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Participatory selection process for indicators of rangeland condition in the Kalahari
Abstract
To develop indicator–based management tools that can facilitate sustainable natural resource management by non–specialists, meaningful participation of stakeholders is essential. A participatory framework is proposed for the identification, evaluation and selection of rangeland condition indicators. This framework is applied to the assessment of rangeland degradation processes and sustainable natural resource management with pastoralists in the southern Kalahari, Botswana. Farmer knowledge focused on vegetation and livestock, with soil, wild animal and socio–economic indicators playing a lesser role. Most were indicators of current rangeland condition; however ‘early warning’ indicators were also identified by some key informants. This demonstrates that some local knowledge is process–based. Such knowledge could be used to improve indicator–based management tools and extension advice on the livelihood adaptations necessary to prevent or reduce ecological change, capable of threatening livelihood sustainability. There is evidence that social background influences indicator use. Communal farmers rely most heavily on vegetation and livestock indicators, whilst syndicate and land–owning pastoralists cite wild animal and soil–based indicators most frequently. These factors must be considered if indicator–based management tools are to meet the requirements of a diverse community.
... Several studies have attempted to summarise and synthesise the various agricultural sustainability indicators proposed and applied by researchers (Bathaei & Štreimikienė, 2023;Hayati, 2017). There are only limited studies to date in Africa which have followed participatory approaches in selecting sustainability indicators (Asare-kyei et al., 2015;Marandure et al., 2020;Reed & Dougill, 2002;Yegbemey et al., 2014). Such studies highlight the importance of frameworks and methods to include the perception of wider stakeholders and the socioeconomic and environmental context of the study area in constructing sustainability indicators usable in specific regions of Africa. ...
... Expert-led indicators on the other hand are scientifically rigorous but difficult to be understood and applied by farmers . Similarly, Reed and Dougill (2002) propose the use of a participatory shortlisting method, whereby a comprehensive list of indicators sourced from the scientific literature is subjected to a collaborative evaluation and refinement process together with local communities. ...
... Collect data using structured questionnaire.A nalyze the data, identify reas of agreement and trade-offs mong stakeholders Modified by the authors based on Frater & Franks, 2013;Luján Soto et al., 2020;Reed & Dougill, 2002. (NB. ...
Measuring agricultural sustainability requires operational definitions and customised indicators, which should ideally be tailored to each country’s context and reflect the full participation of key stakeholders. BEREKET HAILE, ANDREW DOUGILL and ABEL RAMOELO report on their study in which farmers, extension workers and experts collectively drew up a comprehensive list of indicators from relevant literature that can be used to inform researchers worldwide in selecting pragmatic indicators for assessing agricultural sustainability.
... Several studies have attempted to summarise and synthesise the various agricultural sustainability indicators proposed and applied by researchers (Bathaei & Štreimikienė, 2023;Hayati, 2017). There are only limited studies to date in Africa which have followed participatory approaches in selecting sustainability indicators (Asare-kyei et al., 2015;Marandure et al., 2020;Reed & Dougill, 2002;Yegbemey et al., 2014). Such studies highlight the importance of frameworks and methods to include the perception of wider stakeholders and the socioeconomic and environmental context of the study area in constructing sustainability indicators usable in specific regions of Africa. ...
... Expert-led indicators on the other hand are scientifically rigorous but difficult to be understood and applied by farmers . Similarly, Reed and Dougill (2002) propose the use of a participatory shortlisting method, whereby a comprehensive list of indicators sourced from the scientific literature is subjected to a collaborative evaluation and refinement process together with local communities. ...
... Collect data using structured questionnaire.A nalyze the data, identify reas of agreement and trade-offs mong stakeholders Modified by the authors based on Frater & Franks, 2013;Luján Soto et al., 2020;Reed & Dougill, 2002. (NB. ...
... During the past decades, the great potential of collaboration between farmers and researchers to identify relevant and accessible indicators for the assessment of agroecosystem sustainability has been increasingly recognized (Astier et al., 2012;Chambers, 1994;Hoffmann et al., 2007;Reed et al., 2008;Reed and Dougill, 2002). Several authors have argued that including both technical and local indicators can enlarge the accuracy, coverage and feasibility of impact assessment and enhance farmer adoption of sustainable management practices (Cardoso et al., 2001;Dougill et al., 2006;Reed et al., 2008;Stringer and Reed, 2007). ...
... Various previous frameworks to facilitate participatory identification and selection of indicators provide recommendations of best practices. Whether they focus on the selection of local indicators (Reed and Dougill, 2002), or include a parallel selection of technical indicators (Barrios et al., 2006;Fraser et al., 2006;Reed et al., 2006), an active participation of land users has been claimed indispensable to develop monitoring systems that can facilitate knowledge exchange and collective learning (Reed, 2008;Stringer et al., 2013). ...
... Given that operational frameworks for participatory monitoring impacts of sustainable land management on soil quality are sorely lacking, we designed a new participatory framework for the development of a monitoring system of soil quality based on combinations of technical and local key performance indicators adapted to the particularities of the study context (Fig. 2). The design is inspired by the framework proposed by Barrios et al., (2006) and builds on the above mentioned lessons and existing participatory frameworks Reed et al., 2006;Reed and Dougill, 2002) including various iterative phases for the operationalization of indicators and sharing of results. The framework was designed to facilitate understanding and mutual learning between stakeholders, making use of participatory techniques to enhance scientific rigor and local relevance (Jemberu et al., 2018;Stringer et al., 2013). ...
Improving the understanding and fostering large-scale adoption of regenerative agriculture (RA) requires soil quality monitoring systems that integrate farmers’ and researchers’ knowledge. This is especially relevant for participatory impact assessment in semiarid areas prone to land degradation that typically respond slowly to management changes, often resulting in low RA adoption rates. We developed a framework for the identification and selection of local and technical soil quality indicators and for the development of a visual soil assessment tool, to participatory monitor the impacts of RA by farmers and researchers. We applied this framework in a large-scale restoration project in southeast Spain together with almond farmers implementing RA. Local indicators selected by farmers focused mostly on water regulation, erosion control, soil fertility, crop performance and main supporting, regulating and provisioning ecosystem services. Technical indicators selected by researchers focused mostly on soil properties including aggregate stability, soil nutrients, microbial biomass and activity, and leaf nutrients, covering crucial supporting services. The combination of indicators provided complementary information, improving the feasibility of RA impact assessment. This integrated soil quality monitoring system offers a practical tool to enhance knowledge exchange and mutual learning to support the implementation of RA and optimize the delivery of ecosystem services.
... These methods are largely derived form the theory of deliberative democracy (Sen, 1970;Habermas, 1984;Habermas, 1987;Dryzek, 2002). Reed and Dougill, (2002) use a participatory framework to identify, evaluate and select rangeland condition indicators. Participatory approach legitimises the decision making as they incorporate public values and preferences. ...
... Participatory approach legitimises the decision making as they incorporate public values and preferences. This is one important reason why these approaches receive much attention from policy makers (Reed and Dougill, 2002;Renn, 2006). ...
... Without consideration of public values and preferences, decisions cannot be legitimised. On the other hand, public understandings are at least partially based on biased and false assumptions about potential environmental impacts of human actions (van den Hove, 2000; Reed and Dougill, 2002;Renn, 2006;Kalibo and Medley, 2007). This is even more problematic in our case study as inter-group conflicts during the last decades hinder people to think rationally about the importance of environmental criteria. ...
Sustainability is a matter of the distribution of resources across generations besides other aspects. In other words, future generations should be able to enjoy from endowment of natural resources at least as much as the current generation. Societies do overexploit natural resources because of imperfect markets in the context of environmental services. To overcome this problem, environmental economists are working on different methods for valuing resources. Environmental valuation is a key tool to elicit stakeholders preferences based on a hypothetical market. However, measuring stakeholders’ preferences is not always very straightforward. It might be that respondents are not sure about their preferences, unable to state them exactly, or even are unaware of them. Furthermore, the respondents may hold lexicographic preferences that hinder them to make trade-offs between environmental services and market products. To reduce the valuation difficulties and in order to take into account multiple stakeholders interests and lexicographic preferences, this study proposes a new valuation approach that is consistently linked to a decision support system to help policy makers to use stakeholders’ preferences to formulate a reasonable decision. Our methodology is a discursive ordinal multi-criteria valuation method that is a combination of three following steps. Firstly a discursive step which allows stakeholders to come together to discuss on a specific environmental problem, related criteria and finally some applicable plans. This step provides an opportunity for stakeholders to construct their preferences towards environmental criteria. Secondly, to elicit the constructed preferences, stakeholders should follow an ordinal procedure. This ordinal process helps stakeholders to express their preferences and their intensities in an easy way. Finally, a purely qualitative Multi- Criteria Decision Aid (MCDA) is applied to incorporate the aggregated preferences over all criteria to formulate a rank order of the environmental plans proposed in the first step.
... These groups were comprised of farmer households that shared interests or utilized the same resource pool (forest and rangeland) and made decisions based on these interests, such as grazing sites or herd movement(S. Dong et al., 2010;Ho & Azadi, 2010;Nega, 2018;Pokharel et al., 2009;Reed & Dougill, 2002;Ulziibaatar & Matsui, 2021). Through user groups, the community committee played a crucial role in disseminating government policies regarding rangeland management to community members. ...
... Through user groups, the community committee played a crucial role in disseminating government policies regarding rangeland management to community members. Tradition and experience have resulted in well-designed civil regulations and rules, which community committees and farmer associations are aware of Reed & Dougill, 2002;Shikui Dong et al., 2010;Shrestha et al., n.d.). These civil regulations facilitated the formation of local organizations for rangeland resource management and conservation and ensured their sustainable growth. ...
The sustainable development of rangeland ecosystems, the vital ecosystems that provide numerous important ecosystem services to millions of people in the Hindu Kush-Himalaya region, faces a number of challenges at present. Taking the condition into account, research was designed in 2020 to identify the socioeconomic scenarios of the yak/Chauries farming system in Mustang's high hill region. The data were inferred using a combination of techniques, including descriptive statistics such as frequency, percentage, bar graph, pie chart, multiple liner regression, description chart, and secondary data. The preliminary results indicated that household economics, such as the number of animals on the farm and the availability of human resources, as well as socioeconomic factors such as educational status, significantly influenced (P<0.05) the overall rangeland utilization pattern. Our overall socioeconomic data revealed that for the sustainable management of the rangeland, a set of interventions are required, including an increase in education, training, and information for the herders, as well as a long-term improvement of their socioeconomic status.
... The FGD is shown to be robust in exploring livelihoods of farmers ( Rahman et al., 2017 ;Sarkar, 2012 ;Tahiru et al., 2019 ). The method is also powerful in participatory determination and evaluation of sustainability indicators ( Belcher et al., 2013 ;Reed and Dougill, 2002 ;Yegbemey et al., 2014 ). Hence, FGD was selected as the method for this study. ...
... Selection criteria comprised 1) being easy to understand by farmers, 2) being able to measure what is measured, 3) being easy to use and practical to collect data, 4) being suitable to the context, and 5) being acceptable to be applied in general. These criteria were developed with a modification of those used by Reed and Dougill (2002) . The experts were asked to exclude indicators that they considered violating even one of the five criteria. ...
Sustaining the growth of Thailand's bioethanol industry depends markedly on security of feedstock supplies. However, being exposed to crises may impact livelihoods of farmers and discourage them from farming the energy crops. Farmer livelihood sustainability may need to be assessed and monitored. This study was carried out to propose sustainable livelihood outcomes and indicators, and determine causal mechanisms to achieve such outcomes. The UNDP's sustainable livelihood framework was applied. A novel method of data collection, Participatory Process Tracing (PPT) was introduced through which farmers were able to identify achieved sustainable livelihood outcomes and indicators, and causal mechanisms to achieve the outcomes. A variety of sustainable livelihood outcomes primarily related to natural resources, sufficiency of food and income, and social inclusion were encountered by the group farmers. On the other hand, rice growing activity indicated that the solitary farmers were either achieving a single sustainable livelihood outcome of ‘own food production’ or not achieving any outcome at all. The results indicate that group formation is key to enhance farmer livelihood sustainability. There were 10 sustainable livelihood outcomes and 22 indicators proposed and agreed by all farmers for determination of livelihood sustainability. They were proved to be suitable and applicable to Thailand's context. The creation of a livelihood sustainability index based on these sustainable livelihood outcomes and indicators should be encouraged. Nevertheless, the results are sufficiently useful for stakeholders in understanding farmer livelihood outcomes, paths, interconnection and complexity; this can enable policymakers to formulate effective policies and programs.
... and/or ( indigenous herders in the Kalahari (Reed & Dougill, 2002;Reed et al., 2006;Reed, Fraser, Morse, & Dougill, 2005) and creating well-being assessments with stakeholders in coastal British ...
... During the analysis, the wording of each draft indicator was negotiated so that participating organisations found them to be comprehensible, measurable, relevant and locally valid, while attempting to achieve a level of abstraction that would make them generalisable to other contexts. This was in accordance with the 'bottom-up and top-down' approach presented as an example of good practice in indicator development by Reed, Fraser and colleagues Reed & Dougill, 2002;Reed, Dougill, & Baker, 2008;Reed et al., 2006;Reed et al., 2005). ...
... Pastoralists and herders often have different perceptions on the rangelands degradation problems compared to the scholars and the experts (Dejene et al., 1997, Reed andDougill, 2002). This leads to restrictions on the successful implementation of range management plans (Mapinduzi et al., 2003). ...
... It is recommended that sustainable range management systems be based on a combination of indigenous ecological knowledge of local communities and scientific knowledge to prevent degradation of rangelands (Khwarae, 2006). Due to a long history and experience, pastoralists have a comprehensive and accurate body of knowledge about their own pastoral systems and rangelands condition (Reed and Dougill, 2002). In this regard, current study aimed to identify and evaluate indigenous ecological knowledge of pastoralists of rangeland degradation signs. ...
In recent years, large rangeland areas have been destroyed for various reasons, so that its negative impacts on local people's income and sustainable livelihood are become significant. Due to the fact that signs of negative or downward trends in the rangelands condition are being revealed prior to the complete degradation, a study was done to identify these sings and evaluate their importance in Saryqmish rangelands, Marave Tape County, Golestan Province, Iran. Data were gathered using direct and participant observations. Based on rangeland degradation indicators extracted from literature and interviews, a questionnaire was drawn up under which the respondents were asked to rate the importance of rangeland degradation indicators in two different scales: 5-point Likert-type scale and a 20-point scale. The results showed that "vegetation" with 68.9% and 53.3%, and "climate" with 48.9% and 77.8% are known as the indicators with medium and high importance in rangeland degradation, respectively. In other words, exploiters known climate and vegetation more important than other indicators in rangeland degradation. The results indicated that exploiters consider "reducing production plants" and "reduce the number of annual plants and grass" as the first priorities for assessing rangeland degradation Statistical comparison of the rangeland degradation indicators between authorized and unauthorized users pointed out that there were no significant differences between these two groups in assessed rangelands degradation indicators.
... Such important capacity building is rarely provided for these communities. In order to avoid this trap, the meaningful participation of all stakeholders in the entire process of indicator identification, evaluation and selection is essential (Reed and Dougill, 2002). However, involving stakeholders and their interest groups to develop sustainability indicators is a complex process, even for experts (Vaidya and Mayer, 2014). ...
... In the last decade, scientists have proposed many integrated frameworks to aid decision making in sustainability assessment processes (Paracchini et al, 2011;Vaidya and Mayer, 2014). However, the main focus -especially in the developing world -has been on land use and natural resource management (Reed and Dougill, 2002;Reidsma et al, 2011;König et al, 2012). Few studies, though, have focused on cropping sustainability frameworks, except, for example, in Bangladesh (Roy and Chan, 2012) and Benin in Sub-Saharan Africa (Yegbemey et al, 2014). ...
Frameworks to evaluate the sustainability of cropping systems in developing countries are scarce. This study proposes a framework to select easily quantifiable indicators that can be used to assess and communicate the sustainability of cropping systems in developing countries. The widely accepted social, economic and environmental dimensions of sustainability were covered using predefined criteria from which the indicators were then drawn. An initial list of indicators was established based on literature review and expert opinion, and through filtering reduced to 16 core indicators. Using the case of Irish potatobased cropping systems, a grower survey was conducted to collect data on production practices in four different cropping systems. The survey data were then used to calculate the sustainability indicators expressed as resource use efficiencies based on actual potato yields. The survey data also served as input into the Cool Farm Tool – Potato model to estimate greenhouse gas emissions from farm operations involved in potato production. With the help of local agricultural extension officers, focus group discussions were held with farmers of each production system to decide on sustainable and unsustainable indicator threshold levels. The participatory nature of the framework involving farmers and local extension officers secured buy-in from key stakeholders important for operationalization, monitoring and evaluation.
... Published by Frontiers Affiliated with the Odessa Centre 04 impending rangeland problems using early warning signs (Reed and Dougill, 2002). Therefore, indigenous knowledge could remain in improving rangeland management. ...
This paper investigates the impacts of policy and governance institutions on rangeland management practices in southern Africa. A scoping review was conducted, using literature from Web of Science, JSTOR, Scopus and Africa-wide bibliographic databases in the past three decades. The results revealed that several initiatives have been implemented in southern Africa to improve the condition of rangelands, including livestock destocking policies, grazing schemes, improved forage grasses, veld legume reinforcement, high-market beef value chains and agroforestry technology. However, the success of these initiatives has been limited due to a lack of meaningful participation in rangeland management. Moreover, the absence of responsive policies to support communal rangeland management in southern Africa has led to their transformation into unsustainable systems. Additionally, commercial interests often drive national-level policies and tend to disempower traditional institutions, causing conflicts and discord in rangeland management. Therefore, unrolling participatory bottom-up approaches will be essential for inclusive and sustainable rangeland management.
... Instead, participatory development of indicators (e.g. Belcher et al., 2013;Reed & Dougill, 2002) or pilot studies to adapt surveys (e.g. Pour et al., 2018) could better tie indicators to local contexts, but such efforts are not always prioritized or possible within the time and resource constraints of a research or intervention project (Agol et al., 2014). ...
Social outcomes from conservation and development activities on a local scale are often assessed using five livelihood assets—Natural, Physical, Human, Financial and Social—and their associated indicators. These indicators, and the variables used to measure them, are typically based on ‘common practice’ with limited attention being paid to the use of alternative indicators. In this article, we present a typical survey of socioeconomic benefits for ecological restoration workers in South Africa, and ask whether the common livelihood indicators used are adequate and sufficient, or whether any relevant indicators are missing. Results from the livelihood survey show the value of income, food and education as strong indicators of financial and human assets, and the importance of open-ended questions in eliciting details of workers’ perceived changes in their livelihoods. However, by complementing the survey results with qualitative data from semi-structured interviews and stakeholder workshops, we show how unconventional livelihood indicators and aspects provide a deeper understanding of changes in livelihoods that are tied to restoration projects. We guide scholars and practitioners to advance their process of selecting livelihood indicators, in particular to include three additional types of indicators: intangible indicators to assess life quality; relative indicators reaching across spatial and temporal scales to capture community outcomes and livelihood resilience; and, political indicators to uncover causal relationships.
... However, although local participation in ecotourism has been widely adopted as a strategy for assessing sustainability, efficiency, ease of use, and time saving (Vaidya and Mayer, 2014), indicators are that a lack of adequate knowledge of the basic characteristics of an ecotourism project often leads to failure to address key issues (Reed and Dougill, 2002). This means that, although numerous sites in developing countries across the globe have been declared ecotourism destinations, national policies and plans have largely ignored the significance of local communities' participation in ecotourism planning and decision-making processes (Chan and Bhatta, 2013). ...
The commitment and attitudes of all stakeholders, as well as giving recognition to their value as partners in the ecotourism domain, are crucial elements in ensuring sustainable ecotourism development. The social capacity theory (SCT) posits that implementing networks of relationships is a fundamental basis for successful and sustainable tourism development. However, research has shown that the planning and management of numerous ecotourism development programs are marred by a top-down approach. This study examined the level of stakeholder participation in ecotourism activities in the Umfolozi Municipality to determine if any gaps exist in the participation structure of this key economic enterprise. A concurrent exploratory mixed methods design was operated using qualitative and quantitative survey. Qualitative data that were collected from purposefully sampled participants were thematically analysed, while quantitative data that were collected from conveniently sampled respondents were analysed using SPSS software. The findings highlight the centralization of power and a fragmented ecotourism landscape in the study area that is plagued by manipulative participation, lack of collaboration, lac k of coordination , lack of awareness, and apathy among key stakeholders.
... This approach allows both community-based and system-based ways to participate depending on the objectives set for development activity, time and available often limited resources. However, participation of non-local experts who lack basic information regarding initiatives undertaken often results in failure in addressing key issues and inadequately incorporate perceptions, interests and concerns of all participants (Reed & Dougill, 2002). Despite of its shortcomings, the approach has been used effectively as a mechanism by which sustainability, efficiency, ease of use as well as time saving requirements could be assessed. ...
Scholars and stakeholders involved in the tourism industry share a common view that ecotourism has demonstrated a great potential for attracting both local and international visitors. Subsequently, the ecotourism sector has been advocated as one of the fundamental components of the tourism industry resulting mainly from its potential for conserving natural resources whilst enhancing the socio-economies of the nearer communities. A review of literature indicates that most of the developed and developing countries use their scenic natural resources for tourism purposes. The study, therefore, sought to find out how ecotourism contributes towards the local economic development of the study area. The study was conducted at the Oribi Gorge Nature Reserve and surrounding communities (Murchison and Eshobeni). The population of the study comprised of the municipal officials, community tourism organisation, Oribi Gorge Nature Reserve’s Management, community leaders, and households of the communities adjacent to the Oribi Gorge Nature Reserve. A sample of 384 respondents was drawn from the population using a convenience sampling technique. Exploratory mixed methods design was adopted by the study, which suggests that both qualitative and quantitative modes of research enquiry were used during the collection, analysis and interpretation of data. Survey questionnaires were used to collect the data through face-to-face mode of enquiry. Qualitative data were analysed through content analysis, while quantitative data were analysed through Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS version. 24). The findings of the study demonstrate that ecotourism contributes to the local economic development of the study area through employment creation and capacity building.
... The indigenous knowledge of pastoralists and its documentation can play an important role for rangeland conservation and management 11,12 . Local pastoralists often have different perceptions about rangelands degradation 13 . The reinvestigation of rangeland health indicators based on the indigenous knowledge of pastoralists can be of great help in planning and policy making for sustainable management of rangelands 14 . ...
Pastoralists have managed their lands for a thousand years, but they are ignored in the land management approaches. They have comprehensive information about their rangelands, coming from extensive observations and experiences in continuous herding. This research has focused on revealing the mechanism of knowledge-based behavior of pastoralists for rangeland management. The statistical population is made up of 50 pastoralists, all of whom were included in census. The research instrument was a researcher-made questionnaire that measured the knowledge-based behavior of pastoralists with 58 items in three indicators i.e. exploitation, conservation, and restoration. The validity and reliability of the research instrument were assessed using the opinions of local experts and Cronbach's alpha (α = 0.877). The knowledge-based behavior of pastoralists were from the highest to the lowest related to exploitation, conservation, and restoration with the average of 2.35, 2.07 and 1.58 respectively. Exploitation knowledge, restoration knowledge and conservation knowledge had the strongest and weakest significant relationship with the knowledge-based behavior of pastoralists. “The adequate growth of palatable plants is a sign of the start of grazing” and “the soil should not be wet for the start of grazing” had the highest importance for rangeland exploitation with a values of 0.816 and 0.784 respectively. For rangeland conservation, “holding meetings by elders regarding rangeland conservation is useful” and “reducing the number of pastoralists during droughts is one of the rangeland conservation ways” were the most importance items with the values of 0.852 and 0.848 respectively. For rangeland restoration, “implementation of grazing systems (rotation or rest rotation grazing systems) is one of the rangeland restoration ways” and “the appropriate distribution of watering points is one of the rangeland restoration factors” were the most importance items with the values of 0.840 and 0.812 respectively. There was a positive and significant relationship between the age, history of pastoralism and income with the knowledge-based behavior of pastoralists in rangeland management. Therefore, the presented approach based on indigenous knowledge can be considered as an effective component for rangeland management and can strengthen the positive effects of both management systems and create a transformation in the status of natural resources by a compatible combination of indigenous knowledge and modern knowledge. It is worth noting that by knowing these indicators, we can take an effective step in planning and policy making as well as proper management of rangelands.
... Participatory approaches to select assessment C&Is have been implemented to some extent in other non-LCA related assessment fields (Van Calker et al. 2005;Veldhuizen et al. 2015;Reed and Dougill 2002;Boulanger et al. 2011;Bell and Morse 2004), but rather rarely in S-LCA, where "the choice of the impacts is generally determined in a normative fashion using standards established in international conventions […] or national laws" (Mathe 2014). Yet, several S-LCA authors recommend or propose stakeholder consultation/participation as a way to identify assessment criteria from scratch, either solely by participatory approaches (Mathe 2014;Wangel 2014;, or in combination with other processes (e.g., literature review) (Silveri 2016). ...
Today’s supply chains entail numerous and serious issues, concerning the environment but also regarding people, including communities’ surrounding production activities, final consumers and workers. In order to assess those latter social and socio-economic impacts on people, Social life cycle assessment (S-LCA) is a tool being currently developed to complement E-LCA, which assesses potential environmental impacts along the life cycle of products and services. This PhD aims to address some of the outstanding methodological challenges faced by S-LCA, with the support of an application on
products from Belgian alternative food network (AFNs). The thesis focuses on three related main questions: i) what should S-LCA assess (topics, level of assessment, i.e. company’s practices, impacts on people, other) and ii) how to include impact pathways or cause-effect chains in the analysis, as it is done in E-LCA; iii) how should the assessment be carried out, so that it goes beyond a mere reporting? On the basis of three distinct states-of-the-art (on S-LCA frameworks, studies considering impact pathways and
S-LCA studies in the food sector), we put forward and apply specific methodological proposals that argue for i) the use of a participatory approach to select assessment criteria; ii) the use of an impact assessment approach that allows to understand company’s practices rather than their mere reporting, through an articulation of assessment criteria and indicators based on existing theories, including in social sciences. In this regard, the Global commodity chain approach that identify chain governance and value distribution among chain actors as potential stressors or root causes of social and socio-economic problems in supply chains, seems particularly relevant; iii) the use of a nested approach to sustainability in which also economic and governance aspects are taken into account, in addition to managerial and “social” aspects of supply chains, which are usually included. With this work we aim to contribute for S-
LCA to become an analytical tool contributing the improvement of main problems in supply chains, e.g. income, employment and working conditions, by analyzing their root causes. Our assessments of products traded under various alternative chains, including short food chains and a local Fair trade chain, reveal low income and poor employment conditions on farms. This rejects our assumption of better social sustainability performances of AFN products, when compared to those of mainstream chains.
Those poor performances would originate in the mechanisms used (e.g. unbalanced power relations, low commitment between VCAs, unfair prices), which are similar in mainstream chains. This would tend to confirm our assumption that chain governance and transaction modalities (i.e. business practices of chain actors) impact on socioeconomic conditions of workers in supply chains (or for the social sustainability of products), this is why we think it is of interest to consider those aspects in S-LCA. Also, other, more contextual, elements seem to come into play, such as labor regulations in force, that would encourage the use of non-standard forms of employment, and broader market context that influences AFNs quite strongly, including on prices. This is why it seems also important to work on mainstream food chains to improve overall product sustainability. Our research confirms the applicability and relevance of our methodological proposals, however further applications could be useful for further validation and methodological developments.
... Still, there were also several innovative examples and mechanisms documented in the literature (see Reed and Dougill 2002;Santana-Medina et al. 2013;Trimble and Plummer 2019;Kourantidou et al. 2020) and in which managers responsible for moving indicator processes forward centered on a learning process to achieve longer-term outcomes. To center learning and adaptation more effectively, these cases foremost sought to ensure those most affected by change were involved in indicator development processes. ...
In many environment and resource management contexts (e.g., integrated coastal management, ecosystem-based fisheries management), indicator selection and development are perceived as a largely technical, bureaucratic, and scientific challenge. As such, choices about indicators and their application are often treated as external from everyday politics and dynamics of social power. Our aim here is to highlight the value of a relational perspective that weaves power and knowledge together in the context of indicator development and implementation. We highlight four critical dimensions of this relational perspective that may lead to better indicator process outcomes: 1) centering identity and positionality to reflect power differentials; 2) emphasizing the importance of indicator ‘fit’ and the politics of scale; 3) engaging rather than erasing social-ecological complexity; and 4) reflecting on social norms and relationships to foster adaptation and learning. These four dimensions are rarely considered in most indicator initiatives, including those that are more participatory in design and implementation. The dimensions we outline here emerge from the grounded experience of managers and practitioners, including indicator processes in which we are currently engaged, as well as a scoping review of the literature on indicators for coastal and marine governance and conservation specifically. However, the four dimensions and relational focus are relevant to a wide range of resource and environmental management contexts and provide a pathway to catalyze more effective indicator processes for decision-making and governance more generally.
... Herders in the present study used certain soil indicators for assessing range conditions. Literature suggests that litter cover, soil texture and soil structure are few of the critical soil properties that the researchers have used for determining soil conditions in rangelands (Oba, 2012;Reed and Dougill, 2002;Reed and Dougill, 2010;Behmanesh et al., 2016). We showed that herders reported litter cover as the most frequently used indicator for determining the health of rangeland. ...
Traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) of the rangeland inhabitants plays an important role in range resource management. It complements other scientific tools of rangeland monitoring by filling the gaps in the information needed to assess rangeland condition. Local herders in extensive rangelands have developed certain ecological indicators that are used for assessing rangeland condition and resources availability. The current study was conducted to understand the traditional ecological indicators used by the herders for the assessment of grazing resource in Thal rangelands of Punjab province, Pakistan. An ethno-ecological interview-based survey was conducted. We carried out in depth interviews and focal group discussion with 60 herders in Thal rangelands. The herders were asked about the indicators they used for determining the quality of forages, health of animals and degradation of rangelands. The results showed that all the local herders were using similar indicators for assessing rangelands resources. It was observed that indicators used by the herders could be classified into four categories: a) vegetation indicators, b) soil indicators, c) animal indicators and d) environmental indicators. Among vegetation indicators 78% of the respondents used biodiversity of palatable species for determining the quality of vegetation. About 78.3% of the herders utilized dung shape to evaluate the health of animals ultimately describing the health of rangeland. Majority of the herders (58.3%) used loss of litter to assess land degradation thus reassessing grazing site and strategy. These results show promise for developing integrated indicators and monitoring protocols and highlight the importance of developing a common language of monitoring terminology shared by herders, governmental and non-governmental organizations, monitoring agencies, and researchers.
... Herders in the present study used certain soil indicators for assessing range conditions. Literature suggests that litter cover, soil texture and soil structure are few of the critical soil properties that the researchers have used for determining soil conditions in rangelands (Oba, 2012;Reed and Dougill, 2002;Reed and Dougill, 2010;Behmanesh et al., 2016). We showed that herders reported litter cover as the most frequently used indicator for determining the health of rangeland. ...
The study assessed the utilization, marketing and transportation of Non WoodForest Products (NWFPs) in Azad Jammu & Kashmir (AJK)with the view to improving ivelihoods of local inhabitants. Data collection were made in AJK districts of Neelam and Bagh. The respondents that were sampled for the study comprise of local ihabitants involved in collection of NWFPs. A total of 200 respondents were interviwed using simple random sampling technique. The results revelaed most of the farmers were literate having very small land holdings with farming as their prime profession. The main reason for NWFPs collection and selling is to buy food and cater for health needs of the family. Most of the NWFPs are sold directly to local traders at spot and fellow collector/trader remained most worthy source of information in NWFP collection and selling. Regarding mode of transportation manual transportation (on foot) is being used due to low quantityof NWFP collection at most of the times. There is now the need of time that the people of this area involved with NTFPs should be trained. Trainings on collection, processing and packaging of NTFPs must be carried out. Therefore the local communities would be able to add value to their products and are able to fetch high premiums to support their livelihoods.
... It is therefore, important that external experts develop indicators that are informed by rigorous assessment of basic characteristics of ecotourism development project. Otherwise, the participants would not succeed in addressing the identified unique key issues and often fail to incorporate concerns and recommendations raised or made during participatory sessions or workshops [60]. Nonetheless, expert-initiated approach has been considered in many parts of the world as a vehicle through which sustainable, efficient and resource conservation-oriented ecotourism development could be achieved [56]. ...
A vast majority of scholarship share a similar view that collective participation of different stakeholders serves as a prerequisite for ecotourism sustainable development. Local community participation is considered to be an important pillar of ecotourism development as local communities are capable of influencing success or failure of ecotourism development projects. Socio-economic and socio-cultural well-being of local communities are crucial ingredients for maintaining rapport amongst stakeholders and sustaining ecotourism development. Despite being promulgated as a central pillar of ecotourism development, literature reveals that local communities have not been actively participating in planning and decision-making processes regarding ecotourism development. Adoption of Western-centric oriented participation frameworks by numerous state authorities coupled with lacking necessary skills have been identified as the main factors that hinder active participation of local communities in ecotourism development initiatives. It has therefore, been suggested that ecotourism destinations need to adopt and implement participatory approaches that suit their specific contexts and promote bottom-up ecotourism development procedures. Based on its potential for influencing review and amendment of existing tourism-related policies, a local community participation improvement model has been developed. The model is aimed at facilitating inclusive and active participation of all stakeholders in ecotourism development processes.
... Several studies have identified the importance of herders' perceptions and observations as solution to mitigate these challenges [1, [7][8][9][10]. Herders' observation of pasture conditions, for example, provides insights into ecological processes and changes [11][12][13][14][15]. Khwarae [9] suggested to incorporate community perceptions and practices into rangeland policies. ...
Herders play essential roles in sustaining Mongolia’s economy and rangeland conditions. As about 90% of Mongolia’s livestock grazes on natural pasture, how herders manage it largely affects the future sustainability of the livestock industry. Since Mongolia transformed its grazing practices from communal management into loosely regulated household practices in 1990, overgrazing has become a growing concern. Considering this concern, this paper examines the extent to which traditional and non-traditional herders perceive pasture conditions and practice management. We conducted the questionnaire survey among 120 herders in Murun Soum of Khentii Province and asked about rangeland degradation and their coping strategies. To determine correlations between their perceptions/practices and sociodemographic characteristics, we conducted multiple regression analyses. We found that, overall, most herders identified rangeland conditions degrading and grass yield declining with less plant diversity and more soil damage by Brandt’s vole. Herders’ mobility and herd movement frequency have decreased since 1990, placing more strains on limited pasture areas. In coping with overgrazing, about 20% of the respondents had practiced traditional rangeland management, whereas many others had overlooked pasture conditions and increased goat production as the world’s demand for cashmere rose. In response to our question about herders’ future contribution of their traditional knowledge to sustainable rangeland management, traditional herders demonstrated their willingness to help local officials manage the pasture. This paper then explores how local administrations and herders may collaborate in the future.
... An interesting indicator we found is that herders use changes in the body size and body parameters of livestock and wild game as indicators of rangeland production and forage quality change (cf. Oba and Kotile 2001, Reed and Dougill 2002, Levine et al. 2019). ...
ABSTRACT. Recently, climate change has had a considerable impact on rangelands, available forage, and shifting boundaries of
ecological zones in Mongolia. Additionally, long-term studies in the forest-steppe zone show that increasing livestock pressure impacts
vegetation composition and cover. Evidence shows that the traditional ecological knowledge of Mongolian herders can serve as a
valuable body of information relevant to observations about these ongoing ecological processes. Among other things, a deeper
understanding of how herders perceive ecological changes would be useful for improving pasture management and promoting natural
regeneration processes. We conducted indoor and outdoor structured and semi-structured interviews, with additional landscape walks
and participatory fieldwork. In total we interviewed 33 people, all full-time herders. We found 32 indicators on how herders perceived
landscape and vegetation changes for the 14 habitat types studied. Herders had deep knowledge of their landscape, and they attributed
various changes to diverse drivers on their grasslands, wetlands, and forests. Among herders there was variation in the perceived
importance of droughts and increasing livestock numbers. The perceived changes and indicators could be grouped into three main
categories, namely long-term (decadal) trends, regenerative successions after disturbance, and recurrent fluctuations caused mainly by
weather. Some of the long-term trends reported by herders are well-known, e.g., worsening of rangeland production, others, like the
blackening of tussocks, or the impact of oilskin on yurt site regeneration, are rarely mentioned in the scientific literature, if at all.
South-facing mountain slopes and flat areas in valleys were reported as the locations where vegetation change takes place most rapidly.
To reverse adverse changes, herders wish to cooperate especially with each other to increase mobility, stop overgrazing, and help nature
to regenerate their worsening pastures. We conclude that herders have a reliable and widely shared understanding of landscape and
pasture changes that could help with this cooperation.
Key Words: forest-steppe; indicators; landscape changes; perception; regeneration; succession; traditional ecological knowledge; trends
... Direct field observations using soil erosion indicators such as eroded clods, flow surfaces, pre-rills and rills have been used to effectively monitor the effects of erosion from tillage and harvesting in Kenya [12]. Further examples include the participatory degradation appraisal carried out in Botswana [46]. This approach combines three approaches; the land user opinion, the farm-level field observations and assessment of productivity changes. ...
Assessments of land degradation vary in methodology and outcome. The objective of this study is to identify the state, extent and patterns of land degradation in Eastern Africa (Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi and Tanzania). More recently (2000s), satellite-based imagery and remote sensing have been utilized to identify the magnitude and processes of land degradation at global, regional and national levels. This involves the use of Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) derived from Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer data and the use of high-quality satellite data from Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer. This study is the first in Eastern Africa to complement remote sensing with ground-level assessments in evaluating the extent of land degradation at national and regional scales. The results based on NDVI measures show that land degradation occurred in about 51%, 41%, 23% and 22% of the terrestrial areas in Tanzania, Malawi, Ethiopia and Kenya, respectively, between the 1982 and 2016 periods. Some of the key hot spot areas include west and southern regions of Ethiopia, western part of Kenya, southern parts of Tanzania and eastern parts of Malawi. To evaluate the accuracy of the NDVI observations, ground-truthing was carried out in Tanzania and Ethiopia through focus group discussions (FGDs). The FGDs indicate an agreement with remotely sensed information on land degradation in seven sites out of eight in Tanzania and five sites out of six in Ethiopia. Given the significant magnitude of land degradation, appropriate action is needed to address it.
... The attendants were important decision-makers in the village who are key persons in building trust with other residents. The importance of local participation has been acknowledged in several sustainability-indicator development studies [19,20,66,[82][83][84][85]. Villager involvement in the conceptualization of the indicators is crucial, to include their personal views, individual values, concerns, and mutually prioritized goals [19,86]. ...
The aim of this article was to create key indicators for measuring the implementation potential of the green economy transition at a local level in a northernmost, natural biomass-rich environment. The case area to test the set of indicators was the village of Saija in Lapland. The work presented in this article is based on a communicative cooperative research and development project. The selection process for the appropriate indicators is based on a conceptual framework for developing local sustainability indicators and the thematic framework follows the key dimensions of the green economy (ecosystem resilience, resource efficiency and social equity). When selecting the local-level indicators, a strong emphasis was placed on the special characteristics of the local area and the availability and validity of the data. Layman villagers and data policy relevance (in this case green economy) were also taken into consideration. The key indicators developed as a result included: the increment of growing forest stock in relation to the drain on growing forest stock, the village population, the bioenergy consumption share, the utilization share of side streams, the bioenergy production potential, capital outflow, demographic dependency ratio, the ratio between employed and working age residents and the number of forest owners in relation to area households. The key indicators are targeted for use in supporting local decision-making and monitoring and assessing development activities and their effectiveness in the process of the green economy transition. The indicators measure the most critical factors for green economy transition in a local area and identify the most optimal development opportunities when moving towards green growth. In the measurement of the transition potential of the green economy, it was found that the case area’s imported fossil energy consumption could be substituted with self-sufficient bioenergy production utilizing the area’s own raw materials. There is extensive potential for the utilization of manure (an agricultural side stream) and forest resources (forestry side streams) at the local level, especially since forests account for 98% of Lapland’s land area. In support of the change from fossil-based energy consumption towards bioenergy production, plans for a biogas plant were examined for self-sufficient bioenergy production and this appeared to be the initial key process in the path of the green economy transformation in the case village of Saija.
... Comparison and ranking of the rangeland degradation indices from pastoral and agro-pastoral points view are crucial. Pastoralists and herders often have different perceptions on the rangelands degradation problems compared to the scholars and the experts (Reed and Dougill, 2002). Variation in perception between experts and rangeland users leads to restrictions on the successful implementation of range management plans. ...
This study was carried out in Bale Eco-Region (BER) which is located in Southeastern Ethiopia with the objective of addressing the cause and effect of ecological damage, particularly rangeland degradation. Both purposive and stratified random sampling approaches were used to select House Holds (HH). Individual interview, key informants and Focus Group Discussion (FGD) were the main sources of data for this study. The livelihood activity in BER lowland area was pastoralism before 1965 and it was based on highly productive, vast and free Rangeland with unlimited movement of the pastoralists. In the low land of BER, migration has a destination, pattern and objective to meet. These destinations are sources of mineral, a breeding site, feed and water. Migration is used as strong seasonal disease, water and feed shortage escaping mechanism. However, this is currently changed to Agro-pastoral or some of them to crop production do different disturbances. The change was mainly aggravated by expansion of agricultural investment, high population growth, illegal settlement and cultivation and banning of migration to Forest. Utilization of grazing land is communal and rangeland around homestead and watering points are overgrazed and resulted in bare land and encroached by unpalatable and thorny species. The vegetation cleaning and cultivation of drought prone area under rain-fed regimes have accelerated bare land expansion and unpalatable vegetation encroachment. The overall rangeland condition has deteriorated and the livelihoods were jeopardized. The people get in trouble, then moving from degraded area to protected and moist source forest land in Bale Mountain National Park and now causing serious deforestation.
... At the same time, they signalled the need to make some indicators more relevant or specific in relation to the needs of SMCs in Agder and add further optional indicators to the existing lists in order to ensure a better adaptation to local needs and specificities. This conclusion falls in line with the ones of Turcu [17] and Reed and Dougill [18] drawn on the subject of sustainability indicators and their use at local level. Also, the participants' belief was that a country's development status needs to be considered when devising the core indicators, as they found some indicators redundant for Norway. ...
... A reconnaissance survey was conducted to assess, identify and select an appropriate experimental site using subjective (Van Zyl 1986) and objective (Hardy et al 1999) methods with participation of local elders and range managers. Selection criterion included: availability of watering point, grassland representation, presence of a grazing gradient, similarity in slope and soil types and pastoral livestock production systems as described by Manneteje and Jones (2000) and Reed and Dougill (2002). ...
All manuscripts should be presented with 2.5 cm margins and pages numbered on the bottom right hand side. All text, including quotations, references, figure legends, tables and captions, should be 1.5-spaced, with a double carriage return between paragraphs. Do not format paragraphs with space before or space after. Wherever possible the use of indents and tabs should be avoided.
... For example, local knowledge of land degradation indicators may be compared against evidence from research literature (c.f. Reed and Dougill, 2002). However, such analyses are problematic due to their implication that scientific knowledge is superior and can be used to "validate" local knowledge. ...
White Paper of the DSD [Dryland Science for Development Consortium] Working Group 3. Partenaires : Association of DesertNet International ; United Nations University – Institute for Water, Environment and Health ; Dryland Science for Development Consortium.
... The report of Mapiye et al. (2009) from the Eastern Cape province included soil condition (erosion), herbaceous basal and litter cover as well as the abundance of key forage species as indicators of rangeland condition. In Botswana, communal herders relate rangeland condition to livestock body condition, grass cover and the abundance of key palatable forbs and grass species (Reed & Dougill 2002). ...
This study examined local people's perceptions of rangeland resources in three communal grasslands of South Africa and compared them with the views of ecologists. A total of 30 households that own livestock and two elder groups (eight elders per group) were selected in each communal area. Local respondents perceived that vegetation change mainly refers to change in species richness, diversity and abundance in vegetation that is not necessarily related to loss of productivity, feed shortage or rangeland degradation (deterioration). However, most ecologists used vegetation change and rangeland degradation synonymously to explain environmental changes. Most respondents regarded abiotic and biotic factors as the primary drivers of vegetation change and degradation, respectively. Respondents also mentioned a third group of factors, termed as 'institutional', which have been overlooked by most ecologists. One group of factors may be more important than the other but we argue that it is difficult to uncouple them to explain the determinants of vegetation change and degradation within the context of the 'commons'. The impact of human settlement expansion on grazing lands was less recognised by the respondents but we believe this poses a threat to rangelands by reducing and fragmenting grazing resources. About 50% of the elders rated the rangeland as being in poor, very poor, good or fair condition. We recommend incorporation of broader studies of farmers' perceptions in conjunction with scientific analyses in order to establish a sound communal-based rangeland development and restoration programme.
... Participatory approaches to select assessment C&Is have been implemented to some extent in other non-LCA related assessment fields [17][18][19][20][21], but rather rarely in S-LCA, where "the choice of the impacts is generally determined in a normative fashion using standards established in international conventions [ . . . ] or national laws" [8]. ...
In social life cycle assessment (S-LCA), the use of a participatory approach to define and select assessment criteria and indicators (C&Is) is recommended given the specificity of social issues, but it has been, for now, rarely implemented and presents methodological challenges. Within a participatory action research project gathering academic researchers and field actors, we tested the applicability of configuring a C&Is list for S-LCA, together with chain actors of three alternative food distribution systems active in Belgium. The purpose of this article is to present the results of this work and to examine the methodological limits, requirements, and contributions of such an approach. The participatory approach is an appropriate method to build a list of C&Is standing out from other studies, with the identification of ambitious and innovative C&Is relating to value-chain actors (VCAs) stakeholder category, on chain governance and transaction modalities. In our case, it required an adaptation work of C&Is to the S-LCA requirements and the use of a specific theoretical approach to articulate C&Is within a coherent framework. Finally, this kind of work seems useful to give ground to the S-LCA Guidelines’ list of subcategories, which was built through a rather top-down expert-based approach.
... Experience shows that, policies, programs and strategies aimed at halting degradation, were hardly evaluated fro m the perspective of the local communities ( Schechambo et al., 1999). Although a number of frameworks have been used to identify and elaborate indicators for sustainable rangeland management, those indicators have too frequently been identified, evaluated, and selected by researchers ( Reed and Dougill, 2002). Sustainable rangeland management systems should result from a combination of community based indigenous knowledge, communities' perceptions combined with past practical experience and scientific knowledge to rehabilitate degraded rangelands and conserve biodiversity. ...
... Scientific techniques such as satellite remote sensing, ecological assessment, the measurement of soil properties, economic analyses, expert opinions and interviews [12] have all been used to identify, measure and monitor land degradation. However, science has its limitations and cannot always provide an accurate diagnosis or solutions [13]. ...
The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of land degradation on agricultural land use, planning and management in Kalama Division, Machakos County; and specifically determined farmers’ considerations of land suitability for selected types of agricultural land uses in varying cropping zones, investigated farmers’ local environmental knowledge of land degradation indicators and finally documented farmers’ land management strategies and practices for soil and water conservation. Data was collected using a questionnaire, along a road transect cutting across upper, middle and lower zones (parts) of a slope. A total of 40 households along the transect on the three zones were interviewed. Results obtained revealed that crop farming, livestock, poultry, farm forestry and bee keeping were the major agricultural land use activities carried out in the study area. Overall, steep slope was the most important factor considered for farm forestry (17%) (5.29 STDEV). Bee farming was the least land use practice accounting for only 1% of total land use. Most land degradation (15%) was reported in the middle zone while lowest land degradation (7%) was reported in the upper zone. The study found out that most households were aware of land degradation indicators in their local environment and described them using their indigenous environmental knowledge. The smallholder farmers prevented further land degradation by use of their local or traditional ways such as application of organic manure, planting of trees, crop rotation, use of gabions and stone lines. Different zones had different land use and management practices due to differences in terrain and other physical and biophysical characteristics. Overall, the major land management practices included tree planting (23%) (4.04 STDEV) and water conservation and gabion making (10%) (2.52 STDEV). This study clearly established an existence of smallholder farmers’ indigenous knowledge, perceptions, and beliefs of the local environmental factors of land condition which are necessary for the farmer’s decision-making on land use planning and management. On the basis of these findings, the study argues for place-based analysis and understanding of the landscape structure and local micro-environments in enhancing understanding of local-level decision-making on land use planning and management by smallholder farmers in maintaining livelihood security. Even though the study is limited to the local scope, it can provide a basis for designing policies aimed at rural livelihood security improvement and inform and facilitate targeting of outside interventions such as land use planning and management programs which can be built on existing indigenous knowledge.
... Some examples of inclusion of stakeholders in the preliminary phases to select and develop indicators include: (1) identification and selection of SI for strategic monitoring of regional spatial plans in Algarve (Portugal) (Mascarenhas, Nunes, and Ramos 2015); (2) Kalahari rangeland condition and degradation in Botswana (Reed and Dougill 2002); (3) well-being in the coastal British Columbia (Canada), Kalahari rangeland early degradation in Botswana and Guernsey's sustainable development (UK) monitoring ); (4) assessment, management, and reporting in Marine Protected Areas (Marques et al. 2013); and (5) Local Agenda 21 in Iserlohn (Germany) (Valentin and Spangenberg 2000). Similar processes of indicators' selection can be guided by criteria defined by Niemeijer and Groot (2008); Cloquell-Ballester et al. (2006); Donnelly et al. (2007); Reed et al. (2006), among others. ...
Sustainability indicators have been extensively used to measure and communicate the state and progress of sustainability issues by covering robust and meaningful information for a variety of stakeholders. Sustainability indicators allow informal and, many times, sporadic actions of sustainability data collection and evaluation that can be conducted by stakeholders, covering different phases of the sustainability assessments. Stakeholder involvement in sustainability-related initiatives can increase the quality of environmental and sustainability decisions, since the information in these initiatives is then taken into consideration in more comprehensive ways. There have been new approaches to enhance the interaction and empowerment of stakeholders in environmental and sustainability indicator initiatives. Stakeholders can have an active role as part of the team that selects, develops, and evaluates sustainability indicators, as well as participating actively in data collection in the monitoring phase. This chapter aims to explore and describe voluntary and collaborative stakeholder initiatives that use sustainability indicators as evaluation and communication tools. The chapter analyses worldwide initiatives, including technology-based examples. The findings show that in a majority of cases, the examples focus on empowering stakeholder in the selection of sustainability indicators and monitoring data collection of sustainability-related initiatives. These examples appear to have been governmental entities and non-governmental organisations. The integration of stakeholders, as active actors, could: enhance social ties; improve the communication grid, including the vision on what was being implemented; and increase co-responsibility of the shared resources. Stakeholders, thus, can, and should, become part of the environmental and sustainability indicator initiatives, especially when they feel that their opinions are part of decision-making processes that have impacts in their daily lives or are important for their community. An increase of interaction between experts and non-experts of sustainability indicators could enhance transparency of sustainability-related initiatives and help the transition to more sustainable societies.
Keywords: sustainability assessment; indicators; voluntary process; collaborative process; interactive participation; stakeholder empowerment
... Similar approaches of varying complexity exist globally to allow landholders to determine the stability, improvement or deterioration of land condition over time (e.g. Bosch and Booysen 1992;Friedel et al. 2000;Pyke et al. 2002;Reed and Dougill 2002;Gemedo-Dalle et al. 2006). However, most methodologies of this type are not intended to assess the suitability of land for native biodiversity, although managers often assume that improved land condition has a biodiversity benefit (Bosch and Booysen 1992;Pyke et al. 2002;Karfs et al. 2009). ...
Although commercial grazing can degrade natural habitats, sustainably grazed land may be effective for wildlife conservation. Thus, land condition frameworks that assess the landscape quality of grazed land may also be useful for assessment of habitat quality for wildlife. However, the relationship between the condition of grazed land and native biodiversity is mostly unknown, and this knowledge gap must be addressed to adequately balance commercial production and conservation. In the present case study we determined the relevance of a widely used grazing land condition scale to understanding native vertebrate species richness and abundance (birds, reptiles, amphibians, mammals and all these vertebrate classes grouped) in grazed rangelands in northern Australia (~24–13°S; annual rainfall ranging from >1200 to <400 mm), sampled over approximately 10 years from 17 unique sites, containing 381 1-ha study plots. We defined the land condition scale relative to climate and comprehensive assessment of habitat attributes, and then described the relationships between land condition, habitat and biodiversity. The land condition scale partially explained richness and abundance patterns only for mammals (especially rodents), which tended to be higher in better-condition pasture. For other vertebrate groups, the scale was a very poor descriptor of richness and abundance. The land condition scale was not useful to assess wildlife diversity primarily because ‘woody thickening’ (increases in woody vegetation on grazed land, including shrubs and trees) lowers the ‘grazing value’ of land while also generally promoting vertebrate diversity. In line with this, biodiversity decreased with increasing bare ground and erosion, together with, and in the absence of, vegetation cover (i.e. desertification), consistent with grazing land degradation. The present study supports observations that land clearing and reductions in woody vegetation on grazed rangelands are particularly detrimental to native vertebrates.
... BJO was funded by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Fellowship of the European Union (GA 629677) "S4S, Science for Society Solutions". Aronson et al., 1993;Banville et al., 1998;Bautista et al., 2010;Janssen, 2001;Kao, 2010;Munda, 2004;Olmstead, 1919;Reed and Dougill, 2002;Rey Benayas et al., 2009;Siegel and Castellan, 1988;Slovic, 1995. ...
We evaluated the potential of an outranking Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis approach for assisting in the participatory assessment of dryland management actions implemented in the San Simon watershed, in southeastern Arizona, USA. We compared an outranking-facilitated assessment of actions with a simple and direct (baseline) ranking of the same actions by the participating stakeholders in terms of: 1) internal homogeneity of each assessment approach, (2) similarity of individual assessments between methods, and (3) effects of the use of implicit/explicit assessment criteria. The actions assessed combined various management approaches, including livestock management (rotation, resting), vegetation management (grass seeding, brush control), and hydraulic structures (dams, dykes). The outranking-facilitated assessment discriminated better between actions and reduced the variability of results between individual stakeholders as compared with the direct ranking of actions. In general, the two assessments significantly differed in the relative preference of the five management actions assessed, yet both assessments identified rotational grazing combined with vegetation management (grass seeding and brush control) as the most preferred management action in the study area. The comparative analysis revealed inconsistencies between the use of implicit and explicit assessment criteria. Our findings highlight the opportunities offered by outranking approaches to help capture, structure, and make explicit stakeholder perspectives in the framework of a participatory environmental assessment process, which may facilitate the understanding of the multiple preferences involved. The outranking integration process, which resembles a voting procedure, proved simple and transparent, with potential for contributing to stakeholder engagement and trust in participatory assessment.
... During the analysis, the wording of each draft indicator was negotiated so that participating organisations found them to be comprehensible, measurable, relevant and locally valid, while attempting to achieve a level of abstraction that would make them generalisable to other contexts. This was in accordance with the 'bottom-up and top-down' approach presented as an example of good practice in indicator development by Reed, Fraser and colleagues [53][54][55][56][57]. The draft indicators from the different organisations were then clustered intersubjectively to produce a set of 177. ...
A conceptual framework was constructed for United Nations’ complex Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Target 4.7 focusing on education for sustainable development (ESD), and used to analyse the usefulness and character of indicators produced from a values-based approach called ESDinds, compared to a UN process. The analysis shows that the latter generated very few indicators concerning the wider aspects of knowledge such as ‘critical thinking’ or ‘learning to learn’. The values-based approach, created for a different purpose, produced complementary if not better coverage of Target 4.7, including finely-developed concepts for competencies and less tangible aspects. It is suggested that the UN process would benefit from ESDinds design elements such as intersubjective and slightly disruptive elements, purposeful contextualisation at group level, and a holistic and inductive consideration of values. The use of a reference ‘fuzzy framework’ of slightly generalised proto-indicators suited for deep contextualisation locally is recommended, rather than any rigid global-level indicator with unclear local value. It is recommended that ESD practitioners immediately develop localised interpretations of valid measures for whatever final Target 4.7 indicator is selected by the UN, as this localisation process will itself cause important learning towards local ESD achievements.
... So-called 'experts' are more and more involved in participatory processes, "experts" being either a) local stakeholders, i.e. people who have proven and long-standing scientific and operational experience («location-specific») of the area under study; b) external stakeholders, i.e. people who have a universal/scientific knowledge of the phenomena under study (McCall, 2003;Fraser & Lepofsky, 2004). These two categories of experts are generally brought in at the same time (Reed & Dougill, 2002;Reed et al., 2007) as the combination of local and scientific knowledge may contribute to a more complete understanding of complex systems and processes (Johnson et al., 2004), but also in order to open up learning pathways within and between the two evaluators' groups: a group made up of experts in nature sciences and a second group made up of nature enthusiasts but with no direct experience of the sites under evaluation. ...
The idea that landscape fulfils many different functions and provides multiple benefits for human society is gaining strength. This new vision of landscape changes both, the interests and the needs of the persons involved and the use and management of the landscape itself. The objective of this paper is to study landscape conservation in a particular mountainous area of Italy, which requires an institutional, non-generic approach. Using the contingent valuation method, we investigated whether there is a relationship between experts’ and casual observers’ evaluations of ten different scenarios in the Leno Valleys. Results show that direct knowledge of the site characteristics increases the awareness of the importance of the site, significantly impacting on conservation choices and strategies.
... More recently, there has been greater attention given to the potential and need for local knowledge-including, but not limited to traditional ecological knowledge-to be incorporated into rangeland monitoring and management programs. [7][8][9][10] To ensure that our monitoring methods were in line with-and could be integrated with-local knowledge, we researched traditional indicators of ecosystem function and degradation used by various pastoralist groups in Kenya and Ethiopia, using published reports [11][12] and informal interviews. Local indicators of negative change in rangeland function almost invariably fell into three categories: 1) increases in the amount of erosion being observed; 2) changes in plant species composition (including changes from dominance by grasses to dominance by small trees and shrubs, changes from dominance by perennial to annual grasses, and increases in native and non-native invasive succulents and shrubs); and 3) decreases in livestock productivity (including animal health and meat and milk yield). ...
... The heated debates of the 90s and 00s, about whether indicators are best designed with 'local' or 'scientific' relevance (Pinfield, 1996, Brugmann, 1997, Gasteyer and Butler, 2000, Holman, 2009, have cooled, as convergence of of 'expert-led' and 'citizen-led' approaches produced a more generalized preference for integrated indicator sets that embody different sources of knowledge Reed and Dougill, 2002;Turcu, 2013), bringing 'multiple perspectives' to bear on indicator development by 'hybridizing' qualitative and quantitative measures (Bell and Morse, 2001). Furthermore, researchers have found that by integrating 'hard' and 'soft' approaches, indicator development process can bring about more and different benefits that extend beyond 'diagnosis' and 'policy inputs' to community action and learning (Reed et al., 2005) and improved collaboration (Reed et al., 2008). ...
... These expert-driven assessments often sideline social concerns (particularly of underrepresented or disadvantaged stakeholders) and focus exclusively on economic and/or environmental dimensions (Lindner et al. 2010;Bosch et al. 2015). This expert-led, top-down approach has been criticized for failing to adequately address grassroot concerns and sustainability goals of local communities (Reed & Dougill 2002;Fraser et al. 2006). International and national-level certification schemes and assessment tools have been developed for bioenergy production, often by experts through top-down mechanisms with little input from nonexperts (Schouten et al. 2012). ...
As bioenergy production expands and new bioenergy-based technologies emerge, there is a growing concern regarding the sustainability of their ecological and socioeconomic impacts. Comprehensive sustainability assessments are needed to address this concern and to assure that the development of the bioenergy industry meets sustainability goals. Most sustainability assessments for bioenergy are expert-driven, broad, and largely motivated by an interest in optimizing international trade in bioenergy. As a result, social and cultural sustainability targets are vague or underdeveloped. In this study, we developed a sustainability assessment for a regional bioenergy production industry in Upper Michigan, using stakeholder participation. Semi-structured interviews and focus group meetings were used to elicit participants’ concerns and opinion. These concerns were translated into sustainability Criteria and Indicators (C&Is), many of which could be supported with available science. Some of the C&Is identified by participants were unique to the region. Sustainability C&Is were broadly categorized into economic (C = 5; I = 22), environmental (C = 6; I = 12), social (C = 3; I = 9), policy and regulations (C = 3; I = 13), and institutional capacity (C = 4; I = 13). While participants could identify indicators for most of the criteria (many of which are also supported by existing literature), further research and validation will be necessary to identify measurable, practical, and bias-free indicators for all criteria.
Desertification and land degradation present formidable challenges to global sustainable development. This study employs advanced remote sensing (RS) methodologies to ascertain the extent of these phenomena within a specific locale. Integration of satellite imagery, geographic information systems, and machine learning facilitates a nuanced evaluation of key indicators—namely, plant cover, soil moisture, and land surface temperature. Focused on a defined geographical area, the research illuminates the multifaceted impacts of population expansion, climate variability, and unsustainable land management practices. The outcomes contribute a comprehensive understanding of the causative factors driving land degradation, thereby informing the formulation of judicious and sustainable land management strategies. The study underscores the efficacy of RS technologies in addressing pressing environmental concerns related to global land deterioration and desertification, providing actionable insights for policymakers, land managers, and conservationists. Furthermore, it lays the groundwork for subsequent scholarly investigations in this domain.
Traditional ecological knowledge enables pastoralists to cope with social-ecological changes, thereby increasing the sustainability of their practices and fostering social-ecological resilience. Yet, there is a significant knowledge gap concerning the extent to which pastoral traditional ecological knowledge has changed over time at the global level. We aim to fill this gap through a systematic literature review of 288 scientific studies on pastoral traditional ecological knowledge. We reviewed 152 papers in detail (selected randomly from the 288) for their content, and focused specifically on 61 papers that explicitly mentioned one of the four types of knowledge transition (i.e., retention, erosion, adaptation, or hybridization). Studies on pastoral traditional knowledge represent less than 3% of all the scholarly literature on traditional ecological knowledge. Geographical distribution of the 288 case studies was largely biased. Knowledge domains of pastoral knowledge such as herd and livestock management, forage and medicinal plants, and landscape and wildlife were relatively equally covered; however, climate-related knowledge was less often studied. Of the 63 papers that explicitly mentioned transition of pastoral traditional ecological knowledge, 52 reported erosion, and only 11 studies documented explicitly knowledge retention, adaptation, or hybridization of traditional knowledge. Thus, adaptation and hybridization was understudied, although some case studies showed that adaptation and hybridization of knowledge can efficiently help pastoralists navigate among social-ecological changes. Based on the review, we found 13 drivers which were mentioned as the main reasons for knowledge transition among which social-cultural changes, formal schooling, abandonment of pastoral activities, and transition to a market economy were most often reported. We conclude that future research should focus more on the diverse dynamics of pastoral traditional knowledge, be more careful in distinguishing the four knowledge transition types, and analyze how changes in knowledge impact change in pastoral practices and lifestyles. Understanding these phenomena could help pastoralists' adaptations and support their stewardship of their rangeland ecosystems and biocultural diversity.
In cases of donor-funded community-based tourism (CBT) initiatives, sustainability indicators are often developed and used by donors or NGOs for progress reporting purposes, and the voice of the local community is often ignored. In cases where bottom-up participatory approaches have been employed, local communities may be involved in the process of indicator development as participants but are usually not given the opportunity to operate the indicator system independently. This study describes a methodological procedure for developing and implementing a local community-operated grassroots level CBT sustainability indicator system in Boga Lake, Bangladesh. The sixteen-step methodological process to formulate CBT sustainability indicators involved in-depth interviews, workshops, working group meetings, and an empirical examination of the indicator system in practice. The local community were able to form a community research team, develop survey questionnaires and observation checklists, collect and analyse data, and write a report. The community believed that their research-based sustainability reports could serve as strong evidence to negotiate with local authorities and other stakeholders, while also helping them learn and adapt their tourism-related initiatives. Further, there is evidence the community considered it as a matter of pride to operate their own indicator system. [Free e-prints: https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/D2FDR3TQKIFWB7RRCNI7/full?target=10.1080/09669582.2021.1928147 ]
Highlights:
• Effective participation needs to be systematic and guided by rules to ensure effective selection of indicators
• The use of questionnaires is a workable method to integrate the opinions of a community with experts in indicator development of NSATs
• Expert-initiated approach is a viable method for indicator selection of NSATs for African cities
The concept of land degradation neutrality (LDN) is a new approach receiving considerable interest because of its potential to address land degradation. Implementing LDN presents a number of challenges primarily concerned with the choice of scales of operation at which to apply it and then, monitoring and assessing degradation status and trends at these scales. In the absence of studies that apply the concept to local scales and engage local stakeholders, our study was undertaken in the Gilgel-Abay watershed of northwest Ethiopia using sites that equate to a local landscape scale (10–1000 km²) at which decisions about land use are made. Combining participatory mapping, farmer interviews and a field survey of soil erosion prevalence, our objectives were to: (i) understand local perceptions of land degradation and restoration activities; (ii) assess their implications for LDN, and (iii) explore the utility of engaging local land users in the assessment of land degradation and restoration activities. Our findings demonstrate that engaging land users can provide a comprehensive overview of land degradation and restoration activities at local scales; that land users may not share the same priorities, in terms of where, when and how to address degradation, as one another, or with other actors involved in restoration initiatives, which implies a need for negotiation; and that the impacts of restoration activities are likely to be socially differentiated. This makes it important to understand how livelihoods interact with different restoration interventions and to take measures to ensure that striving for LDN does not disadvantage the most vulnerable people. Based on these findings, we propose three guiding strategies for implementing LDN at local scales: negotiate priorities and incentivize action; match options to context; and, co-produce knowledge and indicators.
This chapter reviews the history and typologies of stakeholder participation. Stakeholder participation is generally defined as the process where individuals and groups take an active role in decisions that affect them. In this case these decision are based on the impact of climate change on their cities. Hence, a brief history of bottom-up approach is discussed as well as the typologies based on different degrees of participation. Brief examples of how these typologies affect projects directly or indirectly linked to climate change decisions are also discussed. The reviews of the approaches are accompanied by diverse examples related to the SDGs, climate change and sustainable urban development.
This chapter establishes the links of sustainable development goals (SDGs) to sustainable urban development. It briefly addresses the 17 SDGs and key indicators used to measure the success of each SDG. Well established best practices are used to assess the impact of people in participatory practices in order to achieve SDGs, sustainable urban development and invariably mitigate climate change. This is done by analyzing 10 case studies. By doing so, the results of the chapter considers the relevance and impact of bottom-up processes, type of participation, appropriate level of engagement, best practice procedures, proffer solutions and tailor methods according to various perspectives. The case studies are continental and provide an even spread of countries, providing much needed context and tangible global outlook.
Soil degradation issue is one of the most important factors that threaten the crop production, thereby reflecting on food security. When discussing this issue, it must take into account the factors of surrounding, such as geographical location and climate in addition to social and economic conditions. This chapter illustrates the factors causing land degradation in Egypt as an example of semi-arid condition. It was noted that, under Egyptian conditions, there are many factors that differ from one place to another. Salinization, alkalinization and waterlogging are the most common factors in North Nile Delta. In addition, the rest of the Egyptian territories suffer from urban encroachment due to the high population density, where it was noted that the area located between the main branches of Nile Delta Rosetta and Damietta has lost 30510 acres during 1984–2014 where it is converted to urban areas. Finally, this chapter reviews the different methods used to assess land degradation using advanced techniques.
‘Sustainability’ may be a generalizable concept; its definition however, heavily depends upon context. Understanding the context (sociocultural, environmental, socioeconomic, political etc.) is crucial for defining and assessing the sustainability of any given socio-ecological system. This point underlies our research design and objectives. The primary objectives of this research were to understand the sustainability context in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, and to use it to develop a sustainability assessment framework for a potential forest-based bioenergy industry in the region. We first reviewed top-down and bottom-up sustainability assessment frameworks. Then we used the best-suited approach i.e. bottom-up participatory approach, to pursue our objectives. First, we critiqued a top-down sustainable development framework: the Millennium Project framework. We evaluated the generic environmental indicators employed by the Millennium Project to assess progress of developing countries toward environmental sustainability, based on the indicators’ relevance, comprehensiveness, practicality and sensitivity in a developing country’s context. We used Nepal as a case study for this analysis. Our results suggested that, while international (top-down) development and assessment frameworks play an important role in inserting broad sustainability concerns (e.g., biodiversity, water and sanitation, and environmental management) into country-level development agendas, indicators to monitor progress towards such goals are more effective if based on the on-the-ground realities (i.e., are relevant and practical). Next, we reviewed 13 case studies where a bottom-up approach was used to develop sustainability criteria and indicators (C&I) for natural resource management. This review suggested that while bottom-up approaches may be important for highlighting grassroots concerns, reliance on local belief systems alone might not be sufficient to produce C&I which conform to sustainable thinking. Collaborative learning among stakeholders and experts is the best approach to promote the holistic understanding of a socio-ecological system, which in turn can enhance sustainable decision-making. We used these reviews to design case study research: to generate a regional sustainability assessment framework for forest-based bioenergy production in the Upper Peninsula (UP) of Michigan. We used participatory research techniques including focus groups, semi-structured interviews, a workshop and multi-criteria decision analysis to understand stakeholders’ concerns, values and preferences with regard to wood-based bioenergy production in the UP. These were translated into sustainability criteria and indicators for assessing sustainability of forest-based bioenergy industry in the UP. The final set of C&I were 5 criteria and 31 indicators (in parentheses): Economic (6), Environmental (7), Social (8), Policy and regulations (4) and Institutional capacity (6). This set reflected the general balance across sustainability dimensions valued by the stakeholders.
As the third contribution in the ‘Land’ section, this paper explores the interactions between institutional credibility and epistemic diversity within grassland management in China’s Inner Mongolia and Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. It proceeds in two steps. First, a literature review ascertains that privatization of grassland use rights in Inner Mongolia is contested by a local predisposition for pastoral mobility. Advances in rangeland ecology validate the need for mobility, thus highlighting how pastoralists and policymakers have been evaluating the grasslands not only from unequal positions of power but also on epistemologically contradictory terms. Secondly, through a case study of two villages in Ningxia, it is demonstrated that – under equal circumstances of a Grazing Ban – the rural community that uses grassland primarily as a resource to be converted to agricultural production (thus posing a heavier use on grassland) perceives ecological improvement. Contradictorily, the community that is grassland-dependent for herding or opportunistic dryland farming, and is hampered in that use by land degradation prevention policies, does not perceive improvement. The diverging perceptions of degradation among semi-pastoralist communities examined in this study suggest a more participatory approach towards institution-making can bring closer the knowledge and environmental perceptions of various actors, thus opening up opportunities for more credible institutional arrangements.
This paper reports on a process for selecting a suite of indicators that, in combination, can be useful in assessing the ecological conditions of rangelands. Conceptual models that depict the structural and functional properties of ecological processes were used to show the linkages between ecological components and their importance in assessing the status and trends of ecological resources on a regional scale. Selection criteria were developed so that relationships could be assessed at different spatial scales using ground and aerial measurements. Parameters including responsiveness and sensitivity to change, quality assurance and control, temporal and spatial variability, cost-effectiveness and statistical design played an important role in determining how indicators were selected. A total of ten indicator categories were selected by a committee of scientists for evaluation in the program. A subset that included soil properties, vegetation composition and abundance, and spectral properties was selected for evaluation in a pilot test conducted in 1992 in the Colorado Plateau region of the southwestern United States. This work is part of a major effort being undertaken by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and its collaborators to assess the condition of rangelands (primarily comprised of arid, semi-arid and dry subhumid ecosystems) along with seven other ecosystem groups (forests, agricultural lands, wetlands, surface waters, landscapes, estuaries and Great Lakes) as part of a national Environmental Monitoring and Assessment Program (EMAP). The indicator selection process reported upon was developed to support EMAP's goal of providing long-term, policy-relevant research focusing on evaluating the ecological condition (or health) of regional and national resources.
It has been suggested that climatic variation has the effect on the dynamics of arid and semi-arid grazing systems of reducing animal numbers below the level at which they have much impact on vegetation or soils, and that spatial heterogeneity in resource availability serves to buffer herbivores against climatic variation. Modelling was used to test these hypotheses and to examine the interacting effects of temporal and spatial variability in plant production on animal population dynamics and defoliation intensity. The model distinguishes areas of the range that are accessible during wet and dry seasons, and examines the effect of seasonal restrictions in foraging area. It was established that the animal population is in long-term equi- librium with dry-season resources, on which it depends for survival; that dry season resource areas and outlying areas thus operate in a source-sink manner; and that the ratio of these areas determines the strength of consumer-resource coupling outside the dry-season range. A high ratio of dry season to wet season resources may support a sufficiently large animal population to impose non-trivial defoliation impacts on the outlying range. Increasing degrees of variability in primary production on areas used by animals for surviving the dry season increased the annual variation in animal abundance and reduced the mean. By comparison with a stable environment, for which the model predicts virtually stable animal numbers and constant, low defolia- tion intensity, variation in annual rainfall causes wide fluctuations in animal numbers and defoliation intensity. Under climatic variation, animal numbers can build up enough to impose much higher defoliation intensities than under a constant regime. Periodic intense defoliation is a consequence of climatic variability which is likely to make these environments more, not less, prone to ecological change.
The dynamics of arid and semiarid grazing systems are prone to the effects of highly variable rainfall, with droughts causing frequent episodic mortality in herbivore populations. This has led to the suggestion that they are nonequilibrium systems, in which animal impacts on plants are strongly attenuated or absent. We examine the utility and appropriateness of nonequilibrium concepts for understanding ecosystem processes in African rangeland, attempt to distinguish disequilibrium from nonequilibrium, and argue that such concepts do not justify the view that herbivory has little impact in climatically variable systems. We present evidence for an alternative view of African rangeland function. We argue that, despite the apparent lack of equilibrium, animal numbers are regulated in a density-dependent manner by the limited forage available in key resource areas, which are utilized in the dry season. This model asserts that strong equilibrial forces exist over a limited part of the system, with the animal population being virtually uncoupled from resources elsewhere in the system. Spatially and temporally, the whole system is heterogeneous in the strength of the forces tending to equilibrium, these diminishing with distance from watering and key resource areas and during the wet season. We argue that wet-season range is more heavily utilized by animal populations sustained by key resource areas than
would apply in the absence of key resources, and that uncoupling of the animal population from vegetation carries an increased risk of degradation. Droughts may impose intense and localized defoliation on vegetation, and this may result in altered species composition,
reduced rain-use efficiency, soil erosion, and loss of productive potential. Rather than ignoring degradation, policy-makers and ecologists should seek to identify the characteristics of grazing systems that predispose some systems toward degradation, while others appear to be resistant. Development policies should focus on the spatial heterogeneity in susceptibility to grazing impacts and on preserving the productive capacity of key resource areas.
This article examines the cross‐cutting debates of empowerment, vulnerability, sustainability and livelihoods within the local and global contexts relevant to the people of Okonyoka, a settlement of less than 150 people situated in the heart of Eastern Namibia's southern communal lands. Here, people are adapting their livelihoods flexibly in response to both environmental natural resource variability and to changes in social institutions and land use policies. Drought‐coping strategies, privatisation of the range through fencing and changes to social networks, all have both positive and negative impacts on people's everyday lives. Okonyoka is the first settlement to erect a community fence in Eastern Namibia's southern communal area, but surrounding settlements are impressed with the positive environmental and societal results and are planning to follow suit. Such fences can, however, inhibit neighbouring people's livihoods, particularly the poor or socially excluded, and can change long‐standing regional drought‐coping strategies. Though the policy context is dynamic and changing, such moves have the potential to radically change the landscape of communal areas.
During the last decade a ‘new rangeland science’ has emerged. One of the tenets of the new science is that pastoralists should not adhere to a single conservative stocking rate, but rather adopt an opportunistic strategy, where numbers will fluctuate widely in response to good and bad seasons. It is further argued that opportunistic strategies give higher economic returns compared to strategies based on conservative stocking rates. In the current paper we compare the economics of four cattle management scenarios. The analysis is based on a simulation model of the fluctuation over time of animal numbers, outputs and prices, using data from field surveys and the literature. Our results suggest that strategies based on conservative stocking rates would have higher net present values than strategies based on opportunistic stocking rates. Previous analyses have failed to account for losses due to drought and the costs of capital tied up in livestock, and the analyses have tended to compare commercial with communal production rather than considering different kinds of small holder production methods. To receive the full benefits of destocking, however, a decision to destock has to be made at the level of the community, as the benefits of improved outputs can only be achieved if the stocking rates of the communal grazing lands are reduced. Making collective decisions about managing numbers is a process with considerable transaction costs, and thus the likelihood of new institutions emerging are lessened. It is surprising that a tight tracking scenario (where numbers of cattle are managed by purchasing and selling so as to maintain numbers in equilibrium with the available feed resources) is being recommended in the most recent literature. Our results suggest that such a system would come with considerable economic losses. The costs of a current programme to reclaim small dams illustrate the environmental costs of the opportunistic scenario. A tight tracking policy is likely to further increase environmental degradation and its associated costs. We identify several serious flaws in the papers that elevate opportunistic pastoral systems as giving higher economic returns than other systems.
Except for calcium, the nutrient content of the grasses was below the desirable levels for cattle nutrition. Woody species generally had higher nutrient contents than grasses.-from Authors
Desertification involves the loss of soil productive potential, but a means of assessing and monitoring the progress of desertification on the soil has been elusive. Soil is so varied and complex that methods of assessing condition are too slow, tedious, and expensive for routine use. Moreover, differences in soil type can be confused with soil condition. This paper presents a structured method of assessing soil condition. This method is based on recognizing and classifying soil surface features and examining soil properties that reflect the status of the processes of erosion, infiltration, and nutrient cycling. Published in the form of a user manual, the method has the following three stages: (1) defining the geomorphic setting of the site, (2) recognizing patch/interpatch associations and the mode of erosion at the landscape scale, and (3) assessing soil surface condition ratings in quadrats sited within the landscape pattern patches. Stage 3 is achieved by observing each of 11 features in the field and classifying their status according to detailed fieldnotes and photographs. The method applies to a wide range of soil types and biogeographical regimes and has proven to be repeatable among observers and quickly transferred to new observers.
A recently published rangeland health assessment guide for arid shrublands of the Karoo, South Africa, addresses the problem of apathy toward rangeland. The guide is designed for land users with a minimal knowledge of plants and soil processes. More than 200 colour photographs, maps and diagrams introduce the rancher to the processes that maintain soil fertility and range productivity. Topics covered include soil formation, cryptogam crusts, water acquisition and storage by plants, plant population renewal and vegetation change. Then using subjective five-point scores, the guide assesses rangeland health by vegetation cover, forage value, utilization intensity, plant demography and soil health and protection. This hands-on, non-technical approach to range assessment is intended to avert rangeland damage by making the rancher more aware of the natural resources on which ranching depends. Ranchers who spend time in their rangelands and well understand the dynamics of plant populations in response to rainfall patterns and grazing are generally more successful than ranchers with little interest in their rangeland. A similar approach, combining subjective assessment of soil and vegetation, could be designed for ranchers in other arid and semi-arid regions subject to desertification through misunderstanding and inadvertent mismanagement.
"Relict' desert dunes, frequently but not exclusively of linear form, have been identified in many desert and peri-desert areas and have been widely interpreted as indicators of climatic change, particularly of greater former aridity and atmospheric circulation changes. It is necessary to interpret dune status (relict/active) in terms of dune type: the distinction between sand-moving, sand-passing and sand-accumulating types is especially important. The paper also examines the problems of deducing palaeocirculation patterns from the orientation of relict dunes and the difficulties of dating these features. It is concluded that whilst relict desert dunes may be a valuable palaeoenvironmental tool in tropical and mid-latitudes, their interpretation as such requires careful consideration of a range of environmental factors and the assessment of findings from modern dune process studies. -from Authors
Recent decades have seen major intensification of cattle-based agricultural production in semiarid savanna ecosystems. In the Kalahari of Botswana, cattle production now occurs on privatized and fenced ranches. Patterns of ecological change, notably increased bush dominance, have been linked to increased cattle-grazing intensity, but it remains contentious whether these changes represent land degradation. Uncertainty in ecological understanding stems from the dynamic, “nonequilibrium” functioning of semiarid ecosystems. Given the inherent ecological variability of drylands, we argue that degradation assessments should be based, not on ecological observations alone, but on the study of long-term changes in pastoral production figures and on changes in the ecologically determining factors of soil water and soil nutrient availability. Provided here is a framework incorporating soil and ecological changes at a range of scales that can enable us to distinguish drought-induced fluctuations from long-term ecological-state changes. The results demonstrate that increased cattle use and associated ecological changes have not been caused by, nor are they associated with, changes in soil water and nutrient availability. We present a model of ecosystem dynamics that does not display bush encroachment as a definite form of land degradation. Encroachment may also be curtailed by resilience mechanisms found in protected ecological niches and by the resilience of the nutrient-poor sandy soils.
In the Kalahari of Botswana, as in many other open savannas, the main ecological change following cattle-based agricultural intensification is one of grass removal and bush encroachment. Changes to vegetation communities in Kalahari rangelands have been expressed in terms of a state-and-transition model. However, there remain uncertainties as to the mechanisms and conditions for ecological change. In part, this is due to previous (inadequate) spatial and temporal scales of data collection. This paper describes the results of ongoing ecological studies in the Makoba ranches and analyses the contribution that fine-scale ground-based surveys and interpretation of Earth observation data can make to reducing uncertainties in state-and-transition models. This detailed case study provides a mechanism for evaluating the role of multi-source information for monitoring and modelling open savannas.
Sustainability indicators (SIs) are increasingly seen as important tools in the implementation of sustainable development. Numerous suggested SI lists and matrices exist, but a remaining problem is how these diverse SIs are to be integrated into an answer as to whether something is sustainable or not. In some studies of sustainability workers have adopted a quantitative integration approach whereby SIs are given numerical values and integrated mathematically to produce a value for sustainability. In this paper the authors discuss SI integration by drawing upon the results of a six-year research project based in a village in Nigeria. They conclude that an element of'qualitative integration' incorporating value judgements and subjectivity is inevitable with a concept such as sustainability, even if one begins with what may seem like sharp and quantitative SIs. It is argued that SIs are primarily a product of development intervention rather than a desire to understand, and as a result carry with them the desired characteristics, from the donor perspective, of efficiency and accountability. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment
Mineral deficiencies that lead to production losses often occur concurrently with climatic and management changes. To diagnose these deficiencies in time to prevent production losses, long-term monitoring of mineral status is advisable. Different classification systems were examined to determine whether areas of possible mineral deficiencies could be identified, so that those which were promising could then be selected for further monitoring purposes. The classification systems addressed differences in soil, vegetation and geology, and were used to define the cattle-ranching areas in the central and northern districts of Namibia. Copper (Cu), Iron (Fe), zinc (Zn), manganese (Mn) and cobalt (Co) concentrations were determined in cattle livers collected at abattoirs. Pooled faecal grab samples and milk samples were collected by farmers, and used to determine phosphorus (P) and calcium (Ca), and iodine (I) status, respectively. Areas of low P concentrations could be identified by all classification systems. The lowest P concentrations were recorded in samples from the Kalahari-sand area, whereas faecal samples collected from cattle on farms in the more arid areas, where the harder soils are mostly found, rarely showed low P concentrations. In the north of the country, low iodine levels were found in milk samples collected from cows grazing on farms in the northern Kalahari broad-leaved woodland. Areas supporting animals with marginal Cu status, could be effectively identified by the detailed soil-classification system of irrigation potential. Copper concentrations were lowest in areas of arid soils, but no indication of Co, Fe, Zn, or Mn deficiencies were found. For most minerals, the geological classification was the best single indicator of areas of lower concentrations. Significant monthly variation for all minerals could also be detected within the classification system. It is concluded that specific classification systems can be useful as indicators of areas with lower mineral concentrations or possible deficiencies.
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