Manufacturing Industry: Location, Change and Environmental Impact

Introduction

This option looks at the locational patterns of manufacturing industry in MEDCs, LEDCs and newly industrialised countries (NICs) at global, national, regional and local scales. There is particular emphasis on the processes of change; on their economic, social and environmental impacts; and on the resultant issues and conflicts.

Content     Candidates should have a knowledge and understanding of:

(a) Industrialisation, deindustrialisation and reindustrialisation:

• Export-led industrialisation import substitution and movement offshore in NICs;

• The environmental impact of contemporary industrialisation;

• Deindustrialisation and reindustrialisation in MEDCs since the 1980's.

(b) Industrial location factors:

• The influence of markets, materials, energy, transport, economies of scale, agglomeration (cluster) economies, labour, capital and inertia at different scales;

• The organisation of manufacturing firms at regional, national and global scales;

• Transnational companies (TNCs), multi- and single plants, multi- and single plant locations, small manufacturing enterprises (SMEs);

• The location of firms' Headquarters (HQ), Research and Development (R&D), and branch plants;

• Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and disinvestment and its influence on national and regional economies;

• Globalisation and the global shift of manufacturing; the urban rural shift.

(c) The locational influence of governments and governmental agencies:

• Regions of industrial change: peripheral regions, core regions, deindustrialised regions;

• Policies affecting industrial location.

(d) The economic, social, cultural and environmental consequences of manufacturing growth and decline:

• Unemployment and the threat to communities;

• Impact on the rural-urban fringe;

• The concept of negative externalities, including pollution, dereliction, loss of countryside, disadvantages to particular social groups;

• Management of change by government, planners and other agencies.

Learning outcomes

Candidates should gain a broad understanding of the locational patterns of manufacturing industries across the world, in different economies and at different scales.  They should also appreciate recent changes in the patterns, their causes and the possible consequences.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Managing Urban Environments

Introduction

This option focuses on the economic, social, cultural and environmental problems of urban areas; the planning responses to these problems and the management of change. It builds on the relationships between people and the urban environment introduced in Module 2681 and aspects of physical geography and environments introduced in Module 2680. Problems, planning and management strategies should be evaluated using case studies from urban areas in both MEDCs and LEDCs.

Synoptic Links

This option requires candidates to draw together and apply relevant knowledge, understanding and skills learned in other modules in this specification. There are important links to be made in this option with, for example, the following sections:

5. 1.1 (a) Hydrological systems: Drainage basins

5. 1.1 (b) Hydrological systems: Rainfall discharge relationships

5.1.3(b) Atmospheric systems: Local energy budgets

5.2. 1 (a-c) Population: pattern, process and change

5.2.2(a-e) Rural and urban settlement: pattern, process and change

5.4.7(a-d) Manufacturing Industry: Location, Change and Environmental Impact

Content 

Candidates should have a knowledge and understanding of urban processes. Case studies should be selected from different areas and at scales appropriate to the processes being examined.

(a) Urban growth:

• Urbanisation and urban growth in LEDCs;

• Changing demographic and social structure in MEDCs and the demand for housing;

• Planning to contain urban sprawl (decentralisation of population, industries and services) exurban growth and invasion of the countryside. Green belts, wedges/axes, new towns, overspill towns etc.;

• Development of brownfield sites for housing and economic activities;

• Revitalisation of central areas and inner cities to encourage re-urbanisation;

• Problems of housing in cities in LEDCs. Responses including self help, sites-and-services, upgrading etc.

(b) Social exclusion:

• Social and economic inequality; poverty, ill health, unemployment, access to services and social exclusion in urban areas;

• Multiple deprivation: inner cities, peripheral estates, Government sponsored and private planning initiatives;

• Underemployment in LEDC cities, the informal economy, inward investment by TNCs.

(c) Congestion:

• Traffic congestion, public versus private transport;

• Counterurbanisation, decentralisation and lengthening journeys-to-work;

• Planning responses e.g. rapid transit schemes, bus lanes, car sharing, park and ride, road pricing, re-urbanisation etc.

(d) Pollution:

• Air, noise and water pollution: causes, consequences and management;

• Waste disposal;

• Sustainable cities.

Learning Outcomes 

Candidates should be aware that urban problems stem from the concentration and dispersion of population and economic activity. They should recognise that urban areas in MEDCs and LEDCs often share similar problems, the differences are ones of scale and severity. They should appreciate that interpretations of urban issues and approaches to dealing with urban change vary with time and space. They should have a clear understanding that the future of large urban areas may depend on their sustainable use of limited environmental resources such as urban sites, clean air and clean w ater.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________

Coastal Environments

Introduction

This option focuses on the physical nature of the coastal environment. it introduces candidates to the study of coastal processes and landforms necessary for an informed understanding of the issues of erosion, deposition and management in coastal zones.

Content

Candidates should study the coast as an open system with inputs, throughputs and outputs. The relationships between processes and landforms should be emphasised using appropriate case studies case studies which include stretches of contrasting coastline.

(a) Waves, marine and sub-aerial processes

• Wave generation and characteristics; fetch, energy refraction, reflection;
• Breaking waves; high and low energy breakers, swash and backwash;
• Beach profiles and their relationships to wave energy and sediment size;
• Processes of marine erosion; quarrying, abrasion, corrosion/solution, attrition;
• Wave transportation and deposition; sediment sources and characteristics, sediment cells, longshore drift;
• Sub-aerial processes; weathering and processes of mass movement;
• Lithology and coastal Morphology.
  

(b) Coastal Landforms and coastal Morphology

• Cliffs and shore platforms;
• Cliff profiles (including caves, arches and stacks) and their evolution, form and rate of recession as related to lithology, slope processes and human activities;
• Beaches; their form in cross section and plan, simple and compound spits, tombolos, offshore bars, barrier beaches and islands (cuspate forelands are not required);
• Structure and coastlines; concordant/pacific and discordant/atlantic.

(c) Causes and results of changing sea level on coastal landforms

• Isotatic and eustatic movements;
• Estuaries, rias and fjords;
• Raised beaches, relict cliff lines.

(d) The coastal ecosystem; its landforms and vegetation succession

• Coastal sand dunes; formation and development;
• Salt marshes and mud flats.

(e) Coastal Management

• Contrasting methods of coastal management, hard and soft engineering schemes, alternative approaches;
• Impact of human activities on coastal systems; recreation, conservation, erosion, flooding, reclamation. Sources of conflict and resultant management strategies/schemes with reference to a contemporary case study.

Learning Outcomes

Candidates should appreciate that coastlines and subject to a range of physical processes, not all of which are marine. They should be aware that the impact of physical processes and human activities has resulted in the need for coastal management even if the strategy is that of "managed retreat" or "laissez faire".

 ______________________________________________________________________________________

Hazardous Environments 

Introduction

This option focuses on the nature of hazardous environments. It examines the between people, atmospheric systems and the lithosphere introduced in Module 2680. Candidates have the opportunity to study a range of hazards, their spatial distribution, causes and consequences for people and environments. The roles of monitoring, prediction and risk assessment should be evaluated.

Synoptic Links

This option requires candidates to draw together and apply relevant knowledge, understanding and skills learned in other modules in this specification. There are important links to be made in this option with, for example, the following sections:

5.1.3(a-b)    Atmospheric systems

5.1.4(a-b)    Lithosphere

5.2.1 (c)    Population: pattern, process and change: population change through space

5.2.2(all)    Rural and urban settlement, pattern, process and change

5.4. 1 (a)    Coastal Environments: waves, marine and sub‑aerial processes

Content

Candidates should have a knowledge and understanding of the variable perception of hazards, of their unpredictability, and how this affects attempts to deal with them. Case studies should be selected from different areas and at scales appropriate to the hazards being examined.

(a) Hazards resulting from crustal movements

• Global distribution;
  

• Volcanic hazards - types of eruption and their products; nuee ardentes, lava flows, mudflows, pyroclastic and ash fallout;
  

• Earthquake activity and resultant hazards; shaking, landslides, tsunami;
  

• Effects of hazards caused by volcanic and seismic activity on lives and property; variations in availability of warning systems;
  

• Responses to the perceived level of danger; risk assessment.

(b) Hazards resulting from mass movements

• The nature and causes of mass movement on slopes;
  

• Hazards resulting from slope instability and their level of impact in different areas.

(c) Hazards resulting from atmospheric phenomena

• Distribution of areas at most risk from hurricanes, tropical storms and tornadoes;
  

• Processes causing the development and level of intensity of tropical storms and tornadoes;
  

• Related hazards - severe river and coastal flooding,, landslides, storm surges, wind damage;
  

• Impact on lives, property and communications.

Learning Outcomes

Candidates should understand the causes and consequences of natural hazards, and of their variable impact on people and places. They should appreciate the implications of hazards for the economic, political, social and cultural environment.

____________________________________________________________________________________