TY - JOUR

T1 - Ten facts about land systems for sustainability

AU - Meyfroidt, Patrick

AU - de Bremond, Ariane

AU - Ryan, Casey M.

AU - Archer, Emma

AU - Aspinall, Richard

AU - Chhabra, Abha

AU - Camara, Gilberto

AU - Corbera, Esteve

AU - DeFries, Ruth

AU - Díaz, Sandra

AU - Dong, Jinwei

AU - Ellis, Erle C.

AU - Erb, Karl Heinz

AU - Fisher, Janet A.

AU - Garrett, Rachael D.

AU - Golubiewski, Nancy E.

AU - Grau, H. Ricardo

AU - Grove, J. Morgan

AU - Haberl, Helmut

AU - Heinimann, Andreas

AU - Hostert, Patrick

AU - Jobbágy, Esteban G.

AU - Kerr, Suzi

AU - Kuemmerle, Tobias

AU - Lambin, Eric F.

AU - Lavorel, Sandra

AU - Lele, Sharachandra

AU - Mertz, Ole

AU - Messerli, Peter

AU - Metternicht, Graciela

AU - Munroe, Darla K.

AU - Nagendra, Harini

AU - Nielsen, Jonas Østergaard

AU - Ojima, Dennis S.

AU - Parker, Dawn Cassandra

AU - Pascual, Unai

AU - Porter, John R.

AU - Ramankutty, Navin

AU - Reenberg, Anette

AU - Roy Chowdhury, Rinku

AU - Seto, Karen C.

AU - Seufert, Verena

AU - Shibata, Hideaki

AU - Thomson, Allison

AU - Turner, Billie L.

AU - Urabe, Jotaro

AU - Veldkamp, Tom

AU - Verburg, Peter H.

AU - Zeleke, Gete

AU - Zu Ermgassen, Erasmus K.H.J.

N1 - Publisher Copyright: Copyright © 2022 the Author(s). Published by PNAS.

PY - 2022

Y1 - 2022

N2 - Land use is central to addressing sustainability issues, including biodiversity conservation, climate change, food security, poverty alleviation, and sustainable energy. In this paper, we synthesize knowledge accumulated in land system science, the integrated study of terrestrial social-ecological systems, into 10 hard truths that have strong, general, empirical support. These facts help to explain the challenges of achieving sustainability in land use and thus also point toward solutions. The 10 facts are as follows: 1) Meanings and values of land are socially constructed and contested; 2) land systems exhibit complex behaviors with abrupt, hard-to-predict changes; 3) irreversible changes and path dependence are common features of land systems; 4) some land uses have a small footprint but very large impacts; 5) drivers and impacts of land-use change are globally interconnected and spill over to distant locations; 6) humanity lives on a used planet where all land provides benefits to societies; 7) land-use change usually entails trade-offs between different benefits-"win-wins" are thus rare; 8) land tenure and land-use claims are often unclear, overlapping, and contested; 9) the benefits and burdens from land are unequally distributed; and 10) land users have multiple, sometimes conflicting, ideas of what social and environmental justice entails. The facts have implications for governance, but do not provide fixed answers. Instead they constitute a set of core principles which can guide scientists, policy makers, and practitioners toward meeting sustainability challenges in land use.

AB - Land use is central to addressing sustainability issues, including biodiversity conservation, climate change, food security, poverty alleviation, and sustainable energy. In this paper, we synthesize knowledge accumulated in land system science, the integrated study of terrestrial social-ecological systems, into 10 hard truths that have strong, general, empirical support. These facts help to explain the challenges of achieving sustainability in land use and thus also point toward solutions. The 10 facts are as follows: 1) Meanings and values of land are socially constructed and contested; 2) land systems exhibit complex behaviors with abrupt, hard-to-predict changes; 3) irreversible changes and path dependence are common features of land systems; 4) some land uses have a small footprint but very large impacts; 5) drivers and impacts of land-use change are globally interconnected and spill over to distant locations; 6) humanity lives on a used planet where all land provides benefits to societies; 7) land-use change usually entails trade-offs between different benefits-"win-wins" are thus rare; 8) land tenure and land-use claims are often unclear, overlapping, and contested; 9) the benefits and burdens from land are unequally distributed; and 10) land users have multiple, sometimes conflicting, ideas of what social and environmental justice entails. The facts have implications for governance, but do not provide fixed answers. Instead they constitute a set of core principles which can guide scientists, policy makers, and practitioners toward meeting sustainability challenges in land use.

KW - governance

KW - land use

KW - social-ecological systems

KW - sustainability

U2 - 10.1073/pnas.2109217118

DO - 10.1073/pnas.2109217118

M3 - Journal article

C2 - 35131937

AN - SCOPUS:85124259162

VL - 119

JO - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

JF - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

SN - 0027-8424

IS - 7

M1 - e2109217118

ER -