Ecological support for rural land‐use planning
2005
Theobald, David M. | Spies, Thomas | Kline, Jeff | Maxwell, Bruce | Hobbs, N. T. | Dale, Virginia H.
How can ecologists be more effective in supporting ecologically informed rural land‐use planning and policy? Improved decision making about rural lands requires careful consideration of how ecological information and analyses can inform specific planning and policy needs. We provide a brief overview of rural land‐use planning, including recently developed approaches to conservation. Effective participation in land‐use planning requires ecologists to understand trade‐offs—for example, the need to balance a land owner's desire for a fair and predictable process with the “learn as you go” approach of adaptive management—and the importance of integrating local knowledge with landscape‐level information. Four primary challenges require attention from ecologists to improve rural land‐use planning. First is the mismatch between the spatial and temporal scales in which ecological processes occur and the scales and tempos of land‐use planning. Second, ecologists must engage in interdisciplinary research to critically evaluate and determine how, if, and when ecological information influences rural land‐use outcomes. Third, a comprehensive land‐use framework is needed to better place ecological studies within a broader landscape context. Finally, ecologists have a key role in developing environmental indicators that directly inform local, rural land‐use planning efforts.
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