Legal History and the Present State of Use of the Caspian Resources
This chapter does not discuss issues relating to the legal regime of the Caspian Sea, but concentrates on deliberations concerning the status of this water basin. The rules of public international law that are applicable to the Caspian’s legal status depend primarily on the legal character of this body of water. How the Caspian Sea is regulated will therefore depend on its legal classification and the accompanying body of law. If the Caspian Sea is a “sea” in legal terms, the UNCLOS would be applicable. If, on the other hand, the Caspian Sea is a “lake” in legal terms, then customary international law concerning border lakes would apply. Given the great number of often contradictory legal opinions on its status, it seems that, rather than looking for new future regulation, it would be more rational to try to assess the compatibility of every option with current international public law doctrine. As the Caspian does not appear to fall into either category, it is therefore necessary to take into consideration its historical, geophysical and legal peculiarity in deciding whether it is an international lake or an enclosed sea. The weight of the here presented arguments suggests that the Caspian Sea is not governed by a condominium regime. It also does not appear to be a sea, so the UNCLOS does not apply directly. Nor does it seem to be an international lake. So which legal concept should be applied to successfully define the legal status of the Caspian? It is clear that there are great difficulties in resolving this issue. At the current stage of interstate negotiations regarding future legal situation of the Caspian Sea, as well as in the contemporary practice of states regarding the Caspian Sea there is, however, absolutely no reference to either of the two categories mentioned above, which are today only referred to in research papers about that subject. What remains beyond dispute is that the Caspian Sea is a water basin surrounded by five sovereign states, which must determine its future legal status. After the benefits for each of these states are considered, such a decision needs to be mutual, because only a multilateral solution can guaranty legal stability of the Caspian region.
Cucumaria in Russian Waters of the Barents Sea: Biological Aspects and Aquaculture Potential
Sea cucumbers are a popular luxury and delicacy food items in Asian markets. These echinoderms possess a wide range of bioactive substances that can be used to produce pharmaceutical products. Recent depletion of natural populations of sea cucumbers requires involving new objects both in commercial harvesting and aquaculture. The northern sea cucumber Cucumaria frondosa is the most abundant sea cucumber in the Barents Sea. In this paper, we summarized literature data on the biology of this polar species to evaluate its fishery and aquaculture potential in the area. This eurythermic sea cucumber is typically occurs at 20–100 m depth. Cucumaria mainly colonize rocky or pebbly bottoms. Their main food items are detritus, pellets, phytoplankton, and small planktonic crustaceans. Spawning is registered in February–May. The age of commercial specimens (body length 25–30 cm, wet weight 300–350 g) is 10 years. The most abundant stocks of C. frondosa are registered in the central and south-eastern parts of the sea. Due to the low growth rate of Cucumaria the most appropriate cultivation method for these holothurians is a combination of larval culture and sea ranching. Coastal sites of the Barents Sea merit all the criteria for sea ranching of Cucumaria, but the development of their extensive aquaculture requires significant investments with long pay-back periods.
Study on essential drug use status and its influencing factors among cerebral infarction inpatients in county level hospitals of Anhui Province, China
Background and purpose Drug costs is one of the main components of hospitalization expenditure for cerebral infarction inpatients. In China, the National Essential Medicine System (NEMS) was created to relieve the heavy drug-cost burden for patients. The objective of this study was to investigate essential drug-use status and its influencing factors among cerebral infarction inpatients in county-level hospitals of Anhui province, China. Methods Three county-level hospitals were selected through a multi-stage cluster random sampling method. The hospitalization cost data of cerebral infarction inpatients in the three hospitals were extracted from the Anhui provincial information platform of the New Rural Cooperative Insurance System (NCMS), and whether the proportion of essential drug cost in the total drug cost reached the median value of 33.05% which was set as the evaluation index for essential drug-use status. Questionnaires for hospitals and physicians were designed and given to them to assess influencing factors. Results We retrieved the cost data of 2,189 inpatients from the NCMS platform and investigated 51 corresponding physicians in total. The drug costs accounted for 52.6% of the total hospitalization cost, and essential drug costs alone accounted for 37.0% of the total drug costs. The essential drug-cost proportion was high among physicians with a higher recognition degree on NEMS, older age, lower final academic degree, longer work experience and lower professional title. Married physicians and those with tight organizational affiliation also prescribed more essential drugs. Conclusions Increasing the proportion of essential drugs was an effective way to reduce the disease burden for cerebral infarction patients. Perfecting the NEMS, increasing government investment, reinforcing education and propaganda, and formulating relevant incentive and restrictive mechanisms were all effective ways to promote and increase the number of essential drug prescriptions written by physicians.