Envisioning the future of transhumant pastoralism through participatory scenario planning: a case study in Spain

Transhumance is a practice of nomadic pastoralism that was once common in Mediterranean Europe. This livestock-rearing system is associated with the maintenance of cultural landscapes and the delivery of a wide range of ecosystem services. Although transhumance is still practised in Spain on a small scale, its future is highly uncertain because of socioeconomic constraints and other drivers of change. A participatory scenario-planning exercise with 68 participants, including shepherds, decision-makers, veterinarians, environmental experts, intermediaries from the wool and meat markets, and researchers, was used to envision plausible futures for transhumance and to enlighten policy-making for the maintenance of this practice along the Conquense Drove Road, one of the largest foot-based transhumant social-ecological networks still in use in Spain. Specifically, the aims were to: (1) analyse the drivers influencing the future of transhumance, (2) depict the current situation of transhumance, (3) envision future scenarios for this activity, (4) analyse ecosystem services’ trade-offs between different scenarios and their effect on human wellbeing, and (5) provide some insights for policy-making related to the maintenance of transhumance. Four plausible future scenarios were built, each showing clear trade-offs in the delivery of 19 ecosystem services, such as food, fibre, ecological connectivity, soil fertility, air quality, fire prevention, cultural identity, local ecological knowledge and cultural exchanges, as well as the different dimensions of human wellbeing. As a result of the participatory process, nine management strategies were identified for the maintenance of transhumance. Priority was given to the implementation of payment schemes for ecosystem services, the enhancement of social capital among transhumants and institutional coordination, the improvement of product marketing, and the restoration and conservation of drove roads. Finally, the implications of the current reform of the Common Agricultural Policy in the European Union for the maintenance of transhumance are discussed.

[1]  B. Martín‐López,et al.  Resilience and the Cultural Landscape: Ecosystem services and social–ecological resilience in transhumance cultural landscapes: learning from the past, looking for a future , 2012 .

[2]  P. M. Baena,et al.  Past, present and future of Trashumancia in Spain: nomadism in a developed country , 2010 .

[3]  Lutz E. Schlange.  Scenarios: The art of strategic conversation , 1997 .

[4]  Stephen R. Carpenter,et al.  Scenario Planning: a Tool for Conservation in an Uncertain World , 2003, Conservation Biology.

[5]  Sally Brooks,et al.  Pastoralism: A critical asset for food security under global climate change , 2013 .

[6]  A. G. Sal,et al.  The Present status and ecological consequences of transhumance in Spain , 2004 .

[7]  P. Martín.  The history and characteristics of the Mesteña Transhumance Routes , 2004 .

[8]  C. Folke.  RESILIENCE: THE EMERGENCE OF A PERSPECTIVE FOR SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS ANALYSES , 2006 .

[9]  Jörg Jacobs,et al.  Land use scenario development and stakeholder involvement as tools for watershed management within the Havel River Basin , 2005 .

[10]  T. L. Martínez,et al.  Restoration of Sheep Transhumance In The Ebro Valley, Aragon, Spain* , 2011 .

[11]  A. Bernués,et al.  Trajectories of evolution and drivers of change in European mountain cattle farming systems. , 2009, Animal : an international journal of animal bioscience.

[12]  J. D. Ploeg,et al.  The New Peasantries: Struggles for Autonomy and Sustainability in an Era of Empire and Globalization , 2008 .

[13]  B. Martín‐López,et al.  Participatory Scenario Planning for Protected Areas Management under the Ecosystem Services Framework: the Doñana Social-Ecological System in Southwestern Spain , 2011 .

[14]  Stephen T. Garnett,et al.  Beyond cattle: potential futures of the pastoral industry in the Northern Territory , 2011 .

[15]  Millenium Ecosystem Assessment.  Ecosystems and human well-being: synthesis , 2005 .

[16]  H. Lambie-Mumford,et al.  Consumers and Food Security: Uncertain or Empowered?. , 2013 .

[17]  J. Gonzalez,et al.  Uncovering Ecosystem Service Bundles through Social Preferences , 2012, PloS one.

[18]  L. Marini,et al.  Mitigating the impacts of the decline of traditional farming on mountain landscapes and biodiversity: a case study in the , 2011 .

[19]  F. D. Pineda,et al.  A review of the role of drove roads (cañadas) as an ecological corridors , 2006 .

[20]  H. Gerdes,et al.  Mainstreaming ecosystem services through reformed European agricultural policies , 2012 .

[21]  B. Martín‐López,et al.  Evaluating Ecosystem Services in Transhumance Cultural Landscapes An Interdisciplinary and Participatory Framework , 2012 .

[22]  John M. Anderies,et al.  Toward a network perspective of the study of resilience in social-ecological systems , 2006 .

[23]  Barney Foran,et al.  Sifting the future from the past: a personal assessment of trends impacting the Australian rangelands , 2007 .

[24]  Marta Pérez-Soba,et al.  Insight, part of a Special Feature on Landscape Scenarios and Multifunctionality - Making Land Use Assessment Operational How Personal Judgment Influences Scenario Development: an Example for Future Rural Development in Europe , 2010 .

[25]  K. Galvin.  Transitions: Pastoralists Living with Change , 2009 .

[26]  Minna Kaljonen,et al.  Seeking policy-relevant knowledge: a comparative study of the contextualisation of participatory scenarios for the Narew River and Lake Peipsi , 2012 .

[27]  Henrique M. Pereira,et al.  Ecosystem Services and Human Well-Being: a Participatory Study in a Mountain Community in Portugal , 2005 .

[28]  D. Baldock,et al.  Nature conservation and new directions in the EC Common Agricultural Policy: the potential role of EC policies in maintaining farming and management systems of high nature value in the Community , 1993 .

[29]  J. Davies,et al.  The Economics of Mobile Pastoralism: A Global Summary , 2007 .

[30]  R. DeFries,et al.  Anthropogenic Drivers of Ecosystem Change: an Overview , 2006 .

[31]  M. Fernández-Giménez,et al.  Pyrenean Pastoralists’ Ecological Knowledge: Documentation and Application to Natural Resource Management and Adaptation , 2012 .

[32]  Federica Ravera,et al.  Research, part of a Special Feature on Resilience and Vulnerability of Arid and Semi-Arid Social Ecological Systems Envisioning Adaptive Strategies to Change: Participatory Scenarios for Agropastoral Semiarid Systems in Nicaragua , 2011 .

[33]  G. Daily,et al.  Conservation: limits of land sparing. , 2011, Science.

[34]  K. Norris.  Agriculture and biodiversity conservation: opportunity knocks , 2008 .

[35]  A. Hansen,et al.  Biodiversity consequences of alternative future land use scenarios in Greater Yellowstone. , 2007, Ecological applications : a publication of the Ecological Society of America.

[36]  R. Ginsberg,et al.  The Political Dimension , 1996 .

[37]  W. Neil Adger,et al.  Trade-off analysis for marine protected area management , 2001 .

[38]  Simo Sarkki,et al.  Users or producers of ecosystem services? A scenario exercise for integrating conservation and reindeer herding in northeast Finland , 2012, Pastoralism: Research, Policy and Practice.

[39]  R. B. Jackson,et al.  Global biodiversity scenarios for the year 2100. , 2000, Science.

[40]  Prabhu Pingali,et al.  Why global scenarios need ecology , 2003 .

[41]  Philip Carl Salzman,et al.  Pastoralists: Equality, Hierarchy, And The State , 2004 .

[42]  K. Crews,et al.  Change and Continuity in a Pastoralist Community in the High Peruvian Andes , 2008 .

[43]  W. Reid,et al.  Millennium Ecosystem Assessment , 2005 .

[44]  Elinor Ostrom,et al.  The Challenge of Forest Diagnostics , 2011 .

[45]  A. Power.  Ecosystem services and agriculture: tradeoffs and synergies , 2010, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences.

[46]  Kerry R. Pearn,et al.  What can scenario modelling tell us about future European scale agricultural land use, and what not? , 2006 .

[47]  J. Lassoie,et al.  Synthesis, part of a Special Feature on Resilience and Vulnerability of Arid and Semi-Arid Social Ecological Systems Vulnerability of Worldwide Pastoralism to Global Changes and Interdisciplinary Strategies for Sustainable Pastoralism , 2011 .

[48]  K. Galvin.  Responses of Pastoralists to Land Fragmentation: Social Capital, Connectivity and Resilience , 2008 .

[49]  M. Mortimore,et al.  A new paradigm for people, ecosystems and development , 2009 .

[50]  Adolfo Cazorla,et al.  A multicriteria assessment model for evaluating droving route networks , 2008 .

[51]  Jonathan Davies,et al.  Global Review of the Economics of Pastoralism , 2006 .

[52]  M. Reed.  Stakeholder participation for environmental management: A literature review , 2008 .

[53]  Belinda Reyers,et al.  Future Ecosystem Services in a Southern African River Basin: a Scenario Planning Approach to Uncertainty , 2006, Conservation biology : the journal of the Society for Conservation Biology.

[54]  R. L. Trosper,et al.  Emergence Unites Ecology and Society , 2005 .

[55]  David B Lobell,et al.  Greenhouse gas mitigation by agricultural intensification , 2010, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[56]  K. Dreborg.  Essence of backcasting , 1996 .

[57]  S. Carpenter,et al.  Global Consequences of Land Use , 2005, Science.

[58]  M. Ruiz,et al.  Ecological history of transhumance in Spain , 1986 .

[59]  D. Lindenmayer,et al.  Australia’s Stock Route Network: 1. A review of its values and implications for future management , 2011 .

[60]  A. Rescia,et al.  Reformulating the social–ecological system in a cultural rural mountain landscape in the Picos de Europa region (northern Spain) , 2008 .

[61]  B. Martín‐López,et al.  The role of multi-functionality in social preferences toward semi-arid rural landscapes: An ecosystem service approach , 2012 .

[62]  A. Dobson.  Monitoring global rates of biodiversity change: challenges that arise in meeting the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) 2010 goals , 2005, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences.

[63]  C. Giupponi,et al.  Climate and land use changes, biodiversity and agri-environmental measures in the Belluno province, Italy , 2006 .

[64]  J. Blondel.  The ‘Design’ of Mediterranean Landscapes: A Millennial Story of Humans and Ecological Systems during the Historic Period , 2006 .

[65]  Garry D. Peterson,et al.  Scenarios for Ecosystem Services: An Overview , 2006 .