The UK’s Food, Farming & Countryside Commission has published a proposed land use framework for England, following Defra’s announcement that the government will publish its own strategy in 2023. The FFCC distinguishes its proposals from the government’s current strategy in two ways: the FFCC argues that any land use framework must encompass all uses, including both rural and urban; and it argues that both top-down and bottom-up planning approaches should be used at the same time.
The framework proposes that the complexities of land use issues should be addressed by convening different stakeholders to collaborate on improving land use. It suggests six principles for decision making:
- Gain the long-term backing of senior institutional leaders.
- Involve multiple stakeholders in transparent, inclusive processes.
- Land use decisions should be informed by data, such as mapping tools and qualitative accounts of lived experiences.
- Land use decisions should be integrative, taking account of goals across the issues of climate change, biodiversity, food production, housing, industry, transport and so on.
- Land use decisions should take account of multiple scales.
- Learn from the successes of previous initiatives.
Read the full report, Proposed Land Use Framework for England, here or here (PDF link). See also the TABLE explainer What is land use and land use change?
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