Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
process. Once the understanding of the information gleaned from the previous
stages has been communicated to the stakeholders, the implementation process
normally becomes the realm of the non-scientific participants. However, landscape
ecologists should contribute to the design of the final plan where parts of the
landscape could be viewed as long-term landscape experiments. By engaging in
this stage of the problem-solving process, landscape ecologists continue to interact
with policy makers, resource managers and the public, thereby helping to ensure
the relevance and results of the work (Spies et al. 2002 ). The longer landscape
ecologists can stay involved in the plans during and after their implementation, the
more likely it is that the plans will take on a more adaptive form and evolve toward
practices that can approach long-term sustainability (McAlpine et al. 2007 ).
Stage 7: Monitoring and adaptive management. This final stage involves the
design and implementation of an adaptive management and monitoring protocol
(Holling 1978 ; Walters 1986 ). Linking monitoring and adaptive management
allows plans to be adjusted over time.
The aim of monitoring and adaptive management is to learn about landscape
processes by monitoring the consequences of management actions. This then feeds
back into future decision-making processes. Long-term and adaptive monitoring is
required to understand adequately landscape-scale ecological, social and physical
systems and their responses to management actions. Its specific application is
context-dependent and will vary with the problem to be resolved (Lindenmayer
and Likens 2009 ). Monitoring programs developed through placed-based collab-
orative partnerships between scientists, landscape managers and policy makers can
help lead to the resolution of important environmental problems, the identification
of new problems (Lindenmayer and Likens 2009 ) and acceptance of inevitable
change (e.g., climate change, Spies et al. 2010 ). Monitoring of management
actions must include impacts on social, physical and ecological systems and not
just one of these components (Redman et al. 2004 ).
2.4 Address the Implementation Gap
Despite some successes in areas concerned with sustainability issues, there is a
growing appreciation of our inability to tackle major sustainability issues such as
biodiversity loss and climate change. The gap between research and implemen-
tation is a fundamental problem in all ecological and environmental sciences, and
calls for improved integration and implementation are widespread and diverse
(e.g., Bammer 2005 ; Knight et al. 2008 ). Bammer ( 2005 ) identifies three pillars for
an evidence-based approach to improving integration and implementation: (a)
systems thinking and complexity science, which orient us to looking at the whole
and its relationship to the parts of an issue; (b) participatory methods, which
recognize that all the stakeholders have a contribution to make in understanding
and, often, decision making about an issue; and (c) knowledge management,
exchange, and implementation, which includes a better understanding of how
 
Search WWH ::




Custom Search