Suchergebnisse

Very recently, social innovation has become a subject of investigation in forest research. Earlier on, social innovation turned into a term used in EU policy strategies for addressing social issues and the self-empowerment of local people, as well as for tackling economic, social, or environmental challenges. The question of how the forest bioeconomy might profit from social innovation remains. The article examined the forest bioeconomy from the perspective of social innovation features: How is social innovation reflected in the forest bioeconomy? The forest sector is identified as one principal supplier sectors in the updated European Bioeconomy Strategy. In the strategies' general objectives of job creation and employment through the green economy, we detected some links to social innovation. In contrast, the EU Social Innovation Initiative includes social aspects via addressing collective action, integration of vulnerable social groups, and rural and urban economic development, without mentioning explicitly the forest sector. In order to make use of both EU policy documents, it is necessary to enquire on the overlaps. This research focused on the communalities in their policy goals as a reference framework for systematically identifying specific forest bioeconomy activities fitting into both realms. With example of these activities, we showed how the forest bioeconomy plays a unique role in addressing hitherto unmet needs with the development of new types of services. There is rich potential in the forest bioeconomy for private forest owners and producers with activities that range from social biomass plants to collectively organized charcoal (biochar) production in remote rural areas. Most of these are service innovations, while some combine services with product innovations. Our findings challenge positions that regard economic and social issues as strictly separated. As a result, they are identified as two combined complementary sources of income for Europe's forest owners.

Social innovations can tackle various challenges related to gender equity in rural areas, especially when such innovations are initiated and developed by women themselves. We examine cases located in rural areas of Canada, Italy, Lebanon, Morocco, and Serbia, where women are marginalized by gender roles, patriarchal values, male dominated economy and policy, and lack of opportunities for education and employment. Our objective is to analyze five case studies on how women-led social innovation processes can tackle gender equity related challenges manifested at the levels of everyday practice, institutions, and cognitive frames. The analyses are based on interviews, workshops, literature screening, and are examined via the qualitative abductive method. Results summarize challenges that rural women are facing, explore social innovation initiatives as promising solutions, and analyze their implications on gender equity in the five case studies. Based on our results we propose a new concept: reconstructive social innovation cycle. It refers to is defined as cyclical innovation processes that engage women via civil society initiatives. These initiatives reconstruct the existing state of affairs, by questioning marginalizing and discriminative practices, institutions, and cognitive frames that are often perceived as normal. The new concept helps with to assessing the implications that women-led social innovations have for gender equity. ; The authors are grateful to the European Commission for financial support to the project on Social Innovation in Marginalised Rural Areas (SIMRA) provided from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under Grant Agreement No 677622. Contribution of the author from the James Hutton Institute to this study was also partly funded by the Rural & Environment Science & Analytical Services Division of the Scottish Government through its Strategic Research Programme (2016–2021). The Nunavut/Canada case study was supported by Nordforsk Nordic Centre of Excellence: Resource Extraction and Sustainable Arctic Communities (REXSAC: project number 76938).

The "Final Report on Cross-Case Studies Assessment of Social Innovation" provides a transversal and systematic analysis of the Case Studies of Social innovation (SI) identified in the H2020 SIMRA project (http://www.simra-h2020.eu/) using aggregated qualitative and quantitative empirical information. The cross-case analysis identifies commonalities and differences across the cases in relation to the principal issues and characteristics of social innovation processes in Marginalised Rural Areas and examines complex and situated relationships and interactions. The cross-case assessment of the main social innovation issues and characteristics was based on the investigation of important trends identified within five cross-cutting themes of enquiry: The factors that influence the emergence and development of social innovation in terms of both the context and characteristics of actors. The process of reconfiguration and the changes of social practices (e.g. new networks, new government arrangements). The model of social innovation development and the identification of trajectory of divergence. The impacts of the social innovation on dimensions of territorial capital (economy, society, environment, governance). The analysis of policy impacts on social innovation and social innovation policy implications. In addition to the analysis undertaken for each theme of enquiry, composite indicators were calculated which were based upon the methodology developed in Secco et al. (2019) to better understand Social Innovation in Marginalised Rural Areas on a large scale. Outputs associated with the report are recommendations on factors linked to the success and failure of social innovation initiatives in relation to impacts of policies or on policies. ; Suggested citation: Ravazzoli, E., Dalla Torre, C., Streifeneder, T., Pisani, E., Da Re, R., Vicentini, K., Secco, L., Górriz-Mifsud, E., Marini Govigli, V., Melnykovych, M., Valero, D., Bryce, R., Weiß, G., Ludvig, A., Zivojinovic, I. and Lukesch, R. 2020. Final Report on ...

Deliverable 1.2 is intended to be a guide, a structured interpretation and evaluation of the current knowledge used to collate evidence on intended outcomes and unintended impacts of UF-NBS for urban ecosystem regeneration and human wellbeing. The information reported herein is based on the compilation of a reference-recorded knowledge repository of UF-NBS and their impacts on urban liveability, public health, halting biodiversity loss and re-diversifying UF-NBS structures to enhance urban resilience; specifically, Task 1.2 - Reviewing the knowledge on the importance of UF-NBS for resilient cities - and M1.3 - the Repository on UF-NBS for resilient cities in China and Europe. Sections 2 and 3 of deliverable D1.2a are intended to provide a review of current UF-NBS practices in Europe and China. The in-depth coverage of these UF-NBS case studies is further expanded in Appendix 1 by reviewing the grey literature, i.e. the project and official reports, planning strategies, as well as scientific publications that span the territory of EU Member States and China. This documentation highlights the main goals and methodologies used in UF-NBS research and implementation, policy implications and NBS typology and functions, i.e., ecosystem services, within the frame of Task 1.2, as well as case history templates (Task 1.4). In Section 4, a comparative analysis of case histories provides conclusive insights into common or contrasting aspects in and between these two continents. Final considerations drawn from the comparative analysis of the intended outcomes of UF-NBS implementation include lessons that can be learned and existing knowledge gaps. In Section 5, a Sino-European analysis, in the form of a modelling exercise, was conducted of the selected case histories to explore shared themes, such as connectivity, multifunctionality and social cohesion, and macro-categories (i.e., ecological, engineering, social and economic macro-categories) for urban regeneration and renaturing. The second part, D1.2b, presents a review of ...

In the last two decades, attention on forests and ownership rights has increased in different domains of international policy, particularly in relation to achieving the global sustainable development goals. This paper looks at the changes in forest-specific legislation applicable to regular productive forests, across 28 European countries. We compare the legal framework applicable in the mid-1990s with that applicable in 2015, using the Property Rights Index in Forestry (PRIF) to measure changes across time and space. The paper shows that forest owners in most western European countries already had high decision-making power in the mid-1990s, following deregulation trends from the 1980s; and for the next two decades, distribution of rights remained largely stable. For these countries, the content and direction of changes indicate that the main pressure on forest-focused legislation comes from environmental discourses (e.g. biodiversity and climate change policies). In contrast, former socialist countries in the mid-1990s gave lower decision-making powers to forest owners than in any of the Western Europe countries; over the next 20 years these show remarkable changes in management, exclusion and withdrawal rights. As a result of these changes, there is no longer a clear line between western and former socialist countries with respect to the national governance systems used to address private forest ownership. Nevertheless, with the exception of Baltic countries which have moved towards the western forest governance system, most of the former socialist countries still maintain a state-centred approach in private forest management. Overall, most of the changes we identified in the last two decades across Europe were recorded in the categories of management rights and exclusion rights. These changes reflect the general trend in European forest policies to expand and reinforce the landowners' individual rights, while preserving minimal rights for other categories of forest users; and to promote the use of financial instruments when targeting policy goals related to the environmental discourse.