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1 Land is a finite resource Friends of the Earth Europe Conference on Reducing Europe’s land dependency and its impacts Brussels, 03 December 2012 Ronan Uhel European Environment Agency
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Land is a finite resource
Friends of the Earth Europe Conference on Reducing Europe’s land dependency and its
impacts
Brussels, 03 December 2012
Ronan Uhel European Environment Agency
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Consumed Production/Consumed Import
0
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
4
1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005
Years
How many hectares are used within EU territory for
every hectare used outside of EU territory?
(e.g., in 2004, 3 ha EU /ha outside)
144 crops for: Food Feed
Fibber Fuel
3
EU-27 virtual land exports
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005
Miljo
en
en
Totaal
PARTNER (Meerdere items)
Som van Euexportsha
YEAR
EU virtual land export in hectares to countries outside of the EU territory
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By the way, what is our own land stock and how do we use it?
Three considerations to start with – semantics!
• Land use: Territory characterised according to its current and future planned functional dimension or socio-economic purpose (e.g. residential, industrial, commercial, agricultural, forestry, recreational).
• Land take: Loss of agriculture, forest and other semi-natural and natural land taken by urban and other artificial land development. It includes areas where soil is sealed by construction and urban infrastructure as well as urban green areas and sport and leisure facilities.
• Spatial & territorial planning: This entails organising the distribution of activities across a territory, structuring a territory and the players in it around a vision of the desired development.
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1990 2000 2006 Land use changes in Europe
CORINE Land cover, EEA
1990 2012
…but land take is increasing
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Where and how is it distributed over space?
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9
Top-drivers of urban land development…
Lost land cover due to land take in Europe
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Relative contribution of land-cover categories to urban and other artificial land development
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…to be contextualised in a larger time perspective
• Since mid-50s, European cities expanded by 78 %, whereas population grew by 33 %
• The amount of space consumed per person in the cities of Europe has more than doubled over the past 50 years
• Over past decade 5 times area of Great London given up to just the sprawling area of European cities…
Consumption and production models?
Planning and managing land take - lessons learned in Germany
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Objective of the National Sustainable Development Strategy (2002): • By 2020, land take for new housing and transport developments is to be
limited to 30 ha per day.
• The objective is very ambitious: Situation from 1997-2000: 129 ha per day. Situation from 2007–2010: 87 ha per day.
• The German approach is a twin-track strategy, comprising: • further strengthening inner urban development; • limiting new land take on the urban fringe.
• Implementation with a mix of instruments, such as:
• Giving priority to inner urban development; Revitalizing the inner cities; Space-saving housing developments with low levels of traffic; Enhancing the productivity of land; Land recycling; Taking soil qualities into account; and Safeguarding open spaces.
• The 30 ha objective is addressed primarily to the federal states (regional and
sub-regional planning) and local authorities (development planning). The Federal Government supports their efforts through legislation (spatial planning law, urban development law); financial assistance and research programmes; and information.
Main drivers of current urban sprawl in Europe
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Land use and ecosystem services
Source: Foley et al., 2005 Science Vol. 309
Conceptual framework for integrated land assessment
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Reconsidering land use planning & green infrastructure
• GI and its provision of ecosystem goods and services is linked to land take issues.
• It contributes to minimising natural disaster risks, surface water run-off to reduce the risk of flooding, preventing soil erosion, connecting habitats, mitigating urban heat island effects, etc.
• Land take / spatial planning - key role in facilitating and delivering GI.
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So, land use planning & economic instruments?
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Prerequisite to land-use planning & env. policy: • Env. objectives in spatial planning policy
• Legal framework, land taxation systems, cadastral systems,
territorial planning, etc. in place
Economic instruments in land-use planning & env. policy: • Taxation, fees & charges imposed on undesired land-use practices
• Tradable permit systems - option for land consumption targets
• Subsidies – environmentally motivated and applied for specific land
use purposes
• Payments for ecosystem services
• Open space & green field developments through taxation
What would be the EU policy responses?
• European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP) – aims to coordinate various European regional policy impacts and advocates the development of a sustainable, polycentric and balanced urban system with compact cities.
• Roadmap on Resource Efficient Europe – milestone: no net land-take by 2050. What does this mean? No net change (increase) in built-up areas. If built-up new infrastructure have to reclaim the area some where else (e.g. transform brownfields into agriculture or natural land).
• Biodiversity Strategy 2020: 15 % restoration of ecosystems by 2020.
• Leipzig Charter of Sustainable European Cities – compact settlement structure as especially sustainable.
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(2/2) Responses?
• Territorial Agenda 2020 - changes in land use (urbanisation, mass tourism, etc.) threaten landscapes and lead to fragmentation of natural habitats and ecological corridors.
• Strategic Environmental Assessment (SIA) and Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Directives can improve the consideration of env. aspects in planning projects and contribute to a more systematic and transparent planning.
• European Floods Directive address flooding caused by the construction of impervious surfaces (e.g. buildings and roads).
• The whole of EU thematic strategy on the sustainable use of natural resources, which embeds interests that are often competing for the same territorial resource.
• Rural development and Regional Policies deals with the cross-cutting nature of land use.
• Proposed 7th EAP, Adaptation policy to climate change
Policy coherence (co-benefits)
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Information
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