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LANDSCAPE SUSTAINABILITY
ROBERT BACKHAUS , MICHAEL BOCK and STEFAN WEIERS
German Aerospace Center (DLR), German Remote Sensing Data Center,
Linder Hohe, D-51147 Koln, Germany
( author for correspondence, e-mail: robert.backhaus@dlr.de; fax: +49 2203 68309)
(Received 19 January 2001; accepted 17 June 2002)
Abstract. Sustainability indicators are mostly derived from parameters which are, in the spatial dimension,
more or less distribution-free. In the majority of cases, the indicators are based on statistical data on production,
consumption, pollutants emission, land use, etc. This statistical approach is liable to mask sustainability risks
which are primarily caused by specific spatial and temporal patterns of landscape and land use structure,
such as degradation of soil functions, disturbances in the landscapes water balance, and losses in functional
habitat quality.
Sustainability risks due to ecologically non-adapted spatial landuse patterns require measures on regional
to local scales, based on disaggregated, spatially explicit indicators. Depending on the respective planning
and decision level, different levels of spatial aggregation/disaggregation have to be considered.
In the concept presented here, a differentiated approach is proposed. For an aggregated assessment of
landscape sustainability, long term monitoring of the dynamics of water flow and matter load at the outlet
point of river catchments is recommended. A prerequisite for analyzing those measurements in terms of the
catchments land cover and land use pattern, as well as changes thereof, is a Geographic Information System
(GIS) holding relevant up-to-date geodata sets. For a spatially more detailed indication of sustainability risks,
an approach of GIS-based functional landscape assessment was demonstrated in a regional case study.
The results show GIS on regional to local scales together with satellite remote sensing data on land cover
and landuse to be a powerful data basis for spatially explicit landscape evaluation, provided that suitable
models for assessing specific landscape functions are applied.
Key words: GIS, landscape evaluation, spatial indicators, sustainable development.
1. Introduction
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costs by utilization of available public statistics, a high potential of sectoral aggregation and disaggregation, as well as a high compatibility to top-down concepts of
sustainable development based on generalized sustainability rules without spatial
reference (Jorissen et al., 1999). It can also be assumed that the spatial anonymity
of statistical indicators favours their political acceptance.
Obviously, there are also some problems inherent to this approach. In any dimension of sustainability, application of highly aggregated statistical indicators will, on
the operational level, have to cope with the problem of indicator values being dependent on spatial scale as well as on the areal frame chosen for spatial reference. For
example, the environmental indicator Forest Area Change (CSD, 1996) is defined
as the amount of natural and plantation forest area tracked over time, measured
in hectares. It is quite evident that a highly fragmented woodland embedded in an
agricultural landscape, and a coherent mountain forest of equal area size will not
be discriminated by this indicator, although they can be assumed to greatly differ
in their ecological and economic functions. With decreasing spatial detailedness
(e.g. indicator aggregation on the national level), structural differences of this kind
will be increasingly obfuscated. Even if a statistical indicator reflecting structural
features of the landscape is applied, e.g., Decrease in coherent areas with low
traffic (UBA, 1997), ecological effects due to the specific spatial interaction of
geological substrate, soil type and texture, climate, water balance, landuse, and
habitat quality will not be indicated. In the ecological dimension, this problem is
aggravated by the wide-spread incongruity of ecological and administrative areal
frames of reference. For spatial disaggregation of an indicator, it makes quite a difference if the spatial segmentation is defined according to administrative subunits
or biogeographic regions or river catchments.
The problem of spatial explicitness is less critical in the case of sustainability
risks which are caused by diffuse emissions leading to ecotoxic effects and climate
change. For environmental pollutants from diffuse sources, it may be sufficient to
derive pressure and state indicators from average values of emission/immission rates
and matter loads in environmental media without spatial reference. Merely statistical
indicators will, however, tend to produce diagnostic gaps where sustainability risks
due to specific regional patterns of landuse are concerned. The spatial patterns
of intensive agriculture and urban fabric are particularly critical for maintaining
the natural resources and regulative functions of the landscape. This is evident for
sustainability problems such as soil degradation and landscape water balance as
well as biodiversity losses by structural habitat degradation (Pimentel, 1997; Ripl,
1995; Muhle, 1998).
These problems require regionally adjusted measures, based on disaggregated,
spatially explicit indicators. If the underlying information system does not provide
sufficiently flexible links, allowing the indicator data to be disaggregated down
to the regional level in a spatially explicit way, e.g., by means of a Geographical
Information System (GIS), it will be necessary to refer to suitable additional data
bases (if available), a solution which seems not very promising in terms of data
consistency and cost efficiency.
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in running waters, which can be taken in a highly aggregated way at the point
of tributary discharge into the receiving water, respectively. Suitable hydrological long term measurements at the point of discharge produce aggregated signals
which are determined by the natural structure of the catchment area (relief, soil,
geology, vegetation), meteorological factors (mainly precipitation), and landuse
patterns (agriculture, urban fabric).
The sustainability paradigm followed by this approach is the regional short circuit
of matter flow, together with a balanced water regime of the landscape, by which
irreversible losses are minimized. The scientific rationale of this paradigm has
been developed by W. Ripl (Ripl, 1995; Ripl and Hildmann, 1997; Gumbricht,
1996) on the basis of thermodynamic principles of landscape ecology (Odum, 1983)
and the theory of dissipative processes (Prigogine, 1988). Accordingly, landscape
sustainability is physically represented, to a maximum, by climax stage vegetation
like primeval forests and, to a minimum, by highly desertificated areas, and areas
in the primary phase of post-glacial landscape development. Maximum/minimum
stages are indicated by low/high temporal variability of run-off water flow (the
hydrograph), as well as by low/high net losses of soil constituents, such as loss of
basic cations to open waters. The sustainability state of managed landscapes can
be assumed to range between these extremes. For Germany, e.g., an analysis of
available data on matter transport in rivers showed an average of 1430 kg/ha/year
total salt losses, suggesting a natural leaching process accelerated by a factor of
50100 (Hildmann, 1999).
For deriving correlations between specific landuse patterns and hydrological
indicators, the catchment size is a critical parameter. With decreasing catchment size, hydrological changes (e.g. acceleration of precipitation run-off) may
be more specifically attributed to identifiable changes of the catchments land surface (e.g. extended surface sealing). A small catchment, however, may feature nonrepresentative landscape patterns, and produce a hydrological signal lacking in
areal representativity. On the other hand, with increasing catchment size the signal
characteristics will become more aggregated and hence more representative, but
more difficult to attribute to specific changes in land use patterns. It is therefore
proposed to establish hydrological long term measurements for a set of selected
catchments of medium stream order, with areas in the range of 10005000 km2
(Figure 1). Catchment areas in this range would be sufficiently extended to exhibit
representative landscape structures and land use patterns, but would not exceed
the capability of advanced precipitation run-off models for studying the correlation between structural changes in the catchment area, and resulting functional
changes in the hydrological regime to be measured at the catchments discharge
point. The hydrological data set should comprise parameters describing the short
and long term variability of water flow and matter load, such as mean monthly and
annual run-off, the coefficient of variation thereof, and the annual load of plant
nutrients (mainly calcium, magnesium, ammonium, sulphate, nitrate, carbonate).
The interpretation of run-off data will require additional data on precipitation
(rainfall, snow) all over the catchment area. For monitoring the plant nutrients
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Figure 1. Hierarchical system of river catchments as an areal frame of reference for a hydrological monitoring
network (schematical; representation of (sub-) catchments limited to three stream orders): With increasing
catchment size, measurements at discharge points will tend to be more representative for the total area, but
less attributable to specific landscape changes.
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of reference. On the European level, this issue is presently being addressed by the
Catchment Characterization and Modelling (CCM) project of the EU Joint Research
Centre (Vogt et al., 1999; Bertolo, 2000).
With appropriate geodata sets including an up-to-date land cover/use map held in
a GIS, the sustainability state of the landscape may be indicated either in terms of
area statistics or in a spatially explicit way. Spatially explicit indication in the form
of, e.g., risk or conflict maps will allow causeeffect relationships to be investigated
more specifically and hence will yield a more valuable data basis for sustainable
landscape design and planning. Prerequisite is a valid and practicable concept of
functional landscape assessment.
4.1. The concept of functional landscape assessment
Sustainable land use implies that the cropping and management system in an agricultural landscape is in balance with the self-regulating potential of the landscape
unit considered. Hence a requirement of any indication concept is sound knowledge about natural landscape resources in terms of their resilience and self regulating capacities. Landscape ecology provides a powerful and proven methodology
to derive spatially explicit sustainability assessment. Two fundamentally different
approaches exist (Forman, 1995; Forman and Godron, 1986).
The structural approach investigates patterns of landscapes in terms of their fragmentation, patch size distribution, connectivity, etc. (Blaschke and Petch, 1999)
in order to infer underlying landscape ecological processes.
The functional approach is process rather than pattern oriented and investigates
the relationship of individual geofactors in terms of predefined functions for
ecosystem maintenance and human use potential.
The latter has been pursued in a regional case study since it is highly suitable for
the disaggregation of large scale sustainability indicators and provides useful baseline information for planning and decision making. The principles of the methodology have been elaborated by a group of scientists with a background in landscape
ecological mapping (Marks et al., 1992). Function is defined as the performances
and tasks the landscape ecosystem is fulfilling. The functions are partially related
not only to the use potential regarding human activities but also to the maintenance
of the natural ecosystem itself. Examples for landscape functions are, among others,
run-off regulation, filter, buffer and transformation function of topsoil, biodiversity
carrier function, bioclimatic function. The concept is pragmatic and provides a
landscape evaluation guideline that allows the assignment of scores indicating the
degree of fulfilment of each function in a spatially explicit representation down
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buffer, and transformation capacities of soils. The filter, buffer, and transformation
function will be highlighted exemplarily with more details. It is defined as the ability
of the landscape ecosystem to protect soils and groundwater against the penetration
of pollutant compounds or to absorb and immobilise such compounds. Filtering
means the mechanical retention of suspended pollutant particles originating from
precipitation, sewage sludge, air or waste water. Buffering is defined as adsorption
or binding of pollutants or surplus nutrients by mineral or organic soil sorbents.
Transformation is related to microbiotic activity that catalyzes the conversion of
pollutants into non-contaminant or immobile chemical compounds.
There is no generic parameter to describe the filter, buffer, and transformation
function in total. Hence various subcategories are to be defined. The essential data
layers to be used are soil parameters like grain size distribution, field capacity,
content of organic matter, and pH value. The latter was measured using laboratory
analyses of more than 100 field samples and then interpolated to a raster map using a
geostatistical software package. The assessment procedure was derived from Marks
et al. (1992) which is based on a system developed by the Federal State Agency for
Soil Research of Lower Saxony to assess potential locations for waste dump sites.
Remote sensing based data sets are not basically required in this procedure, but
form a major input in the later risk assessment, which is dependent on the recent
land cover/use.
A generic flow chart of the procedure is shown in Figure 2. Primary data sources
are related to soil properties, geology, groundwater table, and human impact represented by the pattern of dwellings and traffic infrastructure. Moreover, land use
plays a key role in order to estimate pollutants impact. The respective input map
has been derived from an existing coverage of a land use and habitat inventory from
1990 that has been updated and refined by use of Landsat TM satellite imagery
(reference year 1995). Second order proxy data are derivatives from the primary
map data and provide physical and chemical parameters relevant for the buffer and
self regulating capacity. For example, the mechanical filtering properties are mainly
dependent on the soil form and infiltration properties modified by the regional climatic water balance. Another factor is the filter length, which is defined by the
vertical extent of the topsoil profile.
The assessment of filter and buffer capacity for heavy metal compounds depends
highly on the topsoil acidity expressed by the pH value, and on the content of
sorbents like iron oxides and high molecular organic compounds. These properties
were taken from the soil maps (soil texture and type) and the pH value raster map
as explained above. As the binding behaviour of metals is different for various
elements, this procedure was carried out separately for four elements (Pb, Cd, Zn,
Al). In a GIS model the scores of Pb, Cd, and Al were combined by a weighted
average technique with a lower weight for Al which will produce toxic effects only in
high concentrations. The statistical analysis of the digital map in a GIS revealed that
27% of the investigated area belong to the classes low and very low binding capacity
for heavy metals and aluminium indicating a significant risk for groundwater and
soils. Strong binding and buffering scores are only found on 5% of the area.
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Risk map
for
ground water
pollution
Figure 2. Regional sustainability assessment model focussed on the soilwater complex. The scheme outlines flow and integration of data from various geodata sources into a specific sustainability risk map
(here: groundwater pollution risk).
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Figure 3. Map representation of spatial explicit sustainability assessment in terms of region specific conflicts
between groundwater protection and existing land use.
efficiency. General land use zoning can be adapted to the vulnerability of natural
landscape in order to avoid conflicts as stated above.
5. Conclusions
The sustainability of landscapes is not only a question of land use practices, but also
of regional land use/cover distribution, so sustainability indicator systems will have
to take into account the spatial dimension. Consequently, there is a need for spatially
explicit indicators on the regional level. If those indicators are to reflect functional
relationships in the landscape, they have to be attributed not to administrative, but to
ecologically functional landscape units. Due to the complex feedback mechanisms
of the water cycle, the functional landscape unit is represented by the catchment.
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The dynamics of water flow and matter load, as measured at the catchments point of
discharge, provide meaningful, aggregated information on the sustainability status
of the catchment area, especially with respect to the functional relationships between
soil, vegetation, and water cycle.
Under scientific aspects, the validity of this approach is theoretically well
founded. For operational application in the course of sustainable spatial planning,
a better understanding of the influence of specific, spatially distributed changes in
land use/cover on the aggregated hydrological signal at the point of discharge is
required. Further research on this issue will greatly benefit from the availability of
standardized hydrological data on representative medium size catchments, as well
as integrated GIS data sets on the catchment area.
Decisions and activities aiming at sustainable rearrangement of land use/cover
patterns, however, will have to follow bottom up logic, starting from the local
scale. This is clearly illustrated by the multitude of local Agenda 21 initiatives
currently underway.The case study clearly showed the transfer of landscape ecological methodology supported by GIS models and remote sensing techniques to be
feasible for conducting sustainability evaluations on the local scale and to support
practical planning and decision making. Sustainability is assessed by delineation
of areas with non-sustainable land use. The pragmatic approach leads to high resolution spatial disaggregation, but it is obvious that the evaluation results are scale
dependent. Another important aspect is that the approach is analytic, i.e., there is
no overall integrative sustainability indicator and any sustainability evaluation is
related to a specific hypothesis and problem complex. In the case presented here it
is the question of non-appropriate land use versus the ecological vulnerability of
the ground water/soil compartment.
Present indicator systems, if made operational, will produce, in essence, figures
attributable to political or administrative units. In contrast, spatially explicit landscape evaluation will produce maps. In terms of problem awareness by the public,
rationalization of participative processes, and optimization of spatial planning, this
is an advantage. For political purposes, it will be necessary to reaggregate the information content of, e.g., a risk map into numerical indicators. Such indicators, then,
can be expected to be greatly improved in their information quality.
Acknowledgements
The work reported here is a contribution to the joint project Sustainable Global
Development Perspectives for Germany which is presently carried out by the
Helmholtz Community of German Research Centres.
We wish to thank Susan Giegerich for reading the manuscript, Prof. Heidrun
Muhle for helpful discussions and Britta Schade for implementing the GIS models
applied in the regional case study.
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