Cash crops have kept expanding at an accelerating rate across the globe during the last decades. It therefore requires elaborate efforts to examine the socioeconomic and ecological consequences of cash crop cultivation. With a case of the Hangzhou region in subtropical China, this paper investigated the dynamic patterns of four cash crop types (tea, fruit, mulberry and nursery) at town level by using aerial photos; and then quantified the subsequent socioeconomic and ecological consequences using spatial regression.

After forest governance reforms by the Brazilian government, Amazon deforestation rates dropped by almost 80% between 2004 and 2012. Since then, however, deforestation has slowly increased again, casting doubts on the long-term sustainability of past conservation policy achievements. Clearly, deforestation rates and the associated local drivers of land-use and land-cover change differ considerably across the region, and adapting public policies to dynamic local contexts and actor constellations remains a major challenge for decision-makers.

Informed by the ‘quality of life’ model with specific reference to Chinese culture, this article uses reliable and publicly available information seldom used in historical or heritage study to identify the designs of flats and builders of the “Kowloon Walled City” (hereafter the City) and reliable oral testimonies to refute some myths about the quality of life within it. This settlement has been notoriously misrepresented by some as a city of darkness that was razed from the face of the Earth before 1997 to fulfill a pre-war dream of the colonial government.

Climate change is a major driver of land use with implications for the quality and quantity of water resources. We apply a novel integrated impact modelling framework (IIMF) to analyze climate change impacts until 2040 and stakeholder driven scenarios on water protection policies for sustainable management of land and water resources in Austria. The IIMF mainly consists of the sequentially linked bio-physical process model EPIC, the regional land use optimization model PASMA[grid], the quantitative precipitation/runoff TUWmodel, and the nutrient emission model MONERIS.

We assess the production impacts of a 100% conversion to organic agriculture in England and Wales using a large-scale linear programming model. The model includes a range of typical farm structures, scaled up across the available land area, with the objective of maximising food production. The effects of soil and rainfall, nitrogen (N) supply/offtake and livestock feed demand are accounted for. Results reveal major reductions in wheat and barley production, whilst the production of minor cereals such as oats and rye increase.

Despite the increasing importance of studies dealing with acceptance in the field of land use, few theoretical-conceptual reflections and reviews have been published. To address this gap, this paper offers a critical and systematic review of recent literature regarding acceptance and land use. Our aim is to synthesise the contributions of these publications in order to advance scientific debate on this topic. The data set consists of 132 peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters and is dominated by empirical papers (mostly quantitative studies) and European case studies.

Implementing strategic spatial plans is a complex task. The process involves strategy formation, institutional capacity building, funding mechanism establishment and governance arrangements, which take shape within complex power configurations. Based on empirical evidence gathered by interviewing regional planning experts, this paper focuses on the role of governance arrangements and funding mechanisms in current practices of strategic plan implementation in 14 European urban regions.

Agricultural landscapes affect regional development and competitiveness in a way far beyond the production of agricultural commodities. However, comprehensive assessments of the relevant cause-effects between agricultural landscape and regional competitiveness are complex and they require a range of ecological, economic and social aspects to be considered.

There have been drastic changes in resource use practices and land-use patterns in the middle mountains of Nepal as a result of human transformation processes of the environment. This study aimed at assessing land-use and land-cover changes, especially those related to forest cover changes, in Phewa Lake watershed—a typical middle mountain watershed of western Nepal—using multi-temporal Landsat images from 1995, 2005 and 2017.

The purpose of this study is to identify the impacts of abandoned quarries and to examine scenarios for their restoration. Two quarries were selected as case studies, which are located in the Evros Region (NE Greece). Initially, the current state of the abandoned quarries was recorded and evaluated, including slopes, landscape, land use, as well as cultural elements. Four alterative scenarios for the exploitation of each quarry were proposed, taking into account the specifics of each site. Financial, environmental, and socioeconomic criteria were then used to evaluate these scenarios.

Wildland fires are a critical Earth-system process that impacts human populations in each settled continent[...]