89 6 Sustainable Landscapes - Linking Conservation and Production

Document begins: 89 6 Sustainable Landscapes ­ Linking Conservation and Production Jeffrey A. McNeely, IUCN The World Conservation Union Biodiversity preservation and improved agricultural productivity are not only compatible, but actually mutually reinforcing in a very wide range of settings.1 1. INTRODUCTION Approaches being developed under many biodiversity-related international agreements and programmes call for ecosystems to be managed to meet multiple national objectives, including providing timber, forage, fibre, and energy, retaining options for future economic use, carrying out various ecosystem services, providing ethical and aesthetic values, and supplying that nation's share of global benefits.2 Achieving these sometimes- conflicting objectives in a time of rising expectations and shrinking government budgets will require new approaches. One 1. Jeffrey D. Sachs, Director, Earth Institute at Columbia University 2. Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2003). Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. Island Press, Washington D.C. 90 such approach is the concept of `sustainable landscapes'. This chapter examines the `ecosystem approach' ­ as advocated by the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) ­ as the conceptual framework for sustainable landscapes Chapter 6 and then explores `ecoagriculture' as a practical example of the approach in practice. 2. CONSERVATION AND PRODUCTIVE LANDSCAPES For the first time in a binding international instrument, the CBD ...