scholarly journals Ridge-and-Furrow Agriculture around Lake Mikri Prespa, Greece, in a European perspective

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 7-20
Author(s):  
Giorgos Catsadorakis ◽  
Eleni Mougiakou ◽  
Thanasis Kizos
Keyword(s):  
Biodiversity Conservation ◽  
Open Field ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Land Management ◽  
Water Levels ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Southern Europe ◽  
European Perspective ◽  
Aerial Photos ◽  
Communal Land

Ridge and furrow is an archaeological pattern of ridges and troughs used in Europe, frequently associated with communal open-field farming and strip cultivation. Strip farming spread throughout Europe in the Middle Ages but appears to have only slightly penetrated southern Europe. In Greece, no areas under a ridge-and-furrow system were previously known. Working on 1945 aerial photos of Prespa, Greece, a border area around two lakes whose water levels fluctuate seasonally, we noted the presence of strip fields around the lakeshore, and subsequently identified them in the field as a ridge-and-furrow system. Using GIS, we measured the dimensions of all individual fields and collected oral histories from elderly locals. The area under strip farming was over 900 ha. Strips were straight, ca 200 m long and 10m wide, with a mean area of 2,160 m2. Wheat, rye, maize and beans were cultivated on the ridges, whilst grass in the furrows was mowed for hay. The construction and dimensions were almost identical to those seen in England. No information was found on either the origin of this system in Prespa, or connections with ‘zadruga’ or ‘chiftlik’ – other regional communal land management systems. A few adjacent areas with strip cultivations still in use were located in the two neighbouring countries sharing the lakes, and still fewer areas with ridge-and-furrow traces, particularly around lakes. By using ridge-and-furrow agriculture, local people had successfully coped with the perennial and seasonal inundation of their fields, a problem that remains unresolved and afflicts modern biodiversity conservation in the area.

scholarly journals Agroforestry and Its Impact in Southeast Asia

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Hunt
Keyword(s):  
Land Management ◽  
Agroforestry Systems ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Early Interventions ◽  
Significant Component ◽  
The Holocene ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Vegetational Succession ◽  
Food Procurement

Research during the late 20th and early 21st centuries found that traces of human intervention in vegetation in Southeast Asian and Australasian forests started extremely early, quite probably close to the first colonization of the region by modern people around or before 50,000 years ago. It also identified what may be insubstantial evidence for the translocation of economically important plants during the latest Pleistocene and Early Holocene. These activities may reflect early experiments with plants which evolved into agroforestry. Early in the Holocene, land management/food procurement systems, in which trees were a very significant component, seem to have developed over very extensive areas, often underpinned by dispersal of starchy plants, some of which seem to show domesticated morphologies, although the evidence for this is still relatively insubstantial. These land management/food procurement systems might be regarded as a sort of precursor to agroforestry. Similar systems were reported historically during early Western contact, and some agroforest systems survive to this day, although they are threatened in many places by expansion of other types of land use. The wide range of recorded agroforestry makes categorizing impacts problematical, but widespread disruption of vegetational succession across the region during the Holocene can perhaps be ascribed to agroforestry or similar land-management systems, and in more recent times impacts on biodiversity and geomorphological systems can be distinguished. Impacts of these early interventions in forests seem to have been variable and locally contingent, but what seem to have been agroforestry systems have persisted for millennia, suggesting that some may offer long-term sustainability.

scholarly journals Paesaggi collettivi Il silenzio delle proprietà collettive delle Valli del Germanasca nel Piano Paesaggistico Regionale del Piemonte

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michele F. Barale ◽  
Margherita Valcanover
Keyword(s):  
Land Management ◽  
Structural Element ◽  
Collective Management ◽  
European Landscape Convention ◽  
Communal Land ◽  
Regional Landscape ◽  
Shared Ownership

Communal land management is a structural element of the Alpine Mountains. In the Valleys of the Germanasca (TO), collective management has been carried out for centuries by means of extensive private shared ownership. These properties materialize the interrelations between the community and territory as identified by the first article of the European Landscape Convention. This contribution puts the theme of collective management of the highlands in the perspective of the recognition, by the urban tools regarding the theme of Landscape, of the “interrelations” between anthropic and natural elements, and in this case with respect to the Piedmont Regional Landscape Plan.

Issues of sustainability and sustainable land management

1995 ◽  
Vol 75 (4) ◽  
pp. 407-412 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. A. Zinck ◽  
A. Farshad
Keyword(s):  
Land Management ◽  
Policy Making ◽  
Farming Systems ◽  
Land Evaluation ◽  
Economic Viability ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Threshold Values ◽  
Sustainable Land Management ◽  
Knowledge Based ◽  
Land Management System

The concept of sustainability shows many facets. Ecologists, environmentalists, agronomists, sociologists, economists and politicians use it with different connotations. In addition, the sustainability of land management systems varies in space, according to climate, soil, technology and societal conditions. Sustainable farming systems vary also in time, as they evolve and may collapse, frequently together with the corresponding sociosystems. Because of its complexity, sustainability is difficult to measure directly and requires the use of appropriate indicators for assessment. A good indicator is free of bias, sensitive to temporal changes and spatial variability, predictive and referenced to threshold values. Relevant data are often incomplete or inadequate for indicator implementation. To embrace the whole width of sustainability, several methods and techniques should be used concurrently, including land evaluation and coevolutionary, retrospective and knowledge-based approaches. It is, however, at the application level that major constraints arise. A sustainable land management system must satisfy a large variety of requirements, including technological feasibility, economic viability, political desirability, administrative manageability, social acceptability, and environmental soundness. Real world conditions at farm and policy-making levels need to be substantially improved to achieve sustainable land management. Key words: Definition, assessment and implementation issues of sustainable land management

scholarly journals Climate adaptive urban planning and design with water in Dutch polders

2011 ◽  
Vol 64 (3) ◽  
pp. 722-730 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. Schuetze ◽  
L. Chelleri
Keyword(s):  
Water Policy ◽  
Flood Control ◽  
Water Systems ◽  
Water Levels ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Polluted Water ◽  
Local Climate ◽  
Planning And Design ◽  
Urban Planning And Design ◽  
Rainwater Management

The existing water management in Dutch polders is based on independent water systems for each polder. These are featuring artificial stabilized ground and surface water levels. As a result of the local climate the water levels in the polders are not continuously at a constant level. To maintain a stable water table in the polders, the surplus of relatively clean rainwater has to be pumped away during the cold seasons into canals or rivers, which are located on a higher level. During the summer relatively polluted water from these waterways is led into the polders to top up the declining water levels. This procedure leads to various problems regarding water quantity and water quality. The described existing system is not adaptable to climate change and includes the risk of flooding, particularly from torrential rain. Therefore it is crucial to develop, preferably self-sufficient, rainwater management systems in the polders. They should allow the fluctuation of the water levels inside the polders for seasonal storage and flood control. The described concept is adopted in the present water policy in the Netherlands as well as in research and recent urban development projects in Dutch polders.

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