Forests and farmland are increasingly threatened by pressures on our landscapes for commodity agriculture, urban development, mining, tourism, transport infrastructure. The futures of family farmers, pastoralists, forest-dependent communities, fishing communities and indigenous people are at stake. The ‘landscape approach’ is increasingly hailed as an inclusive, equitable and multi-stakeholder means of addressing and resolving conflicts in land and water management. But is it working? Are we on the right track?
On Wednesday 17th September 2014, more than 200 people gathered in Wageningen, the Netherlands to help define the meaning and purpose of the ‘landscape approach’. This term is now commonly used in rural development, but it doesn’t always mean the same thing to everyone. What it is, how does it differ from integrated land management and similar ideas, and how can its components and underlying concepts best be used for the benefit of people and the planet?
We were told how the word landscape came into English from the Dutch ‘landschap’ as a painters term and as such holds more of a physical concept in Anglo-Saxon eyes. However, we must bear in mind the social and cultural components, with a landscape defined as ‘an area as perceived by people, whose character is the result of the action and interaction of nature and/or human factors’ (from the European Landscape Convention). With the move away from single sector solutions to rural development to multi-sectoral approaches with a plethora of names such as integrated land management, and the term ‘landscape approach’ still lacks a clear definition but is applied to refer to them all.
Where we are on the right track?
We are going in the right direction, even though it seems that we are trying to shoot a moving target. We are moving towards more inclusivity. We acknowledge the need to ‘get out of our silos’. The issues at stake – climate change, food security, biodiversity, poverty, resource security – are so large that governments, development professionals and even the private sector see the need for a different approach.
Where we can do better?
We need better representation. Where are the farmer associations and private sector, as key stakeholders? We need a better understanding of differences in scale, and how to balance the different needs of stakeholders in each. We need to develop improved criteria for measuring success (and failure) of different approaches, based on an analysis of previous work (e.g. in REDD+, watershed development programmes, etc.), competing interests, trade-offs and the role of contrasting worldviews. We need to find ways to better translate the findings into political and entrepreneurial realities.
It was good to see landscape architects and rural development specialists and researchers sharing their experiences both in the sessions and in the breaks, though many did find ‘nothing new’ and ‘a lack of concrete policy options’. So, whereas the landscape approach was not entirely unravelled during the afternoon, some of the knots were undone. But bigger knots remained, and that appear to need some fresh fingers before they can be unpicked.
The meeting was chaired by Agnes van Ardenne, Chair of LandschappenNL and former Minister for Development Cooperation in the Netherlands government. Speakers and panel members included René Boot (Tropenbos International), Jeff Campbell (FAO), Ingrid Duchhart (WUR), Koen Kusters (WiW), James Reed (CIFOR), Meine van Noordwijk (ICRAF) and Edith van Walsum (ILEIA).
Unravelling the Landscape Approach’ was this year’s ‘Are we on the right track?’ seminar, an annual event coordinated by Tropenbos International. The seminar was co-organised with ILEIA – Centre for learning on sustainable agriculture, Wageningen University and Research Centre, Utrecht University, the Dutch Society of Tropical Forests, the Netherlands Ministry of Economic Affairs and Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
