Objective
To understand the desertification process in the Mediterranean
mountains, under various natural and human conditions, and to
deliver guidelines for a rational management of such areas,
including prevention, monitoring and appropriate policies for
sustainable development.
The project will be a combination of local-scale and regional-
scale investigations. The general technical approach is based on
a progressive integration of parallel investigations.
At the local-scale: a series of case studies in selected
mountainous pilot-zones of different countries (Greece, Italy,
France, Spain), in order to study the phenomenon, identify
criteria, and to develop guidelines at a local-scale, but also
give evidence of the diversity, the similarities and
dissimilarities among the study areas.
At the regional scale: a limited number of general
investigations, in order to include the local case-studies in a
consistent overview, extrapolate findings, as well as possible
application and recommendations (from the local) to the
regional-scale.
The methodological frame common to all pilot-zones includes: 1)
the integration of three major disciplinary fields, relation to
social sciences, terrestrial and aquatic ecology, 2) the choice
of
test-areas, within the range of diversity offered by each pilot-
zone, 3) the quantification and mapping of as much as possible
relevant data, from the various disciplines, and their
compilation into GIS, 4) the implementation of a
multi-disciplinary
work plan through a succession of four major stages: extraction
of available knowledge from existing records, completion of this
information with questionnaires and field campaigns, focusing
detailed investigation from various disciplines on the selected
test-areas, multi-varied analyses of data, translation of results
into potential indices of desertification, scenarios and
conceptual models of the desertification processes.
Methodology at the regional-scale will consist in a series of
investigations ranging from sensitivity studies to climate
change, through the use of remote sensing techniques and macro-
economic scenarios, to historical botanical reviews .
Integration of local case-studies into a regional dimension will
concern syntheses and comparative studies between the different
pilot-zones and the integration of data and findings from the
local-scale into the various regional approaches.
Fields of science
Call for proposal
Data not availableFunding Scheme
CSC - Cost-sharing contractsCoordinator
20250 Corte
France