Introduction There is a growing policy emphasis on the involvement of stakeholders and the public in water resource planning and decisionmaking (Global Water Partnership, 2000). In Europe, participation in water resource planning gained a new institutional stature with the Water Framework Directive (WFD). This calls for the``active involvement'' of all interested parties in the implementation process and particularly in the production, revision, and updating of River Basin Management Plans (Article 14; Council of the European Communities, 2000). Planning methods that combine public participation with decisionmaking functions are therefore increasingly in demand (Commission of the European Communities, 2002).
Large, complex energy models present considerable challenges to develop and test. Uncertainty assessments of such models provide only partial guidance on the quality of the results. We have developed a model quality assistance checklist to aid in this purpose. The checklist is applied to an energy model for the problem of assessing energy use and greenhouse gas emissions. Use of the checklist suggests that results on this issue are contingent on a number of assumptions that are highly value-laden. When these assumptions are held fixed, the model is deemed capable of producing moderately robust results of relevance to climate policy over the longer term. Checklist responses also indicate that a number of details critical to policy choices or outcomes on this issue are not captured in the model, and model results should therefore be supplemented with alternative analyses.
Growing concern about issues such as environmental quality or the sustainability of natural resources has led to the use of the Decision Support System (DSS), which originated in the business field, and is now part of environmental decision-making processes. The presence of environmental, social, or economic dimensions has helped decision support systems to evolve to be able to tackle investigations that can contemplate all these variables, such as in the case of multicriteria decision analyses. In addition, new lifestyles, in which society recognizes more and more the contribution of forests to its welfare, have led to the need to involve stakeholders in decision-making processes. This article presents a review of different Multicriteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) and participatory decision support systems applied to forest environments. This last point is presented from the perspective of stakeholder participation in the processes and from the point of view of procedures or tools used. To do this, some of the research performed in forest environments within this current century is reviewed.
Sustainable forest planning should involve the participation of stakeholder communities in the decision-making process. This participation can help avoid the possible rejection of new planning measures. In this paper, the decision-making process to implement regulations on the use of forest tracks on the island of Tenerife (Canary Islands, Spain) is analyzed. In recent years, the number of people using the island's forest environments has notably increased, leading to conflicts between different users of the tracks; as a result, the Island Council of Tenerife is working on regulating these pathways. This paper describes the framing analysis, design, and implementation of a participatory multi-criteria approach to explore, together with stakeholders, the best policy alternatives related to forest planning and management issues of forest track use. To do this, a set of tools has been developed, consisting of institutional analysis, participatory methods, and multi-criteria assessment techniques.
Abstract:Agriculture is the main driving force of rural economies so there is a need to promote sustainable rural development and hence improve the living conditions of local communities. This article analyses the role of agricultural policies in reducing poverty in rural communities. Two aspects will be analysed: firstly, whether there has been a reduction in poverty in the basins analysed for the period 2006-2013; and secondly, whether that poverty reduction, to the extent that it has occurred, has been due to the agricultural policies applied. The analysis shows that the agricultural policies implemented helped to diversify and enhance agricultural production, so that a reduction in effective poverty occurred. However, these policies need to work jointly and in harmony with other economic sectors.
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