1,721,012 research outputs found
Common Property Regimes (Regole) in the Veneto Region (Italy): institutional linkages with Municipalities in the integrated forest landscape management
Full text linkForest and pasture Commons are a shared trait of Alpine rural areas, with a total coverage of 1,668,851 hectares, i.e. almost 10% of the total agricultural area of the country (Istat, 2012).
Particularly in the Italian Eastern Alps, forest Common Properties have a long-lasting tradition. Mostly called `Regole´ (singular: `Regola´), these were relevant institutions in the past, superintending to all aspects of community life and acting as essential regulator of natural resources use.
Since 19th century the Italian common lands have come under relevant attack by central State authorities, that considered them an anachronistic remaining of a feudal past, and unable to promote technological and economic development in the agriculture and forest sectors. Only since mid of 20th century, various national legislative initiatives have progressively returned power to Common Properties. Taking cue from this new climate of supporting legislation, the Veneto Region (north-eastern Italy – i.e. the selected case study area for this thesis research) was first in line in the policy process of recognition of the collective role in managing the regional forest landscapes and in fostering the rural development of mountainous territories.
Indeed, Common Properties have a long-standing tradition in the Veneto Region and were tenacious opponents of the fascist attempts to dismantle them. In 2012, Veneto counted 53 Common Properties, almost all of them located in the mountainous province of Belluno. Moreover, 17 Common Properties have been re-constituted since 1996 (Gatto et al., 2012), i.e. since the enactment of a regional law in support of common property regime reconstitution. Where reconstitution processes were successful – or where they are likely to be completed in the near future – a radical change is on the way in the ownership structure of forest landscapes, with large forest and pasture assets shifting from public property regimes to common property regimes, with `close´ membership.
Most of the existing bibliographic resources dealing with the Italian common domain limit their analyses to the historical vicissitudes that common lands passed through, or analyse legal issues in technical terms, or debate about some internal Common Property governance and policy issues (e.g. gender balance, intergenerational renovation, need for statute renovation, etc.). Contrarily, very few published works assessed whether and how the internal Common Property dynamics also relate to and influence both the socio-economic and the institutional environments of the whole local mountain communities of residents, administratively identifiable with Municipalities, that Regole belong to.
Meaningfully, Municipalities still exert an overarching administrative control and planning functions over the lands comprised within their boundaries, common lands included. The ratio for such a prescription emerges out of the fact that Municipalities represent the entire resident population of communities, as the local residents include both members and non-members of local Common Properties. Then, municipal policy decisions should be informed by broad territorial vision that goes beyond sectorial interests, e.g. forest management, in order to ensure a territorial development as most comprehensive as possible.
Nevertheless, it seems that the recent, fast-paced process of re-constitution of Common Properties has the potential to create or increase institutional tensions at the local level, especially due to the new need to coordinate management rights and responsibilities between Common Properties and Municipalities. Florian (2004) reported that in some cases heavy legal disputes and institutional contrasts with local Municipalities were absorbing many available economic and administrative energies of the newly-reconstituted Common Properties. Carestiato (2008) pointed out a similar situation. Hampel (2012) implicitly suggested that nowadays a sort of `feeling of power and individual property´ over common resources by some right-holders might have negative consequences on the social environment that Regole are embedded within. Still nowadays, there are hints of disparate administrative and legal issues still pending among these institutions, insomuch to hinder remarkably the implementation or the achievement of integrated territorial development strategies.
For the reasons above, the Veneto Region represents an interesting case to assess the capacity for polycentric governance of forest resources between Municipalities and Common Properties. In the light of the new challenges and opportunities that Regole are called to face and cope with, among which the ongoing institutional reforms (Gatto et al., 2012) and deep societal and demographic changes (Steinicke et al., 2014), two main research objectives have been identified.
Firstly, the thesis aims to describe and assess the institutional patterns which the institutional relationships between Common Properties and Municipalities are based on, trying to evaluate their mutual degree of cooperation in their own and interdependent statutory competences.
The second objective corresponds to the evaluation of whether, and to what extent, the regional Common Properties give concrete answers to the aims and prescriptions that the Regional law entrusted them with, i.e. forest landscape management and protection and socio-economic development of rural mountain areas.
Research activities have been modulated in three different phases. A prevailing qualitative methodological approach has been knowingly selected.
After a broad literature review, in the first step of the field data collection, face-to-face interviews have been carried out among the institutional representatives (e.g. Majors, Aldermen, Councillors, etc.) of those Municipalities including Regole within their administrative boundaries. It has been made use of a simple but effective data collection procedure and instrument, i.e. a structured survey questionnaire containing both closed and open-ended responses, allowing for analysis across respondents from organizations of the same category at similar administrative levels. Respondents have been asked to provide information on the institutional communication patterns characterising their relationship with local Common Properties. They were also inquired so to reveal their own perception about the Common Property capability to effectively stimulate the socio-economic development of mountain areas and proactively pursue a sound forest management.
In the second phase, taking advantage of a secondary data analysis and through descriptive statistics techniques, the common and municipal attitude towards the active provision of environmental services have been compared. Particularly, a set of environmental services others than wood has been selected, i.e. biodiversity protection, carbon storage, soil protection and water quality regulation, tourism promotion and support to recreational activities. It has been assessed whether Common Properties and Municipalities explicitly considered such environmental services among their current multi-functional forest management practices. The assigned priority to the supply of the environmental services was also tested, analysing whether they consider such provision as a primary or secondary forest management objective. Finally, respondents declaring no or secondary commitment to the supply of one or more environmental services were asked to indicate under which conditions they would be potentially interested in strengthening such proactive provision.
In the third research step, a new set of interviews has been carried out to check and compare municipal representatives’ opinions with common representatives’ ones. So, face-to-face interviews have been carried out among common representatives of those Common Properties located in the same areas where the parallel survey had been conducted among Municipalities. Again, the collaborative mechanisms and the institutional linkages horizontally linking Common Properties with Municipalities have been explored, along with their self-evaluation on their own management options and outputs.
An informed viewpoint is therefore discussed, disclosing whether cooperative institutional relationships among Common Properties and Municipalities prevail and their mutual institutional tensions can be considered sporadic, or deeper and chronic issues affect them. Prerequisites and conditions best facilitating the establishment of fruitful relationships between these two entities are also described. Moreover, it is discussed whether the ongoing regional attempts at reconciliation between public policies and collective strategies is likely to result in higher levels of synergies also through a socio-economic lens. Results suggest that Municipalities remain the primary institutional reference point for mountain territories, and they continue to play a central role in regulation of local-level socio-economic dynamics. Usually, institutional tensions occur when the presumption that Common Properties have nothing to do with Municipalities prevail (and vice versa), although both these institutions play a role in managing overlapping territories. From a social perspective, it seems also recommendable that right-holders conceive Common Properties more as essential tools to ensure the involvement of right-holders in the local policy processes, rather than as a mere legal acknowledgement of ancient property rights. Nowadays, an excessive closure could even threaten the same survival of some Common Properties, shifted from struggling against the so-called past `enclosure of Commons´ to the opposite situation, i.e. the risk to downgrade to `common enclosures´.
Informal relationships among municipal and common representatives have been found to play a relevant role in maintaining the institutional contacts between these bodies vital and properly working. Nonetheless, mechanisms to enforce stable, robust and enduring cooperation (e.g. joint declarations of interest, procedural and/or economic memoranda and agreements, etc.) are worthwhile. In this way, it would be possible also to overcome and prevent personal contrasts that negatively and heavily affect the institutional relationships.
Finally, it is comprehensively argued whether or not the outcomes of the re-assignment of former municipal forests to Common Properties can be considered positive in terms of improved forest management practices and environmental services supply. A general consensus has been found, that forest management has improved since Common Properties newly gained control over local forest resources, probably because it represents their statutory and vocational core business. Particularly, the re-establishment of `new´ Common Properties may reinforce the main provisioning services. However, the dichotomy `Common Properties focussed on market-based activities (i.e. wood harvesting) vs. Municipalities focussed on provision of environmental services´ does not seem appropriate
Italian import flows of woody biomasses for energy use: a sustainable supply?
No full textDespite the inaccuracy of the official estimates, it is commonly recognised that wood biomasses play a relevant role in the Italian renewable energy production. Moreover, the Italian dependence on the international biomass market has significantly increased over the time. This trend seems to be the antithesis of the "short value chain" objective that is a leitmotif of renewable energy and rural development domestic policies.
Starting from these evidences, Italian import flows of woody biomasses for energy use were analyzed over the period 1991-2011 both in quantitative and economic terms. Then, the environmental impacts of these flows have been estimated by means of a Life-Cycle Analysis to determine whether, and to what extent, the increased transport distance reduces the environmental sustainability of these materials with respect to conventional fossil fuels.
Some policy considerations concerning the opportunity of further developing local supply chains are finally provided
Disponibilità di sottoprodotti legnosi impiegabili fini energetici. I sottoprodotti forestali e della gestione del verde.
No full textL’International Energy Agency ha definito le biomasse uno “sleeping giant” (letter. “un gigante dormiente”) facendo riferimento alle grandi potenzialità che il settore ricopre nello
sviluppo delle energie rinnovabili. La possibilità di espandere in maniera significativa tali fonti energetiche nei paesi occidentali sono oggetto di valutazioni contrastanti (Berndes e Hansson 2007; Berndes et al., 2003; Bonari et al., 2009), mentre nel terzo mondo il ruolo giocato dalle biomasse è stimato, a seconda dei paesi, tra il 30 e il 90% dell’offerta totale di energia (IEA Bioenergy, 2010). Il settore delle biomasse ha un ruolo strategico nella politica italiana delle energie rinnovabili: secondo il Piano di Azione Nazionale (PAN) approvato nel giugno 2010 in attuazione della Direttiva 28/2009, le biomasse dovrebbero diventare entro il 2020 le prime rinnovabili in Italia, coprendo il 44% dei consumi di rinnovabili (20% dell’elettricità; 58% del calore; 84% dei biocarburanti), per un totale di 22,3 M tep (milioni di tonnellate equivalenti di petrolio). Tra le biomasse, un ruolo prioritario è quello coperto dai prodotti legnosi di origine forestale. Scopo di questo lavoro è valutare criticamente il ruolo attualmente ricoperto e
che le politiche energetiche nazionali vorrebbero far ricoprire alle biomasse legnose, verificando se queste possono essere effettivamente identificate in uno “sleeping giant” da svegliare e attivare, facendo soprattutto riferimento ai sottoprodotti in legno. Si cercherà quindi di collegare i dati sui consumi con quelli della produzione biologica, della produzione interna (i prelievi boschivi e le altre fonti di biomasse legnose) e del
commercio internazionale. Obiettivo dell’articolo è, più in particolare, individuare il ruolo dei sottoprodotti legnosi nell’offerta di biomasse a fini energetici con riferimento ai flussi
di materie prime legnose sinteticamente descritti nella figura 1
Biomasse forestali ad uso energetico.
No full textQuesto contributo mira a fornire alcuni brevi spunti di riflessione sul settore italiano delle biomasse legnose per fini energetici, che rappresenta un elemento fondamentale nel raggiungimento degli obiettivi nazionali di produzione energetica da fonti di energia rinnovabile prefissati per il 2020. Nonostante la sua importanza a livello strategico sia formalmente riconosciuta, è ancora difficile dare una lettura omogenea e coerente del settore legno-energia italiano, data la forte eterogeneità delle attività e degli attori coinvolti e la mancanza di dati certi su cui poter strutturare solide politiche di programmazione ed incentivazione, non solo economica
Failures of political decentralization in promoting network governance in the forest sector: Observations from Italy.
No full textDecentralization has been the most remarkable reform process that has occurred in the institutional arrangements and framework in Italy, a country of contrasts and contradictions with neglected – but increasing – forest resources and a limited range of actors’ networks able to make the sector more modern and dynamic. On the basis of a qualitative-based document analysis and observations collected in three case-study Regions (Veneto, Molise and Sicily), our paper aims to provide interpretations of the failures in network forest governance in Italy connected with the decentralization policy process. Our findings show that Italy is experiencing several of the recurrent problems highlighted for decentralization in other countries, including difficulties in creating the conditions for more network-based governance initiatives with the involvement of local community and civil society. Problems have been exacerbated by the financial and political crisis and the consequent spending review. However, some encouraging signals also exist
Foreste e servizi ecosistemici: un’analisi preliminare dei fattori che orientano le scelte gestionali nelle proprietà collettive e comunali del Veneto
No full textSecondo la letteratura, la propensione a erogare Servizi Ecosistemici da parte dei proprietari forestali dipende essenzialmente da tre gruppi di fattori: i) le caratteristiche della proprietà forestale (ad esempio la dimensione, il grado di frazionamento, le forme di gestione); ii) le caratteristiche del proprietario (ad esempio la forma di proprietà, la continuità nel possesso, le caratteristiche socio-economiche ed attitudinali del proprietario); iii) le scelte gestionali già in atto, gli aspetti relativi al mercato dei prodotti legnosi e non legnosi e, in genere, le caratteristiche del contesto, quali, ad esempio, la presenza di strumenti di compensazione e le interazioni con le istituzioni pubbliche e con gli altri soggetti del sistema foresta legno.
In quest’ottica è stata analizzata la propensione dei proprietari forestali di un campione rappresentativo della realtà forestale veneta formato da 198 proprietà forestali, tra cui anche 18 proprietà regoliere. I dati sono stati raccolti dall’aprile al novembre 2012 tramite interviste dirette.
Le informazioni raccolte hanno permesso innanzitutto di costruire un quadro originale ed aggiornato della situazione del settore forestale nelle aree montane del Veneto. Inoltre, attraverso un modello di regressione logistica binomiale, è stato possibile individuare quali sono i principali determinanti della propensione ad orientare la gestione forestale verso la produzione di servizi ricreativi, di protezione del suolo e regimazione delle acque, di tutela della biodiversità e di fissazione del carbonio. Tali risultati possono venire letti anche in relazione alla forma di proprietà, offrendo interessanti spunti di riflessione sugli obiettivi e le strategie di gestione dei patrimoni forestali privati, pubblici e collettivi
Occupant-centric models for thermal comfort in buildings: Theoretical and experimental analysis of methods for enhancing user comfort in dynamic thermal indoor environments
No full textIn the last decades, increasing global energy demand, a foreseen reduction of available fossil fuels and increasing evidence for global warming have shown the urgency to rethink the built environment and promote energy transition. Indeed, in most industrialised nations, the building sector accounts for about 40% of the total energy consumption (space heating and cooling, domestic hot water, ventilation, lighting and appliance use). A significant share of this energy is used to thermal control buildings and provide thermally comfortable indoor environments. However, technical building systems are typically designed and operated considering fixed set-point temperatures based on the ‘one-size-fits-all’ principle – which has been questioned in the last fifty years – assuming universal thermal comfort requirements. Furthermore, the indoor environment frequently changes abruptly across buildings or between various parts within a single building. For instance, manually operating thermostats, windows and solar shades can result in considerable and not systematic changes in the indoor environment. Also, automatic controllers exhibit, to a lesser degree, a similar behaviour. Moreover, individual activity modifies the basal metabolic rate over time, and the addition or removal of clothes affects the heat balance of the human body as well. In other words, the steady-state temperature settings are the exception rather than the rule. Building temperature ranges should instead be based on real-time empirical evidence regarding the needs of its occupants, which is obtained through their feedback (usually on a rating scale). This thesis investigates these topics and relies upon an experimental study to explore the human reaction to dynamic thermal environments.
The general approach utilised in this thesis encompasses a technical/methodological aspect, namely a newer controlled experimental procedure and a robust and replicable methodology for human feedback acquisition, and a statistical aspect, namely an original statistics-enabled occupant-centric modelling. The technical/methodological aspect refers to how thermal comfort data are collected; that is, the specific approach and experimental set-up utilised. The statistical aspect refers to how thermal comfort data are analysed, namely, the specific statistical technique to be adopted and the needed modelling steps.
It was found that the human reaction to dynamic thermal stimuli is asymmetric with respect to heating and cooling processes, and two distinct mechanisms cause discomfort due to overheating and overcooling. Compared to the recommendations regarding temperature cycles, drifts and ramps included in the ASHRAE Standard 55, this result showed that current recommendations underestimate the risk of thermal discomfort during a cooling process while overestimating it during a heating one. Concerning the subjective thermal comfort data analysis, the choice of the statistical method affects the conclusions. While it may seem a trivial consideration, till now, it is common in the thermal comfort field to find studies that use, for example, linear regression on ordinal data following an old approximation used to overcome the lack of statistical tools and computational power (which are not anymore limiting aspects in statistical analysis). Particularly, we showed that applying a linear regression model to ordinal data suggested that there is no difference in means and effect size between genders (female/male). In contrast, an ordinal regression model leaded to the opposite conclusion. This is considered one of the reasons why there is no consensus in the scientific literature on whether gender is an influential factor when assessing the perception of the thermal environment. This result points out that greater attention should be paid to the choice of the statistical method used to analyse subjective data, which should consider the level of measurement used during the data gathering. Furthermore, two different procedures were proposed to facilitate the integration of the occupants and their actual needs into the design and operation of buildings: the former is suitable for a better-informed design phase, where the target is the optimal thermal comfort conditions expressed for an ‘average’ occupant; the other is appropriate for including the human-in-the-control-loop of a building, where satisfying the needs of a specific occupant is the primary goal.
Through this thesis work, new knowledge concerning the human reactions to a dynamic thermal environment was created, which can improve the understanding of the extent to which the indoor environmental conditions can vary both naturally and artificially. Designing and implementing thermally comfortable set-point modulations that consider the occupant feedback capabilities would be beneficial to increase perceived thermal comfort and productivity, potentially reduce energy consumption and significantly support the clean energy transition. In addition, several recommendations for future research are presented
The Japanese programme to relaunch the forestry sector: matching pragmatism with sustainable development
No full textLarge forest areas mostly located in mountainous areas, extreme fragmentation of the forest ownership, inadequate forest road network and large wood imports despite the available domestic potential supply are important factors making the Japanese forest sector weak and poorly competitive. The analysis of the recent policies outlined by the Japanese Government to develop the forest sector can be very interesting, since the Italian forest sector faces similar problems and potentials. The purpose of this paper is to present the main policies contained in the “Forest and Forestry Revitalization Plan”, developed in 2009 as a part of the national Plan for the development of a New Growth Strategy. By considering the Forestry Revitalization Plan a key- element in the national economic growth strategy, the Japanese Government assigns to the forestry sector a fundamental role in achieving the well-being of the entire nation. The Forest and Forestry Revitalization Plan considers as a priority the improvement of the domestic wood demand and, at the same time, the enhancement of the domestic timber supply, through concrete policies aimed to both national and regional goals. Thanks to a parallelism with the Italian Strategic Plan for Forests and Forestry and with the Wood Chain Sector Plan, this paper highlights the strengths of the Japanese Plan and particularly, among the others, its practice settings embedded into a strong and broader ideological framework that inspires the national Plan for the development of a New Growth Strategy
Role of Common Properties and Municipalities in forest management of Veneto Region (Italy): conflicting or synergic relationship?
No full textItalian forestland ownership system is characterized by various local public and semi-public (or semi-private) institutions with different internal rules, competences and functions. The paper tries to describe the ongoing status of these institutions in the light of their recent development. In the past, Common Properties superintended to several aspects of local community life and acted as main regulator of the use of natural resources. Thought to be unable to promote technological and economic development in the agriculture sector, common domains have been tackled since 19th Century: common lands were progressively “freed” and put under the administration of Municipalities. Today, a new wave of devolution and institutional reorganization poses new focus on the role of forest commons in ensuring environmental conservation, and fostering socio-economical development of mountain areas. Moving from a renewed favourable State legislation, some Italian Regions promoted their reconstitution. The paper, based on information collected through a semi-structured questionnaire carried out among representatives of Municipalities where Common Properties exist, investigates the degree of cooperation between Municipalities and either long-lasting and newly reconstituted Common Properties. We try to demonstrate that not always the outcomes of the transformation of municipal forests to Common Properties are positive in terms of enlarged public participation by local residents, introduction of innovations and improved forest management practices
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