Work Package 1.4 Response indicators: land management measures taken by local stakeholders to combat desertification (the work package will be coordinated by DITEC-UNIBAS, but will be implemented in all four target areas in collaboration with AUA, FUERM-GF and DGPR-FCSH-UNL)

Through the stakeholder focus groups, this work package will analyse the distinctive management practices and land use types, particularly those that involve ploughing, irrigation, grazing and vegetation cover intervention, in each target area, with the objective of obtaining candidate response indicators. It will explain, at farm level, the main variables that have influenced the land management practices since the implementation of the Common Agricultural Policy and the advent of modern machinery and chemical fertilisers. The cultivation practices and the general land use information will be used to develop land management quality indicators which will be discussed among the focus groups that include the focal point regional/local responsible.

In all four target areas the same work programme will be followed. With co-operation from the local stakeholders, on the bases of the land management quality indicators, the more suitable practices for each area will be identified. Current and potential ecological and economically sustainable management practices, suitable to avoid land degradation and/or promote soil restoration will be promoted and disseminated to similar areas of the European Mediterranean region.

1. Survey of past and present land management practices

Current and past agricultural and silvo-pastoral land management practices will be identified by using a questionnaire given to both a sample of rural family farms and “quality witnesses” (such as retired farmers, agricultural technicians, extension officers) who have historical memories of past land use practices. This will characterise the crop-specific cultivation practices for the entire set of crops. These activities will provide a database for each target area, containing detailed information on crop husbandry and all managed land use, to be discussed within specific stakeholder focus group workshops and to develop the land management quality indicators.

2. Effects of land use on degradation

All the identified land use types will be subject to cluster analysis with respect to their effects on soil degradation and soil restoration as synthesized by the indicators. The cluster analysis will split the database into four sets: a) economically and ecologically sustainable land use, b) economically but not ecologically sustainable land use, c) ecologically but not economically sustainable land use, and d) practices unsustainable from both the points of view.

3. Changes in land management practice

Factors that have brought about land management practice changes and their impact in terms of socio-economic and ecological sustainability will be identified. An historical analysis covering the last few decades (including the main technological, political and socio-economic changes) will clarify the relationship between events and land use transformation and sustainability. This phase will also benefit from the results of the MEDACTION project (Module 1).

4. Stakeholder Focus Group Workshop 2

The results of the questionnaires will be presented and discussed at focus group Workshop 2, with the organisation of a database for all the target areas. All four target areas will be compared. The scientists will meet to assess and identify the indicators that suggest the “best practices” for all the target areas, giving a more general Mediterranean wide dissemination of what has been done in the target areas, using also the results coming from other research projects in that region. The examples of best practice will provide "what if?" scenarios for examination in WP 3.4

Results. Together with the other focus groups leaders, a review will be written entitled "Environmental impacts of common types of land management and the derivation of response indicators in each target area". The review will contain a complete assessment of land use systems and land management practices, along with their influencing factors and related quality indicators. All the results from the research and from the discussion among the focus groups will be made available, in English and in the four north Mediterranean languages, using traditional and modern communication technologies. It provides, in addition to the quality land management indicators, rational knowledge about the agricultural and silvo-pastoral practices adopted in the four target areas, with all the technical details on inputs and outputs for each activity. It also provides detailed information on how these practices can be economically compatible with the recent UNCCD and EU Policies (Agenda 2000). Linking these fundamentals with the assessment of the land management practices with respect to soil degradation phenomena, the focus groups will have a clear set of possible patterns to pursue.