Stakeholder Interaction in Participatory Land Restoration in Iceland: Environmental Officers’ Challenges and Strategies

Abstract

Participatory approaches involve stakeholder interaction but environmental agency employees engaged in participatory undertakings often lack training for interaction tasks. This study explored how district officers at the Soil Conservation Service of Iceland (SCSI) experienced and dealt with stakeholder interaction in participatory land restoration. We made semi-structured interviews with all district officers with at least 1-year experience; seven in total. A thematic content analysis revealed five challenges facing the officers in their interaction activities and seven strategies that they used to deal with these challenges. The core challenge was to establish and maintain contacts with farmers and other stakeholders as it enabled the SCSI to support and influence their land restoration practices. Other challenges were to: accomplish SCSI's objectives; represent the SCSI and the government; have adequate skills, knowledge, and background; and deal with one's own emotions. Four of the strategies seemed to promote collaboration: create win-win scenarios; "go local"; direct and positive communication; and motivation and knowledge sharing. The other strategies: supportive district officer team; self-reliance and personal background; and self-control supported the officers in their interaction tasks. Factors undermining their collaboration efforts included insufficient time and other resources, an unsupportive organizational culture and a legal duty to assess the condition of vegetation cover on farmland. Increased resource allocation to the SCSI's local operations, more attention to emotional issues, and efforts to develop a more flexible and learning organizational culture that supports collaboration could counteract these factors.

A proposed framework for participatory forest restoration in semiarid areas of North Africa

“…Demonstrative planting was barely supported by farmers, particularly by those responsible of forest clearing. This confirms previous studies showing that farmers frequently oppose forest restoration actions because of concerns on losses of farming and grazing opportunities (Arnalds ), and also because of unawareness and uncertainty on the role of restoration to improve land condition (Berglund et al ). Previous research focused on restoration has shown a high willingness of local stakeholders to participate in individual meetings, but poor response to collective meetings and limited engagement in implementation tasks because of mistrust and fruitless previous interactions with government agencies (Metcalf et al ).…”

Understanding Knowledge Exchange in Practice: Empirically Derived Insights for Engaging in Effective Knowledge Exchange for Environmental Management

“…Boundary spanners were regularly cited among the case studies to enable KE work (e.g., Cohen et al, 2012;Berglund et al, 2015;Coleman & Stern, 2018;Holzer et al, 2019;Cadman et al, 2020), which is consistent with the broad literature suggesting that they play a key role in collaborating, facilitating, and exchanging context-specific knowledge with diverse knowledge users (Armitage et al, 2011;Bednarek et al, 2018;Karcher et al, 2021). It is necessary for boundary spanners to possess sufficient background knowledge and expertise of the knowledge they are exchanging (Michaels, 2009;Saarela & Soderman, 2015).…”

“…Many of the challenges to implementing KE were related to the expertise and interpersonal skills of KE practitioners. For example, practitioners had difficulty maintaining trusting relationships with all project actors and sustaining regular communication to identify the evolving needs of knowledge users (e.g., Berglund et al, 2015;Laatsch & Ma, 2016). In the case study produced by Berglund et al (2015), they explored how officers at the Soil Conservation Service of Iceland (SCSI) can improve soil conservation decisions and practices through their interactions with project actors, specifically farmers and locals.…”

“…For example, practitioners had difficulty maintaining trusting relationships with all project actors and sustaining regular communication to identify the evolving needs of knowledge users (e.g., Berglund et al, 2015;Laatsch & Ma, 2016). In the case study produced by Berglund et al (2015), they explored how officers at the Soil Conservation Service of Iceland (SCSI) can improve soil conservation decisions and practices through their interactions with project actors, specifically farmers and locals. One of the main challenges for SCSI officers was the ability to establish and maintain contact with farmers and other locals, which is needed to support and influence their soil conservation practices.…”

Development of Perverse Environmental Subsides for Sheep Production in Iceland

“…Challenges facing the field officers are often complex, as reported by Berglund et al [28]. There is a need for better linkages between the research and science capacity of the SCSI and other agencies involved in the schemes, on one hand, and the people in the field on the other.…”