Land Use Policy最新文献

Insecure rights tend to lead to land-use conflicts. The literature mainly focuses on the impact of insecure land rights on investment. Regarding the causes, studies mainly focus on the effect of state regulations. Little attention is given to the impact of the extractive economy on land rights security. This article scrutinizes how palm oil expansion manipulates insecure land rights, leading to land-use conflict. We pay attention to a particular land right in Indonesia that is based on the´ land status letter´ (Surat Keterangan Tanah, SKT), an initial proof of land ownership that is widely held by villagers in Indonesia. Studies have neglected this land right, as most attention has been on customary rights (Adat). Our main questions are: How do palm oil companies treat the SKT in their efforts to obtain more land for their plantations, and how do farmers try to fight for their SKT rights? Using a qualitative case study in Indonesia´s Riau Province, we show that because of a shared perception that SKTs offer security, villagers did not attempt to get a full legal land certificate from the Land Agency, and palm oil companies often manipulated SKT land rights to acquire land for new plantations. Limited access to conflict resolution mechanisms hampers landholders’ efforts to enforce their land rights, and our study suggests that the security of SKT land rights depends upon landholders’ ability to fight for their rights. NGOs did not help empower them in this matter in most cases.

Due to higher levels of urbanization and increasing impermeable hard land covers, green spaces are decreasing, resulting in stormwater loss as surface runoff instead of being absorbed by soil and reintroduced into the water cycle. This study investigates the effect of land use ratios and land cover materials resulting from settlement design on surface runoff volume. The study was conducted using various scenarios in 9 settlements with different land use ratios, including roofs, sidewalks, parking areas, roadways, and green areas in Istanbul, a city with a high urbanization rate. Thus, surface runoff volume in settlements depending on the land use ratios was evaluated. A total of 336 material combinations were developed using various material alternatives in addition to different land use ratios. Therefore, the effect of different land cover materials used in the settlements on surface runoff volume was also evaluated. Study requirements were taken into consideration when choosing the calculation method, and the Rational Method, often preferred for calculating surface runoff volumes in small urban basins, was chosen. According to the calculation results obtained from the settlements developed for this study, surface runoff volume can be reduced by 37.10 % by increasing only the green space ratio and by 67.65 % by using different material alternatives in the same settlement. Additionally, it was observed that each improvement made to reduce surface runoff in settlements resulted in a positive change.

It has been widely recognized that progress toward achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) must be better harmonized with Ecosystem Services (ESs) to tackle global challenges. In China, the National Key Ecological Function Areas (NKEFAs) were set up as one of the ecological fiscal transfer projects. Despite its significant influences on the SDGs-ESs nexus, there is a lack of empirical studies on the effects and mechanisms of policy. In response, this study provides a synthesized framework that incorporates the coupling coordination degree between the Urban Sustainable Development Goals (USDGs) and Ecosystem Services Scores (ESSs), empirically verifies the policy effect using the difference-in-differences model, and then further investigates the mechanisms of government action to coordinate urban SDGs and ESs. The results show that: (1) The coupling coordination degree between USDGs and ESSs varies significantly across different regions but steadily increases over time, with a faster increasing rate of coordination degree growth in NKEEFAs pilot cities compared to non-pilot cities. (2) The policy has demonstrated benefits in coordinating USDGs and ESSs with a coefficient of 0.005. In detail, the policy enhances ESSs but concurrently exerts a negative influence on USDGs, with coefficients are 0.008 and −0.004 respectively, suggesting an uneven distribution of the policy's impacts. (3) The study unveils the 'technological innovation effect' and the 'industrial agglomeration effect' as crucial mediating pathways for policy effect, laying a solid foundation for USDGs and ESSs coordination. In total, the study highlights the critical need to account for regional development disparities and adequate funding in ecological protection policies to ensure fairness and effectiveness from a central decision-making standpoint. It recommends enhancing transparency in fiscal expenditures and fostering regional joint coordination to address local government challenges. These insights from this study can offer valuable guidance for policymakers to refine policy implementation and promote the coordination of regional ESs and SDGs.

The concept of self-containment in new towns has been widely discussed from social and economic perspectives. However, localized interpretations within the context of China's development, particularly regarding climate adaptability and urban heat island (UHI) mitigation, are scarce. To fill this gap, our research analyzed self-containment from the perspectives of urban spatial scale and land use function. Focusing on Shanghai’s five new towns, we empirically demonstrated how self-containment influenced the UHI effects from 2005 to 2020, employing the Geodetector method. The findings reveal that during the daytime, the intensity of UHI in new towns decreased, serving as vital connectivity nodes of UHI within the region. Conversely, during the nighttime, both the intensity and area of UHI showed an increasing trend. The research confirmed that expanding the urban scale and functional diversity are effective strategies for mitigating the UHI. Based on these findings, we offer practical suggestions for the development of new towns: Increase population size while ensuring coordination with development scale; enhance mixed-use functions in large-scale development projects like university towns and industrial parks; and be vigilant of potential functional decline in central areas and increasing thermal impact due to new town development. Overall, this study enriches our understanding of self-containment in Chinese new towns and provides valuable insights for mitigating UHI in other similar contexts.

Solely focusing on the agricultural production function of cultivated land resources is not conducive to the various demands for meeting the UN's Sustainable Development Goals. Recognizing the multifunctionality of cultivated land and understanding the interrelationships between individual functions are crucial for the rational planning and utilization of resources. This paper introduces an "element coupling-function synergy" analytical framework for the sustainable utilization of cultivated land resources. The proposed framework is based on the causal relationships between elements and functions within the cultivated land system. Subsequently, a causal Bayesian belief network was constructed to identify trade-offs and synergies among multiple functions of cultivated land resources in Guangdong, China. The findings reveal trade-offs between food cleanliness and food production/social security, and synergistic relationships among food production, social security, and ecological regulation, as well as among ecological regulation, habitat maintenance and landscape culture. The study area was divided into eight functional zones: Green Agricultural Zone, Agro-inputs Control Zone, Urban Agricultural Zone, Major Grain-producing Zone, Modern Agricultural Zone, Agro-ecological Preservation Zone, Agro-ecological Tourism Zone, Quality Improvement Zone. Multi-objective management plans were formulated for optimizing multifunctional relationships within each zone. The analysis result reveals the importance of nutrient conditions and ecological environments for the sustainable management of cultivated land. Consequently, specific policy recommendations are proposed accordingly. This paper may not only advance understanding of the multifunctionality of cultivated land but can also provide valuable insights for land-use planning to ensure the judicious and sustainable management of cultivated land resources.

Carbon emission reduction through land use management and forest-based initiatives such as REDD+ depends on multiple factors, including awareness programs, capacity building and inclusive design, and equitable and transparent benefit-sharing mechanisms. Even after a couple of decades of discussion over the REDD+ process, there have still been many contested issues that need to be resolved. Taking the case of three countries in the Asia and Pacific Region ― Vietnam, Nepal, and Fiji, ― at different stages of the REDD+, we have mapped the countries’ progress toward emission reduction program and its benefit-sharing mechanism, documented the perceived impact of a capacity building program and provided the stakeholders’ perspective on the performance of REDD+ program. Our study shows REDD+ participating countries are implementing various REDD+ capacity-building programs, but having a different level of impact from the stakeholders’ perspective. Multilevel governance presents challenges for REDD+ outcomes, as REDD+-related policies and legislations are constrained within the forest ministry but not in other sector ministries, leading to both vertical and horizontal coordination issues. Much emphasis has been given to the technical content of capacity-building programs but little has been done to enhance the functional capacity of REDD+ implementers, especially of Indigenous People and Local Communities. The decision-making process on emission reduction benefit-sharing is neither transparent nor inclusive. Although various social safeguard mechanisms are proposed by the studied countries, there is still a huge gap in understanding the impact capacity building programs in inclusive decision-making, and equitable benefit sharing for Indigenous people. REDD+ stakeholders perceived that REDD+ can be a promising financial tool for developing countries and also contribute to non-carbon benefits, but the prospects of benefit-sharing plans are not fairly inclusive. Increasing transparency and accountability through digital platforms, raising the carbon price from $5/tCO2, adopting unified safeguards, and strengthening horizontal and vertical collaboration at all levels are pivotal for the REDD+ program to generate manifold environmental and livelihood benefits in the Asia and Pacific Region.

Climate change and anthropogenic disturbances have threatened the ecosystem functions including ecological, production and livelihood functions (EPLFs) of the alpine grassland on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau (QTP). Integrating the trade-offs and synergies among the EPLFs into the regional development decision-making system is important for achieving sustainable development goals on the QTP. This study constructed an ecological-production-livelihood functions (EPLFs) index system to quantify and compare the functions of various cooperative and individual management grasslands. A comprehensive functions index (CFI), a total functions value (TF) and a trade-off index (TOI) were built to evaluate these two types of grasslands. The results indicated that production function (PF) of cooperative management grasslands were significantly higher and lower than those of individual management grasslands due to higher productive fixed assets of cooperative management grasslands. By contrast, ecological and livelihood function of cooperative and individual management grasslands did not show significant difference. In addition, the correlation between PF and CFI was also higher in cooperative management grasslands than individual management grasslands. The SEM analysis revealed that the ecological and production functions have positive direct effects on TF. Furthermore, the PF have negative direct effects on TOI. The cooperative management grasslands with higher PF can reduce TOI and enhance TF, and in turn increase the CFI, compared with individual management grasslands. The improvement of PF is critical for enhancing overall EPLFs and decreasing the trade-off of EPLFs. Therefore, we recommend that policymakers attach importance to the multi-objective optimization potential offered by cooperative management grasslands, and provide corresponding policy support to decrease trade-offs and increase synergies of EPLFs on the QTP.

The use of Land Value Capture (LVC) tools in addressing urban inequality is a much-debated problem. A vital aspect of this problem is how the effectiveness of these tools could be measured. To this end, the article focuses on the credibility of LVC tools and assesses this in terms of the extent to which these instruments successfully embody the social function of property. The theoretical perspective of the credibility thesis could be a fruitful approach for understanding how LVC tools materialize (or not) the social function of property. Based on this, the article analyzes whether LVC tools arose endogenously from the interactions between social actors or whether they were exogenously imposed thereby generating the emergence of non-credible institutions. To deal with this complex issue, the article employs a broad qualitative and quantitative dataset (i.e. court cases, interviews, surveys, government/corporate statistics and textual materials), as well as integrated methods including the Conflict Analysis Model (CAM) to measure conflict intensity; the Formal, Actual and Targeted (FAT) Framework to identify actors’ perceptual divergences; and the Credibility Scales and Intervention (CSI) Checklist to relate credibility to desired policy effects. As a case-study, the paper examines LVC tools in a socio-economically skewed metropolis in South America: Medellín, Colombia.

Research on land use policy has been vexed by the pivotal question of which institutions achieve credibility. Scholars have been split as it has been difficult to assess credibility. To provide a solution, an alternative theory pushed forward a renewed understanding of the question why some property rights succeed while others fail. At its heart is the axiom that Form – be it private/public, secure/insecure or formal/informal – follows from Function. This position – aka the Credibility Thesis – has propelled a fundamental change on the study of land, housing, settlements and resources evidenced through a steady stream of publications. Building on this literature, this collection reports several findings: 1) theoretical – credibility revolves around maintaining congruence between the function of institutions; 2) methodological – credibility can be measured via conflict, perceptual divergences and shifts over time; 3) empirical – institutions tend to change when functional congruence is disregarded while enduring when it is safeguarded. The findings cover different geographies (ranging from India and Ethiopia to China and Colombia) demonstrating the theory’s applicability. The collection ends with a double treatise; one pointing out like-minded bodies of thought with reference to Elinor Ostrom and another identifying quandaries that research must consider. To appreciate the collection’s main thrust, this introduction leads it off by reviewing 10 years’ research on the Credibility Thesis in terms of the field, findings and future.

Farmlands, positioned at the interface of mangrove forestlands and urban centers, serve as critical buffer zones. These areas play a pivotal role in determining the ecological fate of mangrove forests, acting as a cushion against mangrove deforestation. This study aims to study the spatiotemporal data from Landsat imagery whilst considering the geo-political and scocio-economic transformations of such a buffer region adjoining the Sunderban mangrove forest to understand the surreptitious reason for such expansive nature of the farmlands. Results indicate that these buffer farmlands are in a constant tug-of-war between the urban and forest ecosystems. The built up area adjoining the cities increases at a much higher pace than the areas adjoining the forest lands. Quite contrary to the popular belief, it is seen that the majority of cropland expansion in the mangrove adjoining regions arises from the use of fallow land rather than the clearing of vegetation. The study shows that the changes need to be addressed through the government’s policies and a restructure of governance is required. In policymaking, the collaborative action of scientists, governments, and local people should be involved. The lack of sustainable development and targeted improvement can increase the threat and risk nearby the mangrove farmlands.