The aim of this paper is to discuss the role of existing policies, programmes and legislation in promoting sustainable land management and livelihoods in mid‐central Botswana. The paper is based on data from the survey of relevant literature, analysis of policy and legal documents, field observations and a series of stakeholder workshops held in the villages of Mopipi, Mokobaxane and Rakops in Boteti Sub‐District between 2008 and 2009.

Land use strongly influences soil properties and unsuitable practices lead to degradation of soil and environmental quality. The aim of this study was to assess the impact of different land uses on some chemical properties of soils developed from Pliocene clays, within hilly environments of central and southern Italy. The areas investigated are located in Vicarello di Volterra (Pisa, Tuscany), S. Quirico d'Orcia (Siena, Tuscany) and Soveria Simeri (Catanzaro, Calabria).

Anthropogenic land use affects aquatic landscapes. For example, landscape-level conversion to urban or agricultural land can heavily influence nutrient cycles in headwater streams via increased nutrient loading and altered hydrologic patterns. Recent studies in headwater streams have found that the stoichiometry and stable isotope compositions of basal resources and consumers can vary as a result of landscape-level change.

What landscapes best represent the land uses and land covers (LU/LC) of the continental United States? Would the set include a cornfield? A forest? A backyard? Combining principles of landscape ecology and computer science, we identified a small set of “exemplar landscapes”, representing distinct LU/LC pattern types of the conterminous US. We first partitioned the 1992 US National Land Cover Dataset into 193 705 landscapes, and quantified patterns with standard measures of LU/LC composition and configuration.

The terrestrial export of dissolved organic nitrogen (DON) is associated with climate, geography and land use, and thus is influenced by geo-climatic variability, human interference, the farmland and woodland in soil, and hydrological connection levels to rivers. A data-set was presented including two catchments covering the major land use types and different hydrological connection levels to rivers within Eastern China: Middle Yangtze (river-isolated lakes) and Huai River (non-river-connected lakes).

Preferential property tax treatment of forested land is part of legislative policy in all 50 states. West Virginia's Managed Timberland (Managed Timberland) is designed to retain private forest land in forested use. In West Virginia, although private forest land owners hold 9.7million acres of forest land (83% of forest land), Managed Timberland enrolled acres have remained at approximately 2million acres since 1998. This lack of enrollment may be a cause for concern regarding the success and benefits of the program.

The suitable spectral mode in remote sensing is often desirable to facilitate the inversion of ecological environment and landscape. This paper put forward an optimizing model based on variable precision rough sets (VPRS) for the land cover discrimination in wetland inventory. In the case study of Lake Baiyangdian which has important ecological functions to the northern China, this model is established successfully according to the domain-experts knowledge. The procedure is as follows.

To document trends in land use and herbaceous production, 71 field sites sampled among cropped fields, fallow fields and rangelands in the Fakara region (Niger) were monitored from 1994 to 2006. The overall trend in land use confirmed the historical increase of the cropped areas since mid 20th century, at an annual rate of 2% from 1994 to 2006. This trend is the result of changes in the relative extent of fields permanently cropped and fields under shifting cultivation, and for the latter, the relative proportion of short (3 years) and long (10 years) duration fallows.

The basic principle of sustainable agricultural production and natural resources is to utilize lands based on their current potentials. Therefore, the present soil sources should be determined firstly. Yesilırmak and Kızılırmak Deltas are the most important agricultural lands in Turkey. However, inappropriate use of agricultural lands and erosion threat these important agricultural centers. In this study, it was determined that 51.92 % of 957.900 ha land in Samsun are exposed to severe erosion, and the percentage of inappropriate use of potential agricultural soils is 18%.

The framework conditions surrounding agricultural production in Germany have changed dramatically due to the Renewable Energy Law (EEG) and a sustained increase in agricultural prices. The Common Agricultural Policy, substantially reformed in the Luxemburg Compromise, will be considered in the framework of the “Health Check”. Against this background, the regional developments anticipated in dairy production, beef cattle husbandry and agricultural land use by the year 2015 are analysed with the help of the regionalized agricultural sector model RAUMIS.

While edge microclimates are well described for closed forests, they remain under-examined in more sparse vegetation types like the temperate woodlands of south-eastern Australia. This limits predictions of edge effects on remnant vegetation in cleared agricultural landscapes, and of changes in these effects with reforestation.