November 28th, 2013

Research Coordinator Dr. Nidhi Nagabhatla attended "Global Landscapes Forum"

Dr. Nidhi Nagabhatla, BioDIVA research coordinator, attended the first ever Global Landscapes Forum (GLF), held in Warsaw (16th-17th November 2013) on the side-lines of COP19. The forum with the overarching target to stimulate discourse on climate and development agenda for forest and agriculture was planned to pitch an argument for a standalone sustainable development goal (SDG) on landscapes. As the post-2015 development global agenda is being carved out, wherein SDG’s are ready to take over MDG’s (Millennium Development Goals), clarity to understand landscape structure, function, benefit and the interlink with social capital is becoming all the more pertinent.

For the concept of sustainable development to become a shared vision, creating a common understanding is fundamental. It deems that experts of various scientific disciplines along with non-academic stakeholders are part of integrated resource management approaches. During the course of the two day event: case studies, projects outcomes, expert comments, example of development interventions implemented by the states or bilateral/multilateral development agencies, interactive discussion sessions together provided a good illustration on how practical information from the plethora of scientific disciplines, along with stakeholder’s perceptions can contribute towards a joint understanding for landscapes. Nevertheless, it would be ambitious to achieve a holistic understanding within a two-day discourse and from a multitude of perceptions of thousands of participating stakeholders. However, GLF initiated an intention to achieve the same. In line with the above argument, it would be interesting to observe, how synergies between the landscape approach propagated by GLF and Ecosystem Based Management framework widely disseminated by the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA-2005) are explored.

Dr. Nagabhatla argues, that the framework of the transdisciplinary approach could support the principal focus of GLF to create a common understanding for landscapes via the landscape approach. In addition, ongoing initiatives such as the BioDIVA project could appropriately compliment that understanding. It exemplifies, how a transdisciplinary framework with a socio-ecological perspective can be applied in practice, and if this application has relevance for different stakeholders. That said, re-viewing the insights on how multiple stakeholders understand landscapes do not necessarily require re-inventing the wheel of knowledge, rather reorientation of the existing knowledge base towards action and implementation

Related to this, Dr. Nagabhatla released her article "An argument for a sustainable development goal on landscapes" in the publication "Outreach". Outreach is a multi-stakeholder publication on climate change and sustainable development produced by the Stakeholder Forum for a Sustainable Future. It has been produced at various international meetings on the environment.

Read the article