Connected nature
Embedding nature protected areas to support biodiversity and ecosystem services at the landscape scale
Sara Borgström and Erik Andersson
Conference where several studies were presented Forum för ett grönskande Stockholm.
Lecture ”Arbeta med naturen i staden”, Sara Borgström 2020 (in Swedish).
Podcast Naturen i staden – podcast Urbanistica, Sara Borgström talks with Mustafa Sherif 2020 (in Swedish).
The Flaten nature reserve and surrounding urban landscape was the main study are for the project. A knowledge co-creation process was developed where landscape changes and strategies to handle those were discussed with a large diversity of stakeholders. This process was performed in collaboration with the research project Enable.
# Factsheet: Participatory resilience assessment (pdf file)
# Scientific publication: Borgström, S., E. Andersson, and T. Björklund. 2021. Retaining multi-functionality in a rapidly changing urban landscape: insights from a participatory, resilience thinking process in Stockholm, Sweden. Ecology and Society 26(4):17.
Brief project description
Nature conservation is rooted in a tradition of protecting valuable ecosystems and threatened species, most obviously by the designation of protected areas where human activities are restricted or excluded. However, nature conservation needs to include more than biodiversity per se, and much recent attention has been given to ecosystem services (ES). Many ES are needed locally where people live and work, and the questions we ask are a) to what degree the current system of nature protected areas are or could be connected to their surroundings, and b) to what extent this connectedness affect the provision of ES benefits outside their boundaries. This project explores the potential of nature protected areas to support biodiversity and ES benefits at a landscape scale by i) developing an assessment system for ecological and social boundaries and bridging elements in landscape transition zones, ii) evaluating this system in an urban landscape and iii) formulating guidelines for how to better connect protected areas to their surrounding by interventions in the transition zones and wider landscape. This will be achieved by an integrative approach combining field data with close collaboration and dialogue with non-academic partners from local to national levels. Ultimately the project advances scientific knowledge on ES from a spatial point of view and provide practical tools for better integrating ES benefits into landscape governance across sectors and types of environments.
The project is finalised and will be reported to Formas in 2022.
Focusgroup meeting in February 2018 – participants discussing preconditions for nature based outdoor recreation.
Selection of scientific publications
Andersson, E, Borgström, S. and McPhearson, T. 2017. Double insurance in dealing with extremes – Ecological and social factors for making nature based solutions last, Chapter 4 in Nadja Kabisch, Horst Korn, Jutta Stadler, Aletta Bonn (eds) Nature‐based Solutions to Climate Change Adaptation in Urban Areas ‐ Linkages between Science, Policy and Practice. Springer Verlag.
Andersson, E., S. Borgström, D. Haase, J. Langemeyer, A. Mascarenhas, T. McPhearson, M. Wolff, E. Łaszkiewicz, J. Kronenberg, D., N. Barton, and P. Herreros-Cantis. 2021. A context-sensitive systems approach for understanding and enabling ecosystem service realization in cities. Ecology and Society 26(2):35.
Andersson, E., S. Borgström, D. Haase, J. Langemeyer, M. Wolff, and T. McPhearson. 2021. Urban resilience thinking in practice: ensuring flows of benefit from green and blue infrastructure. Ecology and Society 26(4):39.
Borgström, S. 2017. Governance perspectives on Urban Biodiversity, Chapter 10 in Ossola, A and J. Niemelä (eds), Urban biodiversity from research to practice. Earthscan from Routledge.
Borgström, S., E. Andersson, and T. Björklund. 2021. Retaining multi-functionality in a rapidly changing urban landscape: insights from a participatory, resilience thinking process in Stockholm, Sweden. Ecology and Society 26(4):17.
Manuel Wolff, Andre Mascarenhas, Annegret Haase, Dagmar Haase, Erik Andersson, Sara Borgström, Jakub Kronenberg, Edyta Łaszkiewicz, Magdalena Biernacka. 2021. Conceptualizing multidimensional barriers – A framework for assessing constraints in realizing recreational benefits of urban green spaces. In press. Ecology and Society