Rice (Oryza sativa and O. glaberrima) is one of the world's most important staple food crops. Over half of the world's population relies on rice. The people in some parts of Africa have been cultivating rice for over 3,500 years.Dataset SummaryThis layer provides access to a 5 arc-minute (approximately 10 km at the equator) cell-sized raster of the 1999-2001 annual average area of rice harvested in Africa. The data are in units of hectares/grid cell.The SPAM 2000 v3.0.6 data used to create this layer were produced by the International Food Policy Research Institute in 2012. This dataset was created by spatially disaggregating national and sub-national harvest data using the Spatial Production Allocation Model. Link to source metadataFor more information about this dataset and the importance of rice as a staple food see the Harvest Choice webpage.For data on other agricultural species in Africa see these layers:CassavaGroundnut (Peanut)Maize (Corn)MilletPotatoSorghumSweet Potato and YamWheatData for important agricultural crops in South America are available here.What can you do with this layer?This layer is suitable for both visualization and analysis. It can be used in ArcGIS Online in web maps and applications and can be used in ArcGIS Desktop.This layer has query, identify, and export image services available. This layer is restricted to a maximum area of 24,000 x 24,000 pixels which allows access to the full dataset.The source data for this layer are available here.This layer is part of a larger collection of landscape layers that you can use to perform a wide variety of mapping and analysis tasks.The Living Atlas of the World provides an easy way to explore the landscape layers and many other beautiful and authoritative maps on hundreds of topics.Geonet is a good resource for learning more about landscape layers and the Living Atlas of the World. To get started follow these links:Landscape Layers - a reintroductionLiving Atlas Discussion Group

Cassava (Manihot esculenta) also known as manioc in South America, is grown world-wide in tropical and sub-tropical regions providing an important staple for the diet of over half a billion people. It is drought tolerant and grows well in marginal soils. More than half of the world's cassava production is from Africa and Nigeria is the world's largest producer. In Ghana, cassava accounts for roughly 30% of the calories eaten. The root of the cassava plant must be prepared to remove harmful compounds prior to eating. Dataset SummaryThis layer provides access to a 5 arc-minute (approximately 10 km at the equator) cell-sized raster of the 1999-2001 annual average area of cassava harvested in Africa. The data are in units of hectares/grid cell.The SPAM 2000 v3.0.6 data used to create this layer were produced by the International Food Policy Research Institute in 2012. This dataset was created by spatially disaggregating national and sub-national harvest data using the Spatial Production Allocation Model. Link to source metadataFor more information about this dataset and the importance of casava as a staple food see the Harvest Choice webpage.For data on other agricultural species in Africa see these layers:Groundnut (Peanut)Maize (Corn)MilletPotatoRiceSorghumSweet Potato and YamWheatData for important agricultural crops in South America are available here.What can you do with this layer?This layer is suitable for both visualization and analysis. It can be used in ArcGIS Online in web maps and applications and can be used in ArcGIS Desktop.This layer has query, identify, and export image services available. This layer is restricted to a maximum area of 24,000 x 24,000 pixels which allows access to the full dataset.The source data for this layer are available here.This layer is part of a larger collection of landscape layers that you can use to perform a wide variety of mapping and analysis tasks.The Living Atlas of the World provides an easy way to explore the landscape layers and many other beautiful and authoritative maps on hundreds of topics.

Fierce international debates rage over whether trophy hunting is socially acceptable, especially when people from the Global North hunt well-known animals in sub-Saharan Africa. We used an online vignette experiment to investigate public perceptions of the acceptability of trophy hunting in sub-Saharan Africa among people who live in urban areas of the USA, UK and South Africa. Acceptability depended on specific attributes of different hunts as well as participants’ characteristics. Zebra hunts were more acceptable than elephant hunts, hunts that would provide meat to local people were more acceptable than hunts in which meat would be left for wildlife, and hunts in which revenues would support wildlife conservation were more acceptable than hunts in which revenues would support either economic development or hunting enterprises. Acceptability was generally lower among participants from the UK and those who more strongly identified as an animal protectionist, but higher among partic..., Data collected from an online vignette experiment hosted on the Qualtrics platform. Data analysed in R statistical software., R statistical software. Required packages called at the top of the accompanying R script., # Public perceptions of trophy hunting are pragmatic, not dogmatic

Data underpinning analyses presented in Hare et al (2024), ‘Public perceptions of trophy hunting are pragmatic, not dogmatic’.

Description of the Data and file structure

This data set includes all columns necessary to replicate model fitting, selection, and comparisons outlined in the manuscript.

Variable names mean:

• education = participant’s level of formal education
• people.animals = whether a participant would prioritise people or wild animals if their interests clash
• individuals.groups = whether a participant would prioritise individual wild animals or groups of wild animals if their interests clash
• hunter = whether a participant identifies as a hunter
• conservationist = whether a participant identifies as an advocate for environmental conservation
• animal.protectionist = whether a participant identifies as an advocate for animal protection
• human.rights = whether a participant i...

In macroecology, body sizes in assemblages have traditionally been investigated from two perspectives: body size frequency distributions (BSFDs) and geographic variation in body size. Neither of these has been investigated for the South African avifauna; one objective of this study was therefore to explore these. The regional BSFD of South African birds was found to be right-skewed. The Southern African Bird Atlas database was used to calculate median body sizes of avian assemblages in quarter degree grid cells. Median sizes were then used to investigate geographic variation in body size across the country. Of the mechanisms previously proposed to explain geographic variation in body size, only the starvation resistance hypothesis, which states that large size confers starvation resistance during seasonally resource shortages, was supported, though weakly, as median body size decreased with increasing productivity. However, much of the variation in median size of assemblages could be predicted by randomly drawing species from the regional BSFD, particularly at high species richness values. This provides empirical support for a continuum between the dominance of niche-based processes at low richness and neutral processes at higher richness. In addition it emphasizes the need to consider null expectations in investigations of the geographic variation in size. The importance of the regional BSFD and species richness for body sizes of local assemblages is highlighted. Previously, it has also been suggested that body size may affect the sensitivity of organisms to human activities. World-wide, landscapes are increasingly being altered by people. Few studies have investigated the effect of such disturbances on the avifauna of South Africa. The consequence of land-use changes on avian assemblages was therefore assessed in three South African regions which experience different environmental conditions and are threatened by different land-use changes. Birds were recorded in transects in undisturbed protected areas and the disturbed landscape outside the protected areas in the three regions. The effect of land-use change on avian assemblages varied between regions, and avian assemblages were most affected where disturbance was most intense. While species richness was not affected in a consistent manner across regions, species composition always changed in response to disturbance. This lead to higher regional species richness as natural and disturbed areas supported different avian assemblages, and heterogeneity of assemblages between vegetation types usually became less pronounced in disturbed areas. Functional diversity was also compromised by land-use changes: the relative proportion of feeding guilds was altered, although the mean body size of birds did not change in disturbed landscapes. This study therefore highlights the importance of natural and protected areas for conserving species, assemblages and ecosystem processes. To determine what effects body sizes of bird assemblages in South Africa, and the effect of land-use changes on the South African avifauna