Nature-based solutions towards sustainable communities – Analysis of EU-funded projects
Over the past thirty years local communities have remained at the heart of efforts to address sustainable development across the European Union, mobilised by a wide range of policies and initiatives to develop sustainable, smart, low carbon, resilient and eco-cities.
This report examines how far Nature-based Solutions can contribute to transformative action for sustainable communities. It examines how such initiatives enable participation and inclusion in the design and implementation of sustainability at the local level and the extent to which the outcomes of NBSs are transformative for communities. The report then turns to consider the challenges and opportunities encountered, before identifying gaps and recommendations for future research and policy.
As interventions that promise to simultaneously address multiple goals and to provide a wide range of environmental, economic and social benefits, Nature-based Solutions (NBS) offer significant promise as responses to sustainability challenges that resonate at a local level whilst also addressing global issues.
They are also seen to have the potential to offer a transformative approach for meeting sustainability challenges, through delivering processes such that sustainable communities are designed, strategies formulated and initiatives implemented which are inclusive and where their outcomes are transformative not only in environmental terms but also account for issues of social justice.