As most developed countries Norway has an ageing population meaning that the number of pensioners is predicted to grow rapidly over the coming years. As a consequence the Norwegian pension system will not be able to provide for these future pensioners. Meanwhile, a rising number of early retirees and disability pension claimants is diminishing the real retirement age. Also the individual pension amount is growing while the pension system itself reaches maturity. In short, major reforms are needed in the Norwegian pension system.

Humans have inhabited mountainous areas in northern Sweden since the end of the last glacial period, ca 8000 B.P., and their presence has marked the landscape in various ways. Older traces include the remains of hearths and dwelling sites, but there are also remains, such as culturally modified trees (CMT's), resulting from more recent activities in forested areas. This study aimed to document how people, both indigenous Sami's and Swedish settlers, have used an area northwest of Ammarnäs in Västerbotten, during the last 300 years, and what traces their activities have left in the area. I used historical records as well as an inventory of CMT's in the area to address this aim. Historical records of Sami activity are meagre, but it is clear that the people of the Ran and Gran Sami villages utilized the area long before 1500 A.D.

The prevailing food and energy crisis of the world, due to the declining reserves of fossil energy and a never ending rise of consumption, forces us to look into new fields to supply our energy demand. The boom of bio energy is criticized, as food crops are used to provide biodiesel and ethanol and the volumes are ridiculously small to supply world demand. Algae are one of the world?s oldest life forms and exist in many different phyla, providing a great variety to choose from, for different purposes. Cultivating microalgae offer a way to produce energy at great volumes without competing with food production and at the same time the algae offer a way to use our expensive nutrients in a more efficient way, besides this the algae are carbon dioxide neutral since their carbon source can be supplied by the atmosphere and the additional energy required can be supplied by algal oil or other renewable sources.

The prevailing food and energy crisis of the world, due to the declining reserves of fossil energy and a never ending rise of consumption, forces us to look into new fields to supply our energy demand. The boom of bio energy is criticized, as food crops are used to provide biodiesel and ethanol and the volumes are ridiculously small to supply world demand. Algae are one of the world?s oldest life forms and exist in many different phyla, providing a great variety to choose from, for different purposes. Cultivating microalgae offer a way to produce energy at great volumes without competing with food production and at the same time the algae offer a way to use our expensive nutrients in a more efficient way, besides this the algae are carbon dioxide neutral since their carbon source can be supplied by the atmosphere and the additional energy required can be supplied by algal oil or other renewable sources.

Several thousand years of human impact on the landscape in the form of cultivation is the reason to many nature- and culture values in the agricultural landscape today. Intensification and rationalization has led to vast monocultures and has forced many farms to close down. These trends have increased in the last years and constitute great threats to the values of the cultivation landscape. The purpose with the environmental objective A varied agricultural landscape is to protect these values. The environmental action plan of the municipality of Lund (LundaEko) 2006-2012 is built on the 16 national environmental objectives. The purpose with this paper is to put together material that the municipality of Lund can use in their work with modifying the local intermediate goals for the environmental objective A varied cultural landscape. The overall issue for this paper is ?What has happened with the state of the cultivation landscape in the municipality of Lund since LundaEko was approved in 2006?? The paper seeks to portrait the current conditions of the following fields: meadows and pastures, organic farming, exploitation threats to agricultural land, landscape elements with cultural values and species that are threatened.

In this paper discourse analysis on the Ethiopian National Action Program (NAP) to combat desertification is made. The aim is to describe how the overall image/picture of desertification, its causes, and effects and of possible solutions are presented in the NAP. The result of this analysis shows that the main cause of desertification is human activities mainly due to the poorly developed socio-economic situation in the dryland areas. It is indicated that an excessive dependency of the rural population on the natural resources, particularly land, is the major cause of land degradation and this deterioration of land is said to have been caused by the rapid population growth, overgrazing, forest clearing as well as past government and institutional failures. In addition it is indicated that the effect of desertification usually involves ecological changes that sap land of its ability to sustain agriculture and human habitation, therefore the most serious threat to human welfare.

The prevailing food and energy crisis of the world, due to the declining reserves of fossil energy and a never ending rise of consumption, forces us to look into new fields to supply our energy demand. The boom of bio energy is criticized, as food crops are used to provide biodiesel and ethanol and the volumes are ridiculously small to supply world demand. Algae are one of the world?s oldest life forms and exist in many different phyla, providing a great variety to choose from, for different purposes. Cultivating microalgae offer a way to produce energy at great volumes without competing with food production and at the same time the algae offer a way to use our expensive nutrients in a more efficient way, besides this the algae are carbon dioxide neutral since their carbon source can be supplied by the atmosphere and the additional energy required can be supplied by algal oil or other renewable sources.

In order to understand the human impact on today?s remaining ?virgin? forest and to develop sensible management strategies for future reserves, it is necessary to know how these forests have developed. This knowledge can be gained by using forest history analysis. here are large areas of forests still untouched by modern forestry in the mountainous region in the county of Norrbotten. These forests are highly interesting study objects from an ecological and historical point of view.

Svartedalens nature reserve a social richness worth develop. The nature reserve of Svartedalen is an area of high biological and social values. The reserve is located close to several densely populated areas. The reserve has been classified as a national area of interest for nature conservation and outdoor life, and as a Natura 2000 area according to both the bird- and habitat directions. The reserve is the largest landarea in Västra Götaland, 3 410 hectares, where a resolution has been made about all these forms of protection. The foundation Skogssällskapet owns 1 956 hectares of the reserve, at 1 384 hectares of the property they pursue FSC-certified silver culture, according to current management plan.

The forest industry is one of the most important industry branches in Sweden. Since the demand of high precision wood deliveries has increased, the demand on a well constructed forest road net also has increased. A good road net gives the wood-supplier competition advantages and also increases its service level towards its customers, lumber-mills and pulp-mills. In some parts of Norrbotten, the road net is still insufficient and not yet built out enough, and that is why it is important to know how to act and where to improve the road net in these areas. The purpose of this thesis was to create a work-model for long term road planning in areas with no road net or a not yet complete road net. The model has been created in an ArcGis environment, where a long chain of tools has been tied together with the program ?Model builder?.

During the late 1800s fire suppression became increasingly effective in northern Sweden which led to decreased areas of fire-disturbed woodland and successive changes in the structure of forests. In the long run this can pose a serious threat to fire-dependent and fire-favored species. Today some fire-prone forest reserves are burned as a nature conservation act. Often partial cuttings are made before burning, with somewhat different motives. The purpose of the study in Långsidberget nature reserve was to give a general picture of forest history and its affect on today?s forest condition, and to show how partial cuttings affect burning conditions and results. Långsidberget is located close to areas that were colonized during the Middle Ages.

During thousands of years, reindeer have adapted to living under harsh conditions with large seasonal variations in climate and forage availability. This adaptation implies that body functions and nourishment needs are strongly bound to the season. In the summer the reindeer has to maximize food intake to build up fat and protein reserves for the winter. More than 200 different plant species are included in the reindeer diet, but since reindeer have an unique ability to use the nourishment in lichen, different lichen species make up a large portion of their winter diet in many areas. Fundamental for reindeer husbandry is access to natural grazing during most of the year.

Numerical simulations play a vital role in both static and dynamic stability assessment of electric power systems and the foreseeing of voltage collapse. Simulations performed by Svenska Kraftnät(SvK) are mainly done in the specialized voltage collapse predicting software tool, SPICA and the more all?purpose software tool, ARISTO.The grid operators at SvK use SPICA to predict the maximum transfer limit at specified sections (in this report the section in concerns is the southern part of Sweden i.e. interface1 4). SPICA is mainly used as an online application by using actual states from the grid, these states update every quarter of an hour.This thesis is a continuation of the master thesis SPICA ? ARISTO JÄMFÖRELSE by Jakob Katzman and Johan Fält.

The responsibility to identify, protect, look after and develop cultural and historical values in our surroundings - urban as well as rural - falls on the local authorities. This essay focus on local preserve programs for cultural landscapes in Sweden?s municipalities. Programs for preserving cultural landscapes are important tools in the aim to reach a sustainable development of these values. The object of the essay is to delineate how the municipalities handle cultural landscapes in terms of how cultural and historical values is identified, how the landscape is divided and assessed and how different aspects of intangible and tangible values are taken into consideration.

The way we design our cities today will affect the living conditions for future generations. Planning as a discipline can become crucial to attain a sustainable urban development with an increased quality of life among the urban population and an improved environment. Urban Agriculture in the Sustainable City -a case study in Managua is a Diploma Work that deal with poverty issues, aspects of sustainability and development work. We have had a theoretical starting-point, but our focus has been on the case study i.e. the practical part, that we carried out in Managua, the capital of Nicaragua. Today about half of the worlds 6,3 billion people live in cities. The demographic growth of the countryside has declined, while the population in the cities is considerably increasing.