Landscape Regeneration
Developing solutions and tools for government and stakeholders to regenerate landscapes for the benefit of climate, nature, and people.
As part of research at the Centre for Landscape Regeneration, we are investigating how nature restoration can be made to work for people and benefit local communities. Through the use of participatory research approaches, we are seeking to identify solutions to landscape regeneration that are desirable, effective, affordable and just. While nature-based solutions aim to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and promote biodiversity, our work package will consider the pathways through which these can be delivered in socially just ways. This will involve an assessment of the challenges and opportunities posed by land management programmes from communities’ perspectives.
Across sites in the Cambridgeshire Fenlands and the Cairngorms national park, our work package aims to build a collaborative approach to adaptive change and conservation and to co-design fair landscape regeneration solutions with key stakeholders and communities. Working toward democratic processes for realising restoration plans, we will co-design and test tools and techniques for implementing landscape change projects with participants in workshops. We will co-create a community regeneration toolkit for use at the sites, while identifying opportunities for scaling or translating tools and techniques to broader communities working on landscape regeneration in the UK and beyond.
The Centre for Landscape Regeneration aims to preserve and restore key landscapes in the UK using cost-effective nature-based solutions. By taking a systems approach and long-term view, the Centre provides the knowledge and tools needed to regenerate important ecosystems and agricultural land in ways that create social, environmental and economic benefits. Learn more about the Centre’s three major projects: Protecting the Fenlands, Expanding Habitats in the Cairngorms, and Challenges and Opportunities in the Lake District.
The Centre is co-led by Emily Shuckburgh in Cambridge Zero and David Coomes in the Cambridge Conservation Research Institute in collaboration with the Cambridge Conservation Initiative, and undertaken is in partnership with the RSPB, UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, and The Endangered Landscapes Programme.
Funding is provided by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) as part of its Changing the Environment Programme. Additional CLR funding has been provided by UK Research and Innovation and the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy.