Conference 2003
Greening the City:
Bringing Biodiversity Back
into the Urban Environment
Abstract:
Shaping
Landscape Policy and Strategy to Promote Biodiversity - Issues and
Options
Simon Swaffield (Environment Society and Design, Lincoln University,
Canterbury)
Urban biodiversity issues
lie at the intersection of two high level government policy initiatives
— the New Zealand Biodiversity Strategy, and the sustainable
cities component within the Sustainable Development for New Zealand:
Programme of action (2003). The priority accorded to these areas
by government through its various agencies ensures that there is
wide institutional interest in the potential for urban biodiversity
programmes. At the same time, there is enthusiasm for action at
the grassroots level, and a growing number of examples of community
revegetation and ecological restoration projects. However, urban
biodiversity lies within a complex web of statutory and non statutory
frameworks, and has cultural and social as well as ecological dimensions.
To integrate these dimensions and ensure local action contributes
effectively to higher-level goals, we need practical ways to 'walk
the biodiversity talk' at the city and district scale.
Landscape strategy offers
one way to integrate biodiversity into urban sustainability, and
to bridge between national and international goals and grassroots
action. In this presentation I will first identify connections between
biodiversity and other aspects of urban management, and identify
a range of management issues. I will make particular reference to
community development and asset management under the Local Government
Act, District plans and rules under the Resource Management Act,
open space and reserve management plans, iwi management plans and
other key mechanisms. Next, I briefly review current directions
in urban landscape policy internationally and within New Zealand.
Finally, using examples, I will show how landscape policy concepts
such as network, mosaic and corridor; heritage, place and identity;
and health, care and regeneration, can be used to provide a strategic
landscape framework for biodiversity initiatives.
The key feature of a
robust yet flexible strategy is the identification of a landscape
structure which utilises a range of management approaches, both
public and private, to protect critical ecological processes and
systems, create opportunities for biodiversity enhancement, and
engage long term political and community support.
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