98
Enne G., Zucca c., Zanolla C.
Concerning vegetation, information is specially needed with respect to a) the
vegetation cover and land use and their dynamics, b) data and information on
vegetation cover, biomass, vegetation growth and plant phenology.
Understanding how different techniques of land use and management affect
vegetation was mentioned as a gap.
A general conclusion of the working group 2 was that trans-disciplinary pilot
areas would be of extreme benefit to:
• Provide locations within which the complete trans-disciplinary data and
information requirements, identified by the working groups as being needed for
combating desertification, would be obtained. The pilot areas would constitute
a desertification research and mitigation facility.
Provide areas, selected by the National Committees, within which the scientific
knowledge built up during previous "Environment" and INCO programmes
projects would be efficiently used to support and underpin the action
programmes proposed by the National Committees.
Provide areas within which restoration and prevention strategies would be
monitored and tested and best practices be demonstrated. The impact of policies
in different sectors would be evaluated.
Working Group 3: Socio-economy and policy related
There exist a urgent need for indicators of response, particularly those which are
local and site specific. Understanding responses means understanding local
knowledge and perceptions, the ways in which broad scale incentives translate into
local opportunities and constraints, understanding locally successful initiatives that
form and inform local behaviour, and understanding how the impact ofinterventions
are seen at the local scale.
This is the type of information that managers and researchers commonly lack.
It can only be gained by in-depth field work using participatory approaches. It
cannot readily be extrapolated because of the complexity of interacting variables,
some operating from afar and some intimately local, producing the behaviour
observed in any given site.
In synthesis, WG3 highlighted the following:
data requirements can only be defined in relation to specific problems, but local
land users commonly have a different perception of 'the problem', and radically
different priorities, from researchers and managers at regional, national and
international levels;
• there is a strong flow of information from macro to micro, but all levels sense a
lack of bottom-up, micro to macro flow.
• it is only possible to compile inventories and identify gaps of existing data sets
with respect to specific sites. However there is a general need for basic data at a
disaggregated (potentially household) level on demography, health, education,
economy and land use trends for:
popUlations living in marginal areas - by definition hard to document
(mobile people, minorities, remote area dwellers, refugees)
Enne G., Zucca c., Zanolla C.
Concerning vegetation, information is specially needed with respect to a) the
vegetation cover and land use and their dynamics, b) data and information on
vegetation cover, biomass, vegetation growth and plant phenology.
Understanding how different techniques of land use and management affect
vegetation was mentioned as a gap.
A general conclusion of the working group 2 was that trans-disciplinary pilot
areas would be of extreme benefit to:
• Provide locations within which the complete trans-disciplinary data and
information requirements, identified by the working groups as being needed for
combating desertification, would be obtained. The pilot areas would constitute
a desertification research and mitigation facility.
Provide areas, selected by the National Committees, within which the scientific
knowledge built up during previous "Environment" and INCO programmes
projects would be efficiently used to support and underpin the action
programmes proposed by the National Committees.
Provide areas within which restoration and prevention strategies would be
monitored and tested and best practices be demonstrated. The impact of policies
in different sectors would be evaluated.
Working Group 3: Socio-economy and policy related
There exist a urgent need for indicators of response, particularly those which are
local and site specific. Understanding responses means understanding local
knowledge and perceptions, the ways in which broad scale incentives translate into
local opportunities and constraints, understanding locally successful initiatives that
form and inform local behaviour, and understanding how the impact ofinterventions
are seen at the local scale.
This is the type of information that managers and researchers commonly lack.
It can only be gained by in-depth field work using participatory approaches. It
cannot readily be extrapolated because of the complexity of interacting variables,
some operating from afar and some intimately local, producing the behaviour
observed in any given site.
In synthesis, WG3 highlighted the following:
data requirements can only be defined in relation to specific problems, but local
land users commonly have a different perception of 'the problem', and radically
different priorities, from researchers and managers at regional, national and
international levels;
• there is a strong flow of information from macro to micro, but all levels sense a
lack of bottom-up, micro to macro flow.
• it is only possible to compile inventories and identify gaps of existing data sets
with respect to specific sites. However there is a general need for basic data at a
disaggregated (potentially household) level on demography, health, education,
economy and land use trends for:
popUlations living in marginal areas - by definition hard to document
(mobile people, minorities, remote area dwellers, refugees)