Vol 39, No 4 (2018)

The tendency for the progressive establishment a broad integration association of a continental scale, “Greater Eurasia”, on the basis of the Eurasian Economic Union and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization is highlighted. A common geographical feature of the countries involved in this partnership is revealed, i. e. the unique ultra–continental location of their remote landlocked territories at the world’s largest distance from economical sea routes and major world markets. An example of the countries of Central Asia, Russian Siberia and western regions of China shows the negative influence of the ultra–continentality factor manifesting itself primarily in increased transportation costs, which creates considerable barriers to economic growth and foreign trade activity. It is suggested that the accelerated creation of international transport corridors of both latitudinal and meridional orientation be regarded as a potential powerful means for closer economic consolidation and interdependent economic development of the remote inland territories of “Greater Eurasia”. The new development opportunities for Siberia opening up before Siberia with the establishment of “Greater Eurasia” are pointed out: access of the Siberian regions via the transport corridors to nearby inland markets, the creation of preconditions for a deeper onsite processing of Siberian raw materials by organizing final process stages and obtaining transportable products with high added value, and by overcoming the depressing effect of the ultra–continentality on economic growth through the construction of the transport corridor on the basis of the Trans–Siberian Railroad using advanced technological solutions.

One of the world’s largest rivers, Yenisei, is considered in terms of sustainable water management, in accordance with the Water Strategy of the Russian Federation into 2020. For that purpose, the UN indicators of water management and the regional indicators (developed by the authors previously) were used as well as the hydrobiological indicators which they can be regarded as the measure of ecosystem stability as they reflect the response of hydrobionts to the anthropogenic effect. The system of indicators thus generated includes four criteria: hydrographic characteristics, the socioeconomic state of water management, waste water characteristics, the surface water quality, and biological characteristics. Each of the criteria is represented by several indicators whose contents are filled with statistical material for the period 1993–2015, by numerical estimates made by these authors, and by expedition–based and published data. It is shown that the water discharge within the Yenisei basin is ineffective: the technical status of the water supply systems is in serious decay, the proportion of recycled and reused water is low, and the water consumption indicator per unit of gross domestic product is high. Because of the decline of the production level, freshwater intake and waste water discharge have decreased; however, this has not led to any improvement in surface water quality. The chemical and biological methods of water quality assessment for the Yenisei river have shown similar results corresponding to the “contaminated” and “dirty” classes. Channel storage of the Yenisei changed its thermal regime, resulting in structural rearrangements of biological communities and triggering a decrease in stability of the aquatic ecosystem.

This paper outlines the industrial potential of the city of Irkutsk as the source of pollution of the urban environment and ecological effects. A crucial role is played by the fuel and energy complex (FEC) represented by the energy industries, coal and oil–refining industries as well as by the metallurgical and agro–industrial sector. A major contribution to air pollution of the city (up to 60%) is made by motor transport. It was shown by observations and calculations of the traffic rate in different functional zones of the city that it fluctuates from high (3714 vehicles/hour) in the industrial zone to low (888 vehicles/hour) in the green zone. The social and demographic situation is characterized. The population size of the city is 623.4 thousand. The population density in different administrative districts varies from 1204 to 4558 persons per square kilometer. The birthrate is 17.5% higher than the national average. In situ assessments were made of the ecological status of soils. We determined the level of soil biochemical activity (SBA) and their alkaline acid conditions as integral and informative indicators. Ecologically, high and low SBA values cannot be considered positive because they indicate a tendency for disturbances in the metabolism regulation mechanisms for organic compounds. Content levels of heavy (HM) metals in soils are provided. The findings are presented cartographically.

Long–term soil research efforts (1980–2017) in the Baikal drainage basin revealed a widespread occurrence of thin layers of skeletal soils in the tundra zone: peat–lithozems, coarse humus and humous and dark–humus lithozems, and petrozems. A variety of complete–profile soils is represented by podburs, peat podburs, gleyic podburs, podzols and gleysols. It is determined that the soil cover of the mountain–taiga zone is nonuniform because of the manifestation of the vertical zonality, the aspects of slopes and permafrost of different types. The main background of the Khangai soils consists of cryosols and podburs; Khentii – sod podburs and dark–humus soils; in the Lake Khövsgöl region – cryosols, podburs and sod podburs; the Baikal region – podburs, podzols, peat podburs and sod podzols, and on the windward slopes of the mountain ridges facing Baikal – podburs and coarse humus burozems. The occurrence and development of burozem soils in the Baikal region is confirmed. In the forest–steppe zone of Hangai and Khentii, the soil diversity is presented by cryosols, sod podburs, dark– and grey–humus soils, and in the forest–steppe contact zone by chernozems and castanozems. It is established that in the Selenga middle mountains, the basis for soil cover is provided by sod podburs, and the accompanying soils are grey metamorphic, light–humic and cryoarid soils. We identified a new type of soils, cespitose–grey soils. Psammozems and light–humus soils occur on sands. Chernozems prevail in the steppe zone, and castanozems, cryoarid and, light–humus soils are dominant in the arid steppe zone. It is determined that the floodplain develops soils of different types: immature, alluvial and halophytic. A study is made of the specific character of floodplain soil formation determined by the mountains on the territory, the regional features of floodplain–alluvial processes, the extremely continental climate, and by the functioning of soils in conditions of the combined manifestation of cryodization and aridization. It is emphasized that the 1:5 000 000 soil map of the Lake Baikal drainage basin was created using a unified methodological framework and a unified classification by soil scientists of Russia and Mongolia. It is established that the soils of the Baikal region differ from the soils located at the same latitude of the European territory of Russia. It is found that the mountain zonality has a determining influence on the formation and spatial distribution of soils.

Based on the data from 17 meteorological stations, we have analysed the characteristics of the temperature change within the surface water layer (0.2–0.5 m) in the coastal zone of Lake Baikal. It was determined that during 1970–2016, the average temperature trend in May–September was increasing from Southern Baikal to Central and Northern Baikal due to a combination of physical– geographical features (heat from the sun, orography of the coastal mountains and underwater slopes, wind conditions, and water dynamics) in the lake basin. It was established that the low value of the trend in Southern Baikal is due to a relatively poor protection of its water area by the Primorskii Ridge (approximately 800 m high) from strong winds of the western quarter. It was found that an increased wind activity causes a more pronounced wind–wave mixing in the upper layers as well as more frequent upwellings/downwellings which also involve the waters from the deeper layers in the exchange with the upper water layers. In the Central Baikal basin, the influence of the water mass on the atmospheric circulation in the surface layer is the most obvious. Its consequence implies high atmospheric transparency and decreased cloudiness over the lake leading to an increase in incident solar radiation in the upper water layers. The high temperature trends, compared to the other parts of Baikal, correspond to the Northern Baikal basin best protected from the strong westerly winds by the Baikalskii Ridge (up to 2500 m high). Over the past two decades (1994–2016), the trend of warming of the surface water layer has decreased significantly, along with an increase in the warming rate of Central and Southern Baikal. Using data of deep–water temperature monitoring in Southern Baikal, we estimated the spatial scales of the identical response of the surface temperature and the lake water column to climate change.

A landscape and ecological analysis is made of the structure of soil zoocenoses in the Tunka depression and the foothill area of Khamar–Daban. We examine the patterns of change in quantitative characteristics and taxonomic diversity of invertebrate communities in the landscape–ecological range under the influence of natural and anthropogenic factors. Taxonomic diversity and structure change mainly in the gradient of edapho–climatic and phytocenotic conditions which vary with the location of a biogeocenosis in the landscape. Within the taiga and forest landscapes, the general regularity of distribution of soil invertebrates is an increase in the number of species from steppificated pine and larch forests to dark coniferous–fir and mixed sufficiently moist biogeocenoses of the mountain forest belt. The relatively low heat availability of the root layer, combined with high humidity, and also the high temperatures that lead to drying of the soil, negatively affect on the taxonomic diversity of the mesopopulation. The main trend of change in taxonomic diversity of pedobiont communities is a decrease of the number of species in the gradient of increasing climate aridity, and an enhancement in hypothermaia and anthropogenic pressure. A structural and dynamical analysis identified two main types of structure of the communities: mesothermohygrophile (with a relatively small contribution from of insects and a large contribution from annelids), and xeroresistant (with a significant involvement of representatives of the insecta class. The first type includes zoocomplexes of taiga, forest, meadow and wetland biogeocenoses represented mainly by moisture–loving forms; the second type includes steppificated, steppe and radically anthropogenically disturbed biogeocenoses, the composition of which is dominated by invertebrates with relatively short development cycles and largely adapted to moisture deficit.

We examine territorial marketing, a direction of regional policy, which is gaining increasing popularity across the globe; it emerged at the interface of marketing and socio–economic geography and is based on the notion of the uniqueness of each place. We discuss the methodological issues related to this direction and to its relevance to Irkutsk. A study is made of the use and prospects of the images of the city of Irkutsk as the tools for the promotion of the place and the attraction of migrants and tourists. The investigation was made at different geographical scales: regional (Irkutsk–Baikal); microgeographical toponymics, and statistical analysis of the individual perception of the city. Use was made of different investigation techniques: a multi–scale treatment of the same geographic phenomena against the background of the world, the country, the region and the agglomeration; analysis of the city’s recreational–geographical location as a variety of the economic–geographic location; comparison of street names according to the locality of the names, that is, the extent to which they are connected with the history and culture of the city as well as according to their popularity and content analysis of texts and images taken from the Internet and belonging both to tourists and to local residents, and images in the field of emotions. Some recommendations are made for the use of the images of the city in its marketing promotion. It is pointed out that the identified images were used in practice; in particular, in designing the historical № 130 Quarter in Irkutsk where timber representing one of the city images was widely used.

Processes of accretion and abrasion and possibilities of using the main natural resources in the maritime coastal areas of the Red River delta in the north of Vietnam are considered. Quantitative data on erosion and accretion are provided for the period since 1930 till the present, and the level of accretion and erosion processes is estimated according to their intensity and prevalence. Three periods of development of accretion and erosion in three areas of the Red River delta have been identified, and the results of cartographic and quantitative analysis of their intensity are presented. It was determined that the erosion areas in some periods reached 47 ha/year with the destruction rate of the coast as high as 9.2 m/year and the rate of accretion 445 ha/year, and the seaward shift of the coastline with the velocity of up to 37.6 m/year. The most eroded coastal areas are Wang Li and Hai Hau, and accretion is largest in Ba Lat. The area characteristics of the eroded and accretion areas are given for ten coastal regions from the city of Haiphong to Ninh Bin Province. It is shown that the dynamical processes in the coastal zone of the northern part of Vietnam significantly complicate the use of natural resources and their economic development. The specific character and ecological problems of sea salt extraction, cultivation of aquaculture, restoration of mangrove vegetation in the maritime and coastal zone of the Red River delta are considered. It was determined that irrational use of the coastal territories gives rise to environmental problems and to a decrease in economic efficiency of natural resource management. It is concluded that the identified patterns of formation of the estuary should be properly identified and, on this basis, it is advisable to develop balanced methods for sustainable use of natural resources of the coastal regions of Vietnam, including coastal shoals.