Strategic planning harnessing urban policy mobilities: the gradual development of local sustainability fix

The aim of our article is to follow how global policy models affect local policy making. Each city has unique local challenges in promoting development, e.g. economic growth, but also needs to find a balance between these targets and demands for sustainable city solutions. In our empirical study, we follow how ideas of waterfront development – to attract new inhabitants and promote economic growth – and global demands of carbon control were used interactively in a strategic spatial planning process in the city of Tampere, Finland. During the six-year planning process, these two policy targets became interdependent, created a new policy-making domain, and led to a combinatorial development of sustainability elements arising from this domain. These findings demonstrate the serial use of global policy models in the creation of a local urban ‘sustainability fix’. To conclude, the intertwinement of diverse global policy models in a city planning process creates easily a recursive cycle that redefines urban sustainability within cities and intercity networks. This perspective makes local policy narratives and strategic planning highly important in urban sustainability research as promoting urban sustainability becomes an inherently ambivalent practice.     

Culture as trigger for sustainability transition in the water domain: the case of the Spanish water policy and the Ebro river basin

There is a mounting body of literature dealing generally with the dynamics of transitions of human systems towards sustainability and specifically with the different stages and processes of transitions. However, the question of why transition processes occur in the first place remains largely unexplained. This paper explores the concept of transition triggers, such as culture or material resource scarcity, and provides a theoretical framework to explain the emergence of a transition and its relation to recent developments in Spanish water policy. We adapt the general framework provided by current transition theory and gather empirical evidence and insights from processes occurring within the Spanish policy context and the Ebro river basin in particular. Our results show that the sole existence of biophysical limits to water use or development cannot explain the start of a possible sustainability transition in this domain in Spain. Changes in the existing water policies in the direction of sustainability were not ignited by people directly affected by water scarcities but by a coalition of sensitive agents, mostly from academia, NGOs and local constituencies, who managed to articulate new identities, integrate multiple sources of policy relevant knowledge, and develop new values under the umbrella of the new water culture movement.

Changes in mineral soil organic carbon stocks in the croplands of European Russia and the Ukraine, 1990–2070; comparison of three models and implications for climate mitigation

Three soil carbon models (RothC, CANDY and the Model of Humus Balance) were used to estimate the impacts of climate change on agricultural mineral soil carbon stocks in European Russia and the Ukraine using detailed spatial data on land-use, future land-use, cropping patterns, agricultural management, climate and soil type. Scenarios of climate were derived from the Hadley Centre climate Version 3 (HadCM3) model; future yields were determined using the Soil–Climate–Yield model, and land use was determined from regional agricultural and economic data and a model of agricultural economics. The models suggest that optimal management, which entails the replacement of row crops with other crops, and the use of extra years of grass in the rotation could reduce Soil organic carbon (SOC) loss in the croplands of European Russia and the Ukraine by 30–44% compared to the business-as-usual management. The environmentally sustainable management scenario (SUS), though applied for a limited area within the total region, suggests that much of this optimisation could be realised without damaging profitability for farmers.     

New frontiers for sustainability: emergy evaluation of an eco-village

The emergy analysis was used to evaluate the sustainability of a village which aims to be ecologically friendly. The choice of focusing on the use of local resources including agriculture and farm goods, photovoltaic panels, renewable heating and cooling systems, recycled water from constructed wetlands etc., aims to obtain a sustainable village. Indices and ratios based on emergy flows have been calculated and used to evaluate the behaviour of the whole system. Their dependence upon the fraction of renewable and non renewable inputs as well as locally available versus purchased inputs from outside is stressed. A new index of sustainability (SI) is also applied to the case study. Readers should send their comments on this paper to BhaskarNath@aol.com within 3 months of publication of this issue.     

Marine Protected Areas in Sri Lanka: A Review

Despite the popularity of marine protected areas (MPAs) as a management tool, increasing evidence shows that many fail to achieve conservation objectives. Although several MPAs exist in Sri Lanka, most are not managed, and resource extraction and habitat degradation continue unabated. At present, the declaration and management of MPAs is carried out without adequate consideration of the ecology, socioeconomic realities, or long-term management sustainability. Managers have focused more toward the creation of new legislation and protected areas rather than ensuring the implementation of existing regulations and management of existing protected areas. Poor coordination and a lack of serious political will have also hindered successful resource management. As in other developing countries, MPA managers have to contend with coastal communities that are directly dependant on marine resources for their subsistence. This often makes it unfeasible to exclude resource users, and MPAs have failed to attract necessary government support because many politicians are partial toward the immediate needs of local communities for both economic and political reasons. A more integrated approach, and decisions based on the analysis of all relevant criteria combined with a concerted and genuine effort toward implementing strategies and achieving predetermined targets, is needed for effective management of MPAs and the sustainable use of marine resources in Sri Lanka.     

Supporting climate change vulnerability and adaptation assessments in the Asia-Pacific region: an example of sustainability science

Sustainability is achieved only when there is full reconciliation between: (1) economic development; (2) meeting, on an equitable basis, growing and changing human needs and aspirations; and (3) conserving the limited natural resources and the capacity of the environment to absorb the mulitple stresses that are a consequence of human activities. The linkages between climate and sustainability are examined in the context of both the wider Asia-Pacific region and local level climate risks and adaptation responses. These findings are used to underpin and illustrate several implications for sustainability science. Climate change is seen as both an impediment to increasing sustainability and as an opportunity, though in most cases the former far outweighs the latter. Assessments of climate change vulnerability and risk are shown to be of critical importance because they inform decisions as to where resources for adaptation are best invested. They also show whether global efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions need to be strengthened because of limits to adaptation. In practice, adaptation takes place at many levels, essentially ranging between tangible interventions at community and enterprise level and national and international efforts to strengthen the enabling environment for adaptation. It is informative to undertake regional assessments of adaptation, even though most adaptation interventions need to reflect local conditions, including local adaptive capacities. The foregoing findings, based in part on a series of regional and local case studies, lead to several recommendations for further research that will help reduce barriers to implementing responses that reduce climate related risks, including adverse consequences for sustainability. The recommendations relate to such themes as making optimum use of predictive capabilities, characterising the linkages between climate change and sustainability, implications of the required rates and magnitudes of adaptation, institutional responses that enhance adaptive capacity, use of new and traditional technologies, the multiple dimensions of social responsibility, and enhancing the enabling environment for adaptation at the community and enterprise level. If these recommendations are acted upon they will, in turn, help address much needed improvements in quantifying the costs and benefits of adaptation, prioritising adaptation options, assessing sustainable development tradeoffs, and monitoring the success of adaptation initiatives. Such improvements will have even greater utility if they are incorporated into user-friendly decision support tools for adaptation.     

Past, present, and future of MSW landfills in Japan

This article focuses on the historical development of landfill technology since the beginning of the nineteenth century in Japan. The regulations and guidelines that form a framework for the technology are reviewed, and the historical background and the current state of Japanese municipal solid waste (MSW) management are described. Through the analysis of data collected from facility leaflets, changes in the leachate treatment system are surveyed. Finally, the concept of the “sustainable bioreactor landfill with low organics” is proposed.     

Improving agricultural sustainability: the case of Swedish greenhouse tomatoes

Of major concern to agriculturists and society are issues of sustainability and land and resource requirements for food and fiber. Sustainability of Swedish domestic agriculture is explored using the production of tomatoes in greenhouses as a case study. Issues of sustainability are related to net yields, environmental loading, greenhouse gases, employment and land use. A model for evaluation of sustainability is developed and illustrated using the concepts and theories of analysis. The intensive tomato production system investigated was shown to be highly dependent on non-renewable resources and human service fed back from society. Substituting wood powder from logging residues for the oil used for heating reduced the environmental load and improved the sustainability of the system significantly.     

Achieving sustainability by introducing alternative livelihoods

The millennium ecosystem assessment report on global assessment of desertification has highlighted its worldwide impacts on the environment—increasing dust storms, floods and global warming—as well as on societies and economies. It links sustainable management of resources, and inter alia well-being of dryland populations, to reducing societal pressures on dryland ecosystems through adoption of alternative livelihoods. This paper, in combination with a companion paper by Safriel and Adeel, presents the conceptual underpinnings of this approach as well as examples of how innovative approaches for creating livelihoods can help reduce the pressure on marginal drylands. Three case studies presented are based on activities undertaken within a joint international project called sustainable management of marginal drylands. First, introduction of chicken farming to farmers in Hunshundake Sandland in northern China has reduced the pressure on grasslands and led to a major recovery of these ecosystems. Second, development of desert-based aquaculture, with accompanied longer-term storage of water, on the margins of the Cholistan desert in Pakistan has provided a new source of income for the villagers. Third, development of a new income-generating activity based on soap production from olive oil in Dana Biosphere Reserve in Jordan has demonstrated that traditional olive farming can be linked to community-based innovation to create a new, high-demand market for goods. Working with communities to develop new, sustainable livelihoods that reduce pressure on marginal drylands can thus be used as powerful tool for overcoming and reversing desertification.