Track 3-01: Improving Livelihoods from Grasslands by Balancing Human Needs and the Environment
Description
There are complex interactions and feedback mechanisms between human and natural systems within the coupled social-ecological systems (SESs) (Liu et al. 2007, Li and Li 2012). Human society is the major driving force that changes ecosystem dynamics from local environments to the biosphere (Liu et al. 2007, Kirch 2005). Grasslands, especially the vulnerable arid and semi-arid grassland ecosystems upon which pastoralists live and graze livestock, can be considered as SESs; pastoral activities influence the biophysical environment and set up interactions between the components of these systems (Robinson 2009). In recent years, the ecosystem services provided by grasslands and the problem of poverty in grassland communities have attracted increasing attention from governments and society in China. One response has been the Nomad Settlement Projects (NSPs), implemented as a development strategy in pastoral areas to find solutions to the prevailing ecological and social problems. Nomadic people were provided with houses and farmland in some place, and encouraged to settle down and modernize the “backward” pastoralism.
In this paper, we explored the impacts of China’s Nomad Sedentarization Project (NSP) for pastoral areas on coupled social and ecological systems by evaluating the consequences of these projects at different scales (village scale, county scale and catchment scale) undertaken in grassland SESs, including the ecological and social consequences. China's government is now promoting the NSP in large areas of grassland as a solution for ecological restoration and poverty alleviation. To determine the effects of this policy, we conducted in-depth interviews at two of the project's sites and examined the social and ecological systems at village, county, and catchment scales.
Included in
Multiple Scale Impacts of Nomad Settlement on Social-Ecological Systems
There are complex interactions and feedback mechanisms between human and natural systems within the coupled social-ecological systems (SESs) (Liu et al. 2007, Li and Li 2012). Human society is the major driving force that changes ecosystem dynamics from local environments to the biosphere (Liu et al. 2007, Kirch 2005). Grasslands, especially the vulnerable arid and semi-arid grassland ecosystems upon which pastoralists live and graze livestock, can be considered as SESs; pastoral activities influence the biophysical environment and set up interactions between the components of these systems (Robinson 2009). In recent years, the ecosystem services provided by grasslands and the problem of poverty in grassland communities have attracted increasing attention from governments and society in China. One response has been the Nomad Settlement Projects (NSPs), implemented as a development strategy in pastoral areas to find solutions to the prevailing ecological and social problems. Nomadic people were provided with houses and farmland in some place, and encouraged to settle down and modernize the “backward” pastoralism.
In this paper, we explored the impacts of China’s Nomad Sedentarization Project (NSP) for pastoral areas on coupled social and ecological systems by evaluating the consequences of these projects at different scales (village scale, county scale and catchment scale) undertaken in grassland SESs, including the ecological and social consequences. China's government is now promoting the NSP in large areas of grassland as a solution for ecological restoration and poverty alleviation. To determine the effects of this policy, we conducted in-depth interviews at two of the project's sites and examined the social and ecological systems at village, county, and catchment scales.
