Can biodiversity and love of nature be promoted in the world's densest urban areas? The High Line is an elevated freight rail line transformed into a public park on Manhattan’s West Side. It is owned by the City of New York, and maintained and operated by Friends of the High Line. Founded in 1999 by community residents, Friends of the High Line fought for the High Line’s preservation and transformation [...]
Is it easier to change systems, markets and human behaviour at smaller scales, and can this add up to global change? A transition town, or more generally a transition initiative, is a grassroots community project that seeks to build resilience in response to peak oil, climate destruction, and economic instability by creating local groups that uphold the values of the transition network (https://www.transitionnetwork.org/). Values include: Respecting resource limits Promoting inclusivity [...]
What combination of food production innovations will allow us to feed a growing global population sustainably in the future? Objective: To grow food where people live, and to grow it sustainably. To Lufa Farms, this means growing food on no new land; capturing rainwater; recirculating 100% of irrigation water and nutrients; reducing energy use; composting green waste; using biological controls instead of synthetic pesticides, herbicides, and fungicides; and delivering produce to customers [...]
Is research and collaboration around sustainable food production a key component of building a good anthropocene? Objective: Identifying a range of current practices in the context of European food systems that have the potential to contribute to transitions to sustainable food and nutrition security in Europe. TRANSMANGO (http://www.transmango.eu/index.html) is a research project supporting the goal of sustainable food and nutrition security in Europe. Scenario work is employed to explore a [...]
Connecting people to nature: Can public challenges and competitions with high media visibility promote sustainable living in urban areas by building awareness, sharing information and through peer pressures? Objective: to understand the barriers and motivators to inspiring behaviour change towards sustainable living In 2012, Unilever ran a six-month research study called the Sustain Ability Challenge in 12 UK households in order to understand the barriers, triggers and motivators for sustainable living, [...]
The values of satoyama landscape, Japanese traditional agricultural landscape, has been increasingly recognized in Japan, as provider of a bundle of ecosystem services to humans while harnessing unique and higher level of biodiversity. It has been understood that continuation of appropriate management of landscapes has created sustainable landscapes benefitting both humans and nature. The challenges faced to the satoyama landscapes today are more on the underuse of natural resources rather than overexploitation which comes from depopulation in rural areas and decline of agricultural sectors. Responding to this, new ways to maintain satoyama landscape is being explored by linking urban and rural areas and creating mutual benefits.