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

Cultural landscapes provide important ecosystem services, including experience-based knowledge on how to adapt to and limit negative effects of climate change. This is because the landscapes themselves are vulnerable to climate change and other negative impacts. By investigating transhumant pastoral landscapes in France, Norway and Spain, we will describe climate change and other threats to the intangible cultural heritage of these landscapes, the landscapes’ characteristics and factors that enable adaptation, and opportunities to preserve the intangible cultural heritage, through policy instruments and measures in society at large. The project will achieve three goals: 1. Develop a toolbox to help communities and decision-makers assess the vulnerability and resilience of cultural landscapes to negative impacts. 2. Develop communication materials that illustrate why conservation of threatened cultural heritage is important and how a living cultural heritage can teach society to adapt to and mitigate the negative effects of climate change. 3. Contribute to the scientific literature on the vulnerability and resilience of cultural landscapes to climate change, and on climate change adaptation strategies based on lessons from intangible cultural heritage. Our team is international and interdisciplinary: American, French, Norwegian and Spanish research scientists collaborate to document and model future changes in grazing landscapes. Stakeholder organizations contribute to project management and compilation of results, and farmers participate in both generation and analysis of research data. In addition to the tools for climate adaptation and cultural heritage management, guides for journalists and films are being produced, to raise public awareness and support for safeguarding living cultural landscapes.

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. The research supports three goals established with societal partners: 1. Develop a toolkit that helps communities and decision-makers assess the vulnerability and resilience of cultural landscapes. 2. 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. 3. Contribute to scientific literature on the vulnerability and resilience of cultural landscapes and culturally informed strategies for climate mitigation and adaptation. Our team builds on multiple collaborations and deep expertise. The most significant involves French, Spanish, and U.S. partners modeling future changes in the French Basque pastoral system. The Basque Centre for Climate Change specializes in Spanish transhumant pastoralism and ecological modeling; 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 analyzing data. 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.