Search results

The purpose of this paper is to examine the framework, operation and prospects of two innovative planning tools – biobanking and biodiversity certification – to protect biodiversity in the context of urbanisation.

Using the Australian State of New South Wales, and its capital Sydney, as a focus, the paper reviews the history and performance of the two planning tools selected for examination.

Through its analysis, this paper supports the use of biobanking and biodiversity certification as tools at the disposal of planners which should be employed to augment the array of tools to manage the impacts on biodiversity of urban development. Indeed, these tools have the potential to increase the level of conserved biodiversity if used appropriately.

Biobanking and biodiversity certification are, respectively, examples of market-based and strategic-based statutory planning mechanisms that can be used to protect biodiversity in an urban development context. Creative adaption of environmental planning laws is required to ensure effective implementation of these innovative planning tools. The relevant contemporary statutory enactments that have given effect to these mechanisms are examined in this paper.

There are some environmentally critical areas (ECAs) in cities such as flood flow areas, agricultural land, canals, rivers, water bodies, forests and hills that need to be conserved from land transformation. The purpose of this paper is to review the compliance, challenges and significance of urban planning, and to develop a contextual framework of urban planning for environmental area conservation to improve the urban environment in case study city Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh.

This research is based on a qualitative thematic analysis of the available relevant literature.

This research identified non-compliance of the contemporary urban plans such as indiscriminate land conversion activities in the ECAs. Conflicting interests between the urban plans concerning protection of the conservation areas and business interests of the community people and the real estate development companies are identified as the major challenges. Dhaka faces several environmental problems such as loss of biodiversity and ecosystem, waterlogging, flooding, pollution, reduction of vegetation, groundwater depletion, temperature increase and a reduction in agriculture and fishing because of land conversion in the ECAs.

Urban planning with effective conservation area management, conflict resolution through communication and participation, creation of economic opportunity to generate income from the ECAs and assessment of the conservation strategies and interventions might ensure environmental conservation in Dhaka.

The conceptual framework of urban planning for environmental conservation is innovative as this could be a basis for other cities in Bangladesh and in other developing countries.

Biodiversity conservation tax incentives were inserted into the Income Tax Act 58 of 1962 in terms of the Revenue Laws Amendment Act 60 of 2008 and are now contained in section 37C. The objectives of this study were to quantify the maximum potential revenue loss, to National Treasury, as a result of these tax incentives granted to landowners in the Western Cape; to identify and discuss alternative policy instruments to encourage conservation; and to investigate the perceptions of landowners in the Western Cape on the tax and alternative incentives available for conservation. The study found that the maximum tax revenue foregone should amount to a tiny percentage of total estimated revenue income for the 2008/2009 fiscal year, while projected future losses could also be insignificant. Landowners prefer direct financial incentives and exemption from property taxes, and contend that direct assistance with conservation activities would also be beneficial. The use of municipal value in the valuation of land would promote objectiveness and consistency. Finally, only a third of the landowners indicated that tax incentives would encourage them to commit more land for conservation.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the feasibility of adopting a market‐based land use model, Transfer of Development Rights (TDR), which is very popular in America and other countries as a positive land use control mechanism for conservation, in an evolving socialist land economy, namely China.

This paper utilizes a case study approach, supplemented by a cost‐benefit model, to estimate the feasibility of establishing a TDR model in Chongqing, China.

From the analysis, it is found that a market‐based land use mechanism can serve to maximize the benefits of all parties and can balance the interests between development pressures and conservation needs. However, this is based on a number of conditions, including: that a well‐developed legal framework should be set up, to clearly delineate property rights; that a good and enforceable planning system should be in place; and that a mature land market mechanism should be developed that allows open market prices to be realized in the trading of development rights.

This case study is based on a hypothetical situation of one case. More data are needed to support the argument in the future.

Conservation is a major concern for the local governments in China, given the recent high speed economic growth. A model that can balance development pressure, while allowing the market to compensate fully for the infringement of property rights in the process of urban regeneration, is worthy of the authority's attention in future policy formulation.

This paper shows that the society as a whole can strike a balance between the need for economic development and conservation of historic sites, provided some conditions can be met.

This paper fulfills an identified need to study the establishment of a market‐based land use model in the conservation policy of land in China.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the regulatory, policy and market‐based approaches taken to incorporate biodiversity conservation in the management of urban growth in Sydney and more broadly in New South Wales, Australia's most populous state. Problems associated with managing Sydney's growth – particularly from the intersection of dealing with perceived property rights and the protection of natural resources such as biodiversity – are identified, and the scope for hybrid “smart regulation” is examined.

The relevant issues are illustrated through significant State Government development decisions relating to the retention of biodiversity in the new growth areas of Sydney.

The paper argues that to better integrate biodiversity conservation in Australian cities a mixed approach be adopted in which a number of tools are utilised – and that this needs to occur in the context of a sound overarching strategic planning framework. This constitutes a hybrid approach involving a “fixed” strategic spatial plan informing statutory‐based regulation primarily through zoning and other development controls, augmented by a range of market based tools implemented through statute and common law measures such as conservation covenants.

Singular reliance on traditional “command and control” regulatory approaches as both a cause and ineffectual solution to the problems faced in biodiversity conservation is highlighted. Newer “market based” mechanisms which are being introduced (e.g. biobanking), or should be adopted (e.g. transferable development rights), and management at the strategic level (e.g. biodiversity certification), are examined.

This chapter evaluates the impacts of and response measures to COVID-19 pandemic on the practice of tourism in the wildlife conservancy model in Kenya thus proposing response interventions to possible tourism crises in the future.

The study uses the qualitative exploratory experience design and collects data from purposely selected conservancies' leaders and other documented materials from two main wildlife conservancies association in Kenya.

The chapter presents findings on the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on wildlife conservancy-based tourism, how conservancies responded to the pandemic and conservancy leadership perspectives on how to model future tourism and related activities in the conservancies based on the lessons they have learnt from the COVID-19 experience.

With the wildlife conservancy-based tourism model in Kenya being a relatively new phenomenon, the study provides important lessons for comparison with other such initiatives in other places in the event of tourism crises in the future.

This chapter argues that better preparedness to crises and uncertainties by various tourism types and models can help mitigate against adverse effects of similar uncertainties in the future. Consequently, the findings offer a glimpse of proposals and solutions to the wildlife conservancy-based tourism models that continue to be established in Kenya and in the region.

In Europe, as in other developed regions of the world, formal protected areas (PA) are, almost by definition, conservation islands within a wider landscape of intensive farming, towns, industry and transport links. The recognised need for “more, bigger, better and joined” implies the need for complementary approaches. The purpose of this paper is to examine some innovative funding and delivery mechanisms in the UK and their strengths – and weaknesses – compared to the formal system of PA.

Building on recent research undertaken for the UK Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) the HLF landscape partnership (LP) programme is described and related to other area-based approaches including the Wildlife Trust’s Living Landscapes, the Futurescapes programme of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and the UK government’s Nature Improvement Areas (NIA).

LPs represent an increasingly important vehicle for securing conservation of the natural and cultural heritage alongside the formal system of designated PA. Their reliance upon local initiative, community engagement and multi-agency participation presents significant advantages. The strength of the LP approach is that it is “bottom up” and in some ways opportunistic.

Non-tax funding of innovative approaches to landscape governance presents significant opportunity for natural and cultural heritage conservation, particularly in their capacity to mobilise local enthusiasm and support. However, it fits also with neo-liberal approaches which seek to transfer to the “third sector” responsibilities previously the province of local and national government.

This paper is one of a very limited number of studies of developed-country LPs. It widens the concept of “PA” beyond formal IUCN categories and indicates the potential for innovations in funding and governance.

Purpose – The purpose is to show that the influx of new seasonal and year-round residents to the small towns located in and around protected areas has numerous implications for governance associated with land management and regional planning including reconciling the competing values of wilderness (amenity vs. livelihood, motorized vs. non-motorized recreation, active vs. passive land management).

Methodology/approach – We use case studies from the Adirondack Park in Northern New York State and the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem in the western United States to demonstrate the land management and governance challenges facing local communities in and around internationally renowned, protected areas.

Findings – We highlight how these transforming communities meet diverse needs and competing interests and how partnering with a non-governmental organization benefits local governance issues.

Originality/value of chapter – The paper presents research from the United States, which theoretically and empirically contributes to the scientific discourse on exurbanization, protected areas, and governance.

It is argued that there are three broad conditions that are necessary for an individual farmer to adopt a farming‐system innovation: awareness of the innovation, perception that it is feasible and worthwhile to trial the innovation, and perception that the innovation promotes the farmer’s objectives. Challenges involved in meeting each of these conditions are discussed, with particular attention to land conservation practices. In Australia, agricultural extension is the main method of intervention that has been used to promote land conservation. Insights from the framework presented here are used to suggest the particular types of approaches to agricultural extension that are most likely to contribute to positive outcomes.