Formation of new property rights on government land through informal co-management: Case studies on countryside guerilla gardening

Extant research on guerilla gardening, defined as the unauthorized cultivation of land belonging to another, has hitherto focused on public space in urban areas, neglecting those that occur in rural settings. This rural land policy study examines a form of guerilla gardening in the countryside in Hong Kong, carried out by specific walker communities who routinely do early morning walks. Most of the gardens they have cultivated have become part of country park protected areas. This study identifies five phases of land use status evolution undergone by these morning walkers’ gardens (MWG), from the time the phenomenon of guerilla gardening in the countryside began in the 1960s to recent times, illustrating the role of land use change in enabling squatters with a degree of property rights by way of informal land resource co-management. Through the three case studies presented in this article, it is argued that MWGs can represent the emergence of incipient forms of natural resource co-management in Hong Kong. This study emphasizes the important role of resource user leadership in enhancing the land use value of land in itself and for the wider community. Some recommendations are provided to enhance resource user participation in land resource management.     

Fenced in: Common property struggles in the management of communal rangelands in central Eastern Cape Province,South Africa

This paper takes as its starting point the assertion that current rangeland management in the central Eastern Cape Province (former Ciskei) of South Africa, is characterised primarily by an ‘open-access’ approach. Empirical material drawn from three case-study communities in the region is used to examine the main barriers to management of rangeland as a ‘commons’. The general inability to define and enforce rights to particular grazing resources in the face of competing claims from ‘outsiders’, as well as inadequate local institutions responsible for rangeland management are highlighted as being of key importance. These are often exacerbated by lack of available grazing land, diffuse user groups and local political and ethnic divisions. Many of these problems have a strong legacy in historical apartheid policies such as forced resettlement and betterment planning.     

Stakeholder perceptions and governance challenges in urban protected area management: The case of the Las Piñas – Parañaque Critical Habitat and Ecotourism Area,Philippines

The conservation and management of protected areas in urban settings has become increasingly challenging with dynamics over land use change in adjacent urban areas being highly relevant to, but at times conflicting with, the protected area. This study seeks to better understand the implications of land use change processes to urban protected area management through the case study of the Las Piñas – Parañaque Critical Habitat and Ecotourism Area (LPPCHEA) in Metro Manila, Philippines. Factors and processes influencing land use change and protected area management and the impact of stakeholders’ perceptions on protected area were analyzed. The urban protected area in itself has limited influence on its surrounding urban areas, as land use change in these areas is shaped more by social, economic and policy/institutional factors occurring within the context of urban-regional development. The study also found that land use conflict is evident in an urban protected area due to the competing ecosystem services derived by various stakeholders. This discord is deepened by the lack of coordination between land use planning and protected area management. Integrating protected area management with land use planning through legally binding instruments, specific timeframes and clear internal procedures can help resolve land use conflict for an urban protected area at the strategic or policy level.     

Knowing but not knowing: Systematic conservation planning and community conservation in the Sierra Norte of Oaxaca,Mexico

Systematic conservation planning (SCP) seeks to propose new reserves through a scientifically rigorous process using databases and research selection algorithims. However, SCP exercises have been criticized for “knowing but not doing”, i.e. not implementing the proposed reserve. But there is an additional problem that can be called “knowing but not knowing”, knowing things from databases, but not knowing crucial contextual information about community-based social processes that have supported the high forest cover and biodiversity detected. Examined here is how a common property region of the Sierra Norte of Oaxaca, Mexico has maintained high forest cover in the absence of public protected areas, while multiple SCP exercises have advocated for the creation of public protected areas in communal tropical montane cloud forests and pine forests as strategies for biodiversity conservation and resilience to climate change. Methods included archival research, review of community documents, focus group interviews, semi-structured interviews, participant observation, land use transects, and GIS analysis and remote sensing. Conservation in the region originally occurred because of low population densities, steep slopes and a lack of agricultural subsidies, supported by locally adapted agricultural practices. In the 1990s, a transition from passive to active conservation took place with land use zoning plans, community conservation rules, community forestry enterprises and payments for environmental service programs that consolidated a trend towards high, unthreatened forest cover. Today, the study communities have an average of 88.3% forest cover, with 61% of that in informal conservation based on community land use zoning and rules and another 14% governed by forest management plans approved by the Mexican government. We argue that truly systematic conservation plans would seek to understand how communities in the region are already managing forests for conservation. It is pointless and uninformed to advocate for top-down conservation interventions of forests that are already robustly conserved and resilient to climate change due to community action.     

MANAGEMENT AGREEMENTS: A TOOL FOR CONSERVATION

Multiple land use management for agriculture, conservation and other objectives is a generally accepted goal. Where land use change is economically beneficial to the landowner and damages conservation values, conflicts arise. Management agreements are one means of resolving such conflicts but they must be set within a better development, policy, information and management framework. Land acquisition by conservation bodies and tax exemptions are alternative means of achieving the same objectives. Few management agreements have yet been negotiated but the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 gives them a central place in resolving such conflicts in the future. Devising equitable methods of financial compensation will be the key to the success of management agreements in resolving land use conflicts.     

Trends in private land conservation: Increasing complexity,shifting conservation purposes and allowable private land uses

The terrain of private-land conservation dealmaking is shifting. As the area of private land protected for conservation increases, it is time to understand trends in private-land conservation agreements. We examined 269 conservation easements and conducted 73 interviews with land conservation organizations to investigate changes in private-land conservation in the United States. We hypothesized that since 2000, conservation easements have become more complex but less restrictive. Our analysis reveals shifts in what it means for private land to be “conserved.” We found that conservation easements have indeed become more complex, with more purposes and terms after 2000 compared to conservation easements recorded before 2000. However, changes in restrictiveness of conservation easements varied by land use. Mining and waste dumping were less likely to be allowed after 2000, but new residences and structures were twice as likely to be allowed. We found a shift toward allowing some bounded timber harvest and grazing and a decline in terms that entirely allow or prohibit these working land uses. Interviews revealed staff perceptions of reasons for these changes. Our analysis suggests that “used” landscapes are increasingly important for conservation but that conserving these properties stretches the limits of simple, perpetual policy tools and requires increasingly complex and contingent agreements.     

Perceived importance of ecosystem services in the Białowieża Forest for local communities – Does proximity matter?

Effective protection of biodiversity in areas of high conservation value requires trade-offs between local use of natural resources and conservation restrictions. The compromise is often difficult to reach, which causes conflicts over the management priorities of existing and potential protected areas. Ecosystem services (ES) perspective offers a promising avenue for diagnosing and reconciling contrasting interests concerning the use of benefits from ecosystems. We examined how the spatial proximity to the Białowieża Forest (BF), a European biodiversity hotspot, affects the perceived use of ES by local communities. We performed a survey among 719 respondents from 35 villages situated within BF and in its vicinity. We found that both the declared use of ES and the perceived influence of ES on household’s economy was declining with the distance from BF with particularly high differences between areas not further than 3 km from BF and areas located 3-15 km from BF. Different zones varied in terms of benefits from tourism and costs connected with a potential limited access to ES due to conservation. Broadening the perspective, we argue that the trade-offs linked to ES may vary depending on the location in relation to the protected area and that local communities should not be treated as a homogenous group when considering benefits from the forest. Awareness of common patterns of ES use over space and local specificity may enhance effective management of even highly contested conservation areas.     

Development stressors are stronger than protected area management: A case of the Pantanos de Centla Biosphere Reserve,Mexico

Evaluation of the management effectiveness of protected areas has become a global priority, especially in coastal zones, where essential services are threatened by land use pressures. To assess the effectiveness of a coastal protected area, we estimated the land-use change (LUC) within and outside of the Pantanos de Centla Biosphere Reserve (PCBR) and interviewed key stakeholders to identify the main stressors causing LUC. The native vegetation cover under the PCBR protection decreased by 65% over 24 years; whereas agriculture and livestock lands doubled, even within the core conservation areas of the PCBR. The greatest loss was in the flooded forest (48%), where the reduction was similar in and around the reserve. The effectiveness of reserve management was affected by drivers of land use change, which include agricultural and livestock enterprises that are run by government programs. Effective management of the PCBR has been undermined by poor management practices, limited capacity and resources, and inadequate zoning design. Protected areas and its surrounding landscapes could be considered to be natural experiments for future research, where high value land uses and conservation objectives coincide within coastal areas that will face a predicted sea level rise, more intense floods and higher temperatures.     

Potential for co-management approaches to strengthen livelihoods of forest dependent communities: A Kenyan case

Many natural resource management researchers have focused either on institutional design and evaluation or on livelihood outcomes per se without explicitly acknowledging and rigorously examining linkages between the two. Thus, a major gap in the current literature on co-management institutional arrangements is the extent to which co-management has strengthened the livelihoods of poor forest-dependent communities. This gap is addressed in this paper by developing and testing an argument that well-designed co-management arrangements have strengthened the livelihood outcomes of poor forest-dependent communities in a Kenyan case study. The hybrid analytical framework developed for this analysis situates Ostrom's (1990) design criteria for co-management institutions in the broader context of the Sustainable Livelihood Framework. It then uses this analytical framework to evaluate the Arabuko-Sokoke Forest Reserve (ASFR) co-management initiative in Kenya, based on a three-step process. First, the paper provides an overview of current institutional arrangements for governance of the ASFR co-management regime. Second, it evaluates the extent to which these governance arrangements can be characterized as devolved collaborative governance, informed by Ostrom's (1990) design principles and; third, it evaluates the extent to which the livelihood outcomes of forest dependent communities that are participants in the co-management project have had their livelihoods strengthened as a result of the ASFR co-management governance arrangements. The paper demonstrates that the institutional arrangements for ASFR co-management are relatively nascent and emerging because the governance arrangements for the ASFR co-management project cannot be characterized as fully devolved de jure collaborative governance. Notwithstanding this, the findings reveal that participant forest-dependent communities in the co-management project had improved livelihoods compared to forest-dependent communities outside the co-management scheme. It is suggested that this is due to the de facto co-management arrangements.     

Developing an appropriate land use methodology to promote spatially just,formal retail areas in developing countries: The case of the City of Cape Town,South Africa

South African scholars have increasingly recognized that the prevailing management system for land use is one not relevant to the current spatial needs of the country's settlements. These include, in particular, the need to create sustainable, spatially just and resilient settlements and to develop land in a manner that promotes efficient urban development. The debate in the South African literature on land use management has, with a few notable exceptions, yet to venture into the specific mechanics of how to fix this system, ways the system can be used to create a spatially just urban form, or its applicability in formal retail areas.This paper addresses these questions within the context of formal retail areas and the zoning category that these are typically found in, namely that of the General Business zone. This paper initially investigates the current exclusionary nature of formal retail areas in the context of South Africa and within Cape Town and how this is linked to the more macro patterns of spatial exclusion within Cape Town. It is argued that within the context of Cape Town there is a need to focus on both commercial, particularly formal retail, as well as residential, areas with regard to the project of creating a more spatially just city. It is subsequently demonstrated, firstly, how zoning scheme provisions could be used as a mechanism to address these patterns of exclusion in formal retail areas, specifically exploring provisions that would encourage inclusion of informal and microenterprises within shopping malls. Secondly, it is demonstrated how provisions can be included that create a safer and more inviting environment for public transport users and poorer employees and consumers, in formal retail areas.The contribution of this paper is to initiate a long overdue conversation regarding the relationship between land use management and social justice within a developing world context, and in formal retail areas, and aims to set out ways in which land use management can be made more relevant; both for South African cities and cities in other developing countries.     

Local participation in cultural landscape maintenance: Lessons from Sweden

Local participation has evolved as a strategy in the conservation and maintenance of biological and cultural values in cultural landscapes. The meaning(s) of the concept, however, are fuzzy, and conditions for fruitful implementation have only been investigated to a limited extent. In this article, a couple of Swedish cases serve as points of departure for a better understanding of the prerequisites and critical aspects as regards an increased local involvement in landscape management. A review of research on community participation reveals some essential aspects; power relations, participants, the institutional framework, organisation, communication, knowledge building, monitoring and contextual factors. These aspects have formed the structure for the analysis of two cases within which local involvement is considered successful; Southern Öland, where community involvement in seminatural grassland management has been experienced in LIFE-projects and in the process of becoming a UNESCO World heritage site, and Mälarhagar, an integrated restoration and beef production project carried out in close collaboration with farmers. The results are discussed in terms of successful ingredients, counterproductive aspects and operational difficulties. The findings show that trust, communication and local influence are vital ingredients in a participatory approach. Communication and co-management are pointed out as central areas of competence for executives working with landscape management and planning. There are, however, collisions between directives concerning nature conservation and directives concerning public participation. For successful local involvement, the subject for collaboration has to be broadly defined. Furthermore, the strong emphasis on collaboration in participatory approaches demands that democratic aspects have to be considered.     

Why should landowners in protected areas be compensated? A theoretical framework based on value capture

Many protected areas around the world are struggling to achieve financial stability and meet management costs, which is a difficult challenge. This difficulty is particularly acute in China, even though protected area conservation has been increasingly stressed upon in recent central policy announcements. The practice of providing supplemental funding for protected areas has been going on for years, but there is a lack of theoretical research on why and how landowners in protected areas could be compensated. This paper aims to fill the gap and make two contributions to the literature by explaining why landowners in protected areas should be compensated and who should pay for protected areas. The theoretical arguments on compensation for protected areas are first reviewed before we derive the theoretical framework of value capture for protected areas in China based on the principle of symmetry between burden and compensation. We conclude that local residents should be compensated according to the principle of equal public burden because the spatial regulation of protected areas has seriously restricted their land development rights. Furthermore, the beneficiaries of added land value in the process of the spatial regulation of protected areas can be categorized into three groups: the general public, residents around protected areas and some residents in protected areas (along the infrastructure site or in the upzoning area). Therefore, we structure a three-level value capture framework for protected areas. This is the first attempt to study compensation for protected areas based on value capture theory, which can provide guidance on protected area management for government leaders and researchers across the world.     

Land registration effectiveness in a state-subsidised housing project in Mbekweni,South Africa

As part of a programme examining the effectiveness of land tenure forms − tenure administration system combinations, the paper examines how and why beneficiaries use land registration in Project 2, a state subsidised housing project in Mbekweni, South Africa. The ownership − registration combination can have a number of negative consequences when policy makers focus on economics alone, rather than the complete set of factors that are critical for registered ownership to work in poor urban communities. South Africa’s state-subsidised housing programme has created up to 3.7 million housing opportunities. Off-register secondary transactions constitute a major problem when the properties registered in ownership. Building on a series of related case studies, an evaluative schema classifying an ownership − registration combination as strong, semi-strong, semi-weak or weak is presented, along with the main findings from three previously reported case studies where the combination was classified as semi-strong. The beneficiaries in Project 2 were predominantly in-migrants from a rural customary area, and based on earlier work and the literature, a weak or semi-weak classification was expected. However, the case was classified as semi-strong. Ongoing, visible administration is possibly a major factor underlying this classification.     

Integrating strict protection and sustainable use areas to preserve the Brazilian Pampa biome through conservation planning

Biodiversity conservation planning must be ecosystem-specific and take into account human needs as food production. The Pampa biome is a temperate grassland with high species richness and with an important role in food production in South America. Here we present the first formal Systematic Conservation Planning for the Brazilian part of the Pampa, which is the least protected biome in Brazil. We aimed to build conservation scenarios where at least 17 % of the biome area were protected, following the 11^th Aichi target for terrestrial lands protection according to the Convention on Biological Diversity. Our conservation targets were the vegetation types of this biome. Three scenarios were built varying in their proportions of strict protection (SP) and sustainable use areas (SU): Permissive scenario (5 % SP, 12 % SU); Intermediate scenario (10 % SP, 7 % SU) and Restrictive scenario (15 % SP, 2 % SU). Urban and rural areas, as well as bovine and ovine density, were used as prioritization costs, aiming to minimize possible conservation conflicts. Four main clusters of priority areas to protect the vegetational diversity can be observed in all scenarios and should be considered when implementing future protected areas in this threatened biome. Sustainable use areas are suitable for low-density livestock raising, combining biodiversity protection and food production, but strictly protected areas are still important to species most affected by livestock. The combination of strict protection and sustainable use areas can be effective in similar biomes. It should be considered in future international negotiations, such as the 2020 Conference to be held in Beijing, opening new strategies to achieve the 17 % of land protection. We expect that this Systematic Conservation Planning reinforces the recently started scientific discussion regarding the conservation of non-forest ecosystems in Brazil.     

Using a Delphi approach to identify the most efficacious interventions to improve Indonesia’s forest and land governance

Improvements to forest and land governance are key to addressing deforestation and degradation of peatlands in Indonesia. While this is a priority area, the steps to achieving good forest and land governance have been under-researched. There is a need for better links between theoretically informed academic analysis and work in the field. This study drew together a panel of experts on forest and land governance using a Delphi method to discuss the underlying drivers of deforestation and peatland degradation, and correspondingly, to identify interventions to improve land and forest governance in Indonesia. Seventeen panelists with an average of more than 12 years’ experience reached agreement over four governance interventions: increasing the capacity of local communities to manage and monitor forests and natural resources (65% of panelist’s votes); identify strengths and weaknesses of community organisations and institutions, and develop strategies to improve their performance (65% of panelist’s votes); gazetting forests to clarify land boundaries and determine which areas should be village, community and state forest zone (59% of panelist’s votes); and, integrating participatory community maps into spatial plans to protect local communities and indigenous peoples’ development needs (53% of panelist’s votes). They also supported action research involving the government, private sector and communities, and political economy approaches to researching forest and land governance issues. Panelists indicated that community level approaches such as securing community forest tenure through clarifying land claims and integrating local land tenure into spatial planning had an important role in sustainable forest management.     

Land use changes in protected areas and their future: The legal effectiveness of landscape protection

It is expected that the application of a restrictive legal instrument would be an important barrier to human pressures on protected areas in Brazil. One aspect that remains to be determined is whether the applied restrictions will be related to the quality of scenarios at the borders of protected areas. The objective of this work was to analyze the capacity for minimizing the impacts on two protected areas and to identify the effective function of the barrier imposed by an environmental legal border. The borders of two protected areas, the Despraiado Sustainable Development Reserve and the Jureia-Itatins State Ecological Station, as well as the corresponding buffer zone were studied. The historical evolution of the land cover/land use of these regions was analyzed by dividing the regions into 900 m² hexagonal units. The scenarios for the years 1962, 1980 and 2007 were overlaid for each hexagon. The hexagons were classified according to the possible effects of conservation, and the results were quantified in terms of the frequency of land use and ecological flows. A simulation of future land use in 2028 was performed using the Kappa index, Markov chain modeling, multi-criteria analysis and cellular automata modeling. Based on the trend for the last 45 years, a very dynamic interaction at the legal boundaries was identified; in certain cases, either conservation or degradation were stimulated, and the intended objectives of legal environmental measures were never fulfilled. The simulation showed that by 2028, the frontiers of these protected areas will retain less than 10% of the natural vegetation cover, and 43% of this area will be covered with banana plantations.     

南非发展淡水养殖业需要关注的几个问题

2006年以来,中国与南非双方签署了多项合作协议和谅解备忘录,开启了中国与南非以农业领域为重点的全面合作。就渔业而言,南非共和国捕捞业发达,养殖业薄弱。本文基于中国援助南非渔业技术示范中心项目的双方座谈、实地考察和收集资料,就南非水产养殖业发展中需要关注的水资源、气候、市场、水产养殖技术、环境保护等问题进行了分析,希望对有志于南非水产养殖业研究的专家学者提供一定的参考。     

Women's Land Rights and the Trap of Neo-Conservatism: A Response to Jackson

In response to Cecile Jackson's article, I argue here that Jackson has seriously misrepresented my work, often attributing to me the opposite of what I have said, and turned nuanced and balanced formulations into one-sided extremes. I seek to correct the important misrepresentations, as well as outline my substantive differences with Jackson. In particular, her argument that women should not claim family land for risk of destabilizing family relations could, by extension, have deeply conservative implications for all forms of women's struggles to enhance their freedoms and capabilities. In many South Asian communities, conflict is equally inherent in women choosing their own marriage partners or professions, or seeking gender-equal education, or wanting freedom of reproductive choice or free public interaction. The fear of family conflict could tie women down on numerous such counts as well. Jackson also overextends the resistance to women's claims in family land by treating South Asia as a uniform entity. The analysis in my book on this subject shows a substantial regional variability in kinship structures and social norms, which would make for much less resistance in southern South Asia than in the north, providing promising initial avenues for extending women's land claims. Also, unlike Jackson, I do not locate the process of women acquiring land rights in each woman's isolated struggle within the family, but in a collective struggle that seeks to build support across multiple tiers of society.     

Anticipating a new conservation bureaucracy? Land and power in Indonesia’s Essential Ecosystem Area policy

As an emerging policy in Indonesia, “Essential Ecosystem Areas” (EEA) is being established as an instrument to expand protections for conservation areas at sites beyond the classical domain of the conservation bureaucracy. The policy impetus is from recent global research identifying high conservation values located outside of formally designated conservation areas. EEA policy provides a foundation for justifying conservation practices at sites based on high biodiversity indicators, but which might not have previously held formal protections. This policy instrument is particularly unique in Indonesia because it is envisioned to support initiatives that emerge voluntarily, even in areas that might not have been historically thought of as conservation areas. This is unusual because it applies to all land categories, including private and public lands. In this article, we introduce the EEA policy and identify the potential applications it might have, considering the possibilities for future conservation area management in Indonesia. In particular, we identify some key principles for researchers and practitioners to follow when assessing EEA implementation. Our organizing framework consists of several elements based on existing land and power characteristics, which we connect to the institutions that might emerge amidst these new policy arrangements. We apply the land and power framework to two emerging EEA sites in Sulawesi to anticipate the extent to which the policy suggests a future trajectory for conservation management, or whether conservation policy will remain tied to existing rigid bureaucratic structures. Findings from the two cases point to the continued primacy of the centralized conservation bureaucracy, indicating that EEA sites are being negotiated through the classical approach for administering conservation areas.     

Landscape patterns of development under two alternative scenarios: Implications for conservation

The spatial pattern of urban development has important ecological and conservation implications. Urban sprawl, characterized by scattered and low-density urban development, is commonly criticized for its negative ecological impact. In response, growth management policies have been proposed in order to promote compact development, which is generally considered more favorable from an ecological perspective. Spatial simulations of land cover change are useful for comparing urban development scenarios and their potential effects. One aspect that has not received much attention is how the rate of development may affect differences between compact development and urban sprawl in terms of their potential impact to biodiversity conservation at the landscape scale. Our goal in this study was to compare the spatial pattern and landscape-scale conservation and ecological implications of sprawling development (expected under unregulated development) versus compact development (promoted by growth management policies) at different development rates. We focused on Israel's Mediterranean region—a region characterized by high human population density and heterogeneous land cover. Using a cellular automata model, DINAMICA-EGO, we calibrated and validated an urban development model for the period between 1998 and 2007. Using this period as a reference, we simulated two scenarios 20 years into the future: unregulated (resulting in a more sprawling development pattern) versus regulated development (resulting in a more compact development pattern). For each scenario we analyzed a range of development rates, and compared built-up area patterns, and several landscape-level attributes of natural habitats, conservation priority areas, and protected areas. We found that at development rates comparable to those observed during 1998–2007, there was no major difference between the two scenarios. At higher development rates, some differences between the scenarios emerged: natural core areas were more fragmented and smaller in their extent, and a higher proportion of conservation priority areas were expected to undergo development in the unregulated scenario. Overall, the regulated scenario was more favorable for conservation. Since the regulated and unregulated scenarios exhibited only minor differences in lower development rates, modifications to policy measures included in the regulated scenario should be considered in order improve its effectiveness.