Criteria for Sustainable Restoration of the Landscape

Abstract

Water, matter and energy are the three basic requirements for any ecosystem to thrive. Studies of natural processes in a central European virgin forest have brought us an understanding of how nature closes the cycles of water and matter and evenly dissipates the incoming solar energy that runs processes. As a result, climatic events, such as precipitation, runoff and temperature, are evenly distributed in time and irreversible matter losses remain low. By minimising matter losses nature prolongs its life-span, i.e. enhances its sustainability. When compared to agricultural landscapes, we can reveal the main mistakes of human interference with natural processes that lead to the opening of cycles, bringing about high irreversible matter losses. Investigations have shown that areal matter losses measured in agricultural catchments in Germany are some 50-100 times higher than those from unmanaged land in a virgin forest. As matter losses are mainly connected to water run off, every disturbance to the hydrological regime has a vital impact on landscape sustainability. Extensive drainage, including that of wetlands and transformation of rivers into drainage channels, has such a negative impact. This chapter brings forward the argument that for greater landscape sustainability it is essential to restore and return more wetlands and natural vegetation cover to the landscape and restore natural dynamics to rivers and streams. Criteria suitable to assess the sustainability of land use are proposed as being: solar energy dissipation and water and matter recycling within the smallest delimited area, such as a catchment or sub-catchment.