Nature-based Solutions to Mitigate Environmental Challenges: A Systems Thinking Approach for Integrated Understanding of Human-Nature Interactions

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Samaneh Seifollahi-Aghmiuni ◽  
Zahra Kalantari ◽  
Carla Sofia Santos Ferreira
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Systems Thinking ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Conceptual System ◽  
Study Region ◽  
Services Delivery ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
System Representation

<p>Urban areas increasingly face challenges associated with dynamic interactions between human and nature systems, such as global (land-, water-use and climate) changes and their related environmental consequences. These challenges can be addressed by sustainable management of coupled human-nature systems that are being stablished and progressed in urban areas. In this context, nature-based solutions (NbSs), as cost-effective actions, are used to protect, sustain, and restore natural or engineered ecosystems for potentially increasing their services delivery to humans. Being inspired and supported by nature systems, NbSs provide human well-being and biodiversity benefits and address coupled environmental-social-economic challenges. This study develops an integrated understanding of human-nature interactions, by investigating wetland functions and their values in Stockholm region, a European densely populated urban area. Wetlands integrate natural and anthropogenic processes and help cities adapt to changes by enhancing their resilience to environmental and social challenges. In this study, a participatory approach has been applied for combining local and scientific knowledge to address the following questions: (i) What are the underlying system dynamics and interactions between urbanization and wetland regulating ecosystem services as coupled human-nature systems? and (ii) How do these dynamics affect synergies and trade-offs in achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)? Therefore, relevant actors have been involved in thematic sector workshops and followed a systems thinking technique to co-create a causal loop diagram (CLD) as a conceptual system representation. The CLD highlights key components and drivers of the system, providing actor-specific perspectives of interactions and feedback structures within the system. Dynamic hypotheses on the effectiveness and roles of wetlands as NbSs in the study region have also been examined in a fuzzy cognitive map, developed as a semi-quantitative system representation. The results provide insights on wetland contributions to attaining SDGs in urban areas, as well as potential transition pathways toward sustainable development by identifying opportunities and barriers for the study region.</p>

scholarly journals Embedding the United Nations sustainable development goals into energy systems analysis – expanding the food-energy-water nexus

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Taco Niet ◽  
Nastaran Arianpoo ◽  
Kamaria Kuling ◽  
Andrew Wright
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
Sustainable Development ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Sustainable Development Goals ◽  
Natural Capital ◽  
Energy Systems ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Ecological Diversity ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Development Goals

Abstract BackgroundThere have been numerous studies that consider the nexus interactions between energy systems, land use, water use and climate adaptation and impacts. These studies have filled a gap in the literature to allow for more effective policymaking by considering the trade-offs between land use, energy infrastructure as well as the use of water for agriculture and providing energy services. Though these studies fill a significant gap in the modelling literature, we argue that more work is needed to effectively consider policy trade-offs between the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to avoid missing important interactions.ResultsWe examine the 17 SDGs individually to determine if it should be included in a modelling framework and the challenges of doing so. We show that the nexus of climate, land, energy and water needs to be expanded to consider economic well-being of both individuals and the greater economy, health benefits and impacts, as well as land use in terms of both food production and in terms of sustaining ecological diversity and natural capital. Such an expansion will allow energy systems models to better address the trade-offs and synergies inherent in the SDGs. Luckily, although there are some challenges with expanding the nexus in this way, we feel the challenges are generally modest and that many model structures can already incorporate many of these factors without significant modification.Finally, we argue that SDGs 16 and 17 cannot be met without open-source models and open data to allow for transparent analysis that can be used and reused with a low cost of entry for modellers from less well off nations.ConclusionsTo effectively address the SDGs there is a need to expand the common definition of the nexus of climate, land, energy, and water to include the synergies and trade-offs of health impacts, ecological diversity and the system requirements for human and environmental well-being. In most cases, expanding models to be able to incorporate these factors will be relatively straight forward, but open models and analysis are needed to fully support the SDGs.

scholarly journals The SDGs and human well-being: a global analysis of synergies, trade-offs, and regional differences

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan-Emmanuel De Neve ◽  
Jeffrey D. Sachs
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Global Analysis ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Decomposition Methods ◽  
Strong Positive Correlation ◽  
Subjective Well Being ◽  
The Sustainable Development ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Short Run ◽  
Being There

Abstract This paper explores the empirical links between achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and subjective well-being. Globally, we find that in terms of well-being, there are increasing marginal returns to sustainable development. Unpacking the SDGs by looking at how each SDG relates to well-being shows, in most cases, a strong positive correlation. However, SDG12 (responsible production and consumption) and SDG13 (climate action) are negatively correlated with well-being. This suggests that in the short run there may be certain trade-offs to sustainable development, and further heterogeneity is revealed through an analysis of how these relationships play out by region. Variance decomposition methods also suggest large differences in how each SDG contributes to explaining the variance in well-being between countries. These and other empirical insights highlight that more complex and contextualized policy efforts are needed in order to achieve sustainable development while optimising for well-being.

scholarly journals Climate Change Adaptation through the Water-Energy-Food Nexus in Southern Africa

2018 ◽  
Vol 15 (10) ◽  
pp. 2306 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sylvester Mpandeli ◽  
Dhesigen Naidoo ◽  
Tafadzwanashe Mabhaudhi ◽  
Charles Nhemachena ◽  
Luxon Nhamo ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Climate Change Adaptation ◽  
Southern Africa ◽  
Climate Change Impacts ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Extreme Weather Events ◽  
Annual Rainfall ◽  
Mitigation And Adaptation ◽  
Trade Offs

Climate change is a complex and cross-cutting problem that needs an integrated and transformative systems approach to respond to the challenge. Current sectoral approaches to climate change adaptation initiatives often create imbalances and retard sustainable development. Regional and international literature on climate change adaptation opportunities and challenges applicable to southern Africa from a water-energy-food (WEF) nexus perspective was reviewed. Specifically, this review highlights climate change impacts on water, energy, and food resources in southern Africa, while exploring mitigation and adaptation opportunities. The review further recommends strategies to develop cross-sectoral sustainable measures aimed at building resilient communities. Regional WEF nexus related institutions and legal frameworks were also reviewed to relate the WEF nexus to policy. Southern Africa is witnessing an increased frequency and intensity in climate change-associated extreme weather events, causing water, food, and energy insecurity. A projected reduction of 20% in annual rainfall by 2080 in southern Africa will only increase the regional socio-economic challenges. This is exacerbating regional resource scarcities and vulnerabilities. It will also have direct and indirect impacts on nutrition, human well-being, and health. Reduced agricultural production, lack of access to clean water, sanitation, and clean, sustainable energy are the major areas of concern. The region is already experiencing an upsurge of vector borne diseases (malaria and dengue fever), and water and food-borne diseases (cholera and diarrhoea). What is clear is that climate change impacts are cross-sectoral and multidimensional, and therefore require cross-sectoral mitigation and adaptation approaches. In this regard, a well-coordinated and integrated WEF nexus approach offers opportunities to build resilient systems, harmonise interventions, and mitigate trade-offs and hence improve sustainability. This would be achieved through greater resource mobilisation and coordination, policy convergence across sectors, and targeting nexus points in the landscape. The WEF nexus approach has potential to increase the resilience of marginalised communities in southern Africa by contributing towards attaining the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs 1, 2, 3, 6, 7, and 13).

SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AND EXPLORATION

1993 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 401
Author(s):  
Brian S. Fisher ◽  
Vivek Tulpule ◽  
Bruce Bowen
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Natural Environment ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Petroleum Exploration ◽  
Future Generations ◽  
Full Account ◽  
Exploration Process ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Exploration Activity

The environment, defined broadly to include both reproducible and natural resources, such as petroleum reserves and wildlife parks, supports all economic and other social activity. The notion of sustainable development arises from a concern that future well-being could be eroded by the pursuit of economic goals which degrade and deplete finite resources.While such concerns are not new, the focus of debate has shifted within the past twenty years. Following the first oil price shock in the early 1970s, questions about whether or not it is possible to maintain growth while energy stocks are declining were brought to the fore. In recent years, however, concerns about the possible negative impact of exploration activity and fossil fuel use on the natural environment — also considered a finite resource — have gained prominence.But achieving sustainable resource use involves making trade-offs. For example, open access to a highly prospective site to help meet the energy needs of current and future generations has to be weighed against the site being partially or fully closed to exploration in order to completely preserve the value of the natural environment inherent in the site.To answer questions about environmental tradeoffs requires judgments about the relative social values of alternative uses of the sites in question. Information based on commercial exploration assists in making such judgments. By upgrading knowledge about the economic and social value of a natural resource, the information gained from exploration can help with making judgments about sustaining or conserving the human environment for future generations. Indeed, because the outcome of the exploration process has both social and commercial implications, it is likely that the level of exploration activities chosen for purely commercial reasons may be lower than the level that would be considered optimal if full account were taken of the trade-offs inherent in maintaining or improving the quality of life of future generations.The purpose in this paper is to investigate the role that exploration can play in improving economic and social well-being generally. To do this, petroleum exploration activity is separated into two phases — first, 'low impact' exploration such as the collection of seismic data and, second, drilling. The key contribution of this paper is to highlight conditions under which levels of low impact exploration, as determined by commercial considerations alone, are likely to be less than the socially optimal level.

scholarly journals Global scenarios of urban density and its impacts on building energy use through 2050

2017 ◽  
Vol 114 (34) ◽  
pp. 8945-8950 ◽  
Author(s):  
Burak Güneralp ◽  
Yuyu Zhou ◽  
Diana Ürge-Vorsatz ◽  
Mukesh Gupta ◽  
Sha Yu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Urban Form ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Energy Use ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Building Energy ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Urban Density ◽  
Heating And Cooling ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Building Energy Use

Although the scale of impending urbanization is well-acknowledged, we have a limited understanding of how urban forms will change and what their impact will be on building energy use. Using both top-down and bottom-up approaches and scenarios, we examine building energy use for heating and cooling. Globally, the energy use for heating and cooling by the middle of the century will be between 45 and 59 exajoules per year (corresponding to an increase of 7–40% since 2010). Most of this variability is due to the uncertainty in future urban densities of rapidly growing cities in Asia and particularly China. Dense urban development leads to less urban energy use overall. Waiting to retrofit the existing built environment until markets are ready in about 5 years to widely deploy the most advanced renovation technologies leads to more savings in building energy use. Potential for savings in energy use is greatest in China when coupled with efficiency gains. Advanced efficiency makes the least difference compared with the business-as-usual scenario in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa but significantly contributes to energy savings in North America and Europe. Systemic efforts that focus on both urban form, of which urban density is an indicator, and energy-efficient technologies, but that also account for potential co-benefits and trade-offs with human well-being can contribute to both local and global sustainability. Particularly in growing cities in the developing world, such efforts can improve the well-being of billions of urban residents and contribute to mitigating climate change by reducing energy use in urban areas.

scholarly journals Sociological modeling of smart city with the implementation of UN sustainable development goals

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Olga Kolesnichenko ◽  
Lev Mazelis ◽  
Alexander Sotnik ◽  
Dariya Yakovleva ◽  
Sergey Amelkin ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Smart City ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Smart Cities ◽  
Personal Space ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Data Governance ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
The World ◽  
The Individual

AbstractThe COVID-19 pandemic before mass vaccination can be restrained only by the limitation of contacts between people, which makes the digital economy a key condition for survival. More than half of the world’s population lives in urban areas, and many cities have already transformed into “smart” digital/virtual hubs. Digital services ensure city life safe without an economy lockout and unemployment. Urban society strives to be safe, sustainable, well-being, and healthy. We set the task to construct a hybrid sociological and technological concept of a smart city with matched solutions, complementary to each other. Our modeling with the elaborated digital architectures and with the bionic solution for ensuring sufficient data governance showed that a smart city in comparison with the traditional city is tightly interconnected inside like a social “organism”. Society has entered a decisive decade during which the world will change by moving closer towards SDGs targets 2030 as well as by the transformation of cities and their digital infrastructures. It is important to recognize the large vector of sociological transformation as smart cities are just a transition phase to human-centered personal space or smart home. The “atomization” of the world urban population raises the gap problem in achieving SDGs because of different approaches to constructing digital architectures for smart cities or smart homes in countries. The strategy of creating smart cities should bring each citizen closer to SDGs at the individual level, laying in the personal space the principles of sustainable development and wellness of personality.

scholarly journals Towards Understanding Interactions between Sustainable Development Goals: The Role of Climate-Well-Being Linkages. Experiences of EU Countries

Energies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (7) ◽  
pp. 2025
Author(s):  
Agnieszka Sompolska-Rzechuła ◽  
Agnieszka Kurdyś-Kujawska
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Sustainable Development Goals ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Good Health ◽  
Linear Ordering ◽  
Health Crisis ◽  
The Sustainable Development ◽  
Eu Countries ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Development Goals

The 2030 Agenda with 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is a challenge for all countries in the world. Their implementation may turn out to be a compromise or the creation of effective interactions that dynamize sustainable development. To achieve the SDGs, it is essential to understand how they interact with each other. It seems that in the times of the climate and health crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, caring for the environment and ensuring a healthy life and promoting well-being at all ages is the basis for environmental, economic and social sustainable development. The aim of the study is to compare the degree of implementation of the goals of sustainable development in the scope of goal 13 “Climate action” and goal 3 “Good health and well-being” in the EU countries. In addition, we analyze how trade-offs and synergies between these goals have developed. Data from the Eurostat database were used to achieve the goal. The study used the method of multivariate comparative analysis—linear ordering of objects. The technique for order preference by similarity to an ideal solution (TOPSIS) method was used to measure the studied phenomenon. The results indicate a different degree of implementation of the sustainable development goals related to climate change and the improvement of health and social well-being. Only a few countries have synergy in achieving these goals, most of them compromise, manifesting themselves in improving one goal over another. In the group of analyzed EU countries, a simultaneous deterioration in the effectiveness of achieving both objectives were also noted. Our research also shows that energy policy is an important attribute in improving the achievement of these goals. The conducted analysis fills the gap in the research on the implementation of selected sustainable development goals and their interactions. It contributes to the discussion on increasing the links between them, in particular with regard to emerging compromises. This research can provide a basis for re-prioritizing and intensifying the actions where individual EU countries are lagging most behind.

scholarly journals The Role of Nature-Based Solutions for Improving Environmental Quality, Health and Well-Being

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (19) ◽  
pp. 10950
Author(s):  
Hai-Ying Liu ◽  
Marion Jay ◽  
Xianwen Chen
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Quality ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Urban Resilience ◽  
Sustainable Solutions ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Quality Health ◽  
Health And Well Being

Nature-based solutions (NbS) have been positioned and implemented in urban areas as solutions for enhancing urban resilience in the face of a wide range of urban challenges. However, there is a lack of recommendations of optimal NbS and appropriate typologies fitting to different contexts and urban design. The analytical frameworks for NbS implementation and impact evaluation, that integrate NbS into local policy frameworks, socio-economic transition pathways, and spatial planning, remain fragmented. In this article, the NbS concept and its related terminologies are first discussed. Second, the types of NbS implemented in Europe are reviewed and their benefits over time are explored, prior to categorizing them and highlighting the key methods, criteria, and indicators to identify and assess the NbS’s impacts, co-benefits, and trade-offs. The latter involved a review of the websites of 52 projects and some relevant publications funded by EU Research and Innovation programs and other relevant publications. The results show that there is a shared understanding that the NbS concept encompasses benefits of restoration and rehabilitation of ecosystems, carbon neutrality, improved environmental quality, health and well-being, and evidence for such benefits. This study also shows that most NbS-related projects and activities in Europe use hybrid approaches, with NbS typically developed, tested, or implemented to target specific types of environmental–social–economic challenges. The results of this study indicate that NbS as a holistic concept would be beneficial in the context of climate action and sustainable solutions to enhance ecosystem resilience and adaptive capacity within cities. As such, this article provides a snapshot of the role of NbS in urban sustainability development, a guide to the state-of-the-art, and key messages and recommendations of this rapidly emerging and evolving field.

scholarly journals Urban–rural linkages: effective solutions for achieving sustainable development in Ghana from an SDG interlinkage perspective

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gideon Baffoe ◽  
Xin Zhou ◽  
Mustafa Moinuddin ◽  
Albert Novas Somanje ◽  
Akihisa Kuriyama ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Rural Areas ◽  
Agricultural Sector ◽  
Integrated Approach ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Research Field ◽  
Health Improvement ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Gender Inclusion ◽  
Urban Rural

AbstractUrbanization and concomitant challenges pose a great threat to sustainable development. Urban and rural development interacts through the flows of people, materials, energy, goods, capital, and information. Without building sound urban–rural linkages, achieving development in one area could compromise it in another area. Achieving sustainable development needs customized policy prioritization and implementation in both urban and rural areas. Much literature exists in the research field of urban–rural linkages, but little has been done via a comprehensive analysis from an interlinkage perspective in the context of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Sustainable Development Goal 11 on sustainable cities and several targets embedded under other Goals provides a good framework for analyzing the urban–rural linkages. This paper contributes to this novel research perspective using Ghana as a case. The study applied an integrated approach by combining the results from a solution-scanning exercise with an SDG interlinkage analysis to identify the challenges and priority solutions and assess the synergies and trade-offs of the identified solutions. It extends the conventional solution-scanning approach by further assessing the synergies and trade-offs of the solutions from an SDG interlinkage perspective. It also enables a more practical SDG interlinkage analysis through the contributions from the multi-stakeholder consultations conducted in Ghana. The analyses show that prioritizing gender inclusion (Goal 5) will positively affect many social and well-being outcomes, including poverty elimination (Goal 1), hunger reduction (Goal 2), health improvement (Goal 3) and access to quality education (Goal 4) and basic services, such as water (Goal 6). However, gender inclusion could have potential trade-offs in the agricultural sector (Goal 2) in the case that women who dominate agricultural value chains could move to work in other sectors. Lack of proper infrastructure (Goal 9), such as transport, will hinder wide gender inclusion. An integrated approach that considers both the synergies and trade-offs of relevant solutions is critical for effective policymaking, specifically in developing countries.

scholarly journals Questioning calls to consensus in conservation: a Q study of conservation discourses on Galápagos

2013 ◽  
Vol 41 (1) ◽  
pp. 13-26 ◽  
Author(s):  
ROSE CAIRNS ◽  
SUSANNAH M. SALLU ◽  
SIMON GOODMAN
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Social Welfare ◽  
Q Methodology ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Shared Vision ◽  
Galápagos Islands ◽  
Sustainable Future ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Global Concern ◽  
Conservation Interventions

SUMMARYEfforts to frame conservation interventions in terms of idealized outcomes that benefit both human well-being and biodiversity, and the rhetoric of consensus that often accompanies these, have been criticized. Acknowledgement of trade–offs between often incommensurable interests and perspectives, has been argued to be more democratic and transparent. This paper critically examines calls to consensus in conservation on the Galápagos Islands, where the population has been urged to unite around a shared vision of conservation in order to secure a sustainable future. Q methodology was used to examine the discourses of conservation on the islands, and to assess whether a shared vision of Galápagos is either achievable or desirable. Thirty-three participants carried out Q sorts about Galápagos conservation. Three discourses emerged from the analysis: conservation of Galápagos as an international/global concern; conservation linked with sustainable development; and social welfare and equitable development. The results highlight the subjective and political nature of the different discourses, and the paper concludes that calls to consensus or shared visions, while seductive in their promise of harmonious cooperation for conservation, can be read as attempts to depoliticize debates around conservation, and as such should be treated with caution.

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