Policy

Objective

The Policy Working Group of the Landscapes for People, Food and Nature Initiative works to support countries in establishing policy frameworks that enable multi- stakeholder landscape initiatives, and to craft policies that support inter-sectoral investment programs.

Strategy

The Working Group strives to achieve this objective by:

1. Developing and validating policy guidance to support and scale up landscape initiatives;
2. Assisting countries to implement policies that effectively support and scale up integrated landscape management;
3. Sharing national and sub-national policy experiences that support integrated landscapes more widely among policymakers and analysts; and
4. Contributing to international policy dialogues on ILM, drawing from national experiences.

Activities

Developing a Framework Paper on Public Policy Tools to Support Integrated Landscape Management (ILM)

Increasingly, national and sub-national policymakers are looking to integrated landscape approaches to help implement goals related to climate-smart agriculture, green growth, food security, and ecosystem restoration, as well as to meet commitments under international environment and development agreements. The Policy Working Group is developing a paper that identifies the ways in which public policy tools can support ILM. The paper will:

1. Define and provide a rationale for integrated landscapes for policymakers;
2. Identify mechanisms available to policymakers that support ILM; and
3. Provide case examples from countries around the world to demonstrate how policy tools can be used to support ILM.

The Working Group is currently soliciting and compiling contributions from policy experts around the world regarding eight major policy tools to support ILM:

• Designing effective government control and regulation;
• Enabling resource rights regimes;
• Coordinating regulations within a landscape;
• Strengthening landscape management capacity for key stakeholders;
• Coordinating policies on a national level;
• Enabling landscape stakeholder collaboration;
• Encouraging and financing technical support to landscape initiatives; and
• Providing economic incentives for landscape goals.

Supporting National Multi-Stakeholder Policy Dialogues on ILM in Kenya and Ethiopia

The Policy Working Group is also engaging directly in Kenya and Ethiopia to mobilize policymaker support for integrated landscape management. The Working Group will assist national and sub-national policy actors as requested with the design and implementation of legislation, regulations, policies, and institutions that support integrated landscape initiatives. By supporting national policy dialogues, the Working Group can help key policymakers and civil society representatives learn about and share their experiences with ILM initiatives, identify opportunities to improve the policy framework to support ILM, and define inter-sectoral investment priorities and modalities.

Investigating Urban-Rural Linkages

The Working Group facilitated the writing of City Regions as Landscapes for People, Food and Nature, a paper showing how natural and cultural resources created through agriculture benefit the sustainable development of both rural and urban communities. Historically, sub-national and local authorities have seldom engaged in systematic food-related planning or policy. However, a new interest in urban, regional, and territorial planning for sustainability and resilience led concepts such as ‘city-region food systems’ to take root among policymakers.

Landscape or place-based approaches to food system planning can help integrate food security and nutrition with climate action planning, disaster risk reduction, economic and community development, and natural resource management. Rethinking the urban-rural continuum comprising urban, peri-urban and rural landscapes is benefiting practitioners and policymakers in countries at all levels of income.

Partner With Us

The Policy Working Group welcomes engagement, including contributions to ongoing activities and suggestions for new work, from people and organizations involved in the above themes. To get involved, please email Seth Shames at sshames@ecoagriculture.org.