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This article presents the current state of protection of terraced landscapes as an important type of cultural landscape, both globally and in Slovenia. The UNESCO World Heritage List, the Satoyama Initiative list, and the Slovenian Register of Immovable Cultural Heritage are analyzed. The findings show that terraces rarely appear as a factor justifying protection, even though certain progress has been made in recent years. At least globally, this has clearly been contributed to by the 2010 adoption of the Honghe Declaration. Slovenia shows both a lack of appropriate criteria for identifying terraced landscapes worth protecting and an insufficiently systematic treatment of heritage sites that are already being protected.
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Acta geographica Slovenica, 57-2, 2017, 131–148
TERRACED LANDSCAPES
AS PROTECTED CULTURAL
HERITAGE SITES
Drago Kladnik, Mateja Šmid Hribar, Matjaž Geršič
Terraced rice paddies in Bali, a UNESCO world heritage site.
SHUTTERSTOCK
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Drago Kladnik, Mateja Šmid Hribar, Matjaž Geršič, Terraced landscapes and protected cultural heritage sites
Terraced landscapes and protected cultural heritage sites
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3986/AGS. 4628
UDC: 911.53:631.613(497.4)
COBISS: 1.01
ABSTRACT: This article presents the current state of protection of terraced landscapes as an important
type of cultural landscape, both globally and in Slovenia. The UNESCO World Heritage List, the Satoyama
Initiative list, and the Slovenian Register of Immovable Cultural Heritage are analyzed. The findings show
that terraces rarely appear as afactor justifying protection, even though certain progress has been made
in recent years. At least globally, this has clearly been contributed to by the 2010 adoption of the Honghe
Declaration. Slovenia shows both alack of appropriate criteria for identifying terraced landscapes worth
protecting and an insufficiently systematic treatment of heritage sites that are already being protected.
KEY WORDS: geography, cultural landscape, terraces, UNESCO World Heritage, Satoyama Initiative,
Slovenian heritage, Slovenia
ADDRESSES:
Drago Kladnik, Ph.D.
Anton Melik Geographical Institute
Research Center of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts
Gosposka ulica 13, SI-1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia
E-mail: drago.kladnik@zrc-sazu.si
Mateja Šmid Hribar, Ph.D.
Anton Melik Geographical Institute
Research Center of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts
Gosposka ulica 13, SI-1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia
E-mail: mateja.smid@zrc-sazu.si
Matjaž Geršič, Ph.D.
Anton Melik Geographical Institute
Research Center of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts
Gosposka ulica 13, SI-1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia
E-mail: matjaz.gersic@zrc-sazu.si
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1 Introduction
Terraced landscapes are cultural landscapes with aspecial value, in which their aesthetic role is of great
importance in addition to ecological, cultural, historical, research, psychological, philosophical, and reli-
gious aspects (Kladnik 2016a; Smrekar, Polajnar Horvat and Erhartič 2016). Therefore, it is not surprising
that terraced landscapes are among the world’s most picturesque landscapes found online (e.g., Amazing
satellite… 2016; Incredible… 2014; Tremendous… 2011). They form aspecial agricultural and ecolog-
ical system that can be found throughout the world. They are formed by diverse agricultural terraces, the
main purpose of which is to produce food. However, if they are well maintained, they can have an added
value in fighting erosion and the negative effects of natural disasters (Komac and Zorn 2008) and in case
of extensively management they also ensure biodiversity (Špulerová et al. 2017). However, if terraces are
not maintained, this only exacerbates the effects of natural degradation. Unfortunately, due to the restruc-
turing of social strata, maladaptation to mechanized farming, and increasingly pronounced globalization
effects, in many places terraces are being abandoned, overgrown, or left to deteriorate in large numbers,
while traditional terraced landscapes are becoming neglected (Kladnik 2016a).
Only well-maintained terraced landscapes can present an attractive image that not only makes the locals
that live with terraces from one generation to the next proud, but can also prove to be an important part
of cultural heritage with developmental potential (Kladnik 2016b). This is true both globally and in Slovenia,
and accordingly the awareness that terraced landscapes are worth protecting as an invaluable part of cul-
tural landscapes is gradually strengthening (Erhartič 2009). Various protective initiatives and strategies
(Ažman Momirski and Kladnik 2015) have sprung up, which in and of themselves do not automatically
guarantee appropriate further maintenance and conservation of terraced landscapes, but they do clearly
play an important role in the perception, awareness, discovery, and evaluation of these landscapes. If pro-
tection is well thought out and the values of terraced landscapes are suitably promoted, the protection itself
can provide an exceptional developmental impulse (Geršič et al. 2016). Together with their increased
profile, this makes possible not only further maintenance of an attractive cultural landscape, but also gen-
erates new jobs in activities related to the growing number of incoming tourists (Ažman Momirski and
Kladnik 2015).
Terraced landscapes belong to cultural landscapes that are the result of the interaction between the
natural environment and human life and work in this environment (Urbanc 2002). The expression »cul-
tural landscape« was introduced by the American geographer Carl Sauer, who defined it as follows: »The
cultural landscape is fashioned out of the natural landscape by aculture group. Culture is the agent, the nat-
ural area is the medium, the cultural landscape is the result« (Sauer 1925, 46). Cultural landscapes are already
indirectly mentioned in the 1972 UNESCO Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural
and Natural Heritage (Convention… 1972), which defines cultural heritage as monuments, groups of build-
ings and sites, which are works of man or the combined works of nature and man, and natural heritage
as natural features, geological and physiographical formations and natural sites.
Cultural landscapes that have been internationally recognized and protected since 1992 (Cultural land-
scapes 2016) are characterized by unique land use adapted to natural conditions and an intangible relationship
with nature. An important step towards the recognition of cultural landscapes was made through the 2000
adoption of the European Landscape Convention, which highlights the interaction between natural and
human factors, but does not specifically mention terraced landscapes. In the Slovenian legal system, the
landscape is mentioned in the Nature Conservation Act (2010), which in principle defines the landscape
as anatural value (even though not even asingle unit like this can be found in the Register of Natural Values),
and in the Cultural Heritage Protection Act (2016), which also covers the Register of Immovable Cultural
Heritage (Register 2016), in which cultural landscapes are included.
Landscapes are also discussed in the 2010 Paris Declaration on the Satoyama Initiative, which covers
socio-ecological production landscapes and seascapes. It conceives of landscapes as »dynamic mosaics of
habitats and land uses that have been shaped over the years by the interactions between people and nature
in ways that maintain biodiversity and provide humans with goods and services needed for their well-being«
(Paris declaration on… 2010, article 1). Satoyama is aJapanese compound term referring to the area between
the foothills of amountain and arable flat land (< sato »arable, fertile« + yama »mountain, hill«). In the
broader sense, satoyama landscapes are amix of forests, paddy fields, plowed fields, pastures, creeks, ponds,
and irrigation systems surrounding Japanese villages (Kobori and Primack 2003).
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Drago Kladnik, Mateja Šmid Hribar, Matjaž Geršič, Terraced landscapes and protected cultural heritage sites
As an exceptional landscape system, terraced landscapes were globally recognized at the conference
on terraced landscapes that took place in Mengzi, China, in November 2010 and where the Honghe Declaration
on the Protection and Development of Terraces was adopted (Peters and Junchao 2012; Kladnik 2016a).
That was also when the International Terraced Landscapes Alliance (ITLA) was established (Ažman Momirski
and Kladnik 2015).
To date, no comprehensive systematic study on the protection and conservation of terraced landscapes
as important cultural landscapes and hence cultural heritage deserving protection has been conducted either
globally or in Slovenia. The best-known protected terraced landscapes are mentioned in the works of Tarolli,
Preti, and Romano (2014), Varotto (2015), Peters (2015) and Andlar, Šrajer in Trojanović (2017) provid-
ed asystematic overview on typological diversity of the Croatian Adriatic terraced landscapes
This article provides an overview of the current state of protection of the terraced landscapes includ-
ed on the UNESCO World Heritage List (World Heritage List 2016) and in the international database of
Satoyama landscapes (Satoyama Initiative 2016) and the Slovenian Register of Immovable Cultural Heritage
(Register… 2016) in one place, drawing attention to the structural deficiencies of the registers and seeking
to further enhance efforts for more planned and systematic protection of terraced landscapes.
2 Methods
This study is based on areview of two international lists–the UNESCO World Heritage List (2016) and
especially its list of cultural landscapes (Cultural Landscapes 2016), and the Satoyama Initiative list (2016)–and
the Slovenian Register of Immovable Cultural Heritage (Register 2016). Based on the justifications for
inclusion on the list and the explanations of the reasons for protection, we identified heritage units (unam-
biguously or by making inferences based on knowing the actual conditions) that have been selected as worth
protecting due to the important role of agricultural terraces. In this, the role of terraced landscapes can
be adecisive factor or quite marginal.
Based on the extent of highlighting the significance of terraced landscapes or their role in the justifi-
cations for addition to the list, three types were defined at the global level (predominant, highlighted, and
marginal) and four among the Slovenian cultural heritage sites (predominant, highlighted, marginal, indi-
rectly identified).
Even though the criteria for classifying terraced landscapes under individual types are subjective, they
are based on the comparison of published justifications. They are illustrated here with four sites from the
Register of Immovable Cultural Heritage (2016), which we classified under various types. For abetter com-
parison, all of the units are from the same Slovenian region: the mesoregion of the Koper Hills (Sln. Koprska
brda).
The predominant type (Register 2016):
Puče settlement: the cultivated terraces between Krkavče Creek (Krkavški potok) and Supot Creek (Supotski
potok): »The preserved traditional system of cultivated terraces was created where the plateau-like level ridges
gradually change into the steep slopes above the Dragonja Valley. The villages of Krkavče and Koštabona dom-
inate the wider area
The highlighted type:
Seča: the Seča Peninsula cultural landscape: »An area transformed by man for agricultural use, with culti-
vated terraces and walls built from local stone; dispersed construction, the Forma viva open air sculpture gallery
on the promontory. Olive trees, grapevines, and orchards predominate among the cultivars
The marginal type:
Strunjan: Strunjan Nature Park: »The area south of Strunjan Cliff (Strunjanski klif) features achurch with
amonastery, dispersed tenant farmers’ houses on aslope that has been converted into terraces, asettlement
next to the former town harbor, saltpans, and astone pine avenue
The indirectly identified type:
Čentur: »Aspecial feature of this village is its characteristic architecture, the special structure of its parcels,
and the unique way in which its farmland is cultivated. Arable land is divided into small parcels that extend
outwards in concentric circles in order to adjust to the terrain
134
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3 Levels of protection around the globe and in Slovenia
This section presents the findings of the review of the UNESCO World Heritage List (2016), the Satoyama
Initiative (2016) database, and the Slovenian Register of Immovable Cultural Heritage (Register 2016).
3.1 UNESCO World Heritage List
The UNESCO classification uses the following three categories of cultural landscapes (Operational Guide -
lines 2012):
Cultural landscape designed and created intentionally by man;
Organically evolved landscapes, developed as »results from an initial social, economic, administrative, and/or
religious imperative and has developed its present form by association with and in response to its natural
environment«; divided into two subtypes: a) arelict/fossil landscape and b) acontinuing landscape »which
retains an active social role in contemporary society closely associated with the traditional way of life, and
in which the evolutionary process is still in progress«; and
Associative cultural landscape.
Figure 1 presents the UNESCO typology of immovable cultural heritage (The World Heritage 2004).
However, because it is not universal, it is not generally established and applied in individual national leg-
islations.
In June 2016, there were 8.5% of cultural landscapes among the 1,031 world heritage sites on the UNESCO
World Heritage List (Cultural Landscapes 2016). Four of these are listed as transboundary properties, and
aGerman one was removed in 2009 because it did not meet the protection criteria. Twenty are connected
with terraced landscapes. Among the rest of the world heritage sites, five are relevant from the viewpoint
of terraces. Four are classified under cultural sites and one, the Historic Sanctuary of Machu Picchu, is
classified under mixed sites.
Thus we identified atotal of 25 relevant terraced landscapes on the UNESCO list (Figure 2): in eight
cases, they became part of world heritage almost exclusively due to their terraced character, whereby cul-
tivated terraces are highlighted as their component part, and in nine cases they are mentioned marginally
because they were ascribed ahigh level of protection primarily due to other landscape elements. The major-
ity of the protected sites include acentral area measuring several hundred square kilometers (with exceptions
over 1,000km²) and asimilarly large or smaller buffer zone.
The analysis of 1,641 world heritage sites included on the tentative list (Tentative Lists 2016) showed
that only four partly referred also to terraced landscapes (one in France, one in Algeria, and two in Yemen).
The first site that mentions a terraced landscape in the justification, the Natural and Culturo-
Historical Region of Kotor, Montenegro, was entered on the UNESCO list as early as 1979 and the second,
the Historic Sanctuary of Machu Picchu, Peru, was added to the list in 1983. The first site that refers explic-
itly to acultural landscape and aterraced landscape as part of it was the Rice Terraces of the Philippine
Cordilleras, which was added to the list in 1995. The graph in Figure 3 shows that the number of these types
of world heritage sites is gradually increasing and, what is even more evident, the significance of terraces
in the justifications is increasingly more highlighted.
3.2 Satoyama Initiative
An important international register of cultural landscapes is being compiled as part of the International
Partnership for the Satoyama Initiative (IPSI), which promotes societies in harmony with nature. As part
of the Satoyama Initiative, an internet-based portal was established, which among other information pro-
vides well-presented case studies of socio-ecological production landscapes around the globe (Satoyama
Initiative 2016).
Currently more than 80 case studies are presented in the database, including seven terraced landscapes.
The significance of terraces is predominant in three, highlighted in two, and marginal in two. All of the
entries on the Satoyama Initiative list are of amore recent date, from 2010 onwards. Two sites, both part
of the Ifugao terraced landscape on the Philippine island of Luzon, are included on the UNESCO World
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Drago Kladnik, Mateja Šmid Hribar, Matjaž Geršič, Terraced landscapes and protected cultural heritage sites
136
Monuments Groups of
uildingsb
Places
Archaeological
heritage:
Individual monuments,
including earthworks,
farms, villas, temples,
and other public
buildings, defensive
works, etc., that are not
in use or occupied
Settlements
(towns, villages),
defensive works,
etc., that are not in
use or occupied
Earthworks, burial
mounds, cave
dwellings, defensive
works, cemeteries,
routes, etc., that are not
in use or occupied
Rockart sites: ––
Caves, rock shelters,
open surfaces, and
comparable sites
containing paintings,
engravings, carvings, etc.
Fossil hominid
sites:
––
Individual sites and
landscapes containing
skeletal material and/or
evidence of occupation
by early hominids
Historic
buildings
and ensembles:
Individual monuments,
ensembles of
monuments, works of art
Urban
and rural
settlements /
historic towns
and villages:
Towns, town
centers, villages,
and other
communal groups
of dwellings
Vernacular
architecture:
Traditionally established
building types using
traditional construction
systems and crafts
Groups of
traditionally
established
building types
Religious
properties:
Buildings and structures
associated with religious
or spiritual values;
e.g., churches, monasteries,
shrines, sanctuaries,
mosques, synagogues,
temples, etc.
Historic
settlements
or towns with
religious
or spiritual
associations:
sacred cities, etc.
Sites with religious
or spiritual associations:
sanctuaries, sacred
landscapes, or landscapes
with sacred features, etc.
Agricultural,
industrial and
technological
properties:
Factories; bridges,
watermanagement
systems (dams,
irrigation, etc.)
Agricultural
settlements;
industrial
settlements
Military
properties: Castles, forts, citadels, etc. Citadels, town
defenses; Defensive systems
Cultural landscapes
with vernacular
settlements
Field systems,
vineyards, agricultural
landscapes; water
management systems
(dams, irrigation, etc ;
mines, mining
landscapes, canals,
railways, etc.
.)
Figure 1: UNESCO typology of immovable cultural heritage (The World Heritage… 2004, 15). Green cells contain material related to cultural landscapes.
Figure 2: Terraced landscapes identified on the UNESCO World Heritage List (2016) and the Satoyama Initiative list (2016). p
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137
#
#
##
#
#
Made with Natural Earth
Authors of map: Manca Volk Bahun, Rok Ciglič, Matjaž Geršič
© Anton Melik Geographical Institute ZRC SAZU
Legend
Signicance of terraces in the justication
Predominant type
#Satoyama
Terraced area
0 2000 4000 6000 Km
Highlighted type
Marginal type
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138
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
Predominant type Highlited type Marginal type
< 1991 19911995 19962000 20012005 20062010 > 2010
Figure 3: The period in which the terraced landscapes identified were entered on the UNESCO World Heritage List (2016) according to the significance
of terraces in the justifications for entry on the list.
Figure 4: The cultural landscape of the Honghe Hani Rice Terraces in China.
JIMMY TRAN
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139
Heritage List. All of the sites on the UNESCO World Heritage List and the Satoyama Initiative list are pre-
sented in Figure 6.
3.3 Slovenian Register of Immovable Cultural Heritage
In Slovenia, the protection of terraced landscapes is provided for as part of the Cultural Ministry’s Register
of Immovable Cultural Heritage (Register nepremične kulturne dediščine) (Register… 2016), which also includes
cultural landscapes among the eight defined types of heritage and two non-defined types (unknown and
other). In June 2016, the register included 317 sites, among which forty-three terraced landscapes can be
identified (Figure 7, Table 1). In two cases, terraces were the decisive reason for addition to the register,
in seventeen cases they were avery important reason, in twelve cases they were not mentioned at all because
other reasons were more important for the entry, and in twelve cases agricultural terraces were not men-
tioned but they can be inferred from the descriptions.
Among the total of 50 mesoregions, only 18 include protected terraced landscapes. By far the great-
est number of registered terraced cultural landscape sites can be found in the Koper Hills (10) and the Sava
Hills (8). Among the nine landscape types, they can be found in six, but not on the Mediterranean plateaus
and in the Alpine mountains, where terraced landscapes do not exist anyway.
Figure 5: The terraced landscape of the Upper D ouro (
Alto Douro
) Wine Region in Portugal.
DRAGO KLADNIK
Figure 6: Terraced landscapes as identified in 2016 on the UNESCO World Heritage List (2016), UNESCO Tentative Lists (2016), and Satoyama Initiative (2016).
The names of sites fully recognized by UNESCO are given in plain tex t, sites on the UNESCO Tentative Lists in italics, and sites on the Satoya ma Initiative
list in underlined italics. pp. 138
Figure 7: Terraced landscapes identified in the Slovenian Register of Immovable Cultural Heritage (Register… 2016). pp. 139
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140
Continent Predominant Highlighted Marginal
Africa
Konso Cultural Landscape
Sukur Cultural Landscape
Bassari Country: Bassari, Fula, and
Bedik Cultural Landscapes
Parc des Aurès avec les établissements
oasiens des gorges du Rhoufi et dEl Kantara
Asia
Cultural Landscape of Honghe
Hani Rice Terraces
Cultural Landscape of Bali Province
Rice Terraces of the
Philippine Cordilleras
ARice Paddy Cultural Landscape
Conservation in an Indigenous
Community, Taiwan
»Muyong in Ifugao Province,
Northern Luzon Island
in the Philippines
«
Town Revitalization Making
the Most of Natural Landscape
and Traditions of Kanakura Wajima
City, Ishikawa Prefecture, Japan
Aflaj Irrigation Systems of Oman
Land of Olives and Vines
Cultural Landscape of Southern
Jerusalem, Battir
GongliaoHohoTerracedPaddy
Fields, Taiwan
Role of Traditional Knowledge in
Strengthening SocioEcological
Production Landscapes
Jibla and its Surroundings, Jabal Haraz
Dong Peoples RiceFishDuck
Symbiotic System in China
Europe
Portovenere, Cinque Terre,
and the Islands (Palmaria,
Tino, and Tinetto)
Cultural Landscape of the
Serra de Tramuntana
Lavaux, Vineyard Terraces
Wachau Cultural Landscape
Upper Middle Rhine Valley
Tokaj Wine Region Historic
Cultural Landscape
Natural and CulturoHistorical
Region of Kotor
Alto Douro Wine Region
MadriuPerafitaClaror Valley
The Causses and the Cévennes,
Mediterranean AgroPastoral Cultural
Landscape
Costiera Amalfitana
Vineyard Landscape of Piedmont:
LangheRoero and Monferrato
Landscape of the Pico Island Vineyard Culture
Parc national des Écrins
North America
Oceania with Australia
South America
Historic Sanctuary of Machu
Picchu
Quebrada de Humahuaca
Fuerte de Samaipata
Spiritual and Political Centre of the
Tiwanaku Culture
The Ayllu System of the Potato Park,
Cusco, Peru
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0 10 20 30 40 50
km
© Anton Melik Geographical Institute ZRC SAZU
Source of the typology: Perko, Hrvatin and Ciglič 2015
Legend
Signicance of terraces in the justication
Landscape types
Predominant type
Highlighted type
Marginal type
Indirectly identied type
Alpine mountains
Alpine hills
Alpine plains
Dinaric valleys and corrosion plains
Dinaric plateaus
Pannonian low hills
Pannonian plains
Mediterranean low hills
Mediterranean plateaus
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142
Table 1: Settlements in the Slovenian Register of Immovable Cultural Heritage (Register … 2016) for which the justification for their protection includes or implies various degrees of significance of terraces, by Slovenian
mesoregions and landscape types.
Landscape Landscape Mesoregion Predominant Highlighted Marginal Indirectly Number of cases/
type group type identified settlements
with terraces
Mediterranean Mediterranean Koper Hills (
Koprska brda
) Puče Izola, Jagodje, Movraž, Korte, Strunjan Čentur 11
landscapes low hills Piran, Seča, Strunjan,
Sveti Peter
Vipava Valley (
Vipavska dolina
) Zemono 1
Mediterranean plateaus 0
Dinaric Dinaric Gorjanci Hills (
Gorjanci
) Javorovica, Veliki Cerovec 2
landscapes plateaus Kambreško Hills and Banjšice Plateau Lokovec 1
Krim Hills (
Krimsko hribovje
) Gorenja Brezovica 1
and Menišija Plateau (
Menišija
)
Kočevje Little Mount (
Kočevska mala gora
), Laze pri Predgradu 1
Kočevje Rog (
Kočevski rog
), and Mount
Poljane (
Poljanska gora
)
Radulja Hills (
Raduljsko hribovje
) Hmeljčič 1
Dry Carniola (
Suha krajina
) and Šmihel pri 1
Dobrepolje Karst polje (
Dobrepolje
) Žužemberku
Big Mountain (
Velika gora
), Mount
Stojna (
Stojna
), and Mount Gotenica
(
Goteniška gora
) Draga 1
Dinaric valley systems Lower Carniola Lowland Spodnja Slivnica, Mali Vrh 3
and corrosion plains (
Dolenjsko podolje
) Temenica (near Mirna Peč)
Velike Lašče Region Knej 1
(
Velikolaščanska pokrajina
)
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Alpine Alpine mountains 0
landscapes Alpine hills Cerkno Hills (
Cerkljansko hribovje
), Gorenja Žetina, Spodnje 4
Škofja Loka Hills (
Škofjeloško hribovje
), Danje, Topolje, Velike
Polhov Gradec Hills (
Polhograjsko hribovje
), Grahovše
and Rovte Hills (
Rovtarsko hribovje
)
Sava Hills (
Posavsko hribovje
) Selo pri Pancah, Gabrje pri Jančah, Javorje pri Gabrovki, 10
Šentgotard, Volavlje Golčer, Javor Tepe, Vinje pri Moravčah,
Zgornja Javoršica
Alpine plains Ljubljana Marsh (
Ljubljansko barje
) Gumnišče 1
Sava Plain (
Savska ravan
) Leše 1
Pannonian Pannonian low hills Boč Hill and Macelj Hill (
Boč in Macelj
) Donačka Gora 1
landscapes Krško Hills (
Krško gričevje
) Dolenja vas pri Raki 1
Slovenian Hills (
Slovenske gorice
) Jeruzalem 1
Pannonian plains 0
2 17 10 14 43
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144
Figure 8: Land surrounding Šmihel pri Žužemberku in Dry Carniola was included in the register precisely because of its well-known terraced landscape.
Figure 9: Like all other terraced areas in the Brkini Hills, the land surrounding the village of Ostrožno Brdo has not yet been recognized by conservationists
as deserving protection.
MATEVŽ LENARČIČMATEVŽ LENARČIČ
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4 Discussion
Terraced landscapes account for 22.7% of cultural landscape sites and 2.4% of all sites on the UNESCO
World Heritage List (2016), for which the listing is legally binding and is considered agreat prestige con-
sidering that it has established itself as asuccessful brand (Erhartič 2014). We determined that the significance
of terraces in the justifications for entering individual sites on the list is becoming increasingly more high-
lighted. This may have been contributed to by the 2010 adoption of the Honghe Declaration on the Protection
and Development of Terraces (Peters and Junchao 2012), which among other things emphasizes the role
and significance of intangible heritage, which comes especially to the fore in Third World countries, where
collectiveness in work, free time, and rituals is still an important value.
In the international Satoyama Initiative (2016) database–which has just begun to be compiled and the
main point of which is high-quality and systematic descriptions of the sites included, the protection of which
is, however, not legally binding–there is anotable predominance of Asian and African landscapes. Terraced
landscapes account for 8.8% of all cultural landscapes described in this database.
We determined that in the »cultural landscape« category of the Slovenian Register of Immovable Cultural
Heritage (Register… 2016), terraces appear as aprotection factor only in 13.7% of cases, and that among
the total of 29,893 Slovenian immovable cultural heritage sites terraced landscapes account for only 0.14%.
Knowing the actual conditions in the field, it can be arrgued that, despite seemingly suitable coverage of
terraced landscapes in Slovenia, the existing range of protected sites included in the register is deficient.
In this regard, deficient criteria for the inclusion and the occasionally terminologically deficient descrip-
tions in the justifications for the sites’ protection can be established (see, e.g., the description for Jeruzalem,
reg. no. 7867; Register … 2016). This points to aconsiderable lack of awareness and poor identification
of terraced landscapes’ values among the responsible experts in the majority of regional units that pre-
pare the protection strategy and plans and the expert bases justifying the inclusion of individual sites in
the register.
Acta geographica Slovenica, 57-2, 2017
145
Figure 10: Terracing a slope in Rwanda as part of public works.
SAM THOMPSON, FLICKR
57-2_Special issue_acta49-1.qxd 5.5.2017 10:23 Page 145
Drago Kladnik, Mateja Šmid Hribar, Matjaž Geršič, Terraced landscapes and protected cultural heritage sites
In Slovenia cultural landscapes and terraced landscapes as parts of them have not yet been officially
recognized as part of intangible heritage, even though certain practices and skills of cultivating terraced
land definitely form part of such heritage (Ažman Momirski et al. 2008). Due to farming organized by fam-
ilies in the areas of Slovenian terraced landscapes, we haven’t identified any organization of labor, celebrations,
and rituals connected with the cultivation and maintenance of terraces within the wider village commu-
nity so far.
The Digital Encyclopedia of Slovenian Natural and Cultural Heritage (DEDI, 2016) among the 468
units also includes adescription of the terraced landscape in the Upper Gorizia Hills (ZgornjaGoriška brda)
(Kladnik 2010). Just like any other area in most distinctly terraced Slovenian region of the Gorizia Hills
(Goriška brda), the presented site has not yet been officially registered as acultural heritage site. However,
the author believes that considering its significance as acultural value the site deserves to be protected
against the possible deterioration that threatens the demographically endangered northern part of the region.
The review of the world and Slovenian heritage lists raises certain questions: which terraced landscapes
are worth protecting and why, is their function or external appearance more important, when did they
become heritage, in which cases do they deserve to be protected, and so on. Since only selected sites can
be protected it is first necessary to inventory various terraced landscapes and create the criteria for their
protection. Here (Table 2) we list afew possible criteria that were identified as part of the project Terraced
Landscapes in Slovenia as Cultural Values.
Table 2: Criteria, identified for evaluating of terraced landscapes in Slovenia.
Criteria Type of criteria
A large contiguous area of terraced land Spatial
The method of terrace construction Spatial and time related
The shape of terrace treads Spatial
The height of terrace slopes Spatial
Time of construction Time-related
Planned construction (whether the terraces were planned or created Time-related
spontaneously with slope processes caused by man)
Rarity Spatial and time related
State of conservation Legislative
Any other accompanying features
Habitats of endangered plant and animal species Natural/ecological
5 Conclusion
Based on the reviews performed, the following findings can be highlighted:
Terraced landscapes and cultivated terraces began to be classified under heritage sites fairly late, or only
after aspecial category of »cultural landscapes« was established in general;
Terraced landscapes are asignificantly more important element of protection than is evident from the
descriptions because those that protected them did not realize the significance of cultivated terraces,
and in Slovenia no uniform criteria were in place then, and still are not;
Intangible aspects of terraced landscapes (e.g., group work, celebrations, rituals, etc.) are already being
recognized around the globe, but this does not apply to Slovenia;
In Slovenia, terraced landscapes could start being regarded as aspecial subtype of cultural landscape
that deserves special treatment due to the complexity of treating it effectively.
The protection of terraced landscapes must definitely be connected with active survival strategies and
the farmers for whom work in aterraced landscape represents an important source of food and an impor-
tant level of subsistence or even market surplus production. To achieve all of this, it is necessary to maintain
avital cultural landscape with asufficient number of people that are able to work and ready to contribute
their share to further maintaining an attractive terraced landscape. If this landscape manages to be added
to world protection lists, such as the UNESCO World Heritage List, this provides new tourism-based devel-
opment prospects, which can generate many new jobs not only in the hospitality sector and accompanying
activities, but also in secondary activities on farms.
146
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Terase Jeruzalemskih goric kot krajinska vrednota. Pomurje: 20 th Congress of Slovenian geographers
  • B Erhartič
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