The purpose of this study is to identify the impacts of abandoned quarries and to examine scenarios for their restoration. Two quarries were selected as case studies, which are located in the Evros Region (NE Greece). Initially, the current state of the abandoned quarries was recorded and evaluated, including slopes, landscape, land use, as well as cultural elements. Four alterative scenarios for the exploitation of each quarry were proposed, taking into account the specifics of each site. Financial, environmental, and socioeconomic criteria were then used to evaluate these scenarios.

Agricultural policies have impacts on land use, the economy, and the environment and their analysis requires disaggregated data at the local level with geographical references. Thus, this study proposes a model for disaggregating agricultural data, which develops a supervised classification of satellite images by using a survey and empirical knowledge. To ensure the consistency with multiple sources of information, a minimum cross-entropy process was used. The proposed model was applied using two supervised classification algorithms and a more informative set of biophysical information.

Bogotá, the rapidly growing center of an emerging economy in the northern part of South America, is located within a biodiversity hotspot in the tropical Andes. The surrounding mountains harbor the ecosystems Páramo and Bosque Altoandino whose high water retention capacity serves as a “natural water tower” for the city’s freshwater supply. Since Bogotá is steadily growing, the city spreads into its peri-urban area, thus threatening its proximal ecosystems.