Resource Database

Incorporating biodiversity priorities in Natural Resources Management (NRM) prioritization at a national scale

The Natural Resource Management (NRM) programmes of the National Department of Environment, Forestry and Fisheries are a series of different intervention programmes namely: Working for Water, Working for Wetlands, Working for Ecosystems, Working on Fire. A need to prioritize spatial areas for interventions was highlighted as an important exercise in order for the programme to efficiently focus and direct NRM investments. In response to this, a more integrative approach of addressing environmental challenges across the NRM programmes has been applied and spatial priorities have been identified for each of the nine provinces. The prioritization process was done at a quinary catchment scale, where all quinary catchments in a province were assigned a score based on their biodiversity importance. Catchments with high biodiversity importance were identified as priority areas for intervention. Areas of high biodiversity importance are also referred to as biodiversity priority areas. These are natural or semi-natural areas in the landscape that are important for conserving a representative sample of ecosystems and species, for maintaining ecological processes, or for the provision of ecosystem services. Incorporating these areas in the prioritization process not only aligns with the aims of the NRM programmes but it also ensures that priority is given to areas with high biodiversity importance. The presentation will highlight how biodiversity priority areas have been used systematically in identifying priority areas for NRM investment.

Securing, restoring, and reintroducing: A case study from Ontario, Canada

Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC) has been conducting landscape scale securement, restoration, and succession management in Southwestern Ontario, Canada since 2005. NCC is working with species at risk biologists on potential reintroduction plans for locally extirpated species in these restored areas. NCC is Canada’s leading not-for-profit, private land conservation organization. NCC focuses its work in areas of high conservation priority across Canada, one of which is the Southern Norfolk Sand Plain (SNSP) in Ontario. SNSP is part of the Carolinian Life Zone, which contains temperate forests, grasslands, and wetlands, and has 25% of Canada’s human population as well as 25% of Canada’s species at risk. SNSP has a history of intensive agricultural use and land clearing, however forest cover is 25%, the highest found in southwestern Ontario. NCC began strategically acquiring land in SNSP in 2005 and restoring agricultural land on these properties. NCC has acquired over 2,300 ha and restored over 650 ha in SNSP to date. Restoration includes altering topography to re-create sand dunes and wetlands and installing the seeds from over 100 native plants. As the restored areas mature, NCC is managing habitat succession at a landscape scale. This is being done to support species at risk with restrictive habitat requirements, while still benefiting species with more general habitat requirements. A recovery team for at risk butterflies has identified restoration sites as prime potential habitat for locally extirpated species. NCC is working with this team to inform management and create reintroduction plans for these butterflies.

Mitigation–driven translocations: Phased destruction or an effective applied science?

One of the major conservation tools used to safeguard threatened species is reintroduction, the intentional release of organisms with the purpose of augmenting, establishing or re-establishing wild populations.  Mitigation-driven reintroductions are a supply-driven form of reintroduction where the current population is under threat of extinction, largely due to human activities, and reintroduction is required to mitigate the resulting extinction risk.  As mitigation reintroduction is a crisis discipline that requires immediate action to prevent extinction, it often fails to uphold suitable applications of scientific principles and scrutiny and may have very limited documentation of outcomes.  Mitigation reintroductions can therefore be a controversial form of management, with questionable conservation efficacy due to a lack of a priori testable hypotheses, direct comparison of management techniques, and long-term monitoring commitments. This suggests the potential for a negative cycle of wildlife relocated away from the public eye for a more socially acceptable ‘phased destruction’, with a high cost to managers and little conservation value.  The aim of this review was to undertake a selective, systematic, quantitative review of the global reintroduction literature to determine the inclusion of a priori goals, comparison of management techniques, and the addressing of key population, meta-population, and ecosystem level questions in mitigation reintroduction studies.  Whilst there was a positive correlation between a number of these factors and reintroduction success, there is both a need for a larger budget and a commitment to long-term monitoring if future mitigation reintroductions are to have a significant conservation value.

Inspired by nature: Using wild populations to inform rare species translocations and evaluate success

Translocations are an increasingly utilized tool for rare plant conservation, as habitats continue to be fragmented or degraded. However, knowledge gaps in a species’ basic ecology can lead to failed attempts at translocations. Wild populations provide a priori knowledge of a species’ basic biology and ecological requirements to help inform translocations. In the heavily fragmented Florida scrub, translocations are recommended as a key step towards recovery for many listed species, including the federally endangered Dicerandra christmanii (Lamiaceae). In 1994, we began monitoring the only protected wild population in permanent plots. Using 16 years of a priori information from ~ 3,300 plants, we designed two experimental translocations (an augmentation and introduction). Here, we determine if translocations share similar vital rates and trajectories as wild sites. Mean annual survival was similar among wild (76%), augmented (74%) and introduced (76%) cohorts. Mean relative growth rate of wild and augmented cohorts were 0.556 and 0.599, respectively, but 0.922 for introduced cohorts. A significant interaction between site and plant age for both survival and relative growth indicates differing patterns in these two demographic metrics. Recruits in the introduction flowered earlier (1.67 years) and were larger (mean branches 28.9; flowering branches 10.1), compared to augmented (age 2.11; branches 19.9; flowering 5.7) and wild (age 2.37; branches 22.8; flowering 5.0) plants. These data suggest vital rates of translocations are comparable or higher than wild sites. Translocations may be viable options for species recovery but continued monitoring and analyses will add insights into the mechanisms for translocation success.

Climate change experiment suggests assisted migration may be necessary to save range-restricted plant species

Climate change poses an existential threat to plant species with restricted geographic ranges. However, climatically favorable habitat may exist at higher latitudes if species can reach such locales. Thus, successful restoration projects should consider how climate change impacts species ranges in the future. In a climate manipulation experiment conducted between 2016-2018, we monitored populations of 14 range-restricted native species in three prairies across a 520 km latitudinal Mediterranean climate gradient in the Pacific Northwest, USA. At each site, 20 plots were divided evenly into controls and three climate treatments: drought, warming, and warming+precipitation. Each year, we measured rates of survival, growth, and reproduction to calculate population growth rates (λ). We found that for many species λ was greatest at the northern site and ≥1 (growing or stable), with climate treatments being neutral or beneficial relative to control. At the central site, warming often negatively impacted λ relative to the control, with several species exhibiting λ<1 (decline) under warming but λ>1 in the control. Lastly, λ was <<1 for most species at the southern site under all treatments. These results suggest that conditions are already detrimental towards the southern end of this gradient, and that climate change may make matters worse within some parts of these species’ ranges but be neutral/favorable towards the northern edge of/beyond their ranges. Thus, these species may need to migrate northward to cope with climate change. If they are unable to do so alone, assisted migration may be the only option for their persistence.

Sleeping threats to biodiversity conservation: Extinction debt in global plant communities

The ability to identify ecosystems suffering delayed impacts of human activity poses a significant challenge for biodiversity conservation. Extinction debt measures the time lag of species losses in ecosystems and as such can be used to predict the magnitude and timing of future species losses without management intervention. There is an urgent need to quantify the extent and magnitude of extinction debt given we are in the midst of the sixth global extinction event. Here, we review and quantify evidence of extinction debt in the literature on plant communities, applying a formal meta-analysis of species–area relationships and extinction debt magnitude estimates. Comparing current richness with past and present habitat characteristics was found to be the most common method, but inadequate to identify species and species groups suffering extinction debt. With extinction debt detectable between 10- and 110-years following habitat fragmentation for communities with short to moderate species longevities, there is an expectation that long-lived communities have longer time lags. Our review revealed a large knowledge gap for long-lived communities and subsequently, we tested for extinction debt in a rapidly urbanising woodland system from south-west Western Australia. To test for extinction debt, we used re-measurement of plots spanning 1991–2016. For the effective management of ecosystems into the future, we discuss how a predictive restoration approach could be used to prevent future extinctions.

Resources, restoration, rights, relevance and resilience: The role of facilitating access to natural resources from within a protected area, South Africa

Natural resource use from protected areas is controversial globally, due to conflicting value systems and perceptions of the role of conservation (what is nature and who is it for) including disputes on defining ecological sustainability criteria. Conservation approaches have transformed from being exclusionary to using an integrated socio-ecological lens, and this has been supported by international and national policies and legislation. The South African National Parks (SANParks) Resource Use policy (2011), and the Kruger National Park (KNP) Resource use programme facilitate the sustainable use of natural and cultural resources within parks using three sustainability objectives: the maintenance of ecological integrity and economic viability and the promotion of social relevance. Early KNP conservation approaches included forced removals and restricted access policies, resulting in humans being removed as drivers of ecosystem processes within parks (traditional hunting, harvesting of food and medicine, managing fire and using water). Some believe this has led to ecosystem degradation within parks as a result of underuse (degradation meaning unnatural change). These policies also led to social, political, and economic degradation of people’s rights and opportunities to access and derive benefits from conservation, leading to an erosion of people-nature connections, people-parks relationships, and a reduction in socio-ecological resilience. Our study reflects on extractive resource use projects currently being implemented in the KNP (mopane worms, thatch, medicinal products, and meat) in the context of how and to what degree these projects have restored natural and social system functionality.

A relational understanding of social-ecological restoration: New perspectives for restoration research, policy, and practice

There is increasing recognition that restoration is embedded in complex social-ecological systems (SES), and that a clearer focus on social processes and outcomes is needed to build resilience through restoration programmes. This is echoed in calls for social-ecological restoration. Seeing restoration as situated in SES is a particular way of understanding the nature of restoration, i.e. an ontology. Adopting this ontology has implications for managing and researching restoration programmes. To consider some of these implications, we focus on one of the key characteristics of complex SES: they are relationally constituted, meaning that system characteristics emerge out of dynamic relations between system components. To illustrate how a relational understanding shifts the way we approach restoration and sustainable landscape management, we present two cases: the Tsitsa River Catchment and the Greater Langkloof Region (both in Eastern Cape, South Africa).  We emphasise inter-personal and social relations between the many actors involved in landscape restoration. A relational understanding of restoration can help programme developers and implementers gain deeper insights into the texture of multi-stakeholder processes in social-ecological restoration. We draw on the notion of ‘relational agency’ to propose a new perspective on multi-stakeholder collaboration, which is widely regarded as a key success factor for social-ecological restoration. From this perspective it becomes apparent that dialectical, transformative learning processes are also key to the social-ecological change processes which restoration initiatives inherently are.  We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of a relational understanding and ways in which transformative learning for social-ecological restoration programmes can be fostered.

Influence of herbivores on ecological restoration after invasive shrub clearing in the Kafue Flats Wetlands, Zambia.

The Kafue Flats Wetlands in central Zambia has experienced significant spread of the alien invasive shrub, Mimosa pigra (mimosa). Efforts are ongoing to remove up to 95% of the current 3,000 hectares of mimosa cover in Lochinvar National Park (LNP) with the aim of restoring this area to increase biodiversity. The restoration area hosts large populations of Kafue Lechwe antelope which feed on fresh grass regrowth in the cleared areas. Hence, it is likely that they will affect vegetation recovery, but it is unknown which species, native or alien, they will particularly support during this process. Our study therefore focused on answering the question: how does herbivore grazing impact vegetation restoration after large scale invasive plant removal? Five months after mimosa removal, we commenced a two- year field experiment in LNP with eight paired plots. At each paired plot, one plot is fenced to prevent grazing and the other unfenced to allow grazing. We have measured the initial vegetation parameters in these experimental plots: i.e., seedling density of mimosa and diversity and composition of the native plant community. Initial results after five months of experimental treatments show that the lechwe herbivores do indeed influence vegetation recovery. Grazed plots had a higher mimosa seedling density, and a lower cover, biomass, and species richness of the native community than the fenced plots. These early results suggest that large-scale restoration projects should factor in the influence of grazing – and its management – to optimise restoration efforts and their subsequent biodiversity benefits.

Improving and Verifying Ecological Restoration Outcomes: Recently Published EPA Guidance

Have you ever questioned the reliability of your monitoring data? (Be honest!) In ecological restoration projects, reliable data are needed to accurately assess ecosystem conditions, track progress toward stated restoration goals, determine the effectiveness of restoration practices, and provide evidence of restoration success.  EPA’s Great Lakes National Program Office (GLNPO) and the Interagency Ecological Restoration Quality Committee are pleased to announce the recent publication of the Application of Quality Assurance and Quality Control Principles to Ecological Restoration Project Monitoring (EPA-905-K19-001, April 2019) to address the unique challenges associated with controlling and documenting the quality of ecological monitoring data. It describes quality assurance and quality control strategies that can improve the quality of data collected and increase certainty in decision-making, with a broader goal of improving the success of ecological restoration activities. This webinar by two of its primary authors will describe the contents of this guidance, particularly how it addresses quality best practices for the collection of observer-determined data.

Application of Quality Assurance and Quality Control Principles to Ecological Restoration Project Monitoring

This guidance is intended to encourage and facilitate the adoption of effective quality assurance (QA) and quality control (QC) strategies in support of ecological restoration projects. Anticipated users include ecological restoration specialists and stakeholders representing federal, state and tribal agencies, NGOs, civic and local groups, and the academic community. Although it is assumed that users will have some background in and knowledge of basic ecological restoration practices and QA/QC concepts, Chapter 2 includes a brief review of QA/QC principles that are discussed throughout the remainder of the document.

The practices, procedures, information, and concepts outlined in this guidance can provide the following benefits to practitioners and stakeholders:

• Save time and resources by enhancing the consistency of documentation and procedures in current and future projects.
• Improve data quality for ecological measurements and observations, aid in evaluating project success, and incorporate long-term effectiveness monitoring as feedback to adaptive management.
• Encourage a common approach to QA/QC across multiple entities involved in ecological restoration projects to improve data comparability over time and support comparison of various restoration strategies.
• Serve as a consolidated collection of the best QA/QC practices for ecological restoration projects across multiple agencies.

Restoring ecosystem function: The conundrum of woody encroachment in South Africa

Woody encroachment and thickening is a global phenomenon, altering the composition of plant functional types within biomes, and changing ecosystem processes and feedbacks. Current consensus is that global change, in the form of increasing atmospheric CO₂ concentrations and changing rainfall patterns, together with local land management strategies such as fire suppression and stocking densities, are the drivers of the emerging landscape patterns. Sweet thorn Acacia (Vachellia karroo) is an endemic to southern Africa, but it is encroaching into grassland systems and threatening livelihoods. However, the species’ status as a non-listed invasive (National Environmental Management: Biodiversity Act 2004, Act No. 10, Alien and Invasive Species Lists) limits control and eradication options. Together with our lack of insight into how ecosystem processes are changing, this phenomenon poses a conundrum to management and decision making from the farm to national level. Using a case study in Adelaide, Eastern Cape, we use the open path eddy covariance technique in a paired tower design together with remote sensing (MODIS and MISR-HR products) to quantify the impact of woody thickening on water, carbon, and energy fluxes and rangeland productivity. We present the results of the 2018-2019 growing and dry seasons and the longer-term patterns in changing ecosystem feedbacks.

Spatial prioritisation of invasive alien plants clearing on La Réunion Island

The largest area of intact vegetation in the Mascarene archipelago is found on La Réunion Island. However, biological invasions are one of the main threats to the biodiversity on this island and globally worldwide. This study aims to spatialize, coordinate, and prioritize conservation issues and invasive alien plants clearing on the island. For this, our approach involved three steps based on existing data and expert knowledge. First, thanks to collective work between researchers and managers, we combined existing data on natural environments, endemic species, and invasive alien plants species. These data allowed us to identify the spatial distribution of biodiversity and threats and to realize the first map of invasion level at the island scale. Secondly, we used a spatial prioritization software, Zonation, for identifying different scenarios of conservation issues. These conservation issues were selected to maximize biodiversity representativeness in lightly invaded areas. Finally, the conservation issues and some operational criteria were used to prioritize clearing of alien plants. Almost 40% of the remaining natural habitats on La Réunion Island are moderately to heavily invaded. We identify 58,500 ha as conservation priorities areas of which 30% are considered as non-invaded. We will discuss how this will influence future alien plant clearing programs at La Réunion.

Comparing two contrasted methods of sand dune restoration after Eucalyptus clearing

Coastal dunes are vulnerable ecosystems, threatened by both direct and indirect human pressures. In Israel, over the past century, well-intentioned efforts were made to stabilize coastal dunes, using exclusively non-native woody plants. Today these species, especially Eucalyptus camaldulensis, cover large areas, effectively stabilizing sand and profoundly modifying native ecosystems both above- and below-ground. In the current research (2015-2018), we tested two different treatments for kick-starting a restoration process: (a) cutting the Eucalypts (assisted regeneration), and (b) cutting the trees, removing all leaf litter, and reintroducing local plant species (active restoration). We established a protocol for collecting a large database on soil structure, nutrient content, soil bacteria, vascular plants, arthropods, and reptiles. We compared data collected from sites undergoing both treatments to the data collected under uncut Eucalyptus, and nearby never planted sand dune ecosystems. Three years after clear-cutting we found significant similarity between Restoration plots and sand dunes control plots. However, Regeneration plots were not significantly different from sand dunes or Eucalyptus controls. We also found significant differences in species composition. Restoration plots were richer in endemic and psammophile plant species, Regeneration plots were richer in foreign plant species. Chalcides sepsoide, a highly adapted skink, did not colonize any of the restored plots. Both Ablepharus rueppellii, and Cyrtopodion kotschy, generalist reptiles, were found only in the Regeneration plots. We concluded that although the litter removal treatment demands larger initial investment, it yields faster and better results for kickstarting self-recovery processes for the degraded coastal dune ecosystem under study

What is preventing oak forest regeneration in human-modified landscapes? Evidence from a multi-site experiment in central Mexico

Oak forests are climax forest states with an elevated associated biodiversity and complex ecological interactions, and they provide a wide range of ecological services and goods. In spite of their importance, deforestation and expanding agricultural frontiers threaten oak forests worldwide. In México alone – where one third of the world’s oak species grow – more than 20% of its oak forests were lost in the last 50 years while the remaining forests are often heavily impacted by human activities. Seedling establishment in these landscapes is often hampered by a lack of seed-dispersers and harsh micro-environmental conditions. As a result, current regeneration rates are often insufficient to replace older individuals. We set up a field experiment in semi-arid Central Mexico to asses oak regeneration in a human-modified oak forest. We sowed over 8,000 acorns of eight different species in 130 experimental units distributed over five sites (eroded landslides, abandoned cattle pasture, and forest relicts). We tested the impact of five different ecological barriers on seedling establishment: compaction, full sun exposure, enhanced seed predation, poor soil, and absence of litter. We also tested the effectiveness of restoration interventions to overcome these barriers, such as artificial shade or soil transference. Particular barriers or restoration interventions had varying effects according to species, life stage, and site. Furthermore, artificial shade and top-soil transference promoted seedling establishment individually, but not when applied in combination. Our results shed light on oak forest succession in human-modified forests and provide a practical restoration guide to enhance oak seedling establishment.

Restoration of Mediterranean temporary ponds in Portugal: Challenges and opportunities

Mediterranean Temporary Ponds (MTP) are habitats of major conservation importance in Europe due to their extensive decline in area and quality. Our work was part of the LIFE Charcos project*, directed to implement restoration actions to preserve this habitat on the Southwest Coast of Portugal. These ecosystems are strongly dependent on rainfall and annually experience a flood / dissection cycle. The exclusive fauna and flora that colonize MTP are specialized to exist with this alternation of ecological conditions. Restoration of typical MTP ecology presents major challenges and opportunities. The recovery of the basin’s topographic profile is challenging and has to be carried out considering specifically the special characteristics of the MTP hydroperiod. The annual species and those with dormancy mechanisms are more resilient and exhibit higher recovery rates. The annual dynamics of the ecosystem present a great opportunity to monitor restoration success and consequently adjust recovery actions on an annual basis. We carried out physical replacement of pond basin topography, invasive vegetation control, and plant community enhancement. The restoration results are positive with reinforcement of the spatial differentiation of the floristic communities and increase of characteristic and indicator plant species. Regarding the control of invasive species (Acacia spp. and Carpobrotus edulis), the results are encouraging, since the removal of the vegetal mass allowed the germination of the small annual species characteristic of the MTP.

* This work was co-funded by European Union LIFE+ programme

A good start but a slow dynamic: Hopes and disappointment of a Mediterranean steppe grassland restoration experiment

The spontaneous recovery of plant communities after severe anthropogenic disturbances has often to face two main obstacles: the reduced propagule pressure of target species and the high dispersal and establishment potential of unwanted species, particularly due to the increased soil fertility. An experiment was carried out 10 years ago to address the question: what are the most efficient restoration treatments to restore such plant communities? After the rehabilitation of an herbaceous sheep- grazed habitat in a formerly intensively cultivated orchard in a Mediterranean steppe in France, four experimental techniques were applied to restore the plant community: i) topsoil was removed to lower ruderal species seed banks and soil trophic levels, ii) nurse species were seeded to rapidly occupy niches, and then to provide safe sites for target species once sheep grazing has been reintroduced, iii) hay was transferred to provide local species seeds and iv) soil was inoculated to provide local species propagules with associated microorganisms and to lower soil trophic levels. Four years later, above-ground vegetation physiognomy was rehabilitated, and some treatments had great results: species richness was restored and community structure was half restored by soil transfer and topsoil removal. Ten years later they did not improve more but the other treatments, including the control, have greatly improved in diversity and structure, reaching the restoration level of the latter treatments. These results will be discussed, as well as the merits of having good results at the very beginning of a restoration project but with no better dynamics after.

Drought affects transitions between dominant plant species in California annual grasslands

In Mediterranean annual grasslands, vegetation communities are sensitive to environmental variation and historical contingency (priority effects). Keen observers in arid and semi-arid systems have long recognized the importance of these drivers, employing qualitative state and transition models (STMs) to guide restoration and management practice. However, there are few empirical tests of assumptions made by these models, related to the number and composition of vegetation “states” and frequency of transitions between them. In light of predicted climate change effects across Mediterranean grassland systems, quantitative approaches to generating STMs may better predict long-term vegetation patterns used to identify key thresholds and windows of management action. Using experimental plantings of three classically-defined groups of grassland taxa – native perennial grasses, naturalized annual forage grasses, and noxious invasive species – we examined transitions between vegetation types over a period encompassing typical precipitation patterns (2007-2010), drought (2011-2015), and post-drought recovery (2016-2019). Through unsupervised classification and multi-state modelling, we assessed the value of these group definitions and quantified transition probability as a function of historical contingency and climatic variation. We found that classic California grassland STMs do not account for a distinct 4th group of species that respond strongly to drought. We also found that vegetation states differed significantly in their transition frequencies; native species, in particular, were resilient to state change once established, but rarely invaded other communities. These results contribute to the growing evidence of contingency and environmental effects in annual grasslands, in addition to development of quantitative approaches that complement existing management tools.

Duivenhoks River – from extinction to sustainability

The Duiwenhoks River required a radical intervention on many fronts. The priority was to stop further erosion. The LandCare team, under the mentorship of Hans King, designed innovative weirs and groyne structures to stabilise the river. Two weirs and 30 groyne structures were built, creating jobs for 140 people at a cost of R40-million. Erosion control and conservation cannot take place without alien clearing. LandCare teamed up with the Grootvadersbosch Conservancy. Together they developed a clearing model where LandCare provides 70% of the funding, while landowners commit to 30%. Eight contracting teams employing 144 people now clear invasive plants.  Where aliens have been cleared, teams plant palmiet and other indigenous plants. None of this work could take place without landowner buy-in. Over 10 years, the LandCare team worked to build close relationships with landowners, to build trust, and so to change farming practices and perceptions. The aim is to encourage farmers along the riverbanks to protect their natural resources – to the benefit of nature, food-security, as well as the broader community. Improvements took place both through LandCare’s direct contribution and through indirect impacts. The 30 groyne structures and two weirs were strategically placed along the river. One of the weirs was placed where an 11-m deep gulley had formed. This weir lifted the gulley floor by 5-6 m. This has already had impressive results with the erosion having stabilised and with palmiet returning to the region, as well as other indigenous fauna and flora.

Integrated partnerships for securing natural resources in the Western Cape, South Africa

The tremendous diversity of plants and animals within the Cape Floristic Region is under constant threat due to the ever-increasing development footprint, particularly in the lowlands and spreading rapidly up to the Cape West Coast. Through the Dassenberg Coastal Catchment Partnership, private owners, communities, and government aim to secure water resources and build climate change resilience through biodiversity conservation. The focus area of the partnership is 34,500 hectares and 50 percent is made up of private and communal land. A number of plant species thought to have been extinct for more than 50 years actually have remaining populations growing on the seasonally wet lowlands within Critically Endangered ecosystems here. These unique wetland habitats are choked by invasive Australian Acacias. The cost of clearing these dense infestations is very high and most landowners are not able to cope with the constant costs, despite their best efforts. It is only through public-private partnerships that significant impacts can be made towards the restoration of these Critically Endangered ecosystems and the multitude of threatened species they contain. By clearing invasive alien vegetation through partnerships in this integrated effort, about 250 jobs are created yearly.  This is done by employing more than 20 teams through the partnership of the 12 members. West Coast LandCare is a partner in this integrated effort and funds at least three of these teams yearly.

A vibrant Junior LandCare Project in the Western Cape Province

The Junior LandCare programme can be seen as the cornerstone for youth development to provide for sustainable resource management for future generation. To ensure that the Junior LandCare programme promotes development of youth with regards to natural resource management, three themes were created: SoilCare, WaterCare and VeldCare. The various themes entail;

• SoilCare: Soil life, erosion, horticulture, and composting.
• WaterCare: Water cycle and water life.
• VeldCare: Indigenous and alien plants and trees.

The Junior LandCare programme promotes food security for homes and schools as food garden competitions are held on a regular basis to create awareness regarding LandCare and sustainable agriculture. Furthermore, the programme also improves leadership skills of the youth as various leadership facilitators are kept consistently in the province. It developed and creates business for local service providers that specialise in environmental education. The main aim of the presentation is to explain the Junior LandCare programme and its various success stories in the province.policy

Restoration of ecological infrastructure through collaboration and LandCare partnerships

Climate change, failing ecological infrastructure, mining threats, unsustainable land use practices, uncoordinated conservation and restoration initiatives, overlapping mandates, and poor buy-in from private landowners are some of the challenges constantly in competition with sustainable natural resource management (NRM). The challenge remains – how to improve the coordination of joint conservation and restoration goals and ensure individual landowner and community buy-in on a landscape scale. LandCare Area Wide Planning was the catalyst to start an innovative platform that resulted in an improved collaboration amongst various role-players. The benefit of such an innovative platform was the creation of a common vision by the various stakeholders who had a collective interest in the restoration of ecological infrastructure on a landscape level. Once common ground was found, challenges were analysed, and potential solutions were identified and put into effect. This network platform resulted in an improved coordination of restoration activities, commitment from the local communities, and innovative ways to create opportunities for the development of SMME’s through river restoration. The most powerful benefit of such an innovative platform is that it provides a vehicle to improve communication between government bodies and local communities. Farmers and other stakeholders could now voice their opinions and press for changes in policies, strategy, and implementation as an equal partner on a landscape scale. To scale up and out the different innovation platforms can generate, test, and implement local solutions to local problems, share ideas, learn from one another, and influence policies to have a nationwide impact.

Berg River Restoration project: A sustainable trail from source to sea

The Western Cape Department of Agriculture (WCDOA) is committed to working towards the restoration of the Berg River to a healthy river system that will promote human wellbeing and support ecosystem functions. More than 4 million people are dependent on the River in terms of food production, water supply, recreation and the value add in the agricultural sector. With over 22 000 hectares of irrigated crops on 600 farms, the River contributes to over R2 billion/year and supports more than 18 000 full time jobs.

The first step in this restoration project is to get the farmers on board as it is private land and without their buy-in nothing could be seen as sustainable, then the massive task of clearing the river of alien biomass is the next step. This task is work in progress and approximately 35% of the river has been cleared at a cost of more than R50 million. After this step the restoration begins, and several partners have step forward to assist in this vital task. Presently we have a dedicated nursery cultivating plants from origin from the river and these are being planted in the riparian zone. The first wetland area of a few kilometres in length that was restored has proven how effective our work has been in the improved water quality and containment of floods. Restoration is vital in this project but to maintain this sustainability the three pillars of sustainable development will be critical.  Key words: River health, agri-tourism, sustainable development, economy and partnerships.

Mapping vocation for forest restoration and multifunctional landscapes in Rio Doce Basin, Brazil: Vocation for Restoration Index (VRI)

Considerable efforts have been devoted to exploring pathways for moving toward resilient landscapes. A particular challenge is to reconcile the needs for economic growth, provision of ecosystem services, and social development across the landscape. This paper has three objectives: The first is to draw upon conceptual models for addressing production vs. conservation challenges. We adapted the land-vocation concept into the context of forest restoration in Brazil, based in three modalities: i) vocation for natural regeneration, ii) forestation for conservation purposes and iii) vocation for agroforestry systems, as an opportunity for landscape planning, after one of the worst man-made disasters in Brazil, caused by the Fundão Dam break in the Rio Doce Basin. The second objective is to apply the conceptual framework to a spatially-explicit index for mapping vocation for forest restoration (VRI), aiming to map the most favorable areas for receiving approximately USD 300 million of restoration investment over the next 10 years. Finally, we address implementation issues and the way IVR is taken up in the Brazilian decision-making context. Our results show that IVR is innovative and suited to dealing with the whole-landscape-approach conceptual framework. The methodological approach, as well as results of VRI received constructive feedback from both governmental institutions and local/regional stakeholders. We expect this work to inspire and gauge the implementation of forest restoration at the landscape scale in Brazil as a way to go beyond land sparing, instead of reconciling land vocation for production (agroforestry) and conservation (natural regeneration nd plantations) at the landscape scale.

The multidimensionality of the Environmental Vulnerability Index in the process of recovery of the Rio Doce Basin, Brazil

Vulnerability assessment is fundamental to environmental management as it allows the identification of areas or resources at risk and the threats posed by the decrease or loss of such resources. The Doce River Basin, which is historically characterized by agricultural degradation and deforestation, suffered in 2015 the most significant environmental impact in Brazil’s history from the mine tailings dam breach in Mariana (Minas Gerais state), which generated several environmental compensation activities, as the reforestation of 400 km² in water recharge areas (WRAs) and watercourses preservation areas (WPAs). The objective of this work was them to establish a methodology for mapping environmental vulnerability in the Doce River Basin to allocate space for environmental recovery. The WPAs were determined according to Brazilian legislation and the WRAs were determined using the multi-criteria Analytical Hierarchical Process (AHP), considering the relief position, climatological water balance, soil drainage, and depth and terrain planform curvature. Subsequently, an AHP was performed to identify the environmental vulnerability in the Basin, using the parameters land use adequacy, erosion potential, quantitative water balance, and fires/heat sources. Finally, a third analysis was done to prioritise the municipalities that presented the highest relative percentage of degraded WPAs and WRAs, generating the environmental vulnerability index (EVI). In all of the 228 municipalities of the Rio Doce Basin, those with the highest EVI were concentrated in the middle part of the Basin area around the cities of Governador Valadares, Aimorés and Colatina, which are characterised by lower rainfall indices, deforestation, and extension of livestock use.

Developing a holistic thread of thought on restoration of land, water, and society: A synthesis and experience from southern Africa

This presentation tracks development, interrelationships, and common provenance of frameworks used in the RESILIM-O and Tsitsa projects in this symposium, and benefits, challenges, and meta-learnings emerging from this longer-term process. These projects emphasise particularly systemic, collective co-construction, and (invariably transformative) learning to support restoration and related practices. This evolved, over time, effectively splicing social science, biophysical science and collectively lived experience into a functional trans-disciplinary praxis. Antecedents included the decade-long Kruger National Park Rivers Research Programme, emphasising strategic adaptive management (SAM), and the Save the Sand Project in which systems thinking and resilience aspects were further developed. Innovative social learning frameworks were progressively added in the latter project and in RESILIM-O. Seeing restoration practice and contexts (system(s) of interest) as nested interconnected wholes enables feedbacks at multiple scales to be utilised for monitoring and learning, both formal and tacit, and for realist-style evaluation. Together with SAM philosophy, this encourages addressing selected immediate crises, balancing this against reflection and building pre-emptive capacity. This overall way of working promotes modesty, tries to accommodate existing structures, but has to confront perversities and promote patience and trust-building. It often defuses tensions and enables different groups to move forward together. Resource management decisions often flow from emergent outcomes of wide reflection and sufficient consensus. Although helping, the methods do not in any direct way address persistent power asymmetries. Requiring time and ongoing thoughtful development, incremental learnings from this approach give hope for more durable, better agreed-on, and sufficiently responsive restoration of land, water and society.

Monitoring, evaluation, reflection, and learning: Transforming M&E into reflexive learning and adaptive management within restoration

Restoration programs in complex social-ecological systems face a conundrum in terms of monitoring and evaluation (M&E). On the one hand they need to report to donors or higher-level structures using indicators and targets. However, targets are notoriously difficult to set because of the unpredictability inherent in these contexts, so people ‘play the game of numbers’ and approach M&E as a quantitative tick-box exercise which does not encourage learning or, even worse, is met with resentment. Despite good intentions, M&E systems often end up being focused on accountability or compliance at the expense of learning. In this talk we present our experiences with transforming M&E to enable, rather than stifle, learning and adaptive management within restoration practice in the Olifants and Tsitsa catchments in South Africa. Innovations include the use of mixed modalities (including quantitative and qualitative monitoring, case-based evaluations, and conceptual work), promoting ongoing reflection through multiple means (including reporting processes and various kinds of learning events), and linking ongoing learning to planning processes so as to build in change as appropriate. We conclude that it is not only specific features of the M&E design that enable learning, but also the disposition of the people who animate the system. Our work provides evidence for the value of adequately resourcing the monitoring, evaluation, reflection, and learning function at catchment or landscape levels – to support scientists and managers to expand their roles, develop new relationships, participate in sense-making and engage in transformative social learning.

Restoration and historicity: Practicing the long view with practitioners and communities to lay the groundwork for transformation within restoration

The transition to democracy saw the emergence of large scale state sponsored and coordinated restoration programmes such as Working for Water in South Africa. Explicitly coupled to socio-economic development objectives, these programmes reflected a willingness by natural resource management (NRM) policy-makers to confront and respond to historical socio-political injustices and their legacies. Translating these social and environmental objectives within individual restoration projects required local level practitioners and stakeholders to additionally confront the unique and nuanced histories of their local contexts within the immediate post-apartheid era. We report on reflections by practitioners on the collapse of efforts to establish the Blyde National Park (in the Olifants Catchment), and particularly the unsuccessful attempts to implement comprehensive and integrated restoration projects within it. Practitioners from an interconnected group of local NRM practices (including restoration, water, forestry, and conservation), highlighted the need to collectively re-define and transform institutional arrangements in collaboration with local communities, especially in relation to changing organizational mandates, capacity, and landownership. This co-enquiry into local pioneering NRM practices, although not fully complete, has supported the emergence of agency and collective action, as well as building a community of practice. Cultural Historical Activity Theory provided a valuable framework for the above process and allowed the re-thinking and re-modelling of the restoration practice as a learning-action space. Finally, we advocate for adequate attention to various social dimensions (including organizational, socio-economic and socio-political) within which the bio-physical and technical aspects of restoration projects are nested, in order to ensure sustainable and just resilience building.

Creating collective socio-ecological learning spaces for transformative learning and custodianship building in natural resource management practices

Over two decades ago, the South African government created the Working for Water (WfW) programme, which is the largest of all restoration programmes in the country. WfW objectives were to restore ecological infrastructure through clearing of invasive alien plants and jobs creation for unemployed citizens. There was no explicit focus on institutionalization of these ecological restoration programmes within local landowners and catchment residents. Furthermore, there was a lack of scope for capacity development to build custodianship for marginalized communities to be actively involved in management of restoration programmes such as WfW. This paper shares insight from the Blyde Restoration project (BRP) located in the Blyde catchment, Mpumalanga Province of South Africa. The BRP project was aimed at building capacity development for custodianship and collaborative management of ecological restoration projects by managers and local catchment residents. The paper demonstrates how systemic social learning approaches can be used as a methodological approach to support the emergence of transformative learning and collective capacity for restoration and protection of ecological infrastructure. The paper argues that deliberate creation of socio-ecological learning spaces, through co-inquiry processes can support resilient restoration practices and strengthen custodianship building for landowners and users who still view the restoration programmes such as WfW sorely as job creation projects. In conclusion, the paper argues that restoration practices should be everyone’s problem, not just the government’s responsibility. And this requires substantial efforts to be focused on transformative learning approaches which are systemic and dialectical, in order to achieve integrated natural resource management practices.

Systems thinking within restoration for resilience: Collectively understanding and managing relationships between land- and water-restoration and human livelihoods

Despite the progressive and enabling legislative framework for Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM), the integrity of many southern African river systems is declining. Many basins are challenged by balancing social development imperatives with resource sustainability. Such challenges resonate with global concerns of water security given an increasingly complex and dynamic context within which water governance has to act. This paper describes the uptake of IWRM in the Olifants Catchment, shared between South Africa and Mozambique, and the Tsitsa Catchment in the Eastern Cape. A systemic catchment management approach is described – not as an end in itself but rather as a process for managing and restoring water and land resources as shaped by the socio-economic and political context. This context is important because many of the issues apparent today are systemic in nature and hence require systemic approaches. We focus on restoring and maintaining environmental water requirements as a lens through which to examine the need for systemic, integrated, and adaptive responses. Regular non-compliance in South African rivers reflects the complexities of governing in dynamic, socio-ecological environments where operationalizing policy depends on the collective contribution of a number of strategies, plans, and practices. We highlight the importance of governance, a practice-based understanding of policy, the role of leadership and communication, collective action and regulation, and self-organisation. These issues are explored through the evolving experiences of working first in the rivers of the Kruger National Park, the uptake of these ideas into the Olifants, and subsequently the Tsitsa Catchment.