Giovanni Quaranta

Community resilience, land degradation and endogenous lock-in effects: evidence from the Alento region, Campania, Italy

This study analyses social, economic and political “lock-ins” for understanding community resilience and land degradation. The study focuses on lock-ins from within communities, using four case study communities in Italy affected by land degradation. The analysis highlights the complex interrelationships between various lock-ins, and suggests that the communities are on declining resilience pathways that may lead to increasing difficulties in addressing land degradation issues in future.

Designing a Public Web-Based Information System to Illustrate and Disseminate the Development and Results of the DESIRE Project to Combat Desertification

Until around 1995 it was challenging to make the scientific results of research projects publicly available except through presentations at meetings or conferences, or as papers in academic journals. Then it began to be clear that the Internet could become the main medium to publish and share new information with a much wider audience. The DESIRE Project (desertification mitigation and remediation of land—a global approach for local solutions) has built on expertise gained in previous projects to develop an innovative online ‘Harmonized Information System’ (HIS). This documents the context, delivery and evaluation of all tasks in the DESIRE Project using non-scientific terminology, with much of it also available in the local languages of the study sites. The DESIRE-HIS makes use of new possibilities for communication, including video clips, interactive tools, and links to social media networks such as Twitter. Dissemination of research results using this approach has required careful planning and design. This paper sets out the steps that have culminated in a complete online Information System about local solutions to global land management problems in desertification-affected areas, including many practical guidelines for responsible land management. As many of those who are affected by desertification do not have Internet access, printable dissemination materials are also available on the DESIRE-HIS.

Sustainability Patterns and Policy Fit: Evidences from a Mixed Approach Applied in a Euro-Mediterranean Area (Alento Basin, Campania Region, Italy)

Rural areas are characterized by highly heterogeneous landscapes; rural mosaics, which are home to varying intensities of land-use and processes of deactivation and abandonment. The study discussed in this paper proposes a method for the integrated analysis of these rural areas which combines the analysis of land cover dynamics, using GIS, with an assessment of socio-economic dynamics, reconstructed through the combined use of indicators and local history. The method, applied to a socio-ecological system which is representative of the Mediterranean basin, is proposed as a tool to support sustainability processes and the territorialisation of rural polices.

Local food production for local consumption: why is it so hard to achieve? A case study from a small UK Transition Initiative

The Transition Mayfield (UK) group ran a Local Food project to raise awareness in the local community about the importance of developing local food production and consumption networks; strengthening the local economy and fostering collaboration and skill sharing. The discussion reveals number of factors that were not addressed: growers can lack the additional energy and skills needed to market their produce locally; the community already has very active social networks and the Transition group could not add anything to it; there is a complex relationship between shopkeepers that determines which shop sells what produce. The paper shows that, when trying to promote local food production for local consumption, attention has to be paid and an understanding gained of the motivation and constraints that operate in every part of the network.

The Local Food Processing House: a social innovation for rural development in Campania

Social innovation assigns importance to the social and relational aspect of the community development linking it to social interactions and cooperation. Collective actions are crucial not only to promote new solutions to the problems generated by the globalization and the financial crisis in rural areas, but also in supporting community resilience. This study focuses on an experience of social innovation in a southern Italian community, Caggiano, who has built around food a new path of development. The work analyses the mechanisms displayed and employed by the community to achieve cohesiveness and trust among different local actors and highlight how the social innovation implemented played a crucial role in promoting the development and the sustainability of the community.