula is as follows:

$$ EST = sqrt {frac{1}{n - 1}sumnolimits_{i = 1}^{n} {(ES_{std} - overline{ES}_{std} } } )^{2} $$

(8)

where ESstd is the normalized ecosystem services, n is the number of ecosystem services , and (overline{ES}_{std}) is the mean value of normalized ecosystem services.

Ecological construction input (ECI)

Human well-being is a premise for the landscape ecological sustainability of urban bluegreen spaces, it is closely related to government investment in ecological construction planning34. From the perspective of economics, this study assessed the human well-being obtained by urban bluegreen space with the ratio of urban ecological construction investment to GDP, that is, the ecological construction input (ECI). The formula is as follows:

where EI is the amount of ecological construction investment, and G is the gross regional product.

The index weight determines its relative importance in the index system, and the selection of the weight calculation method in the decision-making of multi-attribute problems has an important impact on the assessment results21. Traditional weighting methods can be divided into two categories, subjective weighting method and objective weighting method21,38. The subjective weighting method is represented by the analytic hierarchy process (AHP), Delphi method, and so on. It has the advantage of simplicity, but the disadvantage is too subjective and randomness because it was completely dependent on the knowledge and experience of decision makers. The objective weighting method is represented by the entropy weighting method (EWM), principal component analysis, variation coefficient method, and so on. And it has been widely recognized for reflecting the variability of assessment results18, but the values of indexes have significant influence and the calculation results are not stable. Considering the limitations of the single weighting method, the weights of each assessment index in this study were determined by the combination of subjective weight and objective weight. Among them, the subjective weighting selected the AHP, and the objective weighting selected the EWM (Table 2). The formula is as follows:

$$ w_{{j}} = alpha w_{{j}}^{{{AHP}}} + (1 - alpha )w_{{j}}^{{{EWM}}} $$

(10)

$$ w_{{j}}^{{{EWM}}} = d_{{j}} /sumlimits_{i = 1}^{m} {d_{{j}} } $$

(11)

$$ d_{{j}} = 1 - e_{{j}} $$

(12)

$$ e_{{j}} = - ksumlimits_{i = 1}^{n} {f_{{{ij}}} ln (f_{{{ij}}} )} ,;k = 1/ln (n) $$

(13)

$$ f_{{{ij}}} = X^{prime}_{{{ij}}} /sumlimits_{i = 1}^{n} {X^{prime}_{{{ij}}} } $$

(14)

where (W_{{j}}^{{}}) is the combined weight. (W_{{j}}^{{_{AHP} }}) is the weight of the j-th index of the AHP, (W_{{j}}^{{{EWM}}}) is the weight of the j-th index of the EWM, dj is the information entropy of the j-th index, ej is the entropy value of the j-th index, (f_{{{ij}}}) is the proportion of the index value of the j-th sample under the i-th indexm, (X^{prime}_{{{ij}}}) is the standardized value of the i-th sample of the j-th index, m is the number of index, n is the number of samples, and (alpha) was taken as 0.5.

Since the dimensions of indexes are different, it is necessary to unify the dimensions of the index to avoid the errors caused by direct calculation to make the evaluation results inaccurate. The range standardization was used to normalize the index data and bound its value in the interval [0, 1], the range standardization can be expressed as follows15,23:

$$ {text{Positive indicator}}left( + right):A_{{{ij}}} = (X_{{{ij}}} - X_{{{jmin}}} )/(X_{{{jmax}}} - X_{{{jmin}}} ) $$

(15)

$$ {text{Negative indicator}}left( - right):A_{{{ij}}} = (X_{{{jmax}}} - X_{ij} )/(X_{{{jmax}}} - X_{{{jmin}}} ) $$

(16)

Additionally, we divided the LEH index into five levels from high to low using an equal-interval approach as follows40: [10.8) healthy, [0.80.6) sub-healthy, [0.60.4) moderately healthy, [0.40.2) unhealthy, [0.20] pathological, corresponding level IV. And the level transfer of LEH in different periods was divided into three types: improvement type, degradation type, and stabilization type. For example, III-II means that the transfer from level III to level II is the improvement type.

Spatial autocorrelation analysis is one of the basic methods in theoretical geography. It could deeply investigate the spatial correlation characteristics of data, including global spatial autocorrelation and local spatial autocorrelation23. The global spatial autocorrelation uses global Morans I to evaluate the degree of their spatial agglomeration or differentiation of an attribute value in the study area. The local spatial autocorrelation is a decomposed form of the global spatial autocorrelation18,21, including four types: HH(High-High), LL(Low-Low), HL(High-Low), LH(LowHigh). In this study, spatial autocorrelation analysis was applied to study the spatial correlation characteristics of bluegreen space LEH. The calculation formulas are as follows:

$$ I = frac{{Nsumlimits_{i} {sumlimits_{v} {W_{iv} (Y_{i} - overline{Y} )(Y_{v} - overline{Y} )} } }}{{(sumlimits_{i} {sumlimits_{v} {W_{iv} } } )sumlimits_{i} {(Y_{i} - overline{Y} )} }} $$

(17)

$$ I_{i} = frac{{Y_{i} - overline{Y} }}{{S_{x}^{2} }}sumlimits_{v} {left[ {W_{iv} (Y_{i} - overline{Y} )} right]} $$

(18)

where N is the number of space units, (W_{iv}) is the spatial weight, (Y_{i} ,Y_{v}) are the variable attribute values of the area (i,v), (overline{Y}) is the variable mean, (S_{x}^{2}) is the variance, (I) is the global Morans I index, and (I_{i}) is the local Morans I index.

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