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Abstract Socio-ecological resilience is vital for the long-term sustainability of
communities in production landscapes and seascapes, but community members
often find it difficult to understand and assess their own resilience in the face of
changes that affect them over time due to economic and natural drivers, demographic changes, and market forces among others, due to the complexity of the
concept of resilience and the many factors influencing the landscape or seascape.
This chapter provides an overview of a project and its resilience assessment process
using an indicator-based approach, which has been implemented under the
International Partnership for the Satoyama Initiative (IPSI). In this project, a set of
20 indicators were identified to capture different aspects of resilience in SEPLS, and
examples are included from various contexts around the world, with the purpose of
identifying lessons learned and good practices for resilience assessment. These
indicators have now been used by communities in many countries, often with the
guidance of project implementers, with the goal of assessing, considering, and monitoring their landscape or seascape’s circumstances, identifying important issues,
and ultimately improving their resilience. While this particular approach is limited
in that it cannot be used for comparison of different landscapes and seascapes, as it
relies on community members’ individual perceptions, it is found useful to understand multiple aspects of resilience and changes over time within a landscape or
seascape.
Keywords Satoyama Initiative · Socio-ecological production landscapes and
seascapes (SEPLS) · Indicators · Resilience · Assessment
6.1 Introduction and Background
The “Indicators of Resilience in Socio-ecological Production Landscapes and
Seascapes (SEPLS)” are a set of 20 indicators for communities to assess the socioecological resilience of the production landscapes and seascapes on which they rely
for their livelihoods and well-being. While socio-ecological resilience is a complex
concept, for the purposes of this project, it is considered that resilience refers to
“the capacity of a system to deal with change and continue to develop; withstanding shocks and disturbances and using such events to catalyze renewal and innovation” (Stockholm Resilience Center 2014). The set of indicators has been piloted,
field- tested and applied over nearly 10 years through a number of programs, some
of which are introduced in this chapter, with the result that communities in the
landscapes and seascapes covered by these programs have better understood their
own resilience and developed strategies for improvement. The indicators also have
an added benefit as a capacity-building tool, as the process of using them for resilience assessment helps local community members to understand how they can be
actively involved in resilience improvement through actions on the ground and to
learn about concepts that are important for planning activities and project design,
but are often unfamiliar to farmers, fishers, and other ground-level practitioners.
W. Dunbar et al.
Abstract Socio-ecological resilience is vital for the long-term sustainability of
communities in production landscapes and seascapes, but community members
often find it difficult to understand and assess their own resilience in the face of
changes that affect them over time due to economic and natural drivers, demographic changes, and market forces among others, due to the complexity of the
concept of resilience and the many factors influencing the landscape or seascape.
This chapter provides an overview of a project and its resilience assessment process
using an indicator-based approach, which has been implemented under the
International Partnership for the Satoyama Initiative (IPSI). In this project, a set of
20 indicators were identified to capture different aspects of resilience in SEPLS, and
examples are included from various contexts around the world, with the purpose of
identifying lessons learned and good practices for resilience assessment. These
indicators have now been used by communities in many countries, often with the
guidance of project implementers, with the goal of assessing, considering, and monitoring their landscape or seascape’s circumstances, identifying important issues,
and ultimately improving their resilience. While this particular approach is limited
in that it cannot be used for comparison of different landscapes and seascapes, as it
relies on community members’ individual perceptions, it is found useful to understand multiple aspects of resilience and changes over time within a landscape or
seascape.
Keywords Satoyama Initiative · Socio-ecological production landscapes and
seascapes (SEPLS) · Indicators · Resilience · Assessment
6.1 Introduction and Background
The “Indicators of Resilience in Socio-ecological Production Landscapes and
Seascapes (SEPLS)” are a set of 20 indicators for communities to assess the socioecological resilience of the production landscapes and seascapes on which they rely
for their livelihoods and well-being. While socio-ecological resilience is a complex
concept, for the purposes of this project, it is considered that resilience refers to
“the capacity of a system to deal with change and continue to develop; withstanding shocks and disturbances and using such events to catalyze renewal and innovation” (Stockholm Resilience Center 2014). The set of indicators has been piloted,
field- tested and applied over nearly 10 years through a number of programs, some
of which are introduced in this chapter, with the result that communities in the
landscapes and seascapes covered by these programs have better understood their
own resilience and developed strategies for improvement. The indicators also have
an added benefit as a capacity-building tool, as the process of using them for resilience assessment helps local community members to understand how they can be
actively involved in resilience improvement through actions on the ground and to
learn about concepts that are important for planning activities and project design,
but are often unfamiliar to farmers, fishers, and other ground-level practitioners.
W. Dunbar et al.