The Sustainable Land Management Mainstreaming Tool DECISION SUPPORT FOR MAINSTREAMING AND SCALING UP SUSTAINABLE LAND MANAGEMENT Decision Support for Mainstreaming and Scaling Up Sustainable Land Management The Sustainable Land Management Mainstreaming Tool By Soledad Bastidas Fegan FOOD AND AGRICULTURE ORGANIZATION OF THE UNITED NATIONS Rome, 2019 Required citation: Bastidas Fegan, S. 2019.The DS-SLM Sustainable Land Management Mainstreaming Tool - Decision Support for Mainstreaming and Scaling up Sustainable Land Management. Rome. FAO. 44 pp. Licence: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO. The designations employed and the presentation of material in this information product do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) concerning the legal or development status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries. 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Users wishing to reuse material from this work that is attributed to a third party, such as tables, figures or images, are responsible for determining whether permission is needed for that reuse and for obtaining permission from the copyright holder. The risk of claims resulting from infringement of any third-party-owned component in the work rests solely with the user. Sales, rights and licensing. FAO information products are available on the FAO website (www.fao.org/publications) and can be purchased through [email protected]. Requests for commercial use should be submitted via: www.fao.org/contact-us/licence-request. Queries regarding rights and licensing should be submitted to: [email protected]. iii Contents Tables and figures iv Acronyms v 1. SLM mainstreaming strategies 1 1.1. Context 1 1.2. Objective of the mainstreaming tool 1 1.3. The DS-SLM project’s decision-support framework 2 1.4. DS-SLM mainstreaming strategies 2 1.5. Objective 3 1.6. Mainstreaming, scaling up and scaling out 3 1.7. Key elements of DS-SLM mainstreaming strategies 4 2. Designing DS-SLM mainstreaming strategies 7 2.1. Overview 7 2.2. Who, when, what 7 3. Developing DS-SLM mainstreaming strategies 11 3.1. Steps in strategy development 11 3.2. Mainstreaming tool 12 4. Step-by-step guide 15 STEP 1. Conduct a rapid assessment to identify the barriers to SLM 16 STEP 2. Conduct rapid assessment of existing decision-making 17 processes STEP 3. Formulate mainstreaming objectives and associated 23 activities STEP 4. Identify key institutions and stakeholders 25 STEP 5. Formulate an action plan 26 5. Bringing information from DDLD and SLM assessments to decision- 27 makers Annex 1. Mainstreaming tables 31 iv Tables 1. Tools for the design of DS-SLM mainstreaming strategies 13 2. Potential interests at the national, decentralized/subnational, and local/ 29 landscape levels, and objectives for communication with decision makers Figures 1. A decision-support framework for mainstreaming sustainable land 2 management 2. Mainstreaming, scaling up and scaling out sustainable land management 3 3. The Core concept for mainstreaming sustainable land management 4 4. The DS-SLM project approach to mainstreaming sustainable land 5 management 5. Types of decision-making processes and instruments for mainstreaming 6 sustainable land management 6 The three phases of a DS-SLM mainstreaming strategy 8 7. The main steps in the design of a DS-SLM mainstreaming strategy, with 11 associated Excel tables 8. The five steps for developing strategies for mainstreaming sustainable 15 land management 9. Key focus areas for the mainstreaming assessment questionnaire 20 10. DLDD and SLM assessments can trigger interinstitutional processes 27 crucial for mainstreaming SLM v Acronyms DLDD desertification, land degradation and drought DS-SLM Decision Support for Mainstreaming and Scaling up of Sustainable Land Management FAO Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations GEF Global Environment Facility LADA Land Degradation Assessment in Drylands QA questionnaire for approaches QM questionnaire for mapping QT questionnaire for technologies SLM sustainable land management WOCAT World Overview of Conservation Approaches and Technologies vi SLM mainstreaming strategies 1. SLM mainstreaming strategies 1.1 CONTEXT • The DS-SLM Sustainable Land Management Mainstreaming Tool has been developed as part of the Decision Support for Mainstreaming and Scaling up Sustainable Land Management (DS-SLM) project, funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and implemented by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the World Overview of Conservation Approaches and Technologies (WOCAT). • The DS-SLM project (2015 to 2018) is being implemented in 15 countries. Its aim is to support decision-making processes on sustainable land management (SLM) on the basis of national, subnational, landscape and local geographic information and participatory assessments of the drivers, pressures, status and impacts of desertification, land degradation and drought (DLDD) and SLM best practices. The information obtained through these means is crucial for political decision “Environmental mainstreaming” is the informed inclusion making and land-management of relevant environmental concerns into the decisions planning processes at the national and institutions that drive national, sectoral and local and subnational levels. development policy, rules, plans, investment and action. • Each country participating in the DS-SLM project is expected to IIED (www.environmental-mainstreaming.org) design an operational strategy and targeted action plan to structure and monitor activities for integrating SLM into national policy, planning and financial decisions. • DS-SLM mainstreaming strategies are a key component of the project’s DS-SLM Support Framework (Module 1: Operational strategy and action plan for mainstreaming and scaling out SLM). As part of this framework, activities for mainstreaming SLM are to be developed in each country, supported by the process and findings of assessments of DLDD and SLM best practices. • The strategy of the DS-SLM project is to remove key global, regional and national barriers to scaling up SLM through improved SLM decision support by linking sound scientific assessments of DLDD and SLM best practices with the mainstreaming of SLM priorities in national sectoral policies and investment programmes. The pathway from the use of scientific, evidence-based tools to improved decision making is not linear or straightforward, however, and the provision of information to decision makers is unlikely, on its own, to bring about a change of perspective and priorities. Therefore, strategic activities need to be undertaken to promote the integration of SLM into policy, planning and finance- related processes. 1.2 OBJECTIVE OF THE MAINSTREAMING TOOL • The objective of the DS-SLM Sustainable Land Management Mainstreaming Tool is to provide elements for the design of operational strategies and action plans for mainstreaming and scaling up SLM (referred to hereafter as “DS-SLM 1 The Sustainable Land Management Mainstreaming Tool mainstreaming strategies”). The aim of DS-SLM mainstreaming strategies is to guide DS-SLM national teams and other SLM-related projects in establishing processes for mainstreaming information on DLDD and SLM into national and subnational decision-making processes. • The DS-SLM Sustainable Land Management Mainstreaming Tool sets out a stepwise process for designing SLM mainstreaming strategies. It focuses on the identification of key decision-making processes such as national policies, land- use and territorial