Governing land use and restoration: The long-term progress of environmental and agricultural policies on sustainable rangeland management and restoration in Iceland

• Main Author: Petursdottir, Thorunn
• Other Authors: Ása L. Aradóttir; Susan Baker; Guðmundur Halldórsson, Faculty of Environmental and Forest Sciences (AUI), Náttúra og skógur (LbhÍ), Agricultural University of Iceland, Landbúnaðarháskóli Íslands
• Format: Doctoral or Postdoctoral Thesis
• Language: English
• Published: 2020
• Subjects: Natural resource management; ecosystem restoration; social-ecological systems; rangelands; evaluation; Stjórnun á nýtingu náttúruauðlinda; endurheimt vistkerfa; samfélags- og vistfræðileg kerfi; úthagavistkerfi; árangursmat; Auðlindastjórnun; Ecological systems; Vistkerfi; Auðlindir; Beitilönd; Iceland
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11815/1798

Every summer, free-roaming sheep graze large parts of Icelandic rangeland ecosystems, even though some of these rangeland areas are estimated to be in a severely eroded or even collapsed ecological condition. Improved rangeland management and ecosystem restoration of severely degraded rangelands have been designated as official agricultural and environmental policy tasks of the Icelandic government for the last decades. Several new agri-environmental programs and projects have been established since 1990, with the aim of maintaining and improving the ecological condition of rangeland ecosystem and to facilitate behavioral changes among sheep farmers in relation to sustainable rangeland management. Nevertheless, little is known about the overall long-term progress of these activities and their processes and outcomes have never been studied in an interdisciplinary manner. The main aim of this thesis was to carry out research on rangeland management and restoration in Iceland by examining, through a social-ecological lens, if the expected long-term progress of identified policy goals and all related programs and projects has been achieved. The first step of the research was to do a historical analysis on the main drivers of ecological restoration in Iceland during the last century and map if the drivers had changed over time. That study was based on a catalogue of 100 restoration programs, projects and areas of restoration activity (75-85% of all restoration activities in Iceland). The second step included an investigation of the SES surrounding rangeland restoration in Iceland to assess whether social factors, such as stakeholders´ attitude and behavior, influenced the effectiveness of agricultural and environmental policies related to rangeland restoration and improved rangeland management. That study was based on qualitative research, where 15 stakeholders were interviewed. The third step was to examine if a large-scale rangeland restoration program had facilitated expected attitudinal and behavioral changes ...