Pasture Adaptation

Mitigation and Adaptation in Cultural Heritage Landscapes: Lessons from Transhumant Pastoral Systems for Managing Novel Climate Risks

Climate & Cultural Heritage Joint CallClimate science

Cultural landscapes provide essential ecological and sociocultural services and contain insights needed to combat climate change, but they are vulnerable to climate change and other stressors. By examining the cultural landscapes of transhumant pastoralism in France, Norway, and Spain, we will detail climate and other threats to this intangible cultural heritage (ICH), the characteristics and factors that create adaptive capacity in these systems, and methods for sustaining ICH through community action and policy.

About

The research supports three goals established with societal partners:

Develop a toolkit that helps communities and decision-makers assess the vulnerability and resilience of cultural landscapes;
Develop communication resources for the public and policy makers illustrating why threatened cultural heritage matters and how cultural heritage can contribute to climate change mitigation and adaptation;
Contribute to scientific literature on the vulnerability and resilience of cultural landscapes and culturally informed strategies for climate mitigation and adaptation.

In addition to adaptation and management tools, the project supports guides for professional journalists and farmer-made films to spread awareness and increase public support for cultural heritage protection. Each team ensures that their respective portion falls within the guidelines of their funding annex.

Thomas Mote

University of Georgia Research Foundation

I am a hydroclimate scientist and geographer who works at the intersection of the atmosphere, cryosphere, and hydrosphere. Much of my scholarship examines the role of atmospheric circulation on extremes in rainfall, snowfall, and ice ablation. For more than two decades, I have studied the climate of the polar regions, particularly the role of climate change and variability on the surface mass balance of the Greenland ice sheet. More recent work has taken me to the Caribbean, where I study the impact of climate change, land cover change, and atmospheric aerosols on precipitation and drought. Ongoing projects are supported by grants from NSF, NOAA, and NASA.

Project consortium

Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
University of Georgia Research Foundation
University of Lausanne
Norwegian Institute of Bioeconomy Research

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Our team builds on multiple collaborations and deep expertise. The most significant involves French, Spanish, and U.S. partners modelling future changes in the French Basque pastoral system. The Basque Centre for Climate Change specializes in Spanish transhumant pastoralism and ecological modelling; Swiss partners designed tools for measuring livelihood resilience, and partners in Norway have expertise in agricultural landscape change, cultural heritage, and public participation. Societal partners (Syndicate of Soule and Concejo de la Mesta) will contribute to project management and synthesis, and farmers are fully engaged in collecting and analysing data.

Funding agencies

French National Research Agency
The Research Council of Norway
Agencia Estatal de Investigación
National Science Foundation
Swiss National Science Foundation

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Parent programme

Climate&Cultural Heritage

Collaborative Research Action by the JPIs on Cultural Heritage and Climate and the Belmont Forum

This Call is jointly organised between the Joint Programming Initiatives Cultural Heritage and Global Change (JPI CH) and Connecting Climate Knowledge for Europe (JPI Climate) and the Belmont Forum. The Call aims to support transdisciplinary and convergent research approaches on cultural heritage and climate change, to foster collaboration among the research community across several regions, and to contribute to knowledge advances and policy change at the global level.

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