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Understanding the structure and composition of landscapes can empower agencies to effectively manage public lands for multiple uses while sustaining land health. Many landscape metrics exist, but they are not often used in public land decision-making. Our objectives were to (1) develop and (2) apply a process for identifying a core set of indicators that public land managers can use to understand landscape-level resource patterns on and around public lands. We first developed a process for identifying indicators that are grounded in policy, feasible to quantify using existing data and resources, and useful for managers. We surveyed landscape monitoring efforts by other agencies, gathered science and agency input on monitoring goals, and quantified the prevalence of potential indicators in agency land health standards to identify five landscape indicators: amount, distribution, patch size, structural connectivity, and diversity of vegetation types. We then conducted pilot applications in four bureau of land management (BLM) field offices in Arizona, California, and Colorado to refine procedures for quantifying the indicators and assess the utility of the indicators for managers. Results highlighted the dominance of upland and the limited extent of riparian/wetland vegetation communities, moderate connectivity of priority vegetation patches, and lower diversity of native vegetation types on BLM compared to non-BLM lands. Agency staff can use the indicators to inform the development of quantitative resource management objectives in land use plans, evaluate progress in meeting those objectives, quantify potential impacts of proposed actions, and as a foundation for an all-lands approach to landscape-level management across public lands., Highlights Five landscape indicators are relevant to existing policy for multiple-use public lands.We quantified the indicators for priority vegetation types in three western states.Landscape indicators can inform objectives in land use plans for public lands.Indicator products must fit agency workflows and reporting requirements to be used.Limitations of current landcover data impede landscape monitoring on public lands.

Although natural resource managers are concerned about climate change, many are unable to adequately incorporate climate change science into their adaptation strategies or management plans, and are not always aware of or do not always employ the most current scientific knowledge. One of the most prominent natural resource management agencies in the United States is the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), which is tasked with managing over 248 million acres (>1 million km2) of public lands for multiple, often conflicting, uses. Climate change will affect the sustainability of many of these land uses and could further increase conflicts between them. As such, the purpose of our study was to determine the extent to which climate change will affect public land uses, and whether the BLM is managing for such predicted effects. To do so, we first conducted a systematic review of peer-reviewed literature that discussed potential impacts of climate change on the multiple land uses the BLM manages in the Intermountain West, USA, and then expanded these results with a synthesis of projected vegetation changes. Finally, we conducted a content analysis of BLM Resource Management Plans in order to determine how climate change is explicitly addressed by BLM managers, and whether such plans reflect changes predicted by the scientific literature. We found that active resource use generally threatens intrinsic values such as conservation and ecosystem services on BLM land, and climate change is expected to exacerbate these threats in numerous ways. Additionally, our synthesis of vegetation modeling suggests substantial changes in vegetation due to climate change. However, BLM plans rarely referred to climate change explicitly and did not reflect the results of the literature review or vegetation model synthesis. Our results suggest there is a disconnect between management of BLM lands and the best available science on climate change. We recommend that the BLM actively integrates such research into on-the-ground management plans and activities, and that researchers studying the effects of climate change make a more robust effort to understand the practices and policies of public land management in order to effectively communicate the management significance of their findings.

As the world faces unprecedented ecological and social changes, there is a need to better understand the complex dynamics of social-ecological systems (SES) and the mechanisms that underlie their resilience. In Mexico, Natural Protected Areas (NPAs) constitute complex SES as they are generally established on territories that different peoples have historically inhabited and managed. They generally manage their resources following a multiple use strategy (MUS), which involves local traditional agricultural practices and has been proposed as a resilience-enhancing mechanism. In this paper we study the MUS as practiced by the Yucatec Maya communities that inhabit the NPA Otoch Ma’ax Yetel Kooh and its buffer zone in the Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico. Due to the restrictions imposed by the decree of the reserve and the growth of tourism in the region, some of these communities have started to abandon the MUS and specialize on tourism-related activities. To study the consequences of these changes and to better understand the mechanisms by which the MUS may enhance the resilience of this SES, we built an evidence-based dynamical computational model that allows us to explore different virtual scenarios. The model, through the incorporation of agent-based and boolean network modelling, explores the interaction between the forest, the monkey population and some productive activities done by the households (milpa agriculture, ecotourism, agriculture, charcoal production). We calibrated the model, explored its sensibility, compared it with empirical data and simulated different management scenarios. Our results support the hypothesis that the MUS enhances the resilience of this SES in terms of income and food availability, as it increases the system’s response diversity and functional redundancy, thus reducing income variability and increasing the resistance to natural and anthropogenic disturbances. We also identify other possible mechanisms related with the MUS that provide a more nuanced understanding of the resilience of this SES. Our study, in addition to highlighting the importance of local management practices for resilience, also puts forward a novel integration of diverse mathematical formalisms and illustrates how computational modeling and a systems perspective are effective means of integrating and synthesizing information from different sources.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service (USFS) manages 193 million acres of public lands across 43 states and Puerto Rico. The original intent behind reserving lands managed by the USFS was to improve and protect forests, secure favorable conditions for water flows, and furnish a continuous supply of timber for the nation. Through time national forests have evolved, so they are managed for a broad array of uses. Differing expectations have led to conflicts between aquatic conservation and other aspects of the USFS’ mandate. In the 1990s, these conflicting goals came to a head with the listing of the northern spotted owl Strix occidentalis caurina and the need to better protect streams that fostered populations of anadromous salmonids. To better balance these conflicting uses, the agency placed additional emphasis on conserving and restoring aquatic systems by integrating conservation concepts into the forest planning process. If the USFS is to succeed in protecting and restoring aquatic biodiversity, it must continue to address traditional challenges such as minimizing the effects of timber harvest, roads, grazing, and mining on aquatic systems while improving policies and practices regarding contemporary challenges such as climate change and invasive species.

The historical disposition and development of sagebrush (Artemisia spp.) landscapes have resulted in land ownership mosaics and differences in environmental qualities among land managers that influence today’s conservation planning. Early land-use policies following major land acquisitions from 1776 to 1867 in the western United States were designed to transfer the vast public resources to private ownership. Federal legislation enacted during the late 1800s and early 1900s encouraged development of arable regions, facilitated livestock grazing, created transportation corridors, and provided for access to minerals, coal, and petroleum. Productive lands characterized by deeper soils and access to water were transferred to private entities and converted from native habitats to agriculture. Privately owned lands are a major constituent of sagebrush landscapes in the Great Plains and Columbia Basin and are intermixed with public lands in other SageGrouse (Centrocercus spp.) Management Zones. The public still retains large areas and 70% of current sagebrush habitats. The Bureau of Land Management has responsibility for almost half of the sagebrush habitat in the United States; however, those lands are relatively unproductive and characterized by xeric environments and shallow soils. More recent legislation reflects changing public values to maintain or restore natural components, such as plants and wildlife, and minimize the impact of land uses in sagebrush landscapes. Multiple use dominates the management policy of most sagebrush habitat on public land; very little of the lands used by Greater Sage-Grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) has protected status in national parks or reserves. Conserving sagebrush landscapes required by Greater Sage-Grouse and other wildlife will depend on engaging the mosaic of public agencies and private ownerships in management programs, understanding the broad diversity of habitat characteristics, and recognizing the limitations of environments supporting the majority of sagebrush habitat on public lands.

With the increase in outdoor recreation in the United States following WWII and the focus on multiple use management in the wake of the Multiple Use Sustained Yield Act in 1960, land managers have been under increased pressure to balance multiple objectives and ensure that visitor use impacts at the sites under their purview are kept within acceptable bounds. The Act established that multiple uses had “legitimate interests” on public lands (Adams, 1993, p. 137) and that these uses be managed in a “harmonious and coordinated manner” (Cubbage, 1993, p. 298). However, there is no uniform, universally accepted approach to determining the number of visitors at individual sites, especially in light of the various activities undertaken by the public in protected areas. A unified methodology is needed; one that is applicable across multiple types of properties. We propose a generic multi-phase stratified approach capable of capturing visitation in multiple user activity and access categories. The strata used in this protocol are access location, mode of access, day of the week, and season. Access locations are grouped together in zones for ease of data collection. The approach we propose is readily adaptable to target site-specific assessments and strikes a balance between the need to gather sufficient data and staff person-hour commitment. Data are gathered based on mode of visitor access, definable access points, site-specific trends in visitation, and manager delineated zones at each site under consideration. Initial information is used to develop weekly visitation curves (depictions of the variation in visitation by day of the week) for each manager-defined season at each site and to specific survey locations within each zone mentioned above. Weekly visitation curves are confirmed using a two-week census prior to full data collection, thereby improving statistical accuracy. Additionally, multipliers are created for each mode of visitor access to estimate total visitation during the period under review. Data are summed across all zones within the site and across all seasons to gain a full representation of visitor use for the site being studied. The suggested approach may be easily modified to address variation in spatial and temporal patterns of visitation at multiple sites, as well as variation in modes of visitor access. The use of appropriate sampling techniques allows the employment of statistical estimation, thereby greatly reducing the amount of effort required with a full census for a valid estimate of visitation at a particular site or sites. Subscribe to JPRA

Taiwan has advantages in the development of offshore wind power, as it has abundant wind energy resources at the seas. The local government has developed a series of measures to promote the development of wind power generation industry. The development of offshore wind farm in Taiwan, however, has to solve the problems that offshore wind farms are overlapping with some traditional fishing grounds and are unable to reach consensus with relevant stakeholders. This paper starts from the great potential of offshore wind power in Taiwan and the active promotion of the government, and analyses the impact and possible opportunities brought by offshore wind farm development to local fisheries, from the perspective of Zhanghua Area, a key area of development of offshore wind farm in Taiwan. This paper proposes that the local government in Taiwan should use marine spatial planning as a tool, through the comprehensive participation of government, developers, fishermen and other bodies, seeking the coexistence and prosperity of offshore wind farm and fisheries. Avoidance, compensation, and feedback, as well as communication and collaboration will be an important strategy to solve the conflicts of multiple use of the sea and to promote the development of marine renewable energy.

Spatially large and multiple use coastal regions face unprecedented pressures. Decision makers need to build policy that links social, economic and ecological dimensions in ways that build the adaptive capacity of these systems while not compromising individual values. This paper reports on an inter-disciplinary project that used a Capitals approach to build socio-economic indicators robust enough to use in integrated community assessments of adaptive capacity. Using the Spencer Gulf, South Australia as a case study, we demonstrate the utility of these indicators to derive quantitative assessments of socio-economic adaptive capacity. We argue that such assessments used at regular periods, in conjunction with scientific indicators, have the potential to be powerful management tools and provide ongoing ability to measure community adaptive capacity over time.

Ecosystem services are increasingly recognized as a way of framing and describing the broad suite of benefits that people receive from forests. The USDA Forest Service has been exploring use of an ecosystem services framework to describe forest values provided by federal lands and to attract and build partnerships with stakeholders to implement projects. Recently, the agency has sought placed-based applications of the ecosystem services framework to national forest management to better illustrate the concept for policymakers, managers and forest stakeholders. This framework includes describing the ecosystem services provided by forest landscapes, examining the potential trade-offs among services associated with proposed management activities, and attracting and building partnerships with stakeholders who benefit from particular services forests provide. Projects that describe objectives and outcomes using an ecosystem services framework are quickly gaining respect and could provide an optimal method of managing forests to better serve the needs of people. We describe how project-scale guidelines can be designed to address commonly recognized products such as timber and clean water, as well as critical regulating, supporting and cultural services. We present results from national programmes to forest plan assessments to project-scale applications that enhance the provision of ecosystem services and sustainable forest management at broad to local scales.

The modern history of protected area (PA) management in Nepal dates back to 1973 when the National Parks and Wildlife Conservation Act (1973) was promulgated and Chitwan National Park was established. In the years immediately following these key events, protected area acts and regulations were strictly applied and the role of local people in managing natural resources was neglected. However with the passage of time, and with changes in the socio-political and economic characteristics of Nepal, management regimes have shifted towards a more liberal model which recognizes more clearly the contributions of people living and working within protected areas. Recently, landscape level conservation models including the designation of multiple use areas have been utilized in the development of management plans for protected areas in Nepal. Conservation agencies have attempted to tackle challenges such as land use conflict, poaching and smuggling of wildlife parts and illegal harvesting of highly valued medicinal herbs through regulation, but these efforts are not always successful. We recommend a holistic conflict resolution approach which recognizes and resolves the different needs of all stakeholders.

This study assessed the acceptance and awareness of an Australian MPA (Port Stephens-Great Lakes Marine Park) post implementation by recreational fishers using the MPA, and identified factors that influenced the perception of this group towards the MPA. Recreational fishers were interviewed in a multiple-use MPA to investigate their perceptions, attitudes, and support towards the MPA six years after implementation. Almost two thirds of recreational fishers supported the MPA and had positive attitudes towards the concept of MPAs. This is a key result since a similar pre-implementation survey of recreational fishers found only 12% would support the creation of PSGLMP due to fears the MPA would negatively impact their fishing activities and ability to catch fish. However, there was a sub-group of fishers who opposed the MPA and were more inclined to have negative attitudes towards the rationale behind MPAs, despite the common perception that no-take zones were for fisheries management purposes and could increase fish stocks in the MPA. More experienced fishers were inclined to oppose the MPA, as well as fishers who believed management zones did not provide clear rules for activities, penalties for non-compliance were too harsh, or that no-take zones did not increase fish stocks. An important perceived threat to the MPA was from commercial fishing due to perceptions of over-exploitation and issues of non-compliance. In contrast, the majority of recreational fishers did not believe the collective actions of recreational fishers negatively impacted the marine environment and fish stocks, or the number of fish available for capture in the future. An improved understanding of these social aspects is important to target ongoing management in order to increase acceptance, success and long-term existence of MPAs.

The present study focuses on the importance and need to identify criteria and indicators (C&I) for sustainable landscaping using native plants in Qatar. The conditions for operationalizing the criteria and indicators approach are being incorporated into sustainable development practices and management planning in Qatar. This paper aims to develop criteria and related indicators for strengthening the global sustainability assessment system (GSAS) in order to provide a holistic approach for sustainable environmental assessment and the enhancement of ecosystem services. A total of 50 potentially native plant species were prioritized and categorized based on the following different parameters: weather conditions tolerated (temperature, humidity, and rainfall), multiple use value (ecological, economical, and medicinal), standard crown size (≤50 cm and ≥50 cm) and water requirement (moist, moderate, and dry). Diverse local stakeholders as well as international experts were consulted to rank the plant species, and concluded that these prioritized native species are fit for sustainable landscaping as opposed to the exotic plant species which are imported from different geo-climatic zones. Environmental, social, economic, human, and policy sustainability aspects were considered, along with 12 criteria and 49 related indicators which were identified by promoting the use of potential native plants for sustainable landscaping in Qatar.

Multiple use livelihoods and recreational activities provide important economic opportunities for communities throughout the American west, especially in rural areas where public lands are the primary income generator. Federal lands also provide incentives for mining development as the “highest and best use” of the land. This tension between civil society, the mining corporation, and the state as dual regulator/facilitator of natural resource development is most apparent during the public comment period of the environmental assessment process. Such is the case with the Bearlodge mine in the Black Hills National Forest of Wyoming, which has the potential to be the only domestic producer of critical rare earth elements. Therefore, I ask: How do perspectives about control of and access to common property resources and the role of humans as part or separate from an ecological system converge or diverge between community, state, and market stakeholders? To answer this, a Q method survey was carried out from groups representative of the different economic and environmental perspectives related to mining development: environmentalists, the mining/energy sector, state/federal regulators, foresters, local land holders, and recreationalists. Results show that stakeholders fall into two categories: anthropocentrists who desire economic development from the mine for human benefit, even given the potential for environmental harm and curtailed access to multiple use activities; and biocentrists who continue to push for a no development alternative where nature is preserved for nature’s sake and existing livelihoods that help to maintain an already altered environment are able to remain and sustain rural economies.

In the face of a strong societal emphasis on sustainable development, the research on environmentally conscious consumers is becoming increasingly important. In a country such as Finland, non-industrial private forest (NIPF) owners can be used as a proxy for a high-involvement group engaged in forest ecosystem service provision and consumption. NIPF owners constitute a large proportion of the Finnish population and, based on previous research, the values they ascribe to forest meaning and use have become more diverse, strongly emphasizing recreational and conservation values alongside timber production. We thus hypothesize that understanding the NIPFs consumer perceptions better offers new insights into future consumer value creation in Finnish society overall, especially concerning the segment of consumers associated with the lifestyle of health and sustainability (LOHAS). First, the theoretical aim of the study was to validate a measurement model for forest owners engaged in pro-environmental consumption behavior and its effect on the meaning of forest for them. Second, the empirical aim was to identify different consumer categories among NIPF owners by classifying them into groups based on their sustainability orientation, and determine how the valuation of various uses of forests differs between these groups. The data set of 394 forest owners was collected in Finland in 2013 by telephone interview and was analysed using multivariate methods. The findings indicate that the owners with the highest sustainability orientation have a greater emphasis on multiple benefits of forests than owners who have a lower orientation to sustainable consumption behavior, and that they could be therefore considered as an interesting peer group for developing new service offerings in the changing forestry markets as well.

Public agencies worldwide are increasingly adopting an ecosystem service framework to manage lands serving multiple uses. Yet, reliable, practical, and well-tailored methods remain a major limitation in moving from conceptual to actionable approaches. Together with one of the largest federal land managing agencies, we co-develop and co-demonstrate an ecosystem services approach tailored to specific decisions, through a process with potentially widespread relevance. With the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), we focus on balancing military training with biodiversity and resource conservation under both budgetary and land-use pressures at a representative installation. In an iterative process of co-design and application, we define, map, and quantify multiple ecosystem services under realistic management options. Resource management budget emerges as a major determinant of the degree to which managers can sustain both necessary training environments – a DoD-specific ecosystem service – and a prairie ecosystem with species of conservation concern. We also found clear tradeoffs between training intensity and forest-related services. Our co-developed approach brings otherwise hidden values and tradeoffs to the fore in a balanced way that can help public agencies safeguard priority services under potentially conflicting uses and budget limitations.

Forests are the most important resource of our planet. The usefulness of forests is spread from commercial exploitation of them for timber and other products to maintenance of wildlife, ecological balance, prevention of soil erosion, etc. In achieving these goals the essential factor is the proper forest management. Forest management is a system of actions for supplying different products and services for society. In developed countries forest management tends to be elaborated and planned in order to achieve the objectives that are considered desirable for environment and economy. Forests are the most biologically diverse land ecosystems that can supply different products and services. The working of this system is influenced by the natural environment, climate, topography, soil, etc., and also by human action. Forests have been and are managed to obtain the traditional forest products: fire wood, fiber for paper, building timber etc. with little thinking for other products and services. Nevertheless, as a result from the development of ecology science and environmental awareness, management of forests for multiple use is becoming more common. Public concern regarding forest management have shifted from the extraction of timber for earning money for the economy, to the preservation of additional forest resources, including wildlife, soil and water conservation, recreation etc. Forests are the repositories of aesthetic, ethical cultural and religious values.

Marine spatial planning (MSP) is essential to solve spatial multiple-use problems, but first it is necessary to identify and map all existing uses, regulations and conflicts. Use conflicts related to the multi-legislative governance, neglect of fishermen's interests, and intensifying industrial growth due to economic development were identified for in a multiple-use Brazilian estuary. Overlaps between areas that are presently used for fishing and areas that are subject to regulations prohibiting this activity were analyzed. Information on regulations establishing no-fishing zones, the most important fishing sites and fishing records were gathered and superimposed using a GIS dataset. Main fishing zones were located within prohibited fishing areas. Regulations limiting fishing activity govern navigation routes and pipeline safety zone, whereas environmental law restrictions were less important. Due to economic and industrial development, oil and gas distribution and harbor construction projects are increasing, aggravating use conflicts and jeopardizing fishing activity. Legislation fragments usable fishing areas forcing fishers to operate within prohibited zones. Neglect of fishermen's interests, and their exclusion on the decision-making process led to a legislative scenario that reduce fishing legal zone to few areas, which in most cases fisherman are not even aware were they are, beingthe main reasons for fisher's failure to comply with the current regulations, increasing the number of infractions and the marginalization of fishermen. Future studies on multiple-use coastal areas subject to multiple jurisdictions should focus on all uses, not only environmental, to better understand spatial conflicts and to establish a realistic MSP embracing fisheries management, environmental conservation and economic development.

Freshwater resources underpin multiple livelihood systems around the world, particularly in highly productive tropical floodplain regions. Sustaining Indigenous people’s access to freshwater resources for customary harvesting, while developing alternative livelihood strategies can be challenging. The sustainable livelihoods approach was applied to examine the ways in which multiple livelihoods in the East Alligator River floodplain region in northern Australia influence Aboriginal people’s access to freshwater resources for customary harvesting. Interviews with Aboriginal residents were conducted to understand changes to freshwater customary harvesting practices. The dominant floodplain-based livelihoods analysed were pastoralism, biodiversity conservation and tourism and they were found to generate both opportunities and constraints for sustaining freshwater customary harvesting. Opportunities were provided through facilitating regular access to floodplain country and opportunistic access for harvesting, which assists in sustaining bio-cultural knowledge. Partnerships developed through these mainstream livelihoods built human capacity that enhanced all livelihood resource capitals (natural, human, social, financial and physical). Three key ways the dominant livelihoods constrained access to key freshwater resources were identified. Tourism required sacrificing certain hunting places and had to accommodate recreational fishing pressure. The successful recovery of the saltwater crocodile population through biodiversity conservation policy has inadvertently reduced people’s customary access to in-stream resources. Pastoralism on the floodplain had restricted traditional floodplain burning practices associated with accessing aestivating long-necked turtles, affecting access and abundance. These findings highlight the need for the development of remote Indigenous livelihood strategies to make explicit their influences on freshwater customary harvesting practices, to better support their maintenance amongst multiple, non-customary floodplain livelihoods.

Joint Venture schemes based on the floppy irrigation technology are being promoted in the post-Apartheid South Africa's Limpopo Province. Access to land and water resources in South Africa are largely viewed as a mechanism for re-dressing the Apartheid injustices. This research was part of a broader applied research to help inform irrigation practise in the Limpopo Province. The research used literature review, key informant interviews and a questionnaire survey. The overall research question sought to understand how the Joint Venture Schemes had benefited the smallholder farmers. This paper argues that the joint venture partnership created a new injustice. Firstly, the Joint Venture Scheme design is fundamentally a bad idea which disempower farmers not only to water access but also land as well. The choice of the ‘efficient’ floppy irrigation technology was made by the state and entailed that land had to be managed as a single unit. In order to make more effective use of this highly sophisticated new technology, the smallholder farmers also needed to go into a joint venture partnership with a white commercial farmer. By virtue of signing the Joint Venture agreement the farmers were also forfeiting their land and water rights to be used for crop production. The smallholder farmers lost access to their water and land resources and were largely relegated to sharing profits – when they exist - with hardly any skills development despite what was initially envisaged in the Joint Venture partnership. Secondly, the implementation of the JVS has been skewed from the start which explains the bad results. This paper further shows how the negative outcomes affected women in particular. As the smallholder farmers argue the technological options chosen by the state have excluded both male and female farmers from accessing and utilising their land and water resources in order to improve their livelihoods; it has entrenched the role of the state and the private interests at the expense of the smallholder male and female farmers in whose name the irrigation funding was justified. The paper concludes by offering recommendations on how joint venture schemes can be genuinely participatory and meaningfully address the rural livelihoods.

Tropical multiple-use plants provide an array of ecosystem services, including providing food for wildlife, non-timber forest products (NTFPs) and commercial logs. As land-use and land-cover change (LUCC) continues in tropical forests, questions on whether the ecosystem services they provide can be sustained become more pressing. As particular species of plants are targeted for provisioning services, such as commercial logging, the implications for other ecosystem services are often unknown. In this paper we drew on the traditional knowledge of the Makushi and Wapishiana Amerindians of Southern Guyana, and multiple-use plants to gauge the ecosystem services that may be compromised as tropical forests undergo change. An inventory of tree and palm species was classified into one or more of four resource-use classes: commercial timber, wildlife food, traditional uses or no known use. Species that intersected more than one resource use were defined as multiple-use species, and occupied four primary cl...

Marine and coastal areas worldwide are now facing increasing pressures, particularly from intensified human activities; marine protected areas (MPAs) are therefore designated to conserve marine biodiversity, and zoning has been used as an effective means to minimize conflicts between human use and biodiversity conservation and that among different users. However, there are currently very few zoning practice examples of MPAs reported in developing countries. In this paper, an interdisciplinary method combining spatial multi-criteria analysis (SMCA), geographic information system (GIS) and stakeholder consultation to develop a zoning scheme in the multiple-use MPAs of Eritrea is illustrated. Three higher-level criteria and eight lower-level criteria are identified based on the value-focused approach to multi-criteria analysis, and stakeholder preference is represented by pair-wise comparison (AHP analysis). Subsequently, the simple additive weighting (SAW) method is used to determine the suitability of an area for each protection level using spatial analysis software. Through this study, a zoning scheme considering both the scientific soundness and the practical feasibility of the Sheik Seid Marine National Park (SSMNP) in the Eritrean waters is proposed. The method could serve as a model for developing a zoning plan for those similar cases, particularly in the developing countries with data and financial and technical limits.

Addressing community needs or aspirations is critical for the success of marine protected areas (MPAs). However MPA design based on the results of systematic conservation planning tools alone does not fully represent important information on socioeconomic factors. This is because of the reliance of conservation planning tools on spatial data which is better suited to ecological rather than socioeconomic factors which are predominantly non-spatial. We present a case study from Raja Ampat in Indonesia, to demonstrate how we developed MPA zoning plans for six multiple use MPAs that encompass more than 1 million ha of the world's most diverse coral reef ecosystems. These were developed by combining analysis of ecological and spatial socioeconomic data using decision support tools (Marzone), and incorporation of non-spatial socioeconomic data from experts, stakeholders, and local communities. By explicitly including socioeconomic criteria and data into MPA zoning, the final zoning plans recognize community use and governance of resources, maximize equity and access to traditional fishing grounds, and better support long-term food security and livelihoods of local communities. These plans also met recommended guidelines for resilient MPA design and were supported by the community and MPA managers (i.e. Raja Ampat Regency and Indonesian National Government). This case study can act as a guide to other MPA managers and conservation practitioners to better incorporate socioeconomic considerations into MPA zoning plans and systematic marine conservation planning.

In recent years, the concept of sustainable forest management has evolved into a number of Criteria and Indicators schemes that are designed to guide the practice of sustainable forestry. One such mechanism is the Montreal Process Criteria and Indicators, which identifies seven criteria and 54 indicators associated with these seven criteria. While there is sufficient basic forest data available through the FAO's Global Forest Resource Assessment (2015), it is unclear how big forest countries compare in the key parameters surrounding sustainable forest management as defined by major Criteria and Indicator schemes. To accomplish this, we performed analyses of the Global Forest Resources Assessment 2015 (FRA) country report data to provide insights into the current status and trends in the period 1990–2015 in eight jurisdictions, namely Australia, Canada, China, Japan, the European Union, New Zealand, the Russian Federation and the USA. This study found that Canada has performed well against several key sustainable forest management parameters of the Montreal Process, including forest area designated for multiple use, and protective functions such as soil and water conservation and ecosystems services. Forest area in Canada remained stable over the past 25 years, although a relatively small area of forest had been lost. Compared to other countries, the rate of deforestation (which involves a change in land use) in Canada is small and has declined from 65,000 ha per year in 1990 to 48,000 ha per year in 2010. Forest area was also compared in the category of primary forest. Canada lost 741,000 ha of primary forest from 1990 to 2015, although this does not necessarily imply a change in total forest area. Our findings show that Canada, has some of the most stringent forest management legal and policy frameworks. While most other jurisdictions have only national and state level policies and a legislative framework to support sustainable forest management, Canada has comprehensive policies and a legislative framework in place at the national, provincial and local levels. In terms of social parameters, stakeholders are allowed to be involved in the planning, operations and review of almost all forest areas in our selected jurisdictions. This study demonstrates that the forest management and conservation regime in Canada, within the studied domains i.e. legal framework, management plans, national forest inventory and stakeholder involvement, incorporates a sophisticated understanding of the global, national and local interests linking economic, environmental and social issues.

The integrated landscape approach is re-emerging in the global agenda as an approach which can give a fair deal to landscape functions such as climate change response, biodiversity conservation, food security, poverty reduction and economic growth. However, transformational change might be required to enable landscapes respond to these different functions. This is due to the sensitive nature of landscapes to local, national and global economic, social and political drivers. Based on national policy instruments, this paper presents a situational analysis of the landscape concept in Cameroon, operationalized as Technical Operation Units (TOUs) and in the context of the present institutional, social, economic and political features, it examines the rationale for a landscape approach in Cameroon. We notice potential trade-offs, indicating that the landscape approach is an opportunity for TOUs in Cameroon. Firstly, TOUs are characterized by multiple resource regimes with overlapping claims each having a legal land allocation and management plan. Secondly, TOUs are characterized by different stakeholders, with different land-use interests and motives, each controlling key components in the landscapes. Thirdly, the interests and motives of stakeholders overlap spatially and are connected to different sectoral policies at the national level. This setting might threaten decision making and the sustainability potentials of landscapes. Nonetheless, we propose areas for in-depth studies to generate knowledge and information to orientate win–win policy construction for landscapes. This is relevant for the social, ecological and economic objectives that underpin the sustainable development goals proposed in the post-2015 development agenda.

The designation of marine protected areas (MPAs) may have intense social and economic effects on human communities. Driven by overarching global and European policies and national legislations, current systematic conservation planning in the UK and France requires an ecosystem approach that takes into account not only nature but also the human activities that take place in an area. Here, we identified a set of 64 socioeconomic variables potentially relevant for marine and coastal stakeholders in a European context and a comprehensive set of 20 marine and coastal stakeholder categories. Ninety national organisations in the UK and France belonging to those categories and potentially affected by/interested in the designation of multiple-use MPAs were identified and surveyed. Results show that environmental NGOs, research centres, local councils, managing agencies and statutory nature conservation bodies perceived that they are positively affected by these MPAs, whereas fishers’ organisations, shipping and aggregate industrial organisations and recreational organisations perceived to be chiefly negatively affected by MPAs. On average, the ecological effects of multiple-use MPAs are perceived as ‘largely positive’, though 30% of respondents did not perceive any positive ecological effects from these MPAs. The social, economic and cultural effects of such MPAs are perceived as ‘moderately positive’. Most respondents perceived broad range (>10 km) and permanent ecological, social, economic and cultural effects from multiple-use MPA designation suggesting high societal expectations towards these areas. However, only five variables were perceived to vary in intensity after the designation of multiple-use MPAs: ‘research’, ‘environmental performance by citizens, businesses and towns’, ‘number of green businesses’, ‘tourism’ and ‘economic activities’. The most important ‘social’ variables for stakeholder organisations referred to local populations’ engagement with the MPA, tourism and research. The most important ‘economic’ variables were linked to fishing, shipping and aquaculture activities. These variables highlight relevant topics to be considered in MPA planning, designation and management processes, especially in the UK and France. There were statistically significant differences in the ratings of socioeconomic variables between many organisations belonging to the same intuitive stakeholder categories, suggesting the importance of including as wide a range of stakeholder organisations as feasible in MPA socioeconomic-related processes. Our methods and findings can help to inform and streamline ongoing and future participatory MPA planning, management and monitoring processes in Europe and in other regions with similar socioeconomic characteristics.

Marine Spatial Planning attempts to develop integrated planning frameworks for the management of activities within marine ecosystems and support sustainable development. This study demonstrates the application and testing of an existing multiple-use zoning scheme within Scottish territorial waters. The zoning scheme developed is based on integrating existing legally permitted management mechanisms to develop a series of zones where increasing number of activities are restricted. When applied, the zoning scheme allows for assessment of the ability of current governance mechanisms to cope with the increasing number of activities and developments in the marine environment and the pressures associated with them. The zoning scheme was tested by evaluating how the zones defined relate to the protection of features of conservation interest. Specifically, it was tested by determining the proportion of the five rarest marine landscapes as classified by UKSeaMap 2010 and also a selection of OSPAR Priority Marine Features that fell within different zones within Scottish waters.

Zoning is a basic step to separate protected areas for planning and sustainable management purposes of a region. The objective of this study was to obtain potential zones in Boujagh national park within an area of 3266 ha, in Guilan province, Iran, by using grid method. For this purpose, after recognizing ecological, social and economic resources, data analysis was performed with grid method in Geographic Information System (GIS) feature in a 1/25000 scale. The gridding of studied area was conducted by using satellite image of IRS 2007 and Arc GIS 9.3 software. A number of 160 grid cells and 40 micro grids were recognized in the studied park and the data of each grid cell was imported in cell characteristics table, using GIS. According to ecological characteristics of Boujagh national park and based on the classification for the parameters, some specific ecological models were designed. Also, ecological capability evaluation of area was performed by several agent techniques for different zones. After recognizing and organizing of zones, zoning map of the studied national park was created. The results indicated that in coastal marine Boujagh national park, the strict nature, protected, extensive use, intensive use, recovery, administrative, scientific use and multiple use zones are consisted of 21.85, 56.05, 3.35, 6.09, 0.82, 0.05, 1.64 and 10.16 percents of the total studied area, respectively.

Decision-makers focus on representing biodiversity pattern, maintaining connectivity, and strengthening resilience to global warming when designing marine protected area (MPA) systems, especially in coral reef ecosystems. The achievement of these broad conservation objectives will likely require large areas, and stretch limited funds for MPA implementation. We undertook a spatial prioritisation of Brazilian coral reefs that considered two types of conservation zones (i.e. no-take and multiple use areas) and integrated multiple conservation objectives into MPA planning, while assessing the potential impact of different sets of objectives on implementation costs. We devised objectives for biodiversity, connectivity, and resilience to global warming, determined the extent to which existing MPAs achieved them, and designed complementary zoning to achieve all objectives combined in expanded MPA systems. In doing so, we explored interactions between different sets of objectives, determined whether refinements to the existing spatial arrangement of MPAs were necessary, and tested the utility of existing MPAs by comparing their cost effectiveness with an MPA system designed from scratch. We found that MPAs in Brazil protect some aspects of coral reef biodiversity pattern (e.g. threatened fauna and ecosystem types) more effectively than connectivity or resilience to global warming. Expanding the existing MPA system was as cost-effective as designing one from scratch only when multiple objectives were considered and management costs were accounted for. Our approach provides a comprehensive assessment of the benefits of integrating multiple objectives in the initial stages of conservation planning, and yields insights for planners of MPAs tackling multiple objectives in other regions.

The 2030 agenda presents an integrated set of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and targets that will shape development activities for the coming decade. The challenge now facing development organizations and governments is how to operationalize this interconnected set of goals and targets through effective projects and programs. This paper presents a micro-level modeling approach that can quantitatively assess the impacts associated with rural water interventions that are tailored to specific communities. The analysis focuses on how a multiple-use water services (MUS) approach to SDG 6 could reinforce a wide range of other SDGs and targets. The multilevel modeling framework provides a generalizable template that can be used in multiple sectors. In this paper, we apply the methodology to a dataset on rural water services from Mozambique to show that community-specific equivalents of macro-level variables used in the literature such as Cost of Illness (COI) avoided can provide a better indication of the impacts of a specific intervention. The proposed modeling framework presents a new frontier for designing projects in any sector that address the specific needs of communities, while also leveraging the knowledge gained from previous projects in any country. The approach also presents a way for agencies and organizations to design projects or programs that bridge sectors/disciplines (water, irrigation, health, energy, economic development, etc.) to advance an interconnected set of SDGs and targets. Published version

This chapter describes and analyses overlapping planning structures and multi-level planning issues and how they affect current land use and management in the forest landscape. Forest land use in Sweden is based on a large proportion of privately owned forests with the primary purpose of producing timber for the forest industries. Nevertheless, the forests are also characterised by multiple uses and many stakeholders (economic as well as ecological and social) who express themselves and relate to forest management. In this chapter, we present a number of methods, both traditional and more recent, for managing multiple use of the forest landscape. These range from physical planning and the Swedish Right of Public Access to Natura 2000, forest certification, reindeer-husbandry plans, and scenario techniques.

Urban and peri-urban forests are recognized as basic elements for Nature-Based Solutions (NBS), as they preserve and may increase environmental quality in urbanized contexts. For this reason, the amount of forest land per inhabitant is a pivotal efficiency indicator to be considered in the sustainable governance, land management, planning and design of metropolitan areas. The present study illustrates a multivariate analysis of per-capita forest area (PFA) in mainland Attica, the urban region surrounding Athens, Greece. Attica is considered a typical case of Mediterranean urbanization where planning has not regulated urban expansion and successive waves of spontaneous growth have occurred over time. In such a context, an analysis of factors that can affect landscape changes in terms of PFA may inform effective strategies for the sustainable management of socio-ecological local systems in light of the NBS perspective. A total of 26 indicators were collected per decade at the municipal scale in the study area with the aim to identify the factors most closely associated to the amount of PFA. Indicators of urban morphology and functions have been considered together with environmental and topographical variables. In Attica, PFA showed a progressive decrease between 1960 and 2010. In particular, PFA progressively declined (1980, 1990) along fringe areas surrounding Athens and in peri-urban districts experiencing dispersed expansion of residential settlements. Distance from core cities and from the seacoast, typical urban functions (e.g., multiple use of buildings and per capita built-up area) and percentage of agricultural land-use in each municipality are the variables most associated with high PFA. In recent years, some municipalities have shown an expansion of forest cover, mainly due to land abandonment and forest recolonization. Findings from this case study have allowed us to identify priorities for NBS at metropolitan level aimed at promoting more sustainable urbanization. Distinctively, proposed NBS basically focus on (i) the effective protection of crop mosaics with relict woodlots; (ii) the improvement of functionality, quality and accessibility of new forests; and (iii) the establishment of new forests in rural municipalities.

Aquaculture will be the dominant producer of global seafood in the 21st Century and the emerging open ocean farming sector must play an important role. Current concepts for utilizing the ocean for aquaculture in national Exclusive Economic Zones, include; standalone structures for growing shellfish and finfish and aquaculture production facilities co-located with other, compatible ocean uses, e.g., offshore oil platforms and wind energy towers. There may also be potential for multiple use of marine space incorporating aquaculture at different trophic levels together with artificial reefs, recreational angling and diving and commercial fishing using static gear. This chapter examines the global status of open ocean aquaculture (OOA), stand alone and co-located projects, in national ocean jurisdictions. Regulatory regimes and experiences permitting OOA shellfish and finfish farming in the United States and shellfish farming in the United Kingdom are shared. Examples of the permitting process from several U.S. states are also cited. Finally, conclusions and recommendations are offered to assist nations in formulating and implementing regulatory systems to effectively facilitate commercial aquaculture development in the open ocean environment.

Landscapes undergo changes in structure and function at multiple temporal and spatial levels. As a consequence of natural and anthropogenic drivers, these changes affect options for land use. We describe winter land use by reindeer husbandry in the boreal forest in Northern Sweden. The landscape changes in its suitability for husbandry practices due to environmental stochasticity and transformations due to other forms of land use. This creates structures that can either (i) promote flexibility in the form of mobility or (ii) create fragmentation that restricts adaptation to changes. As these drivers are interdependent in their influence on land use practices by reindeer herders, different choices regarding husbandry strategies have to be made within a season and between years. To allow such choices and ensure pastoral resilience to change, boreal forests should be regulated to provide continuity of grazing resources at multiple temporal and spatial levels.

Recent studies have shown that social networks and their properties are key in the search for explanations for the success in the governance and management of natural resources. We investigated the structure and properties of inter-organizational social networks involved in the use and management of natural resources in a coastal marine ecosystem in northern Chile proposed as a possible marine protected area. We explored two network configurations: i) relations of collaboration and ii) relations of transfer and exchange of scientific knowledge and information useful to the management of natural resources and the decision-making process involved. Both networks showed little cohesion, with low values of centralization and density indicating a low flow of collaborative and exchange relations among different stakeholders. The knowledge network achieved greater levels of centralization than the collaboration network. National government agencies and fishermen organizations were the most powerful stakeholders in the collaboration network. National government agencies and universities were the most powerful stakeholders in the knowledge network. We found a disconnected network when analyzing the flows of collaboration and knowledge between different administrative operation levels that potentially would hamper the governance of this area. On the other hand, we identified stakeholders that would help to connect the network (bridging stakeholders). Additional analysis of stakeholders using influence-capacity matrix allowed us to identify key stakeholders for planning and implementing the new marine protected area, compare results with the network analysis, and propose network interventions. We propose combining Social Network Analysis with other methods of stakeholder analysis to produce more practical and implementable results. Our results are relevant for future interventions aimed at improving or implementing management and governance of coastal areas.

The conflict between conservation and timber production is shifting in regions such as Biscay (Basque Country, northern Spain) where planted forests are no longer profitable without public subsidies and environmentalist claim that public subsidies should be reoriented to the regeneration of natural forest. This paper develops an approach that integrates scientific knowledge and stakeholders’ demands to provide decision-making guidelines for the development of new landscape planning strategies while considering ecosystem services. First, a participatory process was conducted to develop a community vision for the region’s sustainable future considering the opportunities and constrains provided by the landscape and its ecosystems. In the participatory process forest management was considered an important driver for the region`s landscape development and forest multi-functionality was envisioned as a feasible attractive alternative. The participatory process identified a knowledge gap on the synergies and trade-offs between biodiversity and carbon storage and how these depend on different forest types. Second, to study the existing synergies and trade-offs between biodiversity and carbon storage and disentangle the identified knowledge gap, a GIS-based research was conducted based on spatially explicit indicators. Our spatial analysis results showed that natural forests’ contribution to biodiversity and carbon storage is higher than that of the plantations with exotic species in the region. The results from the spatial analysis converged with those from the participatory process in the suitability of promoting, where possible and appropriate, natural forest ecosystems restoration. This iterative learning and decision making process is already showing its effectiveness for decision making, with concrete examples of how the results obtained with the applied approach are being included in planning and decision-making processes.

Multiple-use public lands require balancing diverse resource uses and values across landscapes. In the California desert, there is strong interest in renewable energy development and important conservation concerns. The Bureau of Land Management recently completed a land-use plan for the area that provides protection for modeled suitable habitat for multiple rare plants. Three sets of habitat models were commissioned for plants of conservation concern as part of the planning effort. The Bureau of Land Management then needed to determine which model or combination of models to use to implement plan requirements. Our goals were to: 1) develop a process for evaluating the existing habitat models and 2) use the evaluation results to map probable and potential suitable habitat. We developed a method for evaluating the construction (input data and methods) and performance of existing models and applied it to 88 habitat models for 43 rare plant species. We also developed a process for mapping probable and potential suitable habitat based on the existing models; potential habitat maps are intended only to guide future field surveys. We were able to map probable suitable habitat for 26 of the 43 species and potential suitable habitat for 41 species. Forty percent of the project area contains probable suitable habitat for at least one species (43,338 km(2)), with much of that habitat (43%) occurring on lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management. Lands prioritized for renewable energy development contain 3% of the habitat modeled as suitable for at least one species. Our products can be used by agencies to review proposed projects and plan future plant surveys and by developers to target sites likely to minimize conflicts with rare plant conservation goals. Our methods can be broadly applied to understand and quantify the defensibility of models used in conservation and regulatory contexts.

Australia's Great Barrier Reef is the largest coral reef ecosystem on earth. The governance of such a large and iconic area is complex due to the overlapping federal and state (Queensland) jurisdictions. Since 1975 this globally significant area has been protected by pioneering federal legislation which enabled the ‘reasonable use’ of natural resources to co-exist with conservation, thus introducing the concept of a multiple-use marine park. In 1981 the Great Barrier Reef was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Area. Today a federal multiple-use Marine Park covers 99% of the Great Barrier Reef Region and World Heritage Area, with the remaining areas under state jurisdiction. A close working partnership between the federal and state governments has evolved over 37 years and includes complementary legislation, joint field management and joint permits. In the face of increasing pressures, management of the Great Barrier Reef continues to be effective for a range of reasons, including a sound governance/legislative framework together with complementary federal/state legislation; integrated management with relevant federal and state agencies; and the application of ecosystem-based management principles both inside and outside the area of the marine park's jurisdiction. This integrated and comprehensive management model is widely regarded as effective by marine and coastal managers around the world.

This paper presents a deterministic finite time horizon dynamic optimisation model aimed to determine optimal paths for artificial plantations and natural regeneration of two main tree species in dehesa multiple use ecosystems, holm oak ( Quercus ilex L. ) and cork oak ( Q. suber L. ). Whilst dehesa forest sustainability problems associated to exhaustive use of grazing resources have been indirectly approached by European Union authorities, providing support for artificial plantations over treeless land, no mention is made to natural regeneration techniques. In this sense, the formulated model allows for natural regeneration of already established ageing stands as a complement or even a substitute of actual reforestation practices. The proposed methodology is neither designed to determine optimal rotation of tree species nor optimal decorticating or pruning cycles of cork oaks and holm oaks, respectively. Instead, this information enters the model exogenously through knowledge of region specific silvicultural cycles for those commercially relevant tree species, and the optimisation program acts as an optimal land use allocator and thus a practical tool for policy analysis purposes. In addition to existing cost benefit analysis applications in dehesa ecosystems, the presented model allows in one side efficient evaluation of long term management dynamics —thus oak woodlands sustainability can be tested for sufficiently large time horizons—, and in the other, management decisions, instead of being forced through predefined scenarios, correspond to the optimal actions a decision agent would take from the complete set of feasible possibilities given actual land use and tree age distributions.

Human land use contributes significantly to the growth of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Changes in land management practices have been proposed as a critical and cost-effective mechanism for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and promoting the storage of additional carbon in vegetation and soils. However many discussions of the potential for land use to mitigate climate change only take into account biophysical factors such as vegetation and land cover and neglect how the agency of land owners themselves affects whether additional carbon storage can be achieved. Unlike many potential REDD opportunities in developing countries, land management in the U.S. to enhance carbon sequestration would occur against a backdrop of clearly defined, legally enforceable land ownership. In addition, more than a third of the land surface in the U.S. is managed by federal agencies who operate under legal guidelines for multiple use and is subject to demands from multiple constituencies. We set out to investigate how the goal of enhancing carbon sequestration through land use is perceived or implemented in one region of the U.S., and how this goal might intersect the existing drivers and incentives for public and private land use decision making. We conducted a case study through interviews of the major categories of landowners in the state of Colorado, which represents a mixture of public and privately held lands. By analyzing trends in interview responses across categories, we found that managing for carbon is currently a fairly low priority and we identify several barriers to more widespread consideration of carbon as a management priority including competing objectives, limited resources, lack of information, negative perceptions of offsetting and lack of a sufficient policy signal. We suggest four avenues for enhancing the potential for carbon to be managed through land use including clarifying mandates for public lands, providing compelling incentives for private landowners, improving understanding of the co-benefits and tradeoffs of managing for carbon, and creating more usable science to support decision making.

In the article, the need of transition to the rational subsoil use (the alternative mining approach) is proved, which unlike general one supposes the increasing of extraction rate of valuable components in the deposit and multiple use of raw materials, the maximizing recycling, the decreasing of land occupation, the increasing of the development period of deposit at some income decrease up to the moderate level, which is enough to provide the attraction for investors. The multicriteriality is considered as the crucial principle of rational subsoil use at taking management decisions, i.e. the considering of ecological, economic and social targets, aimed at receiving moderate profit at proper social and environmental standards. The graphic representation of models of the general mining approach and the alternative one allows to emphasize the specified advantages of transition to rational subsoil resources development and reflect them in design equation. In the paper, three performance strategies providing the implementation of the alternative approach are offered: full-field development, application ecologically and economically effective systems and the development processes, consideration of reclamation and minimization of long term environmental effects of mining.

Management of federal public forests to meet sustainability goals and multiple use regulations is an immense challenge. To succeed, we suggest use of formal decision science procedures and tools in the context of structured decision making (SDM). SDM entails four stages: problem structuring (framing the problem and defining objectives and evaluation criteria), problem analysis (defining alternatives, evaluating likely consequences, identifying key uncertainties, and analyzing tradeoffs), decision point (identifying the preferred alternative), and implementation and monitoring the preferred alternative with adaptive management feedbacks. We list a wide array of models, techniques, and tools available for each stage, and provide three case studies of their selected use in National Forest land management and project plans. Successful use of SDM involves participation by decision-makers, analysts, scientists, and stakeholders. We suggest specific areas for training and instituting SDM to foster transparency, rigor, clarity, and inclusiveness in formal decision processes regarding management of national forests.

Summary Roads cause functional habitat loss, alter movement patterns and can become ecological traps for wildlife. Many of the negative effects of roads are likely to be a function of the human use of roads, not the road itself. However, few studies have examined the effect of temporally and spatially varying traffic patterns on large mammals, which could lead to misinterpretations about the impact of roads on wildlife. We developed models of traffic volume for an entire road network in south-western Alberta, Canada, and documented for the first time the response of grizzly bears Ursus arctos L to a wide range of traffic levels. Traffic patterns caused a clear behavioural shift in grizzly bears, with increased use of areas near roads and movement across roads during the night when traffic was low. Bears selected areas near roads travelled by fewer than 20 vehicles per day and were more likely to cross these roads. Bears avoided roads receiving moderate traffic (20–100 vehicles per day) and strongly avoided high-use roads (>100 vehicles per day) at all times. Synthesis and applications. Grizzly bear responses to traffic caused a departure from typical behavioural patterns, with bears in our study being largely nocturnal. In addition, bears selected private agricultural land, which had lower traffic levels, but higher road density, over multi-use public land. These results improve our understanding of bear responses to roads and can be used to refine management practices. Future management plans should employ a multi-pronged approach aimed at limiting both road density and traffic in core habitats. Access management will be critical in such plans and is an important tool for conserving threatened wildlife populations.

The majority of the world's forests are used for multiple purposes, which often include the potentially conflicting goals of timber production and biodiversity conservation. A scientifically validated management approach that can reduce such conflicts is retention forestry, an approach modeled on natural processes, which emerged in the last 25 years as an alternative to clearcutting. A portion of the original stand is left unlogged to maintain the continuity of structural and compositional diversity. We detail retention forestry's ecological role, review its current practices, and summarize the large research base on the subject. Retention forestry is applicable to all forest biomes, complements conservation in reserves, and represents bottom-up conservation through forest manager involvement. A research challenge is to identify thresholds for retention amounts to achieve desired outcomes. We define key issues for future development and link retention forestry with land-zoning allocation at various scales, expanding its uses to forest restoration and the management of unevenage forests. Fil: Gustafsson, Lena. Sveriges Lantbruksuniversitet; Suecia Fil: Baker, Susan C.. University of Tasmania; Australia Fil: Bauhus, Jrgen. Universität Freiburg Im Breisgau; Alemania Fil: Beese, William J.. Vancouver Island University; Canadá Fil: Brodie, Angus. No especifica; Fil: Kouki, Jari. Itä-suomen Yliopisto; Finlandia Fil: Lindenmayer, David B.. Australian National University; Australia Fil: Lhmus, Asko. University Of Tartu; Estonia Fil: Martínez Pastur, Guillermo José. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Austral de Investigaciones Científicas; Argentina Fil: Messier, Christian. Le Réseau de L'université Du Québec; Canadá Fil: Neyland, Mark. Forestry Tasmania; Australia Fil: Palik, Brian. United States Department of Agriculture; Argentina Fil: Sverdrup Thygeson, Anne. Universitetet For Miljø- Og Biovitenskap; Noruega Fil: Volney, W. Jan A.. Northern Forestry Centre; Canadá Fil: Wayne, Adrian. Western Australia Department Of Environment And Conservation; Australia Fil: Franklin, Jerry F.. University Of Washington, Seattle

Legislation of greenbelts adjacent to cities is a common method to contain sprawl and protect land for multiple purposes e.g., agriculture, environment and recreation. However, greenbelt planning lacks an effective approach which can combine multiple intrinsic land characteristics with diverse stakeholder values to quantitatively identify a desired long term mix of land uses and the criteria upon which changes in land use can be judged. The research aimed to create a quantitative, community-engaged basis for the evolution of multiple land-uses. It evaluates a process to simultaneously develop multiple land-use designations e.g., for agriculture and environmental preservation, based on combining spatial multi-criteria modelling using MCAS-S software and stakeholder judgment. Trialling the process on a 129,000 ha portion of the Toronto Greenbelt demonstrated that it effectively identifies land that has embedded attributes or value and provides a real-time tool for assessing land-use scenarios. Maps of these attributes and focus-group scenarios did not coincide with the existing boundary of the Toronto Greenbelt. The MCAS-S composites that simultaneously address the multiple purposes of greenbelts (agriculture, environment, etc.) were likely to be helpful for policy-makers and researchers to identify land that was highly valued for several purposes and therefore likely to be contested, but they were less helpful than simple composites addressing one purpose as a basis of explanation and guiding community discussion. The method is unlikely to be scalable across large heterogeneous areas, other than to assist professionals and identify inconsistencies in land-use classification, because local knowledge is desirable for consensus on land-use scenarios.

Federal land managers are faced with the task of balancing multiple uses and goals when making decisions about land use and the activities that occur on public lands. Though climate change is now well recognized by federal agencies and their local land and resource managers, it is not yet clear how issues related to climate change will be incorporated into on-the-ground decision making within the framework of multiple use objectives. We conducted a case study of a federal land management agency field office, the San Juan Public Lands Center in Durango, CO, U.S.A., to understand from their perspective how decisions are currently made, and how climate change and carbon management are being factored into decision making. We evaluated three major management sectors in which climate change or carbon management may intersect other use goals: forests, biofuels, and grazing. While land managers are aware of climate change and eager to understand more about how it might affect land resources, the incorporation of climate change considerations into everyday decision making is currently quite limited. Climate change is therefore on the radar screen, but remains a lower priority than other issues. To assist the office in making decisions that are based on sound scientific information, further research is needed into how management activities influence carbon storage and resilience of the landscape under climate change.

Constraints in making multiple use forest management a more widespread land use type across the tropics still prevail. Technical and managerial capacities usually differ for different forest products, market opportunities and degrees of market knowledge. Local communities or small-scale forest operators face difficulties in adjusting traditional practices to implement official forestry regulations, that are usually drafted with little harmonization of different management objectives and also little consideration of local socio-ecological contexts. Strategies that optimize trade-offs, by nature more complex than trade-offs in single-commodity production systems, have been neglected. Although the available evidence suggests that formal management practices favor specialization over integration, studies that attempted to discern or draw lessons learned seem, to date, limited. This Special Issue is intended to further contribute to the knowledge related to biophysical, institutional, regulatory and socio-economic aspects influencing the design, implementation and effectiveness of multiple use management throughout the forested tropics. A few messages emerge. Although the constraints impeding the implementation of multiple use of forests differ little from the constraints in plans that only include timber, the required trade-offs in the former are expected to be more problematic. Refining the scientific basis for assessing and minimizing trade-offs at different spatial scales is warranted. As important as it may be to establish multiple use objectives from the outset and involve different stakeholders in the planning process, social learning and multi-stakeholder dialogue in the context of adaptive management are needed to maintain these objectives over time, both from the top down and the bottom up. For managers and practitioners to work on multiple forest use in the tropics they must consider spatial aspects in detail, from the stand to the landscape. Finally, moving from “concept to reality” will also require new forestry training and education approaches to keep up with the ever-growing methods for valuing and using tropical forests.

The changing nature of Swedish national parks from a primarily resource protection emphasis to a more multiple use philosophy, including tourism, requires new ways of looking at park-related planning and development. Tourism must not be considered in a vacuum spatially but from a broad regional perspective as its economic impact is greater than just that which occurs in or adjacent to a park. The aim of this study was to analyze primary economic impacts (expenditures) at three different spatial levels (in the park, the gateway communities, and the region outside these gateway communities) associated with tourism to Fulufjallet National Park in Sweden. Results show that park visitors do have significant economic expenditures beyond the national park and nearby gateway communities. The probability of expenditures, and the magnitude of those expenditures, increases with a wider geographical scale of analysis. These observations illustrate the importance of examining national park tourism from a wider spatial...

The IUCN protected area management category system provides an internationally-recognized, unifying framework for the description and classification of the world’s diverse protected areas. It includes six main categories, of which category V has attracted debate because of its emphasis on the role of harmonious people–nature interactions in maintaining biodiversity within cultural landscapes. Madagascar’s new generation of protected areas comprises sites mainly proposed as category V, with the joint management objectives of biodiversity conservation and the promotion of natural resource use for rural development. Here, I use a categorization decision tool to investigate the categorization of 10 new protected areas proposed as category V, and find that these sites fail to meet the criteria for any management category. I argue that category V is inappropriate for these new protected areas because their associated people–nature interactions are largely negative for biodiversity. I further argue that management of these new protected areas differs fundamentally from management of category V protected areas in Europe, and recommend the modification of the management category system to account for such distinctions.