Towards Sustainable Land-use Strategies in the Context of Climate Change and Biodiversity Challenges in Europe

Aligned with the European leading efforts in climate science and multiple initiatives on climate action and sustainability, the project Towards Sustainable Land-use Strategies in the Context of Climate Change and Biodiversity Challenges in Europe (EUROPE-LAND) focuses on the integration of natural and social sciences to identify, develop, test and implement integrated tools to improve the understanding of the factors behind land-use decisions as well as the stakeholders’ awareness and engagement in terms of climate change and biodiversity challenges. EUROPE-LAND expects to go beyond the state-of-the-art and fill in specific gaps associated with integrated indicators for monitoring land use and land cover change, the effects of awareness and behavioural typologies on pathways to more sustainable land use across Europe, and interactive tools to explore land use under different scenarios and with participatory approaches. The project also intends to challenge the dominant narrative through its choice of case studies – particularly comparing Eastern and Western European situations, while also devoting special attention to the role of stakeholders in land-use decisions. EUROPE-LAND integrates 12 EU member states and consists of 7 work packages with tasks associated with assessing land-use behaviour across Europe, investigating the awareness of key land-use related stakeholders about climate change and biodiversity challenges and their willingness to contribute to addressing them, mapping land use and land cover patterns, and constructing integrated assessment modelling approaches. The project will also produce an interactive toolbox designed in a user friendly way, to allow users via the web to experiment with different land-uses, understand hidden connections between them and develop a holistic and systemic way of thinking. Combined with efforts on strategic stakeholder engagement and capacity-building initiatives, the project resources are expected to support sustainable land use and decision making at all levels.