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Case Study: Scenario Planning for Sustainable Development in Peru's Amazon Forest

Madre de Dios, located in the foothills of Peru’s tropical Andes, is one of the most biodiverse places in the world. The region has renowned protected areas and initial land-use plans, which makes sustainable development a challenge. In 2014, a hydrocarbon company began gas exploration activities in Madre de Dios as part of the government’s economic development needs. The work overlapped a protected area, called the Amarakaeri Communal Reserve, and included several Indigenous territories. 

There were concerns that energy exploration would open the area to illegal mining and deforestation. Local communities feared it would impact their forest and livelihoods. This case study explores how researchers from the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute’s Center for Conservation and Sustainability used scenario planning to help the company and regional government minimize social and environmental impacts in Madre de Dios and create a strategy for sustainable development.

Madre de Dios is located within the Vilcabamba-Amboró conservation corridor, which connects about 74 million acres (30 million hectares) of wildlife habitat between Peru and Bolivia. The corridor is the most biologically diverse ecosystem in the world. Dividing Madre de Dios and the conservation corridor is the Interoceanic Highway, which connects ports on the Atlantic coast of Brazil to those on the Pacific coast of Peru.

The road, completed in 2010, sped the transition of the regional economy from forest-based extractive industries (logging, Brazil nut harvesting, ecotourism, etc.) to agriculture, cattle production and gold mining. These changes promoted population growth. Today, Madre de Dios is home to about 150,000 people, including 14 native cultures, migrants from neighboring Andean regions, and immigrants from Brazil, Bolivia, and other countries.  

Agriculture and gold mining are the main causes of deforestation in the area. The Amazon Forest covers more than 90% of Madre de Dios territory, of which about half is protected. The rest is divided into concessions for logging, hydrocarbon, mining, ecotourism and more.

Evaluation and Analysis  

The Center for Conservation and Sustainability suggested a scenario planning approach to minimize the possible impact of the gas development field in Madre de Dios. Scenario planning is a structured way to think about the future of a region and facilitate decision making by exploring a handful of plausible futures, called scenarios. For this purpose, the CCS team needed to compare the economic, social and environmental success of different development scenarios. With more than 30 years of experience in Peru, CCS scientists were able to work with local stakeholders and the government to define a path forward. 

When the exploratory drilling well produced no gas, the work ended. However, CCS continued to complete the scenario planning project for Madre de Dios to benefit sustainable development across the entire region (32,935 square miles or 85,301 square kilometers).  

Creating sustainable landscapes requires managing roads and cities (gray infrastructure) that provide economic services with rivers and forests (green Infrastructure) that support biodiversity. Recognizing this, CCS developed the Working Landscape Simulator. The simulator combined state-of-the-art modeling with community engagement. It included seven steps:

• Assess the critical goods and services that people get from ecosystems (called ecosystem services) in Madre de Dios  
• Develop qualitative scenarios about the future of the region with community participation   
• Collect and generate quantitative data (demographic, economic, etc.) 
• Model landscape changes, like deforestation and urbanization, for each scenario 
• Evaluate economic, environmental and social indicators of success 
• Develop lessons learned from the study 
• Share the results 

Models of land-use changes, such as trends in deforestation and urbanization, made the best use of the existing data. Engagement with local stakeholders ensured they were interested in the results and more likely to use them for decision making.

Milestone Solutions  

This study demonstrates that industrial operations, such as gas exploration, can contribute to sustainable development beyond traditional approaches and legal obligations. In scenario planning, CCS was able to provide: 

• Collective recommendations  that highlight the need for a land-use plan and provide a roadmap for planning regional land changes and sustainable development 
• Maps of critical conservation corridors  and other areas that are key to keeping habitats connected within Madre de Dios. 
• Essential and previously unavailable data  – such as historical land cover maps; ecosystem services; and economic, social, and environmental indicators – needed to guide sustainable development and land-use planning.

Recommendations 

The Center for Conservation and Sustainability’s study was key to understanding the conservation landscape of Madre de Dios and integrating that knowledge with the region's development needs. Best practices from this approach include: 

• Consider scenario planning for large-scale projects to build a shared conservation and development vision 
• Engage stakeholders early in the process 
• Use high-quality models that track socioeconomic and ecosystem changes 
• Develop various indicators of success in the three dimensions of sustainable development (economic prosperity, human wellbeing and environmental integrity) 
• Share information by making methods and results publicly available to all 

To learn more about the Madre de Dios scenario planning study download the  “Future of Madre de Dios: Smithsonian’s Working Landscape Simulator for Sustainable Development” book.

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SpringerBriefs on Case Studies of Sustainable Development

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The importance of sustainable development has been realized for at least 60 years, even though the vast majority of people erroneously think this concept originated with the Brundtland Commission report of 1987 on Our Common Future. In spite of at least six decades of existence, we only have some idea as to what is NOT sustainable development rather than what is. SpringerBriefs on Case Studies of Sustainable Development identify outstanding cases of truly successful sustainable development from different parts of the world and analyze enabling environments in depth to understand why they became so successful. The case studies will come from the works of public sector, private sector and/or civil society. These analyses could be used in other parts of the world with appropriate modifications to account for different prevailing conditions, as well as text books in universities for graduate courses on this topic. The series of short monographs focuses on case studies of sustainable development bridging between environmental responsibility, social cohesion, and economic efficiency. Featuring compact volumes of 50 to 125 pages (approx. 20,000—70,000 words), the series covers a wide range of content—from professional to academic—related to sustainable development. Members of the Editorial Advisory Board: Mark Kramer, Founder and Managing Director, FSG, Boston, MA, USA Bernard Yeung, Dean, NUS Business School, Singapore

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Poverty Alleviation Best Practice via Practices and SDG Strategies

• International Poverty Reduction Center In China
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Off-Grid Water Supply

Should It Be Mainstreamed?

• Pawan K. Sachdeva
• Asit K. Biswas
• Ojasvee Arora
• Copyright: 2023

Urban Water Demand Management

A Guidebook for ASEAN

• Corinne Ong
• Open Access

Islands and Resilience

Experiences from the Pandemic Era

• Can-Seng Ooi
• Roxane de Waegh
• Cristina Alexandra Trifan
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Revitalising Rural Communities

• Jessica M. Williams
• Wai-Fung Lam
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• Copyright: 2021

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Sustainable development: Principles, frameworks, and case studies

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Coined in the 1970s, the term sustainable development and the ideas behind it have enjoyed varying amounts of popularity over the years. And while dire predictions abound, the full impacts of global warming are not known, nor can they be known. What we do know is that to be sustainable, all societies must adjust to new realities, which include changing ecosystems and natural limits to growth. How do we address these issues and maintain an equitable way of life for all on the planet? Exploring the human-related aspects of sustainable development, Sustainable Development: Principles, Frameworks, and Case Studies emphasizes the need to move away from an unwanted circumstance by being systemic in our thinking instead of symptomatic. The authors argue that we cannot move away from an unwanted, negative circumstance, unless we can move toward a desired, positive outcome. The text summarizes positive approaches and presents strong theoretical and historical concepts along with salient case examples that illustrate the desired outcome of each model or framework discussed. Often ensnared in thorny political ideology, the sustainable development issue also suffers from a deep and multidimensional nature that can be intimidating. This book offers, in one volume, a broad discussion of important frameworks pertaining to sustainable development. Based on the expertise of distinguished practitioners and scholars, the book’s content includes diverse and interrelated subjects drawn from a wide range of geographical areas. It offers techniques for evaluating and applying the basic principles of sustainable development and participatory project planning to achieve economic and environmental goals.

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This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

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T1 - Sustainable development

T2 - Principles, frameworks, and case studies

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AU - Maser, Chris

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N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2010 by Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.

PY - 2010/1/1

Y1 - 2010/1/1

N2 - Coined in the 1970s, the term sustainable development and the ideas behind it have enjoyed varying amounts of popularity over the years. And while dire predictions abound, the full impacts of global warming are not known, nor can they be known. What we do know is that to be sustainable, all societies must adjust to new realities, which include changing ecosystems and natural limits to growth. How do we address these issues and maintain an equitable way of life for all on the planet? Exploring the human-related aspects of sustainable development, Sustainable Development: Principles, Frameworks, and Case Studies emphasizes the need to move away from an unwanted circumstance by being systemic in our thinking instead of symptomatic. The authors argue that we cannot move away from an unwanted, negative circumstance, unless we can move toward a desired, positive outcome. The text summarizes positive approaches and presents strong theoretical and historical concepts along with salient case examples that illustrate the desired outcome of each model or framework discussed. Often ensnared in thorny political ideology, the sustainable development issue also suffers from a deep and multidimensional nature that can be intimidating. This book offers, in one volume, a broad discussion of important frameworks pertaining to sustainable development. Based on the expertise of distinguished practitioners and scholars, the book’s content includes diverse and interrelated subjects drawn from a wide range of geographical areas. It offers techniques for evaluating and applying the basic principles of sustainable development and participatory project planning to achieve economic and environmental goals.

AB - Coined in the 1970s, the term sustainable development and the ideas behind it have enjoyed varying amounts of popularity over the years. And while dire predictions abound, the full impacts of global warming are not known, nor can they be known. What we do know is that to be sustainable, all societies must adjust to new realities, which include changing ecosystems and natural limits to growth. How do we address these issues and maintain an equitable way of life for all on the planet? Exploring the human-related aspects of sustainable development, Sustainable Development: Principles, Frameworks, and Case Studies emphasizes the need to move away from an unwanted circumstance by being systemic in our thinking instead of symptomatic. The authors argue that we cannot move away from an unwanted, negative circumstance, unless we can move toward a desired, positive outcome. The text summarizes positive approaches and presents strong theoretical and historical concepts along with salient case examples that illustrate the desired outcome of each model or framework discussed. Often ensnared in thorny political ideology, the sustainable development issue also suffers from a deep and multidimensional nature that can be intimidating. This book offers, in one volume, a broad discussion of important frameworks pertaining to sustainable development. Based on the expertise of distinguished practitioners and scholars, the book’s content includes diverse and interrelated subjects drawn from a wide range of geographical areas. It offers techniques for evaluating and applying the basic principles of sustainable development and participatory project planning to achieve economic and environmental goals.

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Triple Wins for Sustainable Development - case studies of sustainable development in practice

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• Published: 08 July 2022

A critical examination of a community-led ecovillage initiative: a case of Auroville, India

• Abhishek Koduvayur Venkitaraman   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-8515-257X 1 &
• Neelakshi Joshi   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-8947-1893 2  

Climate Action volume  1 , Article number:  15 ( 2022 ) Cite this article

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Human settlements across the world are attempting to address climate change, leading to changing paradigms, parameters, and indicators for defining the path to future sustainability. In this regard, the term ecovillage has been increasingly used as models for sustainable human settlements. While the term is new, the concept is an old one: human development in harmony with nature. However, materially realizing the concept of an ecovillage is not without challenges. These include challenges in scaling up and transferability, negative regional impacts and struggles of functioning within larger capitalistic and growth-oriented systems. This paper presents the case of Auroville, an early attempt to establish an ecovillage in Southern India. We draw primarily from the ethnographic living and working experience of the authors in Auroville as well as published academic literature and newspaper articles. We find that Auroville has proven to be a successful laboratory for providing bottom-up, low cost and context-specific ecological solutions to the challenges of sustainability. However, challenges of economic and social sustainability compound as the town attempts to scale up and grow.

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Introduction.

Scientists have repeatedly argued and emphasized for an equilibrium between human development and the basic ecological support systems of the planet (IPCC 2014 ; United Nations 1987 ). Human settlements have been important in this regard as places of concentrated human activity (Edward & Matthew E, 2010 ; Scott and Storper 2015 ). Settlement planning has responded to this call through visions of the eco-city as a proposal for building the city like a living system with a land use pattern supporting the healthy anatomy of the whole city and enhance its biodiversity, while resonating its functions with sustainability (Barton 2013 ; Register 1987 ; Roseland 1997 ). In planning practice, this means balancing between economic growth, social justice, and environmental well-being (Campbell 1996 ). However, the concept of eco-cities remains top-down in its approach with city authorities taking a lead in involving the civil society and citizens to implement the city’s environment plan (Joss 2010a , b ).

Contrary to the idea of eco-cities, ecovillages are small-scale, bottom-up sites for experimentation around sustainable living. Ecovillages resonate the same core principles of an eco-city but combine the social, ecological, and spiritual aspects of human existence (Gilman 1991 ). Findhorn Ecovillage in Scotland is one of the oldest and most prominent ecovillages in the world and has collaborations with the United Nations and was named as a best practice community (Lockyer and Veteto 2013 ).

Another notable example is the Transitions Town movement that started in Totnes, United Kingdom but has now spread all over the world (Hopkins 2008 ; Smith 2011 ). The movement focuses upon supporting community-led responses to peak oil and climate change, building resilience and happiness. Additionally, it emphasizes rebuilding local agriculture and food production, localizing energy production along with rediscovering local building materials in the context of zero energy building (Hopkins 2008 ). Ecological districts within the urban fabric are also termed as ecovillages (Wolfram 2017 ).

Ecovillages are intentional communities characterized by alternative lifestyles, values, economics and governance systems (Joss 2010a , b ; Ergas 2010 ). At the same time ecovillages are located within and interact with growth-oriented capitalistic systems (Price et al. 2020 ). This dichotomy presents a challenge for ecovillages as they put ideas of sustainability transformation into practice. We explore some of these contradictions through the case study of Auroville, an ecovillage located in southern India. A discussion on the gaps between the ideas of an ecovillage against their lived reality throws light upon the challenges that ecovillages face when they attempt to grow. We begin by elaborating the key characteristics of ecovillages in the “Characteristics of ecovillages” section. We then present our material and methods in the “Methodology” section. Furthermore, we use the key characteristics of an ecovillage as a framework for analysing and discussing Auroville in the “Auroville, an ecovillage in South India” and “Discussion” sections. We conclude with a reflection on the concept of ecovillages.

Characteristics of ecovillages

The concept of an ecovillage is broad and has multiple interpretations. Based on a reading of the existing literature on ecovillages, we summarize some of their key characteristics here:

Alternative lifestyles and values : Ecovillage can be seen as intentional communities (Ergas 2010 ) and social movements which have a common stance against unsustainable modes of living and working (Kirby 2003 ; Snow et al. 2004 ). Ecovillages advocate for achieving an alternate lifestyle involving a considerable shift in power from globalized values to those internalized in local community autonomy. Therefore many ecovillages aspire to restructure power distribution and foster a spirit of collective and transparent decision-making (Boyer 2015 ; Cunningham and Wearing 2013 ). However, it is difficult to convince many people to believe in a common value system since the vision is to establish a world that is not only ecologically sustainable but also personally rewarding in terms of self-sacrifice for a good cause (Anderson 2015 ).

Governance : ecovillages tend to rely on a community-based governance and there is an assumption that the local and regional communities respond more effectively to local environmental problems since these problems pertain to the local context and priorities (Van Bussel et al. 2020 ). In a community-based governance system, activities are organized and carried out through participatory democracy committed to consensual decision-making. However, participatory democracy has its own set of problems. Consensual decision-making is time-consuming, and the degree of participation tends to vary from time to time (Fischer 2017 ). Participatory processes have also been criticized on the grounds for slowing down the decision-making process and resulting in a weak final agreement which doesn’t balance competing interests (Alterman et al. 1984 ).

Economic models in an ecovillages : ecovillages have attempted to combine economic objectives along with the overall well-being of people and have experimented with budgetary solutions appealing to a wider society (Hall 2015 ). As grassroots initiatives, ecovillages have advocated and practised living in community economies (Roelvink and Gibson-Graham 2009 ) and have influenced twentieth century economic practices beyond their geographical boundaries (Boyer 2015 ). Due to the emphasis on sharing in ecovillages, they can be considered to accommodate diverse economies (Gibson-Graham 2008 ) where human needs are met through relational exchanges and non-monetary practices, highlighting strong social ties (Waerther 2014 ). In some ecovillages, living expenses are reduced by sharing costly assets and saving cost on building materials by bulk buying and growing food for community consumption and sale (Pickerill 2017 ). These economic models have their own merit but are perhaps insufficient for the long-term economic sustainability of ecovillages (Price et al. 2020 ). Eventually, ecovillages might have to rely on external sources to import goods and services which cannot be produced on-site. This contradicts the ecovillage principles of being a self-reliant economy, reduction of its carbon footprint and minimizing resource consumption, thus implying a dependence on the market economy of the region (Bauhardt 2014 ).

Self-sufficiency : fulfilling the community’s needs within the available resources is a cornerstone principle for many ecovillages (Gilman 1991 ). This is often achieved through organic farming, permaculture, renewable energy and co-housing. Such measures are an attempt to offset and mitigate unsustainable development and limit the ecovillage’s ecological footprint (Litfin 2009 ). The initial small scale of the community often allows for this. However, as ecovillages grow in size and complexity, the interconnectedness and inter-dependence to the surrounding space become more apparent (Joss 2010a , b ). Examples include drawing resources from central energy and water systems (Xue 2014 ). Furthermore, ecovillages might turn out to be desirable places to live, with better quality of life, driving up land and property prices in the region as well as carbon emissions with additional visitors (Mössner and Miller 2015 ). Furthermore, in their role as catalysts of change in transforming society, ecovillages need to interact with their external surroundings and neighbouring communities, the municipalities, and the state and national level policies (Dawson and Lucas 2006 ; Kim 2016 ). This is particularly relevant in the Global South, where the ecovillage development has the potential to drive regional-scale sustainable development.

The characteristics of an ecovillage, however, do not exist in a geographical vacuum. Scholarly understanding of ecovillages as bottom-up efforts to drive sustainability transitions largely draw from the experiences of the Global North (Wagner 2012 ). Such ecovillage models often challenge the dominant capitalistic paradigm of post-industrial development, overconsumption and growth. Locating ecovillages in the Global South requires an expansion or re-evaluation of their larger socio-economic context as well as their socio-ecological impacts (Dias et al. 2017 ; Litfin 2009 ) .

To build upon the opportunities and challenges of ecovillages, locating them within the context of the Global South, we present the case of Auroville, an ecovillage located in southern India.

Methodology

We use the initial theoretical framework of ecovillage characteristics as a starting point for developing the case study of Auroville. Here, we draw from academic literature published about Auroville during 1968–2021. We also draw inferences from self-published reports and documents by the Auroville Foundation. Although we cover multiple interconnected aspects of Auroville, the characteristics pertaining to an ecovillage remain the focus of our work. We review the literature sources deductively, drawing on aspects of values, governance, economics and self-reliance, established in the previous section.

We triangulate the secondary data sources against our ethnographic experience of having lived and worked in Auroville for extended periods of time (2010–2012 and 2013–2014, respectively). We have worked in Auroville as architects and urban planners. During this time, we participated in multiple meetings on Auroville’s development as part of our work. We have discussed aspects of Auroville’s sustainability with Aurovillians working on diverse aspects, from urban planning to regional integration. Furthermore, living and working in Auroville brought us in conversation with several individuals from villages surrounding Auroville, employed in Auroville. For writing this case study, we have revisited our lived experience of Auroville through memory, research and work diaries maintained during this period, photographs as well our previously published research articles (Venkitaraman 2017 ; Walsky and Joshi 2013 ). Given our expertise in architecture and planning, we have also presented the translation of the key characteristics of an ecovillage, namely, alternative values, governance and economic systems and self-reliance, in these domains.

We acknowledge certain limitations to our methodology. We rely largely on secondary data to expand upon the challenges and contradictions in an ecovillage. We have attempted to overcome this by drawing from our first-hand experience of having lived in Auroville. Although our lived experiences are almost a decade old, we have attempted to compliment it with recently published articles as well as newspaper reports.

The next section presents Auroville as an ecovillage followed by a critical examination of its regional impact, governance, and economic structure.

Auroville, an ecovillage in South India

Foundational values.

Sri Aurobindo was an Indian philosopher and spiritual leader who believed that “man is a transitional being” and developed the practice of integral yoga with the aim of evolving humans into divine beings (Sen 2018 ). His spiritual consort, Mirra Alfassa realized his ideas in material form through a “universal township” which would hopefully contribute to “progress of humanity towards its splendid future”. Auroville was founded in 1968 by Mirra Alfassa, as a township near Pondicherry, India. Alfassa envisioned Auroville to be a “site of material and spiritual research for a living embodiment of an actual human unity” (Alfassa 1968 ). On 28 February 1968, the city was inaugurated with the support of UNESCO and the participation of people from 125 countries who each brought a handful of earth from their homelands to an urn that stands at its centre as a symbolic representation of human unity, the aim of the project. This spiritual foundation has guided the development of the socio-economic structure of Auroville for individual and collective growth (Shinn 1984 ). To translate these spiritual ideas into a material form, Mirra Alfassa provided simple sketches, a Charter, and guiding principles towards human unity (Sarkar 2015 ).

Roger Anger, a French architect translated Alfassa’s dream into the Auroville City Plan that continues to inform the physical development of Auroville (Kundoo 2009 ). The Auroville Masterplan 2025 envisions Auroville to be a circular township (Fig. 1 ) spread over a 20 sq. km (Auroville Foundation 2001 ). Initially planned for a population of 50,000 people, today Auroville today has 3305 residents hailing from 60 countries (Auroville Foundation 2021 ). Since its early days, there has been a divide between the “organicists” and the “constructionists” of Auroville (Kapur 2021 ). The organicists have a bottom-up vision of low impact and environmentally friendly development whereas the constructionists have a top-down vision of sticking with the original masterplan and realize an urban, dense version of Auroville.

A map of Auroville and its surrounding regions, with the main villages in the area

Auroville has served as a laboratory of low-cost and low-impact building construction, transportation, and city planning. Although the term sustainability has not been explicitly used in the Charter, it has been central to the city planning and building development process in Auroville (Walsky and Joshi 2013 ). Unlike many human settlements that negatively impact their ecology, the foundational project of Auroville was land restoration. The initial residents of Auroville were able to grow back parts of the Tropical Dry Evergreen Forest in and around Auroville using top-soil conservation and rainwater harvesting techniques (Blanchflower 2005 ). While the ecological restoration has been lauded both locally and globally, Namakkal ( 2012 ) argues that it is seldom acknowledged that the land was bought from local villagers at low prices and local labour was used to plant the forest as well as build the initial city. At the time of writing this paper, the Auroville Foundation still needs to secure 17% of the land in the city area and nearly 50% of the land for the green belt to realize the original masterplan. However, land prices have gone up substantially as have conflicts in acquiring this land for Auroville (Namakkal 2012 ).

Governance structure

While the Charter of Auroville says that “Auroville belongs to humanity as a whole” (Alfassa 1968 ), in reality, it is governed by a well-defined set of individuals. Auroville’s first few years, between 1968 and 1973, were guided directly by Mirra Alfassa. After her passing, there was a power struggle between the Sri Aurobindo Society, claiming control over the project, and the community members striving for autonomy (Kapur 2021 ).

The Government of India founded the Auroville Foundation Act in 1988 providing in the public interest, the acquisition of all assets and undertakings relatable to Auroville. These assets were ultimately vested in the Auroville Foundation which was formed in January 1991 (Auroville. 2015 ). The Auroville Foundation envisioned a notion of a planned future, resulting in a new masterplan in 1994. This masterplan encouraged participatory planning and recognized that the architectural vision needs to proceed in a democratic manner. This prompted the Auroville community to adopt a more structured form of governance. The Auroville Foundation has other governing institutions under it, namely: The Governing Board which has overall responsibility for Auroville’s development, The International Advisory Council, which advises the Governing Board on the management of the township and the Residents’ Assembly who organize activities relating to Auroville and formulate the master plan. Furthermore, there are committees and working groups for different aspects of development from waste management to building development.

Auroville is an example of the ‘bottom-up’ approach, in the sense that developments are decided and implemented by the community and the state level and national level governments get involved later (Sarkar 2015 ). An example of this is seen in the regular meetings held by the Town Development Council of Auroville which also conducted a weeklong workshop in 2019 for the community which covered themes such as place-making, dimensions of water and strategies for liveable cities and community planning (Ministry of Human Reource Development Government of India 2021 ).

Conflicts often arise between the interpretation of the initial masterplan and the present day realities and aspiration of the residents (Walsky and Joshi 2013 ). This is often rooted in the initial vision of Auroville as a city of 50,000 versus its current reality of being an ecovillage of around 3000 people. Spatially, this unusual growth pattern has been problematic in Auroville’s building and mobility planning (Venkitaraman 2017 ). At the time of writing this paper, there is a clash between the Residents’ Assembly and the Auroville Foundation over the felling of trees for the construction of the Crown Road project inside Auroville (The Hindu 2021 ). While the Residents’ Assembly wants a re-working of the original masterplan considering the ecological damage through tree cutting, the Auroville Foundation wants to move ahead with the original city vision.

Beyond its boundaries, Auroville is surrounded by numerous rural settlements, namely, Kuyilapalyam, Edayanchavadi, Alankuppam, Kottakarai, and Attankarai. The Auroville Village Action Group (AVAG) aims to help the village communities to strive towards sustainability and find plausible solutions to the problems of contemporary rural life. In September 1970, a charter was circulated among the sub-regional villages of Auroville, promising better employment opportunities and higher living standards with improved health and sanitation facilities (Social Research Centre Auroville 2005 ). Currently, there are about 13 groups for the development of the Auroville sub-region. However, Jukka ( 2006 ) points out that the regional development vision of Auroville is top-down and does not sufficiently engage with the villagers and their aspirations.

Auroville’s economic model

Auroville has also strived to move away from money as a foundation of society to a distinctive economic model exchange and sharing (Kapoor 2007 ). However, Auroville needs money to realize its multiple land and building projects. Auroville also receives various donations and grants. During 2018–2019, Auroville received around Rs. 2396 lakhs (around 4 million USD) under Foreign Contributions Regulation Act (FCRA) and other donations. The Central Government of India supports the Auroville Foundation with annual grants for Auroville’s management and for the running costs of the Secretariat of the Foundation, collectively known as Grant-in-Aid. Auroville received a total of Rs. 1463 lakhs (around 2 million USD) as Grant-in-Aid during 2018–2019. The income generated by Auroville during this time was Rs. 687 lakhs (around 91,000 USD) (Ministry of Human Reource Development Government of India 2021 ).

Presently, the economy of Auroville is based on manufacturing units and services with agriculture being an important sector, and currently, there are about 100 small and medium manufacturing units. The service sector of Auroville comprises of construction and architectural services and research and training in various sectors (Auroville Foundation 2001 ). In addition to this, tourism is another important source of income generation for Auroville. As per the Annual Report of Auroville Foundation, the donations and income have not been consistent over the years. In this regard, Auroville’s growth pattern in terms of the economy has not been linear and it does not mimic the usual growth patterns associated with the development of counterparts, in terms of capitalization, finance, governance, and on key issues such as distribution policies and ownership rights (Thomas and Thomas 2013 ).

Auroville also benefits from labour from the surrounding villages. The nature of employment provided in Auroville to villages remains largely in low-paying jobs (Namakkal 2012 ). It can be argued that the fruits of Auroville’s development have not been equally shared with the surrounding villages and a feeling of ‘us and them’ still pervades. Striving for human unity is the central tenet of Auroville (Shinn 1984 ), however, it has struggled to do so with its immediate neighbours.

Striving for self-sufficiency

Auroville has strived for self-sufficiency in terms of food production from local farms, energy production from renewable sources like solar and wind sources and waste management.

Many prominent buildings of Auroville have been designed keeping in mind the self-sufficiency principle in Auroville. For example, the Solar Kitchen was designed by architect Suhasini Ayer as a demonstration project to tap the solar energy potential of the region. At present, this building is used for cooking meals thrice a day for over 1000 people. The Solar Kitchen also supports the organic farming sector in Auroville by being the primary purchaser of the locally grown products (Ayer 1997 ). Another example is the Auroville Earth Institute, renowned for its Compressed and Stabilized Earth Block (CSEB) technique, which constitute natural and locally found soil as one of its main ingredients (Figs. 2 and 3 ).

Compressed earth blocks manufactured by Auroville Earth Institute

A residence in Auroville constructed using compressed earth blocks

However, it is important to acknowledge that Auroville does not exist as a 100% self-sufficient bubble. For example, food produced in Auroville provides for only 15% of the consumption (Auroville Foundation 2004 ). An initial attempt to calculate the ecological footprint of Auroville estimates it to be 2.5 Ha, against the average footprint of an Indian of 0.8 Ha (Greenberg 1998 ). Furthermore, though Auroville has strived for material innovation in architecture, it has not been successful in achieving 25 sq. metres as the limit to individual living space (Walsky and Joshi 2013 ). This challenges the notion of Auroville continuing to be an ecovillage if it aspires to be a city of 50,000 people and might end up having substantial ecological impact on its surroundings.

Urban sustainability transformation in a rapidly urbanizing world runs into the risk of focusing on technological fixes while overlooking the social and ecological impacts of growth. In this light, bottom-up initiatives like ecovillages serve as a laboratory for testing alternative and holistic models of development. Auroville, a 53-year-old ecovillage in southern India, has achieved this to a certain extent. Auroville is a showcase of land regeneration, biodiversity restoration, alternative building technologies as well as experimentations in alternative governance and economic models. In this paper, we have critically examined some achievements and challenges that Auroville has faced in realizing its initial vision of being a “city that the world needs” (Alfassa 1968 ). Lessons learnt from Auroville help deepen our understanding of ecovillages as sites of fostering alternative development practices. Here we discuss three aspects of this research:

Alternate lifestyles and values in the context of an ecovillage : Ecovillages are niches providing space for realizing alternative values and lifestyles. However, ecovillages seldom exist in a vacuum. They are physically situated in existing societies and economies. Although residents in an ecovillage seek to achieve collective identity by creating an alternative society, an ecovillage is embedded within a larger culture and thus, the prevailing ideologies of the dominant society affect the ecovillage (Ergas 2010 ) as seen in Auroville. This can be noticed between the material and knowledge flows in and out of Auroville. Furthermore, the India of the 1970s when Auroville was born with socialist values is very different from present-day India where material and capitalistic aspirations are on the rise. These are reflected in higher land prices and living costs in and around Auroville. Amidst the transforming political landscape of India in the 1970s, there were implications which were seen in the character of architectural production. Auroville welcomed and immersed itself into this era of experimentation. These developments form an integral part of the ethos of Auroville. To achieve its initial visions, Auroville depends on multiple external economic sources. In analysing ecovillages, it is important to critically examine the broader context within which they are located and how they influence and, in turn, are influenced by their contexts.

Even though Auroville’s architects and urban planners remain committed to their belief that architecture is a primary tool of community - building, decades later, the developments seem to have progressed at a slow pace. The number of permanently settled residents in Auroville has barely reached 2000 currently and the overall urban design remains fragmentary. Despite witnessing a slower rate of progress, it has been able to sustain a culture of innovation and Auroville remains utopian in its aim to create an alternative lifestyle (Scriver and Srivastava 2016 ).

Governance, economy, and self-sufficiency in an ecovillage that wants to be an eco-city : In growth-based societies, ecovillages present the possibility of providing an alternative vision of degrowth (Xue 2014 ). However, Auroville currently functions as an ecovillage that aspires to be an eco-city as per its initial masterplan. This growth-based model sometimes conflicts with Auroville’s vision of being a self-reliant, non-monetary society. Given the urgent need to remain within our planetary limits, ecovillages like Auroville could re-evaluate their initial growth-based visions and explore alternatives for achieving sustainability and well-being. The visions of ecovillages should thus not be set in stone, but rather remain flexible to evolving ideas and practices (Ergas 2010 ).

Similarly, governance structures might need a re-evaluation with changing priorities within the ecovillage as well as a need to be inclusive of regional visions and voices. It would be intriguing to explore on what kind of governance model/leadership is best suited to fulfil the aims of an ecovillage. Auroville seems to follow the elements of sustainability-oriented governance: empowerment, engagement, communication, openness and transparency (Bubna-Litic 2008 ), yet it is seen that conflicts arise. One solution to this could be greater external engagement with government and continuing to engage the external community about Auroville. Generally, intentional communities are organized by embracing the ideology of consensus, but it remains to be seen whether the consensus decision-making model works to its full potential in the context of alternative lifestyles. When individuals seek alternative lifestyles in the current world, there is a shift from globalized values towards local community autonomy, this shift demands a need for processes that allow for a different and more equitable approach to governance (Cunningham and Wearing 2013 ).

Ecovillages in the Global South : Situating ecovillages in the Global South requires a nuanced examination of the social, economic, and environmental aspects of sustainability that the ecovillage aims to achieve (Dias et al. 2017 ; Litfin 2009 ). In the case of Auroville, Auroville has helped bring back ecologically restorative practices in forestry, agriculture, and architecture in the region. However, the average Aurovillian has a higher standard of living than the neighbouring villagers. This in-turn influences the material consumption practices within the community. The lessons in sustainable living, in ecovillages located in the Global South, need not be unidirectional (from the ecovillage to the surrounding society). Rather, the ecovillage also stands to lean from the existing models of low-impact living.

Ecovillages in the Global South such as Auroville face similar problems related to Governance as seen in some other ecovillages in the developed world such as The Aldinga Arts Village in South Australia (Bubna-Litic 2008 ) and in Sweden (Bardici 2014 ). However, despite the issues related to consensus in Governance, the ecovillages are noted for their sustainable innovations.

Auroville’s sustainable measures have been endorsed by the Government of India as well. The Auroville Master Plan for 2000–2025 has been dedicated to creating an environmentally sustainable urban settlement which integrates the neighbourhood rural areas. The surrounding Green Belt, intended to be a fertile zone is presently being used for applied research in various sectors such as water management, food production, and soil conservation. The results promise a replicable model which could be used in urban and rural areas alike (Kapoor 2007 ).

To address the expansion and re-evaluation of the larger socio-economic context of Auroville and its socio-ecological impacts, as enunciated by Dias et al. ( 2017 ) and Kutting and Lipschutz (2009), a proposal for a sustainable regional plan was prepared in 2012 jointly by Government of India, ADEME (French Environment and Energy Management Agency), INTACH (Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage) and PondyCAN (An NGO which works to preserve and enhance the natural, social, cultural and spiritual environment of Pondicherry). The report was prepared and aimed to be a way forward for unique and diverse communities to grow together as a single entity and to develop a holistic model for future development in this region. This report takes into consideration the surrounding villages and districts around Auroville: Puducherry, Viluppuram and Cuddalore (ADEME, INTACH, PondyCAN,, and Government of India 2012 ).

The concept of eco-cities in urban planning is defined as utopias, hard to achieve standards of human settlements. Ecovillages emerge as small-scale realization of the ideas of an eco-city. Over the years, the alternative practices of Auroville have served as an educational platform for researchers, students, and the civil society alike. However, realizing alternative ecological lifestyles, governance and economic system and self-sufficiency struggle with challenges and contradictions as the ecovillage interact with a larger growth-oriented capitalistic system. Although ecovillages are sites of experimentation, they are seldom insular space. Regional impacts of and on ecovillage are important in analysing their developmental trajectories. Finally, the vision of ecovillages needs to evolve as the ecovillage as well is surroundings grow and change. Experiments in ecovillages like Auroville remind us that alternative visions of human settlements come with opportunities and challenges and are a work-in-progress in achieving a more sustainable future. There is further potential to understand the consensus-based approach and the governance models in an ecovillage in a better manner.

It can be deduced from the findings that ecovillages as catalysts of urban sustainability have a lot of potentials and challenges. The potential is in terms of devising an alternate lifestyle based on an alternative style of governance while the challenges include the local ecological impact and the difficulty in consensus about certain things. There is a future possibility to explore other conditions which facilitate the mainstream translation of ecovillage practices and how future ecovillages can progress to the next level (Kim 2016 ; Norbeck 1999 ).

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Koduvayur Venkitaraman, A., Joshi, N. A critical examination of a community-led ecovillage initiative: a case of Auroville, India. Clim Action 1 , 15 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s44168-022-00016-3

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POLICY BRIEF article

Environmental dilemma and sustainable development of resource-based cities: a case study from northeast china.

• 1 Sino-Danish College, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Institutes of Science and Development, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
• 2 China Center for Urban Development, National Development and Reform Commission Beijing China, Department of Energy and Power Engineering, Tsinghua-BP Clean Energy Center, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
• 3 Department of Economics, Party School of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, Beijing, China
• 4 Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research, Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing, China
• 5 School of Public Administration of Guangxi University, China Center for Agricultural Policy (CCAP), School of Advanced Agricultural Sciences, Peking University, Beijing, China

With ambitious carbon peak and carbon neutral targets, China has to realize it relies heavily on significant reductions in energy-related carbon emissions. Therefore, as the largest contributing region, resource-based cities (RBCs) must achieve an energy transition. Unfortunately, these cities are facing serious environmental problems. The aim of this study is to analyze the development history and problems of RBCs by using the example of the Northeast region. The results show the reasons blocking the green development of these cities include management policies and life cycles. This implies the management of RBCs needs to develop toward a win-win situation of industrial transformation and ecological protection. Finally, some policy recommendations are proposed to achieve emission reduction and sustainable development.

Introduction

RBCs were once regarded as cities with a single extractive industry as the pillar industry and dominated by one industrial company. Moreover, they have been essential for industrialization and urbanization in China. Generally, they are also called mining towns or RBCs ( Yan et al., 2019 ). In recent years, due to the decrease in recoverable resources, it has been more and more difficult to exploit the resources. With the pressure of survival and development, the exploitation intensity of natural resources has increased, and thus resource exploitation has transferred from developed countries to many developing ones ( He et al., 2017 ; Wang Y. et al., 2020 ). However, due to the fragile economic foundation of these developing countries, resource development causes many economic problems, such as low per capita GDP, unbalanced economic and industrial structure, heavy labor pressure, and reduced tax revenue, hurting the long-term sustainability of the cities. ( Li et al., 2013 ; Li et al., 2015 ; He et al., 2017 ; Li and Dewan, 2017 ; Ruan et al., 2020 ). Besides, large-scale resource extraction can also bring serious environmental problems to RBCs, including accelerated resource extraction and depletion, and increased pollution levels in the existing environment ( Krueger and Grossman, 1991 ). Fossil energy extraction, for example, on the one hand, creates a large amount of solid waste, leading to surface and groundwater pollution and air pollution if not properly treated ( Wiedensohler et al., 2009 ). On the other hand, it will cause ground collapse, ground fractures, and other geoenvironmental high-risk areas to expand ( Tan J. et al., 2017 ), causing waste of land resources and further increasing environmental pressure ( Zoundi, 2017 ). These crises threaten the development of RBCs in many developing countries. Some scholars ( Xia et al., 2021 ) mentioned that the sustainable development of RBCs needs to be realized through a transformation because the resources are non-renewable. Naturally, how to solve the current problems of RBCs and finally realize the transformation of RBCs has become a hot issue.

In the context of carbon peak and carbon neutrality targets, the relationship between RBCs and carbon emissions has received much academic attention. However, the impact of RBCs development on carbon emissions is uncertain. On the one hand, Hou et al. (2018) argued that the development of RBCs was accompanied by a heavy reliance on fossil energy and an irrational industrial structure, i.e., the “lock-in effect”. This implies the sloppy development pattern caused by this effect will further promote carbon emissions ( Sun Q. et al., 2021 ). On the other hand, Zhou et al. (2022) suggested that RBCs with low carbon as the goal can enhance carbon emission efficiency, which will help to promote carbon emission reduction and achieve carbon peak and carbon neutrality in advance. Similar findings can be found in Zhang M. et al (2022) , and Zheng and Ge (2022) . Many scholars support this view and argue that China’s achievement of carbon peak and carbon neutrality depends on RBC’s low-carbon development ( Ma et al., 2021 ; Guo, 2021 ; Liao et al., 2022 ). According to statistics, RBCs consume 60% of national energy ( Fong et al., 2008 ; Zhang H. et al., 2022 ). The per capita carbon emission of RBCs is twice the national average. Besides, the carbon emission intensity of RBCs is 1.5 times the national average ( Sun X. et al., 2021 ). Therefore, it is significant to achieve sustainable development through improving energy resilience among RBCs ( Tan P. et al., 2017 , 2020 ) under the carbon peak and carbon neutrality targets.

This study chooses Northeast China as a typical case to study China’s RBCs. First and foremost, Northeast China not only includes many representative RBCs ( Wang Y. et al., 2020 ) but also has to bear relatively high pressure on environmental governance, similar to other RBCs. Up to now, there are 39 RBCs in the urban agglomeration of Northeast China, with a single economic structure, dual management system, and differentiated urban functions ( Tan J. et al., 2017 ). At the same time, according to the list of difficulties in transforming RBCs published by Peking University in 2017, the top four cities are located in Northeast China. To some extent, it reflects that the RBCs in Northeast China face relatively high transformation pressure. There are still some undiscovered and unsolved deep-seated contradictions to be solved. Hence, the ecological transformation of RBCs in Northeast China is imminent ( Wang et al., 2020a , b ). Secondly, the Chinese government has constantly been attaching great importance to urban construction in Northeast China, making the case particular. The Chinese government has promulgated a series of policies targeting the development of this area. However, as in many other countries rich in natural resources, the resources of these cities have not been the motivation for their development, but have left them far behind other cities, thus seriously hindering the overall progress of the country ( Sachs and Warner, 2001 ; Chen et al., 2018 ; Ruan et al., 2020 ).

Therefore, this paper also used case studies ( Omolade et al., 2019 ; John and Tasciotti, 2020 ; Nel and Connelly, 2020 ) to expound on the typical RBCs and analyze their dilemma and solutions for reference, with the following two contribution. First, compared to Reid and Gartell. (2013) and Mitchell and O’Neill. (2016) , this paper can provide a more comprehensive overview of the development history of the Northeast region. Second, although the quantitative research methods used in Zhang M. et al. (2022) ( Zhang H. et al., 2022 ) and Zheng and Ge. (2022) did not be used, this paper, similar to Sunikka (2006) and Liu and Gallagher (2010) , is an exploratory approach to considering what policies governments in developing countries can adopt to guide the development of RBCs in the context of the “paradox” of economic transformation and environmental protection.

The rest of this paper is structured as follows. The second part is a case study including the basic situation, the dilemma, and underlying causes in Northeast China. The third part is policy recommendations. The Final is the conclusion.

Basic situation of northeast china

Northeast China consists of three provinces and part of an autonomous region: Liaoning, Jilin, Heilongjiang, and eastern Inner Mongolia. The land area is 1.45 million square kilometers, and the total population is up to 120 million in this region ( China Bureau of Statistics, 2019 ). As shown in Figure 1 , resources in Northeast China accounted for a high proportion of national output in the 1940s. For this reason, Northeast China is known as China’s old heavy industry base.

FIGURE 1 . Ratio of resources in Northeast China to national output in 1940s.

According to the National sustainable development plan for resource-based cities ( 2013–2020 ) ( State Council, 2013 ), there are 39 RBCs in Northeast China, and their distribution is shown in Table 1 .

TABLE 1 . List of RBCs in northeast China.

The dilemma of transformation and development in northeast China

Reviewing the development process of RBCs in Northeast China, there are the following development problems.

1) Northeast China has a large number of RBCs with diverse types and different development stages. In terms of resource types, the RBCs in Northeast China can be divided into coal-based cities, including Fushun; oil-based cities, such as Daqing, Songyuan, and Panjin; cities dominated by iron and steel industry, including Fuxin; dominated by nonferrous metal mineral RBCs and nonmetal RBCs, including Huludao, and Tieli city; forestry industry cities, including Yichun and Heihe. At the same time, from the development status of these cities, according to the division of RBCs in the Plan, 39 RBCs in Northeast China include two growing resource cities, 13 mature resource cities, 19 declining resource cities, and five renewable resource cities, as shown in Table 2 .

2) RBCs in Northeast China have economic problems such as a single industrial structure and slow regional economic growth. At first, relying on unique natural resources, Northeast China was devoted to developing many serious pollution industries, such as metallurgy, machinery, and building materials. At the same time, other industrial sectors were still unchanged. It results in a single industrial structure, as shown in Figure 2 .

TABLE 2 . Classification of RBCs in northeast China.

FIGURE 2 . Industrial proportion of RBCs in northeast China in 2001.

After more than half a hundred years of exploitation and excavation, many RBCs in Northeast China began to experience resource depletion, economic recession, and population loss ( Yang et al., 2022 ), and the low learning and innovation capacity hindered the development of alternative industries ( Yu and Cheng, 2016 ). These problems led to the bankruptcy and relocation of many industrial enterprises ( Yang et al., 2022 ), causing sharp urban unemployment and continuous urban population loss ( Yu and Cheng, 2016 ). Meanwhile, most cities in Northeast China do not have medium and long-term development plans and cannot implement new energy projects to improve energy efficiency due to policy conflicts ( Yu and Cheng, 2016 ). In addition, the labor force shortage has emerged, and the alternative for high energy-consuming industries is still too immature to make up for economic losses, which comprehensively leads to the slow growth of the regional economy.

3) Environmental problems such as land collapse and soil erosion are common in RBCs in Northeast China. For coal mining, underground mining was carried out around mines in Northeast China, resulting in large-scale surface subsidence and destruction of various buildings, roads, bridges, and farmlands. According to the survey, at the end of 1995, the area of land collapsed by state-owned coal mines in China was about 350,000 ha. Taking Liaoyuan for instance, the subsidence area, mined-out area, and unstable subsidence area formed by history were 18.95, 14.58, and 15.66 square kilometers, respectively ( Jilin Provincial government, 2016 ). Similarly, the coal mined-out area of Shuangyashan is 116.6 square kilometers, and the subsidence area was 62 square kilometers, involving 68,000 residents. Moreover, Datong produces two billion tons of coal annually and forms nearly 45,000 ha of mined-out areas. In addition, environmental problems such as industrial pollution, landslides, and soil erosion ( Tan P. et al., 2017 ) in large areas of river basins are also severe. Taking Jilin Province as an example, the monitoring results show that the soil erosion area in 2019 was 41,800 square kilometers, accounting for 21.95% of the province’s total land area ( Jilin Provincial government, 2020 ).

Dilemma causes

The dilemma faced by RBCs in Northeast China is caused by two factors. On the one hand, the plight of RBCs in Northeast China is closely related to management policies. As the first region in China to implement a planned economy, Northeast China, with its industrial base and a large number of natural resources, has undertaken most of the industrial production tasks of the new China since the 1950s ( Li et al., 2013 ). Under the guidance of the planned economy, resource exploitation in the Northeast became more frequent in order to secure the needs of national economic development. Subsequently, reform and opening up emerged in China’s southeast coastal regions. The Northeast failed to effectively attract foreign investment because of geographic constraints resulting in fewer new industrial layouts and a large population loss to the southeastern coastal regions ( Yang et al., 2018 ). In the 1990s, China started a wave of state-owned enterprise reforms. This directly led to the layoff of eight million workers in Northeast China (accounting for nearly 30% of the country), making the development of this area increasingly difficult ( Mak, 2008 ).

On the other hand, these difficulties are related to the characteristics of RBCs. According to the life cycle theory, RBCs have a four-stage development process (growth-maturity-recession, and regeneration). Similarly, RBCs in Northeast China first relied on natural resources such as coal and iron ore to form highly overwhelming energy-consuming industries to stimulate economic development during the formative years. Subsequently, the original pillar industries matured but were impacted by the emerging industries due to their low technology and slow development of successive replacement industries ( Yu and Cheng, 2016 ). Then, during the recession phase, RBCs lose their original resource advantages due to the non-renewal of mineral resources, resulting in the frequent closure of industrial enterprises ( Yang et al., 2022 ). Consequently, the labor force moved out due to fewer job opportunities. Finally, life cycle theory states RBCs in the regeneration stage can eliminate dependency on resources and achieve high-quality economic development and environmental protection benefits. However, for RBCs in Northeast China, most of them are in the maturity and decline stages, therefore, how to get rid of resource dependence and move to the regeneration stage are the main difficulties for RBCs in China at present.

Policy implications

This paper shows the challenges faced by some RBCs in the development by taking Northeast China as an example. Overall, the case of Northeast China reveals the general characteristics of RBC. The leading solution to these problems is to develop replacement industries or improve the competitiveness of resource-based industries ( Yu and Cheng, 2016 ) while building a green development mechanism of resource conservation, industrial optimization, environmental friendliness, and ecological harmony. Therefore, the policy recommendations are given as follows:

1) Promote industrial transformation. RBCs should exploit their comparative and late-mover advantages to cultivate leading industries ( Zhang et al., 2021 ), especially high-tech equipment manufacturing and other new industries with low environmental pressure and high added value. Table 3 compares the industrial development characteristics of the four types of RBCs and gives the suggested directions for the pillar industries after the transformation of the each type of city. More details are able to be found in the Supplementary Materials .

TABLE 3 . Industrial characteristics and pillar industries of four types of RBCs.

Subsequently, we propose development suggestions for each type of RBC. The transformation of pillar industries in growing resource cities has abundant resource advantages but is constrained by factors such as low resource utilization efficiency and economic efficiency. Take Songwon City as an example, its original pillar industries are petroleum, oil and gas extraction and chemical industry, respectively. Therefore, the city’s transformed pillar industries should be related to petroleum resources, so that the added value of the pillar industries can be increased significantly and its sustainable development capacity can be enhanced.

Mature resource cities inherit a better economic foundation but are constrained by factors such as technology, talent, capital, and lack of innovation. We suggest that the transformed pillar industries should develop toward increasing the added value of resource industries or further expanding different types of industries. Taking Yanbian as an example, we suggest that the city should inherit the traditional advantageous industries such as coal mining and forestry while reforming towards energy and hydropower, forest products processing, garment and textile, and information and electronics industries.

Industrial transformation in recession resource cities is slow and difficult. Besides, it is difficult to find suitable successor industries. In Yichun, for example, we suggest that the city should develop in the direction of broadening the industrial chain based on the development of forestry, and further introduce the “1 + 1″ model to explore forestry-related fields, such as wood processing, forest food processing industry, forest ecotourism, etc.

Regenerative resource cities can gradually get rid of their dependence on resources by improving the level of industrial science and technology innovation, but they are often constrained by the low level of high technology and the general ability of science and technology innovation. Taking Panjin as an example, we suggest that the city, on the basis of inheriting the original petrochemical industry, further develop in the direction of material finishing and actively expand the petrochemical and fine chemical industry, oil and gas equipment manufacturing, plastic new materials, marine engineering, and other related industries. In order to achieve this, talent acquisition ( Yu and Cheng, 2016 ; Yang et al., 2019 ) is a good way.

2) Consider environmental protection. Considering the severe pressure on ecological environment protection in Northeast China, we think the following three aspects are needed to integrate sustainable development into urban transformation.

The first is to strengthen ecological protection and restoration. For example, the ecological damage and environmental pollution caused by mining should be well evaluated according to the mine ecological planning before mining. The mining scheme should follow the principle of minimizing environmental costs. During the mining process, it is necessary to meet the requirements of the mine ecological environment evaluation index and minimize environmental loss when implementing green mining in the whole process. The mining scheme should always ensure that the reliable implementation of the mine fits ecological environment standards. The predicted loss should compare with the actual loss after mining. As for the ecological damage and the environmental pollution loss caused by mineral resources exploitation, the relevant stakeholders should be compensated following the green property rights system. Meanwhile, the ecological environment of mines should be repaired by their functions and structures to maintain the ecological structure, resistance, self-recovery, and sustainable development ability of the mining areas, and thus guarantee the quality of environmental restoration.

Secondly, strengthen innovations for green mining technology, mainly including water-preserved mining technology, ecological restoration technology of mining wasteland, building and land protection technology, and clean mining technology. Specifically, the government should take the lead in building a technological alliance, extensively appeal to experts and scholars to solve enterprises’ problems in production, and improve the technical level with the goal of green and low carbon.

Thirdly, strengthening supervision can promote the intensive and comprehensive utilization of resources and develop a circular economy. Some valuable experiences of cases such as the Ruhr region in Germany can be referred to. Ruhr’s government strictly implements environmental regulations on air quality management, pollution source control, and emission treatments. Emission control is realized through national environmental protection legislation, economic policy tools such as subsidies and taxes, and industrial structure adjustment ( Hassink and Shin, 2005 ).

3) Optimize the guiding policies. First, for state-owned assets in the Northeast, there is an urgent need to establish a more optimal and equitable management system, optimize the separation of social and operational functions, and implement the main responsibility for safety management. In this process, using modern management theories, information technologies, and supervision measures can promote the proper operation of the economy of state-owned enterprises under the current laws and regulations. These measures can effectively avoid the loss of state-owned assets in economic transformation and strengthen the public’s awareness of supervision and willingness to participate, thus forming a good atmosphere for economic development.

Secondly, for environmental protection, governments at all levels should strictly implement laws and regulations on environmental protection and strengthen inspection measures while following the basic management principle of “whoever develops, whoever recovers”. It is important to encourage private capital to participate in environmental protection, and ecological restoration according to local conditions. In addition, governments should constantly innovate new ecological restoration models and strictly implement environmental protection responsibility.

Thirdly, the governments should actively build a cooperation platform to deepen the exchange between Northeast China and other domestic and foreign regions. It should make full use of location superiority, implement the opening-up strategy, and establish a strategic partnership of sharing resources and achievements. Moreover, the governments should expand the industrial development space and deepen the integrated development of external resource elements and dominant industries.

Fourthly, the local governments should persist in adopting specific policies for each city, enterprise, and mineral to develop and utilize resources by considering the local conditions and thus enhance the resource support capacity. After introducing relevant policies, the government should introduce corresponding supporting measures to help loss-making enterprises out of their current predicament. For enterprises with overcapacity, it is necessary to reduce overproduction. The local government needs to take decisive measures to shut down the enterprises characterized by either inefficiency, high consumption, or low development. At the same time, more attention should be paid to properly handling the exit of zombie enterprises and arranging the transfer of a large number of surplus labor.

This article mainly studies RBCs’ problems and their development countermeasures.

1) RBCs in Northeast China have the standard features of global RBCs and the local particularities. More precisely, the common problems refer to economic-related problems, such as the single industrial structure and the low development of substitute industries ( Yu and Cheng, 2016 ). Particularity refers to the environmental issues caused by exploiting natural resources in Northeast China, including industrial pollution, soil erosion ( Tan J. et al., 2017 ), landslides, ground subsidence ( Yu and Cheng, 2016 ).

2) The challenges faced by RBCs in Northeast China are closely related to their development realities and policy systems. Two of the reasons cannot be ignored. On the one hand, the management policies in the Northeast have brought these cities problems of population exodus, environmental damage, and slow economic growth. On the other hand, the characteristics of RBCs lead to a very difficult transformation of the predominantly mature and declining Northeast China.

3) Based on the plight of RBCs in Northeast China, this paper proposes practical policy recommendations from three perspectives: promoting industrial transformation, considering environmental protection and optimizing the guiding policies.

Compared to former studies, we followed the literature such by Heidenreich (2015) , Jawadi and Fitti. (2019) , Omolade et al. (2019) , Nel and Connelly. (2020) , John and Tasciotti. (2020) , Ogbonna et al. (2020) , and Zhang J. et al. (2022) by adopting the method of the case study. However, compared with previous studies, the contribution of this paper is to supplement the solution of how to solve the common and individual issues faced by RBCs. At the same time, compared with the studies of Reid and Gartrell. (2013) , and Mitchell and O’Neill. (2016) , our contribution derives from analyzing the possible impact of the severe environmental issues faced by RBCs on the follow-up policies and accordingly putting forward targeted measures to guide various RBCs in developing countries, to achieve sustainable development, just like Sunikka (2006) , Liu and Gallagher (2010), Omer (2008) and OECD economic surveys European Union 2009, 2009 .

Finally, this paper does not explain why both economic transformation and environmental protection in RBCs in China are still in the exploratory stage, but objectively discusses the current development dilemma of RBCs in Northeast China.

Therefore, in future research, it is necessary to discuss how to combine economic transformation and environmental protection ( Yang et al., 2019 ; Zhang et al., 2021 ), to be able to predict the future trends of RBCs in China from multiple perspectives. In addition to this, we believe that similar to Wei et al. (2022) , how to reasonably plan the future resource development of RBCs with an ambitious carbon neutrality target is also a worthy research direction for the future.

Author contributions

YQ led the whole design of the manuscript. WG: editing. GC: Writing-Review. YQ wrote the initial drafts. XN and HW: revision. All authors reviewed the manuscript and provided comments and feedback.

The National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 71973038 and 71763001) supported this study.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Publisher’s note

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Supplementary material

The Supplementary Material for this article can be found online at: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fenvs.2022.998754/full#supplementary-material

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Keywords: resource-based cities, sustainable development, northeast China, environmental dilemmas, green transformation

Citation: Qing Y, Guo W, Cao G, Qin Y, Nie X and Wang H (2022) Environmental dilemma and sustainable development of resource-based cities: A case study from northeast china. Front. Environ. Sci. 10:998754. doi: 10.3389/fenvs.2022.998754

Received: 20 July 2022; Accepted: 22 August 2022; Published: 12 September 2022.

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Copyright © 2022 Qing, Guo, Cao, Qin, Nie and Wang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Xin Nie, [email protected] ; Han Wang, [email protected]

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

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Agriculture, Environment and Sustainable Development

Experiences and Case Studies

• © 2022
• Rukhsana 0 ,
• Asraful Alam 1

Department of Geography, Aliah University, Kolkata, India

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Department of Geography, Serampore Girls’ College, Serampore, Hooghly, India

• Introduces new perspectives on issues of agricultural and environmental management towards sustainable development
• Explores methodological and innovative approaches in agricultural planning at the local and global scale
• Discusses the risks and challenges of agricultural and environmental management strategies

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Table of contents (15 chapters)

Front matter, global warming and climate change: vulnerability in agricultural sectors, agriculture, environment and sustainable development: an overview.

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Spatio-temporal analysis of built-up area expansion on agricultural land in mousuni island of indian sundarban region.

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Back Matter

Editors and affiliations.

Asraful Alam

About the editors

Dr. Rukhsana  is an Assistant Professor in Department of Geography at Aliah University, Kolkata. She obtained her Ph.D. degree in Geography from Aligarh Muslims University. She has been awarded nine academic awards and fellowship, including International Young Geographer Award 2009, Indo-Asian Education Award in Agriculture Geography 2022 , International Women of the Year 2022 in Geography, AMU-JRF award 2006-07 and UGC-RF 2007-2009. She has published more than 35 papers at national as well as international level in reputed journals and 19 chapters in edited books. Dr. Rukhsana has published four books and presented a no of research papers at national and international level. She has attended XXV FIG International Congress 2014, Malaysia and ICGGS-2018, Thailand Bangkok. Dr Rukhsana has successfully completed one major research project sponsored by ICSSR, Ministry of Education, New Delhi and a second one is ongoing in agriculture.She has served as a reviewer for many reputed international journals. Her specialization in research is Agriculture development and planning, Urban expansion and planning, Population pressure, environment and rural development. She is engaged in various professional activities, and serves several university administrative posts such as Head of Geography department, and superintendent of Aliah girls hostel at Aliah University.

Dr. Asraful Alam  is an Assistant Professor and HoD at the Department of Geography, Serampore Girls’ College, University of Calcutta, West Bengal, India. He received his M.A.& Ph.D. degrees in Geography from Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh and Aliah University, Kolkata, India respectively and also completed PG Diploma in Remote Sensing & GIS. Dr. Alam completed his Post Doctorate (PDF)from Department of Geography, University of Calcutta, Kolkata, India. Earlier he was an Assistant Coordinator in PG Department of Geography, Calcutta Women’s College, University of Calcutta, Kolkata, India.  His research interests include Population Geography, Agricultural Geography, Climatology and Remote Sensing & GIS and Developmental Studies. He has published three books (two book from Springer) and more than 29  papers in peer-reviewed journals. Dr. Alam has served as a reviewer for many international journals.

Bibliographic Information

Book Title : Agriculture, Environment and Sustainable Development

Book Subtitle : Experiences and Case Studies

Editors : Rukhsana, Asraful Alam

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-10406-0

Publisher : Springer Cham

eBook Packages : Earth and Environmental Science , Earth and Environmental Science (R0)

Copyright Information : The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022

Hardcover ISBN : 978-3-031-10405-3 Published: 01 October 2022

Softcover ISBN : 978-3-031-10408-4 Published: 02 October 2023

eBook ISBN : 978-3-031-10406-0 Published: 30 September 2022

Edition Number : 1

Number of Pages : XXI, 272

Number of Illustrations : 5 b/w illustrations, 82 illustrations in colour

Topics : Environmental Management , Agriculture , Sustainable Development , Food Science

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Social values and sustainable development: community experiences

• Walter Leal Filho   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-1241-5225 1 , 13 ,
• Vanessa Levesque   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-2965-3545 2 ,
• Subarna Sivapalan   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-6318-5637 3 ,
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• Ulisses M. Azeiteiro   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-5252-1700 9 ,
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• Bruno Borsari   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-9463-333X 11 &
• Chris Shiel 12  

Environmental Sciences Europe volume  34 , Article number:  67 ( 2022 ) Cite this article

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Metrics details

This paper presents a review of the literature and trends related to social values and sustainable development and describes a set of case studies from a variety of community-based projects which illustrate the advantages that social values bring about as part of efforts to promote sustainability. Three approaches were used to develop this study: a bibliometric analysis of the topic “social values and sustainable development”, an analysis of case studies that concretely present community projects addressing social values and sustainability, and the development of a framework linking up bibliometric clusters and the cases studies.

While the bibliometric analysis revealed clusters where social values are strongly connected with sustainable development, the case studies indicated the lack of a common terminology and understanding of the relation between social values, sustainable development, and community-based projects.

Conclusions

The study concludes by suggesting a set of measures that could be deployed to better take social values into account when planning policies or making decisions related to community projects.

Introduction

September 2015 marked a significant milestone for the people, planet, and prosperity. It was during this historic occasion that United Nations Member States collectively agreed upon the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The adoption of the SDGs would see the global population come together to realize the urgent call for action to end poverty, safeguard the planet, and ensure peace and prosperity. The SDGs consist of 17 interlinked global goals that are designed to serve as a blueprint to achieve a more sustainable future for the global community, addressing among others, critical issues such as poverty, quality education, climate change, clean water and sanitation, partnerships, and sustainable communities. The emphasis of the SDGs and Agenda 2030 on addressing the dimensions of people, planet, prosperity, peace and partnership is the further assertion that these aspects are crucial to the future of humanity and the planet [ 56 ].

Agenda 2030 and the SDGs are essentially a socially driven agenda, projecting—social values and trajectories. To be able to better understand the place of values within the sustainability debate, there is first a need to define social values in this context. From a sociological perspective, values are considered the foundation for the spurring of human actions. Values are also deemed to be instrumental in the development of an individual’s personal and collective identities, besides being a vital conduit for social integration [ 54 ], while being appreciated by those focused on sustainable business. According to the organization Impact [ 29 ], a social value is seen as a strategic and achievable process that involves impacting societies positively, regardless of an entity’s financial status, business direction, or size.

In a sustainable development context, values are often considered in the assessment of communities classified as vulnerable [ 51 ]. Under-development, environmental ethics, and preservation of social and cultural traditions are but some of the prevalent issues explored in the literature on this subject matter [ 57 ]. Development has had an impact on the economy and the environment. This situation generates a critical purpose to investigate, while defining and evaluating the value of development, particularly from a social stance [ 25 ].

Social values never occur in a vacuum. We are socialized into pre-existing yet malleable conceptions of community and social relations [ 28 , 40 ]. At the same time, there is a tension between autonomy and egotism, the need to create a healthy sense of individual self can conflict with the need to maintain a healthy and coherent community, with established social mores. Historically, human communities have created and policed social values that have privileged the latter—for example the hierarchical “5 great relationships” of Chinese dynasties informed by Confucianism, or the varna (caste) system of India. With the onset of violent European clearances, global colonialism and industrialization, coupled with individual is facilitated by the Protestant Reformation, the strong bonds of community values (that were also patriarchal, heteronormative, and confining for many), were sundered. This inversion of the social order flourished in the post-World War II US economy. It was based on limited affluence where individual consumers became the social model of modernism, establishing a culture that diminished all other relations. This social value of extreme individualism has in large part become globalized and has led the 2000s to anomie, dysnomia, economic crime [ 39 , 44 ], and planetary crises. It has also led to high rates of mental health, suicide, and life dissatisfaction for many, where these factors are compounded by living through environmental devastation brought by the same system of over-consumption and over-population [ 46 ]. It is in this context that the focus on social values related to healing, flourishing, and justice as well as mutual support and a sense of community become central to sustainable development and a social leg of sustainability; which is related to personal growth and being connected [ 28 ]. Therefore, all people could aim at „personal evolvement in the community “ the as English translation of the German expression “Persönliche Entfaltung in Gemeinschaft” [ 14 ], 32).

We point out, though, that social values in support of sustainable development rightfully focus on equity, inclusion, and justice, but more and more data suggest that such values must also focus on and include the natural world and the connection of humans to it, as well [ 53 ]. Additional data indicate that as long as rampant individualism and a strong anthropocentrism tethered to values of over-consumption continue to shape social values and patterns of behaviours [ 33 ], sustainable development will be very hard, if not impossible, to achieve. Thus, the question arises about what social values are being advanced that can promote sustainable development? For example, values that (1) strengthen resilience; (2) support change and transformation; and (3) advance a social basis for these two conditions that may support sustainable development. Values that activate thinking, feelings and actions and that relate to determining benign change [ 49 ] may act to overcome dysfunctional norms and values humans learned to follow in societies and communities.

Interestingly, there has not been much literature focusing on the notions of social values and sustainable development within the context of community experiences [ 22 , 48 ]. Thus, with this paper we aim at creating an avenue to explore these concepts in greater depth. More specifically, we aim to understand the extent to which the notion of social values and sustainable development have been approached and described within literature, to draw out international best practice case study examples showcasing social values and sustainable development within community-based projects, and to develop a framework integrating the best practice case studies and literature analysis.

The theoretical underpinning of our work is a three-pronged framework that considered stakeholder theory to understand how economic value is created and traded, including its links to ethics and capitalism. According to Parmar and his collaborators [ 45 ] this knowledge is necessary to assist entrepreneurs to reflect about management with emphasis on the value of goods and trading practices. Institutional theory instead is a paradigm about the more profound aspects of social structure, that focuses on the processes by which schemes, rules, and norms, become established to guide social behaviour [ 2 ]. The third prong of our framework is the point of convergence of the previous two, consisting of the theory for sustainable development as proposed by Shi and team [ 50 ]. This process is an evolutionary path that began with the single goal of using sustainably Earth’s resources, to Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), and most recently, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). We first present a review of literature and trends related to social values and sustainable development. Following there is a discussion on a set of case studies from a variety of community-based projects which illustrates the advantages a focus on social values can bring about in promoting sustainable development. Finally, conclusions are made and some measures are listed, which may assist in deploying a better understanding of social values into account, when planning policies, or making decisions on spending, for which the sustainability of specific groups and communities may be jeopardized.

Methodology

We are interested in exploring the context in which community-based projects focused on sustainable development have explicitly assessed and incorporated social values. One method of doing so is to analyse the publications about these topics, to assess the linkages and themes within this research area. Our methodological approach occurred in three main steps:

Step 1: Bibliometric analysis of the topic “social values and sustainable development”.

Step 2: Cases studies that concretely present community projects addressing social values and sustainability.

Step 3: Framework connecting bibliometric clusters and the case studies.

Firstly, we conducted a bibliometric analysis using the software tool VOSviewer. This analysis allowed us to assess scientific investigation by using quantitative studies; it is based on the assumption that the number of citations of an article tends to reflect its impact on the scientific community [ 59 ]. Bibliometric analyses generated information about the quantity and performance of the publications, giving insights into the relations between fields of knowledge by means of the statistical analysis of co-publications and citations [ 47 ].

This bibliometric analysis included peer-reviewed publications indexed in the Web of Science (WoS). This is one of the most trusted and well-known worldwide citation databases covering multidisciplinary research. The following search string was used: TOPIC: (“social values”) AND TOPIC: (“sustainable development”). All years of the timespan available at WoS were considered (1945–2021). Only studies in English were considered, with no restrictions applied regarding document types. The search was carried out on March 2021 and returned 89 papers. In a second step, the titles and abstracts of the identified papers were checked, in order to validate their relevance and ensure their compatibility with the aims of the study. The exclusion criteria used in the study were: thematic relevance, interdisciplinarity, due emphasis to social science components under the lenses of sustainability. Based on these criteria, 74 articles were chosen for analysis. The co-occurrence analysis was performed in VOSviewer and returned a set of nodes and links. Each node is a frequently used term in the articles (analysed in titles and abstracts) and the size of the node refers to the frequency of the keyword. The distance between two nodes indicates the strength of the relation between the terms; therefore, shorter distances tend to suggest stronger relations [ 37 ]. Linked topics mean they have appeared together, and the link width is proportional to the number of co-occurrences the keywords have [ 37 , 47 ]. The minimum number of occurrences of a keyword was set to 2, resulting in 24 selected keywords. For the process of clustering, where the software grouped closely related nodes in clusters, 2 terms were defined as the minimum number of keywords per cluster and clustering resolution was set to 0.5 (as per the software guidelines, this parameter determines the level of detail of the clustering and must have a non-negative value; the higher the value, the larger the number of clusters produced).

The bibliometric analysis was complemented by a qualitative assessment of the literature that focused on a set of community projects that incorporated social values for sustainable development. In this second phase, from the results of the bibliometric analysis, we presented selected case studies of community-based projects and initiatives. Keywords addressing social values such as: equity, inclusion, justice, human rights, health, values and life quality, were considered to identify the cases, as suggested by Estes [ 17 ]. More constructs were taken into account, such as: strengthening, resilience [ 10 ], and support for change and transformation [ 32 ]. Worldwide initiatives were analysed considering the following questions: what were the project’s goals? To which results has it led, in a sustainable development context? What difference is the project making? The collected case studies were presented in a summary table containing information about the title of the initiative, the goal of the project/programme, the main results, its geographical location and a reference article.

Each reported case study was examined and assessed for its consideration of sustainability topics such as communities’ resilience, social inclusion, gender equality, eco-innovation, and for how those topics intersected with each of the four clusters that emerged from the bibliometric analysis.

For Step 3, the analysis of the results from the previous 2 steps, or phases, served as the foundation for the development of a framework, which associates the case studies (Step 2) with the clusters identified in the bibliometric analysis (Step 1).

Bibliometric analysis

The bibliometric analysis of the 74 selected articles showed that the publication on the topic of social values and sustainable development is still incipient (first publication dated 1992) and with over 60% of the publications occurring in the last 5 years.

Results of the term co-occurrence analysis are presented in Fig.  1

Output of the co-occurrence analysis

and illustrate the main topics associated with social values and sustainable development derived from the literature. Even with a modest set of references resulting from the applied search string, four primary clusters were generated from this initial classification.

The red cluster centres on ecosystem management, such as forest management, incorporating explicitly, social values and sustainable development. Ecosystem management is a concept feature that aims to protect environmental conditions by taking into account the larger ecosystem context, as well as sustainable development and thus, is inclusive of social values and needs [ 35 ]. Similarly, sustainable forest management is a practice in which protecting and maintaining forests’ values is balanced with forests’ sustainable development in a way in which various, sometimes competing, social values come into play [ 6 , 26 ].

The green cluster is focused on rural development, such as privately owned forestry, which suggests that some sustainability development researchers could be interested in the social values of rural development settings. For example, studies from Sweden and China revealed that while rural development efforts can promote sustainable development, there is often an underlying tension between urban and rural social values, suggesting a need to identify more explicitly, the role of and impacts on social value systems in rural areas [ 6 , 27 ].

The blue cluster centres on business sustainability, integrating concepts such as corporate social responsibility, stakeholder engagement (in a corporate setting), and ecosystem services. Businesses have a role to play in achieving sustainable development, and research has explored the ways in which corporate social responsibility is driven by company and stakeholder social values, as well as the challenges of creating an economically viable business while maintaining core values [ 16 , 20 , 60 ]. The small purple cluster is an offshoot of the business-centric blue cluster, with a more specific focus on social responsibility and globalization. For example, a study from Croatia explored the intersection of and tension between the dynamic changes in local economies due to globalization, especially regarding the social values and identity of rural communities that create indigenous products [ 15 ].

Finally, the yellow cluster centres around ethics and moral values. There is much interest in the degree to which ethical and moral values influence environmental attitudes, human capital, adoption of sustainable practices, and transitions to more sustainable futures [ 11 , 12 , 24 , 41 ]. These social values might arise out of religious [ 12 ], educational [ 3 ], or neighbourhood settings [ 41 ].

Case studies

Multiple case studies on social values for sustainable development in community-based projects could be found around the world. Table 1

 shows the case studies in Latin America and the Caribbean, East Africa, North America, Europe, and Asia which were considered in this analysis.

The analysis of the case studies provided in Table 2 demonstrates how any given sustainable development project can address multiple social values while addressing relevant sustainability issues.

Classification of case studies according to the proposed clusters of social values research topics (red: ecosystem management; green: rural development; blue: business sustainability; yellow: ethics and moral values)

further demonstrates the ways in which the community-based sustainable development projects often intersect multiple social value categories. The presented case studies were distributed across the main clusters identified from the bibliometric analysis. The red one represents the ecosystem management, which aims to protect environmental conditions, the green cluster centres on social values in rural development, the blue group gathers social values regarding business sustainability and Corporate Social Responsibility along with the offshoot of globalization, and the yellow cluster is focused on ethics and moral values (educational, religious and neighbourhood settings).

Most of the case studies addressed social values related to more than one cluster. For instance, the corporate case called Natura and Co Commitment to Life covers strategies focused on business sustainability, rural development, ecosystem management and ethics and moral values. Withal Natura and Co, cases such as SAKSHAM, Red Rocks Initiative, FAA, INCLUDE, Equator Initiative and What’s for Dinner? point out a strong link between social values across rural development and ecosystem protection. Another meaningful string was found among business sustainability, CSR, and ethical values in view of the case studies Re-Code and the EcoInnovation District in Uptown Pittsburgh.

The implications of the results for the implementation of the SDGs are twofold. Firstly, it illustrates that much can be gained by providing an emphasis on social sustainability when it comes to realizing the SDGs. Secondly, whereas the targets of each SDG are quite specific, social sustainability permeates all of them. This includes not only socially oriented SDGs such as SDG1, SDG2, SDG4, or SDG5 for instance, but also some “technical ones” such as SDG11, SDG12, or SDG13, all of which have strong social roots.

This study has demonstrated that social values are being addressed in community-based sustainable development projects, however the social values considered herein differ depending on the focus of each project. The social values may be related, for example, to rural traditions and cultures, or to business stakeholders. Because sustainable development is locally based and context-specific, such that action and solutions are grounded in local needs [ 58 ], it follows that the social values considered would be tailored to the presenting issue.

However, it also became clear that currently, there is no a common terminology, nor a description of social values in the context of sustainable development. While the number of papers (74) identified in our bibliometric analysis does provide an insight into the broad arenas in which researchers are exploring sustainable development and social values, we are limited in our ability to draw strong conclusions about the realm of social values research in sustainable development. We note, for example, the lack of frequently used terms related to equity and justice, although we are aware that there are researchers that are exploring these topics in a sustainable development framework. This suggests that some scholars who do this type of research are using alternative terms than those we used in our search string (“sustainable development” and “social values”). For example, they might have used the term “sustainability” instead of “sustainable development” or, instead of using “social values” they used a specific social value concept they focused on, such as equity. Thus, we recommend that future research identifies the way in which specific social values are brought into sustainability and sustainable development narratives, such that future analyses can investigate more thoroughly, the ways in which social values are defined and advanced in sustainable development work.

Furthermore, the case studies that included social values in sustainable development were not taken to a broader analysis level to substantiate whether social values are being engendered to promote sustainability. Are the social values considered in rural development, business sustainability, ecosystem management, and morals and ethics likely to promote a societal basis supportive of change and transformation? Are community-based projects assessing the degree to which there is a change in social values that prioritize consumerism, for example, over social well-being? We posit that while it is essential that social values continue to be assessed and incorporated into community-based sustainable development projects as reported, a more comprehensive effort must be started to analyse the ways in which broader social values are impacting our ability to achieve sustainable development in different places around the world.

This paper explores the notions of social values in sustainable development, within the context of community experiences. The literature was reviewed and trends related to social values and sustainable development were investigated, through a bibliometric study and juxtaposed to a set of case studies from a variety of community-based projects, with the goal of illustrating the advantages of a focus on social values can bring about in promoting sustainable development. A framework has been presented that links up the bibliometric clusters and the case studies. The evidence gathered valuable data from these analyses and allow some conclusions to be made.

Firstly, the bibliometric study reveals four clusters where the featured values feature relate to sustainable development. This relationship appears in the contexts of:

Ecosystem management—where social values are evident;

Rural development—where social values in a rural development setting are apparent;

Business sustainability—where values are driven by corporate social responsibility and stakeholder values;

Ethics and moral values about environmental attitudes, human capital, sustainable practices, and a sustainable future.

Secondly, the case studies illustrate that social values are being considered in a variety of projects; the framework deployed to analyse the case studies under the headings identified above, suggests that while community-based sustainable development projects may differ in the values considered, some projects address more than one cluster.

Thirdly, it is apparent that a lack of common terminology in relation to social values in the context of sustainable development is an obstacle to the analysis of the relationship between the two.

Finally, case studies where social values and sustainable development are linked, rarely consider whether social values are being engendered, influenced, or changed as a result of community-based projects. Thus, with less understanding of value change, we may fall short of achieving sustainable development.

The paper has two main implications. The first is that it sheds light on a topic of central relevance, since social components are key elements of sustainability, both as a theme and as an area of knowledge. The second is that the information here compiled and the findings deriving from them provide a timely overview of some of the variables which characterize the extent to which social aspects influence the sustainability debate.

Our research does have some limitations. For instance, it focused on case studies as data collection instruments, and not on other empirical tools such as surveys or interviews. In addition, the range of the case studies is limited to some of the topics identified by the authors, namely rural development, ethics and moral values, business sustainability and ecosystem management. But despite these constraints, the study represents a welcome addition to the literature, in the sense that it has gathered evidence demonstrating how social values under a sustainable development perspective are perceived, and the added value this brings to community experiences.

Moving forward, some measures which may be deployed to better take social values into account, when planning policies or making decisions on spending, which may affect specific groups or communities should be:

A more systematic approach to taking social values into account when undertaking projects on the principles of sustainable development.

A greater use of indicators such as public participation and community acceptance, since some social values are not truly objective and—as such—not easy to quantify.

A more adaptable design and use of a common framework, which may cater for a more accurate measurement of considerations of social values in sustainability projects.

Employment of innovative models to promote social sustainability issues, both in communities, in schools and workplaces, in particular.

A further measure that could implemented is to design tools, which may cater to an assessment of the impacts of a project, as far as influencing social values are concerned. A due emphasis on social values may allow communities and their stakeholders to understand the advantages of pursuing sustainable development, in a way that they can relate to.

Availability of data and materials

Not applicable.

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Leal Filho, W., Levesque, V., Sivapalan, S. et al. Social values and sustainable development: community experiences. Environ Sci Eur 34 , 67 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12302-022-00641-z

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Case Study: How The Hans Foundation Revived Goom—A Model of Environmental and Economic Renewal

In the heart of India, where the challenges of poverty, deforestation, and rural exodus intersect, a remarkable transformation is taking place. The Hans Foundation , a pillar of support for marginalized communities, embarked on an ambitious mission to revitalize the impoverished village of Goom. Faced with a dwindling workforce, environmental degradation, and economic despair, the village posed a formidable challenge that would test the resilience and ingenuity of all involved.

Through the creation of the Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery, the foundation not only aimed to restore the region’s ecological balance but also to empower the village’s women and youth. The following case study explores the intricate journey of building a community-driven initiative from the ground up—overcoming obstacles and ultimately establishing a sustainable model for rural development and environmental conservation.

Discover how a barren landscape was transformed into a flourishing nursery, offering livelihoods, protecting the environment, and reigniting hope in a community that was yearning for change.

Foundation Overview: The Hans Foundation’s Legacy of Community Empowerment

The story of the Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery in Goom is just one example of how The Hans Foundation has been making a lasting impact across India. Established in 2009, the foundation is dedicated to improving the quality of life for marginalized and underserved communities throughout the country. Over the past 15 years, the foundation has implemented a wide range of programs across various sectors, including education, healthcare, disability livelihood, and environmental conservation.

The foundation's mission centres on the holistic development of remote and underserved communities, with particular attention to initiatives for children, women, and persons with disabilities. Committed to creating a more equitable society, The Hans Foundation ensures that no one is left behind in the pursuit of social justice and development. Aligning its efforts with the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the foundation contributes significantly to the global agenda for a better world.

In terms of community development and environmental conservation, The Hans Foundation has made remarkable strides, reaching over 12,000 villages, 24 cities, and 25 states, and impacting 40 million beneficiaries. Notable among its initiatives is the Forest Fire Prevention and Mitigation Program, which seeks to reduce forest fire incidents, protect biodiversity, and support local livelihoods. Through a strong emphasis on community engagement and co-creation of solutions, The Hans Foundation ensures that its interventions are both culturally relevant and sustainable.

Background of the Initiative: Selecting Goom Village for Sustainable Development

This alignment with The Hans Foundation’s goals made Goom Village a clear choice. The selection for the Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery project was driven by several critical factors::

• Agricultural Dependence: With 60 families relying on agriculture and livestock, there was a need for sustainable practices to enhance economic stability.
• High Migration Rates: Significant migration due to lack of facilities and opportunities highlighted the need for local employment and improved living conditions.
• Aging Population: The elderly demographic created challenges in maintaining a productive workforce, making it crucial to engage younger residents and women in meaningful work.
• Environmental Concerns: The village’s need for environmental conservation, especially in forest fire mitigation, aligned with the initiative's dual focus on ecological and economic benefits.

These conditions made Goom Village an ideal choice for fostering community resilience and sustainability.

Addressing Key Challenges

The Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery initiative aimed to address several challenges in Goom Village:

• Economic Instability: By creating jobs and providing a stable income, particularly for women, to counter the village’s reliance on agriculture and high migration rates.
• Environmental Degradation: To combat issues like deforestation and forest fire risks by growing native and valuable plants, promoting environmental conservation.
• Lack of Infrastructure: To improve essential facilities and enhance the quality of life, addressing the decline in infrastructure and reducing migration.
• Community Engagement: To empower local residents, especially women, through training and involvement in nursery management and sustainable practices.
• Scepticism and Experience: To build confidence and demonstrate successful plant cultivation, overcoming initial skepticism due to a lack of experience.

In short, the initiative sought to create a sustainable model benefiting both the local economy and environment.

Initiative Proposal

The initial proposal for the Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery was drafted by the villagers of Goom, with significant contributions from key figures in the community. Notably, the leadership of  Smt. Rajni Devi , the President of the nursery committee, and  Shri Kuldeep Singh Bisht , the village Pradhan, played crucial roles in articulating the community's vision and needs.

The main environmental and economic issues addressed in the proposal that aligned with The Hans Foundation’s mission included:

• Environmental Degradation: The need for reforestation and ecosystem restoration to counteract deforestation and forest fire risks.
• Economic Challenges: The proposal aimed to create local jobs and enhance economic resilience amidst high migration rates and a lack of sustainable livelihoods.
• Community Empowerment: Emphasis on capacity building, especially for women, to foster engagement and ownership, aligning with The Hans Foundation’s goals of empowerment and gender equality.
• Sustainable Practices: Promotion of sustainable agriculture and environmental stewardship to support long-term ecological balance and community well-being.

Inception and Approval

During the physical inspection of the proposed nursery site for the Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery, several key factors were assessed to ensure its suitability. The evaluation focused on land suitability, including soil quality, drainage, and topography, to support plant growth. The availability of reliable irrigation facilities and the site's accessibility for transporting materials were also critical. Additionally, the potential environmental impact, including contributions to local biodiversity and measures to prevent soil erosion, was considered. The community's needs and the alignment of the initiative with local aspirations were key factors as well.

The Forest Officer's recommendation was pivotal in the approval process, providing expert assessment and formal documentation that influenced the final decision. Their evaluation highlighted how the nursery aligned with broader conservation goals. Other criteria included the community proposal outlining the initiative's benefits, compliance with local regulations, and support from The Hans Foundation, which demonstrated a commitment to the nursery’s success and sustainability.

Formation of the Executive Committee

The selection of committee members for the Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery was conducted during an open meeting to ensure transparency and inclusivity. Community members, including landowners and volunteers, were invited to express their interest in serving on the committee. The process was democratic, involving nominations and votes, which helped in selecting individuals who were genuinely committed to the initiative.

Committee members were assigned several key roles and responsibilities. They were tasked with overseeing the nursery’s operations, managing resources, and providing leadership to guide the initiative's development. They also played a crucial role in engaging with the community, raising awareness, organizing meetings, and fostering participation. Financial oversight was another critical responsibility, with members managing budgets, fundraising, and maintaining financial records. Additionally, they facilitated training sessions to share knowledge on nursery management and sustainable practices, thus empowering the community.

Involving landowners and volunteer firefighters brought significant benefits. Landowners provided valuable resources and local agricultural expertise, which were essential for the nursery's success. Their participation also helped build community trust and encouraged broader engagement. Volunteer firefighters contributed their knowledge in fire management, which was crucial for protecting the nursery and ensuring community safety. The collaboration between these diverse members enhanced the committee’s problem-solving capabilities and led to more innovative approaches to managing the nursery.

Training and Capacity Building: Equipping the Committee for Effective Nursery Management

1. Land Preparation  - Techniques for preparing the land for planting. 2. Seed Sowing  - Methods for effectively sowing seeds to ensure successful germination. 3. Bed Construction  - Guidelines for constructing beds suitable for plant growth. 4. Polybag Filling  - Instructions on how to fill polybags for sapling cultivation.

The training was structured to provide both theoretical knowledge and practical skills, ensuring that the committee members could apply what they learned directly to their nursery operations. The Hans Foundation played a pivotal role in delivering this training, which was crucial for building the committee's capacity to manage the nursery effectively.

As for feedback from the committee members, the training was beneficial, as it equipped them with the necessary skills to overcome initial challenges and successfully cultivate a variety of saplings. 

Nursery Activities and Collaboration

The nursery selects species based on environmental and economic criteria. Chosen species are either native to or well-adapted to the local ecosystem, enhancing biodiversity and supporting habitat restoration. For example, Baanj (Oak) and Kachnar offer ecological benefits such as supporting wildlife and improving soil health. Economically, species like mulberry (Sahtoot) and Kachnar are valued for their market demand and industrial uses. The ease of cultivation is also considered for successful management.

The nursery grows 10,000 saplings of Baanj, 6,000 of Kachnar, and 2,500 of Amwala (Emblica officinalis), among others. These species aid in soil conservation, prevent erosion, and contribute to carbon sequestration, helping to mitigate climate change. They also enhance biodiversity by supporting local wildlife. Economically, the sale of saplings provides income for the community and promotes sustainable livelihoods, reducing migration and strengthening local economies. The nursery’s approach effectively combines environmental conservation with economic benefits.

Addressing Initial Scepticism: Overcoming Challenges with Leadership and Support

The main sources of scepticism and uncertainty regarding the success of the Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery initiative included:

1.  Lack of Prior Experience: The committee members, particularly the women involved, had little to no prior experience with plant production and nursery management. This lack of familiarity with the processes and techniques necessary for successful cultivation led to doubts about their ability to manage the nursery effectively.

2.  Community Doubts: There may have been general scepticism within the community about whether the initiative would yield tangible results, especially given the historical challenges faced by the village, such as high migration rates and limited resources.

3.  Environmental Challenges: The initial condition of the land, which was overrun with invasive species, posed a significant challenge to starting the nursery.

The committee, under the leadership of Rajni Devi and with the support of The Hans Foundation, cleared the land of invasive species and prepared it for planting. This hands-on approach demonstrated their commitment and capability, gradually building confidence in the initiative's potential for success.

Leadership and Support

The Hans Foundation played a crucial role in the Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery initiative's success by providing continuous support in several key areas. They offered detailed training on nursery management, technical guidance to address challenges, and financial assistance for equipment and seeds. The foundation also organized village-level meetings to raise awareness and foster community involvement.

To maintain motivation and engagement among villagers, the leadership team, including Smt. Rajni Devi and Shri Kuldeep Singh Bisht, used several strategies. They involved community members in decision-making, celebrated small successes to boost morale, maintained open communication with regular updates, and encouraged a learning-oriented approach to handle both achievements and setbacks.

This combined effort of The Hans Foundation’s support and the leadership team's effective strategies ensured the initiative's success and sustained community engagement.

Community Engagement and Awareness: Tools and Methods

The Hans Foundation conducted training sessions that provided both technical knowledge and hands-on learning experiences, helping build skills and fostering a sense of community ownership. Awareness campaigns were also implemented to educate the community about the nursery's benefits and the importance of environmental conservation, encouraging greater participation.

Additionally, feedback mechanisms were established to ensure that community members could voice their concerns and contribute to decision-making. Celebrating milestones such as successful sapling growth and sales helped maintain enthusiasm and reinforce community spirit. Collaborative activities, including land preparation and seed sowing, further strengthened teamwork and commitment.

Together, these tools and methods effectively engaged the community, fostering a sense of ownership and collaboration that was crucial for the initiative's success.

Village-Level Meetings: Organizing and Promoting Community Involvement

The village-level meetings organized by the Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery and The Hans Foundation played an essential role in raising awareness and fostering a proactive community spirit. These meetings were organized with active participation from committee members, especially women, who played key roles in promoting the initiative and mobilizing community members. Promotion was done through word-of-mouth and community networks, ensuring broad attendance from local residents, landowners, and volunteers. Regular scheduling of these meetings allowed for continuous updates and addressed concerns, maintaining ongoing communication with the community.

Key topics covered in the meetings included the importance of environmental conservation, particularly regarding forest fire prevention and the benefits of tree planting. Updates on the nursery's activities, such as sapling cultivation and management progress, were shared to build transparency and trust. Discussions also focused on encouraging community involvement in supporting the nursery through planting activities and promoting sapling sales.

These meetings significantly contributed to raising awareness and fostering a proactive community spirit by encouraging residents to actively engage in environmental stewardship and local development. They helped build community cohesion by bringing residents together to discuss shared goals and challenges, overcoming initial scepticism. The active participation of women not only empowered them but also showcased their leadership capabilities, contributing to a shift in perceptions about women’s roles in community development and environmental management.

Financial Management: Strategies and Future Plans

The Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery implemented several strategies to ensure financial prudence and support its operations:

• Strategies for Financial Prudence: The committee opened a savings account at PNB Chaulyusain with an initial deposit of INR 28,000 to support ongoing operations and future initiatives. Budgeting and financial planning covered essential expenses, while revenue generation from sapling sales is anticipated to reinvest about INR 100,000 into the nursery.
• Initial Contribution's Role: The initial INR 28,000 helped procure essential materials and equipment, providing a financial cushion and allowing the committee to focus on operations without immediate income pressure.
• Plans for Diversifying Funding Sources: The nursery plans to reinvest revenue from sapling sales to expand operations, explore additional partnerships, and improve training and productivity.

Expansion and Future Vision

The Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery has outlined several specific plans for expansion to ensure sustainability and provide employment opportunities:

Site Expansion: Plans include increasing the nursery's land area from the current 10 Nali (0.2 Hac.) to accommodate more sapling varieties and enhance production capacity.

Infrastructure Development: Upgrades to irrigation facilities and the addition of new greenhouses or polyhouses are planned to improve sapling growth and operational efficiency.

Diversification of Plant Species: Introducing a broader range of plant species to meet market demand and environmental needs, such as medicinal plants, fruit trees, and ornamental plants.

Contribution to Sustainable Employment

Expanding the Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery will create new jobs in nursery management, fieldwork, and sales, providing stable employment for local residents. The plan includes training programs to develop skills in horticulture and sustainable agriculture, offering long-term career opportunities and enhancing local expertise.

Measures for Scalability and Sustainability

To ensure scalability and sustainability, the nursery is focusing on strong community engagement and a robust financial plan that includes diversifying funding sources and reinvesting revenue. Environmental management practices will minimize the ecological footprint, and regular monitoring will help adapt operations for continued success and impact.

Partnerships and Key Learnings

The major partnerships formed during the Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery initiative and their key takeaways include:

• Role: Provided financial support, training, and technical guidance essential for the nursery’s setup and operation.
• Takeaway: Demonstrates the critical role of external support in empowering grassroots initiatives and building necessary skills for sustainability.
• Role: Assisted in securing a market for the nursery's saplings.
• Takeaway: Highlights the value of local government partnerships in enhancing initiative visibility and facilitating resource access.
• Role: Actively participated in various nursery operations, from land preparation to seed sowing.
• Takeaway: Shows the importance of community engagement in fostering ownership and ensuring long-term initiative success.
• Role: Provided critical training on nursery management practices.
• Takeaway: Underlines the necessity of expert knowledge for overcoming challenges and improving practices.
• Role: Managed funds and supported nursery operations through a savings account.
• Takeaway: Emphasizes the importance of financial management and planning for initiative sustainability.

Partnership Impact and Future Revenue

The partnership with the Block Development Office Dwarikhal for sapling sales was established through proactive outreach and negotiations by the nursery committee. They reached out to offer saplings from the Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery, leading to a formal agreement on the sale terms.

The partnership is expected to generate around INR 100,000 from the sale of approximately 5,000 saplings, including mulberry and Kachnar. This financial boost will support ongoing operations, create local jobs, and contribute to environmental conservation efforts. The revenue will be reinvested into covering operational costs, improving infrastructure, and further training for committee members. Additionally, it will support plans to expand nursery output to 30,000 plants, enhancing its community impact.

Reflecting on these experiences, Ms. Seema Singh emphasizes the vital role of collaboration. She notes that working with local authorities, such as the Forest Officer and Divisional Forest Officer, was crucial for securing land approvals and technical guidance, ensuring the nursery was established on suitable land with the necessary facilities. The partnerships with community members and organizations, including The Hans Foundation, fostered a strong sense of ownership and commitment, which was essential for mobilizing resources and enthusiasm. Looking ahead, she outlines plans to further strengthen existing partnerships by providing regular updates and seeking input from local authorities. Additionally, the foundation aims to expand its network by engaging NGOs, agricultural experts, and environmental organizations for further expertise. Future initiatives will include organizing joint training programs with local agricultural departments to enhance nursery management skills and sustainable practices. To boost market development, they will collaborate with local businesses and participate in fairs and markets, while also planning to partner with academic institutions for monitoring and evaluation to refine strategies and assess the initiative’s impact effectively.

Initiative Impact and Success Stories

Economically, the nursery has created job opportunities for local residents, particularly women, thereby empowering them both socially and economically. The sale of approximately 5,000 saplings to the Block Development Office is anticipated to generate around INR 100,000, which will be reinvested into the nursery to support its ongoing operations and future expansion. This revenue generation is a key step towards establishing the nursery as a self-sustaining business, contributing positively to the local economy.

The impact of the initiative is further highlighted through personal testimonials. Smt. Rajni Devi, President of the nursery committee, shared, “ This initiative has empowered women in our village and given us a reliable source of income .” Shri Prem Singh, the committee Secretary, added, “ The revenue from sapling sales will help us enhance the nursery and offer better training to our members. ” A local villager said, “ We see the positive changes in our environment and are proud to contribute to a better future through this initiative .” These outcomes and testimonials underscore the initiative's success in driving meaningful change both environmentally and economically within the community.

Reflection on Success Factors

The Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery's success stemmed from several key factors. It significantly contributed to environmental conservation by cultivating native species like 10,000 Baanj (Oak) and 6,000 Kachnar saplings, aiding reforestation, enhancing biodiversity, and mitigating forest fire risks. The initiative also improved air quality and restored wildlife habitats. Economically, it created jobs, particularly for women, and generated about INR 100,000 from sapling sales, which will be reinvested to support and expand the nursery.

Community involvement was crucial, with testimonials reflecting its impact: Smt. Rajni Devi motioned the empowerment of women, Shri Prem Singh highlighted the benefits of revenue for nursery improvement, and a local villager praised the environmental benefits. The initiative’s success underscores the value of integrating community engagement with environmental and economic goals.

Insights for the Social Impact Sector

The success of the Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery highlights several key factors and collaborative efforts. Strong leadership from Smt. Rajni Devi and her committee, combined with The Hans Foundation’s support for training and resources, was crucial. Active community involvement, especially by women, fostered ownership and sustainability. Additionally, comprehensive training and effective financial management were essential.

Collaboration and a unified vision for environmental and economic goals drove significant progress. The community’s adaptability and willingness to learn from challenges were critical for continuous improvement.

Key lessons for future initiatives include prioritizing ongoing training, engaging local stakeholders for support and resources, implementing sound financial planning, encouraging community ownership, and promoting adaptability and resilience. These elements are fundamental for ensuring the long-term success of similar projects.

Moreover, the initiative provides valuable insights for the social impact sector, particularly regarding scalability, replicability, and sustainable development :

Future Outlook and Strategic Goals

Looking ahead, The Hans Foundation has outlined several ambitious goals for the Hans Mahila Kisan Nursery. Ms. Singh emphasizes , "Our long-term objectives include ensuring sustainability by generating enough revenue to cover costs and support expansion. We plan to boost production to 30,000 saplings and further empower the community. Additionally, we aim to replicate this success in other regions by documenting our approach and strengthening partnerships with local stakeholders."

The future vision for the nursery involves strategic expansion and sustained community empowerment. The foundation will focus on scaling operations, enhancing sustainability, and exploring opportunities to replicate the model in other regions for broader impact.

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Immunity of cities: A strategy in sustainable urban development (assessing a plan of reconstructing old Mosul-case study)

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Iqbal Younus , Wahda Al-Hinkawi , Sabeeh Farhan; Immunity of cities: A strategy in sustainable urban development (assessing a plan of reconstructing old Mosul-case study). AIP Conf. Proc. 19 August 2024; 3105 (1): 050098. https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0213835

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Urban areas face increasing threats from many sources; the most prominent are environmental, economic, society, policy, and other unexpected changes in its urban elements, which may threaten its stability, development, and growth trends. These threats need more attention from the designing, planning, and administration of cities to cope with the challenges and enhance the validity of urban areas to survive, adapt and grow. The research examines the concept of cities’ immunity adopting it as a norm for the evaluation and continuous success of cities when addressing catastrophes. It is a vast term adopted by cities that face shocks and pressures. Its principle is resilience and enhancement aiming at developing and achieving sustainable growth and survival. The natural and acquired immunity, together with the mechanisms to gain immunity and response to adapt at different levels, depend on the specificity of each city and the related chances and challenges, reaching an immune product characterized by creativity, innovation, continuity, and acceptance. The research followed an analytical and descriptive approach on two levels: introducing the theoretical level, The concept of immunity, urban immunity, and impregnable cities, arriving at a comprehensive theoretical framework for the concept of urban immunity, and the role that concept levels play in enhancing the immunity of cities, where the research assumes that "the immunity of cities increases with the increase in the achievement of administrative, morphological, infrastructure, environmental, economic and social levels." The practical level includes an evaluation of the reconstruction plan for the old city of Mosul. Many international institutions and organizations worked on this plan to reconstruct the city after the military operations and the numerous disasters that the city witnessed. The objective of analyzing the reconstruction plan is to explain the implementation of immunity, arriving at the essential conclusions; The reconstruction process is participation at different levels, competition, and development to enhance the resilience of the old city of Mosul. Thus, the study recommends directing the reconstruction operations in all its stages towards urban sustainability, based on the vision of the war as an opportunity for urban and architectural advancement and redressing past mistakes.

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Reducing ammonia emissions in polish agriculture, the implementation of the nec directive, and the context of sustainable development—pilot studies.

1. Introduction

2. materials and methods.

• General information about farm owners;
• General information about farms;
• The opinions and knowledge of agricultural producers regarding environmental protection;
• The knowledge of agricultural producers about ammonia emissions and related risks;
• The knowledge of agricultural producers about legal regulations regarding air protection and limiting air pollutant emissions;
• Activities undertaken on farms in terms of nitrogen management;
• Methods used on farms to reduce ammonia emissions in the field of livestock housing systems;
• Methods used on farms to reduce ammonia emissions in the field of farm animal feeding systems;
• Methods used on farms to reduce ammonia emissions in the field of the storage of natural fertilizers;
• Methods used on farms to reduce ammonia emissions during the application of natural fertilizers to fields;
• Methods used on farms to reduce ammonia emissions during the application of mineral nitrogen fertilizers to fields.
• Farm area: 0–40 ha, 40–80 ha, over 80 ha.
• Education: vocational, secondary, or higher.
• The application of nutritional reduction techniques.
• Time of incorporation for the slurry.
• Time of incorporation for the manure.
• Type of slurry application method used.
• Use of reduction methods during the application of urea.

3. Results and Discussion

3.1. general knowledge about environmental protection, 3.2. legal regulations about ammonia emissions, 3.3. feeding methods for ammonia reduction, 3.4. animal housing methods for ammonia reduction, 3.5. low-emission manure storage systems, 3.6. low-emission manure and urea application techniques, 4. conclusions, author contributions, informed consent statement, data availability statement, conflicts of interest.

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Mielcarek-Bocheńska, P.; Rzeźnik, W. Reducing Ammonia Emissions in Polish Agriculture, the Implementation of the NEC Directive, and the Context of Sustainable Development—Pilot Studies. Sustainability 2024 , 16 , 7145. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16167145

Mielcarek-Bocheńska P, Rzeźnik W. Reducing Ammonia Emissions in Polish Agriculture, the Implementation of the NEC Directive, and the Context of Sustainable Development—Pilot Studies. Sustainability . 2024; 16(16):7145. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16167145

Mielcarek-Bocheńska, Paulina, and Wojciech Rzeźnik. 2024. "Reducing Ammonia Emissions in Polish Agriculture, the Implementation of the NEC Directive, and the Context of Sustainable Development—Pilot Studies" Sustainability 16, no. 16: 7145. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16167145

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