Corsi di Studio del Dipartimento di Economia e Statistica "Cognetti de Martiis"

Buongiorno a tutti,

 sono disponibili 5 tesi (cinque) presso l'Università di Aveiro da svolgersi con la supervisione del prof. Roebeling e della dr.ssa Quagliolo oltre che di un docente del CCL EACT oppure Geografia e Scienze Territoriali (normalmente il prof. Frontuto oppure il sottoscritto).

A seguire gli argomenti:

1- Urbanization is a global trend – today over 50% of the world population live in urban areas – and leads to increased residential, industrial and infrastructure development, associated increases in surface sealing and air pollutant emissions, and subsequent consequences for urban heating and air pollution. Urban heating and air pollution have been associated with cancer, cardio-vascular and respiratory diseases (morbidity) that, in turn, imply health care and medical costs, productivity losses as well as pain and suffering. While morbidity costs associated with health care and medication as well as productivity losses are well established, morbidity costs associated with pain and suffering are less well established. The objective of this study is to assess the willingness-to-pay for reducing pain and suffering associated with urban heating and air pollution. Specific objectives are:

i) Literature review on willingness-to-pay (WTP) for reducing morbidity risks related to urban heating and air pollution;

ii) Development of a Choice Experiment (CE) to assess the WTP for reducing pain and suffering associated with urban heating and air pollution;

iii) Perform CE-survey in case study area (to be defined);

iv) Perform statistical analyses and analyze results; and

v) Report writing and presentation.

This study is developed in the context of the DISTENDER project.

Supervisors: Peter Roebeling and Carlotta Quagliolo (UAVR) and Vito Frontuto, Lorenzo Minola (UniTo), Alessandro Pezzoli (PoliTo).

2- The current food system causes land-use-change, greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions and biodiversity losses, damaging people’s health by contributing to obesity and destroying the environment. Plant-based diets are considered to improve human health and protect the environment, and require the production of plant based protein crops, such as legumes. Hence, beyond providing provisioning services (protein food crops), legume based farming systems also provide regulating (e.g. reduced GHG emissions) and cultural (e.g. aesthetics) ecosystem services and values. The objective of this study is to synthesize and map the potential ecosystem services and values provided by legume-based farming systems. Specific objectives are:

i) Literature review on the multiple ecosystem services and values provided by legume-based farming systems;

ii) Systematization, analysis and synthesis of literature review results;

iii) Mapping of the potential ecosystem services and values provided by legume-based farming systems;

iv) Discussion of results with project partners and stakeholders; and

v) Report writing and presentation.

This study is developed in the context of the LegumES project.

Supervisors: Peter Roebeling, Carlotta Quagliolo and Luiz Magalhães-Filho (UAVR) and Alessandro Pezzoli (PoliTo), Elena Comino (PoliTo).

3- The current food system causes land-use-change, greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions and biodiversity losses, damaging people’s health by contributing to obesity and destroying the environment. Plant-based diets are considered to improve human health and protect the environment, and require the production of plant based protein crops, such as legumes. There are, however, several constraints to and drivers for the transition towards legume-based farming systems by farmers in Europe. The objective of this study is to assess the potential for adoption and diffusion of legume-based farming systems by farmers in Europe. Specific objectives are:

i) Literature on the constraints to and drivers for the adoption and diffusion of legume-based farming systems;

ii) Develop and apply questionnaire to assess the constraints to and drivers for the adoption and diffusion of legume-based farming systems in case study area (to be defined);

iii) Develop and apply modelling approach to assess the extent to which drivers and constraints influence the adoption and diffusion of legume-based farming systems;

iv) Results processing, analysis and discussion; and

v) Report writing and presentation.

This study is developed in the context of the LegumES project.

Supervisors: Peter Roebeling and Max Lopez (UAVR), Claudia Meier (FIBL) and Alessandro Pezzoli (PoliTo) e Elena Comino (PoliTo).

4- The current food system causes land-use-change, greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions and biodiversity losses. Plant-based diet policies are considered to improve human health and protect the environment, and are expected to lead to increased biodiversity, ecosystem services and values. The biodiversity impacts and ecosystem service benefits of such policies are, however, not equally distributed. The objective of this study is to assess the spatial biodiversity impacts from EU plant-based diet policies. Specific objectives are:

i) Identify and characterize EU plant-based diet policies;

ii) Prepare land use and management database for use in InVEST (GLOBIO);

iii) Develop and apply InVEST (GLOBIO) model to assess biodiversity impacts from plant-based diet policies;

iv) Results processing, analysis and discussion; and

v) Report writing and presentation.

This study is developed in the context of the KOEVOET project.

Supervisors: Peter Roebeling and Luiz Magalhães-Filho (UAVR) and Nico Polman (WR), Vito Frontuto (UniTo) e Alessandro Pezzoli (PoliTo).

5- Cities are facing increasing pressures from population growth, urban sprawl, and environmental impacts (e.g. emissions) while climate change-related challenges strongly intensify their vulnerabilities. Therefore, urban adaptation led to a growing interest in the use of green/blue solutions, such as nature-based solutions (NBS), to mitigate these problems. There is emerging evidence that urban NBS ecosystem services (namely provisioning, regulating and maintenance, and cultural services) can provide effective solutions to these challenges, thus contributing to social welfare, human health, and well-being. However, the available evidence is still partial to fully support the implementation of NBS, which requires a comprehensive evaluation of the monetary and non-monetary ecosystem services values (ESV) that they provide. The objective of this study is to develop an integrated assessment of the multiple ecosystem services and values from NBS, using a spatially explicit meta-analytic value function transfer (MA-VFT) approach. Specific objectives are:

i) Literature review on meta-analytic studies to estimate multiple urban ecosystem services provided by NBS;

ii) Development of a comprehensive/aggregated meta-analytic value function transfer (MA-VFT) approach to assess spatially-explicit ecosystem service values from NBS;

iii) Apply the MA-VFT approach to the case study area (to be defined);

iv) Perform GIS analyses and analyze results; and

v) Report writing and presentation.

This study is developed in the context of the Urban-ES project.

Supervisors: Peter Roebeling, Carlotta Quagliolo and Luiz Magalhães-Filho (UAVR) and Vito Frontuto (UniTo).

Per una prima informazione potete rivolgervi al prof. Alessandro Pezzoli (alessandro.pezzoli@polito.it).

Cordiali saluti

Alessandro Pezzoli