Despite its ostensible future orientation, research on land use planning has given relatively little consideration to temporality, either empirically or conceptually. The need for analytical advances becomes clear when considering the treatment of ‘end-of-life’ issues for renewable energy facilities like onshore wind. Expanding renewables is central to sustainable energy futures yet land use regulation often treats consents as ‘temporary’, raising questions about how the trajectories of energy transition are maintained into the future.

The transition of farms and ranches to the next generation has generated considerable attention and concern. Over the past 30 years, public and private institutions across the U.S. have introduced policies and programs to help farms without identified family successors achieve successful transfers by connecting them with new farmers through “farm link” services. However, the effectiveness of these services is unclear and assessment is needed.

Smallholder farmers in the mid-hills of Nepal are facing an acute labor shortage due to out-migration which, in general, has affected the capacity to achieve timely crop establishment, harvest, and inter-cultural operations. These effects are more visible in the case of labor-intensive crops such as rice and promoting higher levels of rural mechanization has emerged as the primary policy response option. Nevertheless, quantitative evidence for the ability of mechanization to offset the adverse effects of shortages increasing labor prices in these systems is largely absent.