Publications
NIBIOs employees contribute to several hundred scientific articles and research reports every year. You can browse or search in our collection which contains references and links to these publications as well as other research and dissemination activities. The collection is continously updated with new and historical material.
2015
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Public participation in landscape planning and management has received increased attention acrossEurope since the European Landscape Convention (ELC) came into force in 2004. The ELC has now beenratified by many countries, which have been working on its implementation for up to several years. In thisarticle, we study experiences from public participation in five different planning processes in Norway,and we assess the methods used according to a set of evaluation criteria developed in a European context:Scope, Representativeness, Timing, Comfort and Convenience, and Influence. Subsequently we identifyten singular methods as being particularly effective in terms of contributing significantly to increasingscores of Scope, Representativeness, and Comfort and convenience, i.e. the criteria most influenced by themethods chosen. All ten methods identified contribute to increase scores on one or two evaluation crite-ria, which underlines the importance of combining different methods to achieve effective participationwithin the restricted framework of a concrete spatial planning process. In an international perspectiveit seems most fruitful to apply a set of both dominantly verbal methods as practiced in Norway andsomewhat more visual approaches used in other countries. This would also acknowledge basic differ-ences among theoretical understandings of landscape and follow a recent scientific development of theconcept of landscape.
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Wenche DramstadAbstract
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Hanne Sickel Bolette Bele Ragnar Eltun Odd-Arild Finnes Gustav Fystro Knut Hovstad Marit Jørgensen Vibeke Lind Jørgen Todnem Håvard SteinshamnAbstract
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Increased forest biomass production for bioenergy will have various consequences for landscape scenery, depending on both the landscape features present and the character and intensity of the silvicultural and harvesting methods used. We review forest preference research carried out in Finland, Sweden and Norway, and discuss these findings in relation to bioenergy production in boreal forest ecosystems. Some production methods and related operations incur negative reactions among the public, e.g. stump harvesting, dense plantation, soil preparation, road construction, the use of non-native species, and partly also harvest of current non-productive forests. Positive visual effects of bioenergy production tend to be linked to harvesting methods such as tending, thinning, selective logging and residue harvesting that enhance both stand and landscape openness, and visual and physical accessibility. Relatively large differences in findings between studies underline the importance of local contextual knowledge about landscape values and how people use the particular landscape where different forms of bioenergy production will occur. This scientific knowledge may be used to formulate guiding principles for visual management of boreal forest bioenergy landscapes.
2014
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This review identifies ‘successful’ policies for biodiversity, cultural heritage, and landscape scenery and recreation in Austria, France, Bavaria (Germany), Wales (UK), and Switzerland, and a comparison with current efforts in Norway. All of these countries face similar risks and challenges, mostly with regard to mountain areas. Sources used for the analysis were the evaluations of the national Rural Development Plans, and the midway evaluation and national ex-post evaluations of the CAP programme period 2000–2006. An evaluation of the Swiss Direct Payment System was available from 2009, as well as information about further development from 2011. Scientific papers and other official reports by, e.g., the OECD, the European Commission and the European Environmental Agency, were used as well. Expert interviews were conducted by telephone and e-mail. Measures deemed particularly successful often had very specific aims, included local information, appeared to involve fairly simple application and organization requirements, were developed and designed in cooperation with farmers and were adapted to local characteristics or challenges. Measures considered less successful were criticized for being unfair in terms of regional repartition of grants, for lacking transparency, for being applied only to small areas, and for requiring a great deal of organization and implementation work. In terms of future developments of the Norwegian agricultural and agri-environmental subsidy system we recommend examining the following particular policies more closely: the Organic Farming scheme in Austria, the Welsh whole-farm scheme Tir Gofal, and the Austrian, Bavarian and Swiss measures for cultural landscape maintenance. Since no ‘best practice’ or ‘standard design’ of agricultural support schemes has been recognized on an international level to date, an enhanced evaluation system will be as important as new and adjusted schemes. Monitoring data suitable for comparison should be collected, based on internationally defined indicators. For the time being, we suggest “double-tracked” agri-environmental support: mainly measures that have proved to be effective; but also measures where positive effects are considered very likely due to well-known cause-effect relationships, even though they may not yet have been thoroughly documented and approved, e.g. because of their long-term character or due to weaknesses in monitoring and evaluation.