Luisa Andronie

Traditional Forest Management Plans (FMPs), which often span hundreds of pages on paper, present significant challenges due to their extensive length and lack of clear spatiotemporal context. This study aimed to integrate complex data from FMPs into an interactive, spatially referenced database. Using Gârda Forest in Romania’s Apuseni Mountains as a case study, we gathered raw data, developed the geodatabase’s spatial and alphanumerical components, and conducted spatial analyses related to ecological and production factors. Our GIS was designed to accommodate multiple attributes within the compartment layer’s attribute table. Unlike previous studies, we incorporated the full range of information from the Compartment Description, not just isolated management aspects. This comprehensive approach enabled spatial analysis to highlight, in maps, key features across the 50 compartments (totaling 752.5 ha) including dominant species (Norway spruce, silver fir, beech), target species composition (Norway spruce as the predominant target), land protection needs (required for 4% of the area), median forest volume (1565 m³ per compartment), elevation range (1020–1420 m), compartments with production functions, and silvicultural treatments. These thematic maps provide a tool for further analyses and clear spatial visualization. Our GIS-based methodology supports rapid condition assessments and aids forest professionals and decision-makers in promoting sustainable forest management.

The Common Agricultural Policy is focused on the environment increasingly degraded by intensive agriculture. The aim of the study is to analyse the effectiveness of the measures implemented under the Common Agricultural Policy in Maramureș County, Romania during the reference period 2007-2023. This research monitored the intervention logic for the payments made in relation to environmental benefits. The effectiveness of this policy was evaluated by processing primary data collected by conducting a survey and getting answers from 350 respondents, most of them farmers, but also representatives of the local public administrations or agricultural institutions in the county. Results show large gaps between the objectives set by the policy and the actual benefits declared by respondents in the study area. Following the introduction of the greening scheme, farmers in Maramureș county reported little change in farming practices as a result of its implementation. Moreover, farmers have incurred low costs for the implementation of greening measures, resulting in an unfair cost-benefit outcome. These results make it necessary to reduce the arable area to a lower incidence limit for the greening scheme in order to address a larger number of farmers and bring out the need to redefine voluntary environmental measures, with more demanding requirements to bring major environmental benefits. The main change that should be made concerns the removal of more measure-specific requirements to avoid double funding. Other changes relate to the inclusion of more complex requirements for measure 10 - agri-environment and measure 13 addressing areas facing constraints. Currently, the requirements are designed to conserve farming practices, not to generate additional environmental benefits. This study can be a solid starting point for extending the research to the county level or replicating the study in other regions.

The control and assessment of the level of mycotoxins in food is a very important desideratum for the food industry and, in particular, for products of plant origin. Control of food products represents a priority to get safe the population. Products intended for consumers must comply with the legislation. Mycotoxins are compounds with high stability, with very few ways and possibilities of elimination from the body. In order to eliminate the risk, a rigorous control of the feed is necessary. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the content of zearalenone (ZEA) and deoxynivalenol (DON) in cereals, bread and bread with potatoes. As a result of the determinations, it was found that the ZEA and the DON are well below the values provided by the legislation, due to the proper application of the food safety systems. In the case of ZEA and DON, the highest amount was observed in the case of whole grains, and the smallest amount was observed in homemade bread with potatoes

In a shared environment, our companion animals became unintended sentinels for pollutant exposure consequences, developing even earlier similar conditions to humans. This review focused on the human–pet cohabitation in an environment we all share. Alongside other species, canine and feline companions are veritable models in human medical research. The latency period for showing chronic exposure effects to pollutants is just a few years in them, compared to considerably more, decades in humans. Comparing the serum values of people and their companion animals can, for example, indicate the degree of poisonous lead load we are exposed to and of other substances as well. We can find 2.4 times higher perfluorochemicals from stain- and grease-proof coatings in canine companions, 23 times higher values of flame retardants in cats, and 5 times more mercury compared to the average levels tested in humans. All these represent early warning signals. Taking these into account, together with the animal welfare orientation of today’s society, finding non-invasive methods to detect the degree of environmental pollution in our animals becomes paramount, alongside the need to raise awareness of the risks carried by certain chemicals we knowingly use.

In this world that we share with them, they became unintended sentinels for the consequences of pollutant exposure, developing similar conditions to humans, and even earlier. This review focuses on the human-pet interaction and on the effects of the environment pets share with us. Alongside other species, canine and feline companions are veritable models in human medical research. The latency period for showing chronic exposure effects to pollutants is just a few years in them, compared to considerably more, decades in humans. Comparing the serum values of man's best friends to ours can indicate the degree of poisonous lead-load we are exposed to, for example, and of other substances as well. We can find 2.4 times higher perfluorochemicals from stain- and grease-proof coatings in canine companions, 23 times higher values for PBDEs in cats, and five times more mercury compared to the average levels obtained in humans. All these represent early warning signals. Taking into account all these, and the animal welfare orientation of today’s society, finding non-invasive methods to detect the degree of environmental pollution in our animals becomes paramount, alongside with the need to raise awareness on the risks carried by certain chemicals we knowingly use.

Nowadays, there are a multitude of sources of heavy metal pollution which have unwanted effects on this super organism, the soil, which is capable of self-regulation, but limited. Living a healthy life through the consumption of fruits and vegetables, mushrooms, edible products and by-products of animal origin, honey and bee products can sometimes turn out to be just a myth due to the contamination of the soil with heavy metals whose values, even if they are below accepted limits, are taken up by plants, reach the food chain and in the long term unbalance the homeostasis of the human organism. Plants, these miracles of nature, some with the natural ability to grow on polluted soils, others needing a little help by adding chelators or amendments, can participate in the soil detoxification of heavy metals through phytoextraction and phytostabilization. The success of soil decontamination must take into account the collaboration of earth sciences, pedology, pedochemistry, plant physiology, climatology, the characteristics of heavy metals and how they are absorbed in plants, and in addition how to avoid the contamination of other systems, water or air. The present work materialized after extensive bibliographic study in which the results obtained by the cited authors were compiled.

The comparison of the antioxidant activity of the studied seeds of fiber crop (hemp and flax) emphasized a hierarchy of antioxidant capacity. The purpose of the study was to investigate the antioxidant capacity and nutritional value of flax seeds (Linum usitatissimum L.) and hemp seeds (Cannabis sativa L.) in powder form. In this study, the FT-IR technique was utilized in order to detect molecular components in analyzed samples. Antioxidant capacity was evaluated with photochemical assay as well as humidity, protein, fiber, lipid and carbohydrate content. The FT-IR results reveal the presence of different bio-active compounds in hemp such as flavonoids, tannins, sugars, acids, proanthocyanidins, carotenoids and citric metabolites. The highest antioxidant capacity was observed in flax seeds, 18.32 ± 0.98, in comparison with hemp seeds, 4 ± 0.71 (μg/mg dry weight equivalent ascorbic acid). Regarding nutritional parameters, flax seeds showed the most increased content of protein, displaying average values of 534.08 ± 3.08, as well as 42.20 ± 0.89 of lipids and 27.30 ± 0.89 of fiber (g/100 g/sample). Hemp seeds showed the highest protein content of 33 ± 1.24 (g/100 g/sample).