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Envisioning the Future of Mosaic Landscapes: Actor Perceptions in a Mixed Cocoa/Oil-Palm Area in Ghana

The future and benefits of mosaic landscapes have been a source of scientific and societal concern due to increasing population growth, climate change, urbanization, and expanding agricultural commodities. There is a growing call for integrated landscape approaches in which landscape actors discuss...

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Autores principales: Asubonteng, Kwabena O., Ros-Tonen, Mirjam A. F., Baud, Isa, Pfeffer, Karin
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Springer US 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8560681/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33057799
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00267-020-01368-4
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author Asubonteng, Kwabena O.
Ros-Tonen, Mirjam A. F.
Baud, Isa
Pfeffer, Karin
author_facet Asubonteng, Kwabena O.
Ros-Tonen, Mirjam A. F.
Baud, Isa
Pfeffer, Karin
author_sort Asubonteng, Kwabena O.
collection PubMed
description The future and benefits of mosaic landscapes have been a source of scientific and societal concern due to increasing population growth, climate change, urbanization, and expanding agricultural commodities. There is a growing call for integrated landscape approaches in which landscape actors discuss trade-offs between different land uses with a view to reaching a negotiated decision on the allocation of land uses. Yet, the operationalization of such approaches is still in its infancy, and integrated methodologies to visualize actors’ landscape visions are still scarce. This study therefore presents a participatory spatial scenario-building methodology that uncovers local perceptions of landscape dynamics and needed actions in a mixed cocoa-oil-palm landscape in Ghana’s Eastern Region. The methodology visualizes landscape actors’ perceived plausible changes and desired future landscapes, and is designed to trigger discussions on actions needed to achieve these desired futures. Findings show that farmers and institutional actors are aware of their landscapes with future preferences coming close to actual landscape composition and spatial configuration, and that—contrary to common assumptions—only those in the oil-palm-dominated landscape who already experienced the drawbacks of increasing landscape homogenization desire a mosaic landscape. The paper concludes that the collective mapping process makes actors aware of challenges at landscape level and increases farmers’ negotiation power through active engagement in the process and visualization of their knowledge and visions. Application of the methodology requires dedicated funding, political will, and capacity to apply it as an ongoing process, as well as monitoring feedback loops.
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spelling pubmed-85606812021-11-15 Envisioning the Future of Mosaic Landscapes: Actor Perceptions in a Mixed Cocoa/Oil-Palm Area in Ghana Asubonteng, Kwabena O. Ros-Tonen, Mirjam A. F. Baud, Isa Pfeffer, Karin Environ Manage Article The future and benefits of mosaic landscapes have been a source of scientific and societal concern due to increasing population growth, climate change, urbanization, and expanding agricultural commodities. There is a growing call for integrated landscape approaches in which landscape actors discuss trade-offs between different land uses with a view to reaching a negotiated decision on the allocation of land uses. Yet, the operationalization of such approaches is still in its infancy, and integrated methodologies to visualize actors’ landscape visions are still scarce. This study therefore presents a participatory spatial scenario-building methodology that uncovers local perceptions of landscape dynamics and needed actions in a mixed cocoa-oil-palm landscape in Ghana’s Eastern Region. The methodology visualizes landscape actors’ perceived plausible changes and desired future landscapes, and is designed to trigger discussions on actions needed to achieve these desired futures. Findings show that farmers and institutional actors are aware of their landscapes with future preferences coming close to actual landscape composition and spatial configuration, and that—contrary to common assumptions—only those in the oil-palm-dominated landscape who already experienced the drawbacks of increasing landscape homogenization desire a mosaic landscape. The paper concludes that the collective mapping process makes actors aware of challenges at landscape level and increases farmers’ negotiation power through active engagement in the process and visualization of their knowledge and visions. Application of the methodology requires dedicated funding, political will, and capacity to apply it as an ongoing process, as well as monitoring feedback loops. Springer US 2020-10-15 2021 /pmc/articles/PMC8560681/ /pubmed/33057799 http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00267-020-01368-4 Text en © The Author(s) 2020 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) .
spellingShingle Article
Asubonteng, Kwabena O.
Ros-Tonen, Mirjam A. F.
Baud, Isa
Pfeffer, Karin
Envisioning the Future of Mosaic Landscapes: Actor Perceptions in a Mixed Cocoa/Oil-Palm Area in Ghana
title Envisioning the Future of Mosaic Landscapes: Actor Perceptions in a Mixed Cocoa/Oil-Palm Area in Ghana
title_full Envisioning the Future of Mosaic Landscapes: Actor Perceptions in a Mixed Cocoa/Oil-Palm Area in Ghana
title_fullStr Envisioning the Future of Mosaic Landscapes: Actor Perceptions in a Mixed Cocoa/Oil-Palm Area in Ghana
title_full_unstemmed Envisioning the Future of Mosaic Landscapes: Actor Perceptions in a Mixed Cocoa/Oil-Palm Area in Ghana
title_short Envisioning the Future of Mosaic Landscapes: Actor Perceptions in a Mixed Cocoa/Oil-Palm Area in Ghana
title_sort envisioning the future of mosaic landscapes: actor perceptions in a mixed cocoa/oil-palm area in ghana
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8560681/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33057799
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00267-020-01368-4
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