The limitations and risks of land use change tools in decision-making: Lessons from Galloway and Southern Ayrshire UNESCO Biosphere, Scotland

Abstract

Land use change is needed to mitigate climate change and biodiversity loss and is increasingly incentivised through natural capital approaches that reward delivery of ecosystem services including carbon sequestration and biodiversity. A proliferation of land use change decision-support tools are developed –often by private companies– to support land use change decision-making and measure success of government policy and private investment targets. However, understanding of land manager uptake of these tools is often limited, and the limitations and risks of tools used to support land use change decision-making is understudied. We explore these knowledge gaps in a UNESCO Biosphere in Galloway and Southern Ayrshire, Scotland through nineteen interviews with a wide range of land managers. We found that the promotion of tools as a mechanism to deliver rapid land use change is unlikely to be successful for three reasons: 1) the dominant focus on instrumental values, neglecting land managers’ broader values; 2) the technocratic tools-based approach to decision-making is at odds with land manager behaviour; and 3) the importance of peer-led networks is neglected. Framing the promotion of tools as another form of environmental rescaling, we argue that they are a red herring in addressing issues of land use change. The emphasis should instead be on appropriately supporting and resourcing local peer-led networks to enable and incentivise land-use change. These findings have global relevance given increasing promotion of these approaches within international policy and country-level policy in many countries worldwide.