strategies Multiple-benefit strategies LEGEND
Change4.1 agents
4.2Proactive
state 4.4
International cooperation and coordination
4.5Three new multilateral cooperation alliances 4.3European Union
2.2
The trilemma of land use
3.4
Transformation of dietary habits 3.5
Bioeconomy:
timber-based construction 3.6
Interaction of multiple-benefit
strategies 3.2
Protected-area systems 3.3
Diversified farming systems
LAND AS A KEY TO SUSTAINABILITY
TRANSFORMATIVE GOVERNANCE
KEY MESSAGES FOR A GLOBAL TRANSFORMATION
OF LAND USE MULTIPLE-BENEFIT
STRATEGIES
3.1 Carbon sinks:
ecosystem restoration
11 Land is the basis of human life. With advancing climate
change, the human-caused mass extinction of bio-logical diversity and an often dysfunctional food sys-tem, we are experiencing three colliding global crises that are directly linked to the way we manage land.
Land use has therefore become increasingly important in international environmental, development and sus-tainability policy in recent years. The land and its bio-logically productive ecosystems are under more pres-sure than ever before. Stewardship of the land means not only land use, but also the conservation and resto-ration of ecosystems. This is the starting point of the present report:
> Which strategies for managing terrestrial ecosystems are most suitable for defusing the existing competi-tion between different forms of land use and simul-taneously ensuring climate-change mitigation, bio-diversity conservation and food security?
> How can transformative change towards sustainable land use be promoted and which actors need to be mobilized and involved?
> What challenges does this pose for research and for Germany’s role in global environmental and devel-opment policy?
Land stewardship as an essential key for climate-change mitigation, biodiversity conservation and food security
The ways in which we humans currently use land world-wide – e.g. practise agriculture and feed ourselves, man-age or clear forests, build infrastructure and develop cities – have far-reaching, mostly negative ecological impacts. Terrestrial ecosystems and soils are being degraded and destroyed at great speed. Human activities are furthermore causing an unprecedented loss of bio-diversity. The common overuse of natural resources impairs basic functions of terrestrial ecosystems and thus also endangers humanity’s natural life-support systems (IPBES, 2018a, 2019b; IPCC, 2019b; SCBD, 2020; Inde-pendent Group of Scientists, 2019; UNCCD, 2017b).
With the IPCC’s Special Reports on ‘Global Warming of 1.5°C’ and on ‘Climate Change and Land’ (IPCC,
2018, 2019b), as well as the internationally agreed goal of limiting global warming to well below 2°C, the need to extract carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere has, among other things, moved into the focus of poli-cy-makers and researchers. Terrestrial ecosystems are discussed as a key option in this context. Intact terres-trial ecosystems are also a prerequisite for ensuring suf-ficient and high-quality food supplies for everyone worldwide (IPCC, 2019b).
New diseases such as COVID-19, which were trans-mitted from animals to humans, are also related to ter-restrial ecosystems. Their occurrence and distribution are encouraged by the destruction and fragmentation of natural ecosystems, by intensive livestock farming and the wildlife trade.
There is an acute need for action
As early as 1992, at the UN Conference on Environ-ment and DevelopEnviron-ment in Rio de Janeiro, the interna-tional community of states set up important negotia-tion processes for sustainable development by agreeing the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and the UN Convention to Combat Desertifica-tion (UNCCD). The objectives of these three Rio Con-ventions are to prevent dangerous global warming, to protect biological diversity and use it sustainably and equitably, and to combat land degradation.
Almost 30 years later, societal movements like Fri-days For Future and Extinction Rebellion are calling for a more determined implementation of measures to pro-tect the climate, biodiversity and the environment. At the same time, multilateralism is in crisis; the process of implementing the goals of the Rio Conventions is cum-bersome. The most recent milestone in environmental and development policy are the 17 UN Sustainability Goals adopted in 2015, which are to be achieved by 2030. Whether they will have a sufficient impact is an open question (Zeng et al., 2020). Despite all the ongo-ing political processes involvongo-ing land issues, to date the international community has not sufficiently addressed land stewardship as an overarching challenge and focus
Introduction 1
4.5Three new multilateral cooperation alliances
KEY MESSAGES FOR A
GLOBAL TRANSFORMATION
12
for action. The COP of the CBD planned for 2021 in China and the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, which also begins in 2021, could, however, herald a trend reversal.
This report develops options for the stewardship of the land and its natural resources that can help defuse existing competition for land use; it also identifies chal-lenges for research.
An overview of the report
> The trilemma of land use: Chapter 2, ‘Land as the key to sustainability: a systemic view’, describes as a starting point the interwoven and mutually reinforc-ing global crises of climate, biodiversity and the food system. Due to their different and competing demands on global land use, they are seen as the
‘trilemma of land use’. To overcome this trilemma, it is necessary to defuse competition for land use and to halt or reverse land degradation. Against this background, the WBGU outlines its vision for a transformation towards sustainable land use.
> Multiple-benefit strategies for sustainable land stew-ardship: In Chapter 3 the WBGU develops examples of ‘Multiple-benefit strategies for sustainable land stewardship’ to overcome the trilemma. Multi-ple-benefit strategies are strategies that aim for mul-tiple concomitant benefits. First, the restoration of degraded ecosystems can do more than just remove CO2 from the atmosphere. Second, networked sys-tems of protected areas with participatory manage-ment can conserve biodiversity and ecosystem serv-ices and help create and secure a sustainable liveli-hood system. Third, diversified farming systems and fair and sustainable trade support food security, cli-mate-change mitigation and biodiversity conserva-tion. Fourth, changing dietary habits away from diets with a high proportion of animal products can also help overcome the trilemma of land use. Fifth, as part of a responsible bioeconomy, timber-based construction can make a contribution not only to cli-mate-change mitigation but also to other challenges of sustainable development.
> Governance for multiple benefits instead of competi-tion: An effective implementation of multiple-bene-fit strategies is needed to pave the way for the urgently needed transformation of our land stew-ardship. Policy-making and the involvement of a wide range of actors at all levels are key conditions for success. Chapter 4, ‘Transformative governance for solidarity-based land stewardship’, looks at (1) how change agents assume responsibility, (2) how a proactive state and (3) the European Union in par-ticular create framework conditions for the imple-mentation of multiple-benefit strategies, (4) how
existing international cooperation can be strength-ened, and (5) how the establishment of new multi-lateral cooperation alliances of like-minded states can drive the land-use transformation towards sus-tainability.
> Key messages and recommendations: The report con-cludes in Chapter 5 with ‘Key messages for a global transformation of land use’, which summarize the main statements of the report. The recommenda-tions for action and research on individual multi-ple-benefit strategies and on governance are pre-sented at the end of the relevant sections in Chapters 3 and 4 and are summarized in the Overview of Recommendations section.
Trilemma
Governance Multiple-benefit strategies LEGEND
Biodiversity conservation
Food security Climate protection
Multiple-benefit- strategy approach Competition for land can be
overcome by integrated land stewardship