In a period of rising concern for sustainable land management systems to achieve food security at a global scale, land-use changes demand increased attention. This study assesses the past observations and future risk calculations for land abandonment across European regions, highlighting the particular risk for mountain areas. It draws from a study commissioned by the European Parliament to investigate the situation and probability for high and very high risk of land abandonment until 2030. Revealing that land abandonment is at three times higher risk in mountain areas than in non-mountain areas, the need for action to cope with this pressure is the core result. We reveal that the high disparity in agricultural competitiveness between regions (at fine geographical scale) is the main driving force leading to the spatially uneven performance of land management. Viewing this wide set of drivers and mitigation options, land abandonment is understood as the outcome of a multitude of factors of socio-ecological systems and a combination of farm-specific, internal regional and trans-regional factors. The present dominance of narratives of effectiveness leaves little scope for mountain regions under threat of abandonment and marginalization. In this situation, policy reform would address the issue but this might turn out to be influential only if the complex nature and trade-off of the comprehensive policy framework are prioritized.
Increasing flood damage has led to a rising importance of land use in flood risk management policies, commonly referred to as the spatial turn in flood risk management. This includes policies aiming at making space for rivers, which, in practice, lead to an increasing demand for land. Although research has been conducted on the variety of policies, the resulting land use conflicts in flood-prone areas have not been paid much attention to. This paper therefore analyses the current land use and its changes in Alpine flood-prone areas in Austria. The results show that space for rivers has been decreasing due to human activities (e.g., river straightening and channel narrowing) since the middle of the 19th century, and settlements have been expanding into flood-prone areas. Furthermore, the share of valuable agricultural land (which is important for food production) located in flood hazard zones is higher in more mountainous areas. Given the limited space for permanent settlement in Alpine regions, these land use changes exert pressure on the availability of land suitable for flood risk management. Therefore, making space for rivers as part of flood risk management policies faces considerable restrictions in Alpine areas.
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