Participation and empowerment-based development of socio-cultural indicators supporting regional decision-making for eco-efficiency

This article describes a process of developing socio-cultural indicators to support local and regional decision-making for eco-efficiency. Although eco-efficiency is calculated using environmental and economic variables, decisions on local and regional levels cannot ignore the socio-cultural impacts. The indicators were developed by a participatory process that was based on involvement and empowerment of local actors. The process ensured policy relevance and meaningful indicators and advanced their future use in the decision-making.