TerraSAgE: Terraces as Sustainable Agricultural Environments

Lead Research Organisation: Newcastle University
Department Name: Sch of History, Classics and Archaeology

Abstract

Across the world terraced landscapes have been created to produce diverse crops, to improve soils and to manage water resources - historically, they have been critical in many areas for dry-land agriculture. Despite this widespread occurrence, the history of agricultural terraces has remained poorly understood, largely due to problems in dating their construction, modification and use. This failure to understand the history of terraces has hampered broader research on the histories of landscapes, limiting knowledge of how settlements operated within their wider landscapes and of how terraces reflect the long-term investment choices made by rural communities. A new technique for dating soil profiles developed by members of the project team has recently demonstrated unique potential to unravel the formation and development of terraces through time (Kinnaird et al. 2017). Applied in parallel with geoarchaeological techniques, including chemical and micromorphological analysis, and broader landscape survey, these methods presents an opportunity to revolutionise understanding of past terrace systems and their landscapes - and to reveal and evaluate the societal, economic and environmental strategies that underpinned their construction, evolution and abandonment. Our project will answer research questions in four key areas about the history of terraces:
- When and how were terraces constructed, maintained and managed in different periods and regions?
- What were the triggers for terracing, and why were they sometimes abandoned?
- Has terracing proved an environmentally sustainable land-use strategy for rural communities?
- Did terraces enable greater resilience to economic or ecological instability, and did they help mitigate the impacts of past climate change?

TerraSAgE is geared towards uncovering knowledge of past landscapes and using it to model scenarios of change and thereby inform sustainable strategies for the future of land-management. Terraces provide a unique case for understanding long-term environmental impacts of land-use and evaluating long-term sustainability in agricultural practice and policy. For example, studies have demonstrated how the EU Common Agricultural Policy led to more intensive farming, mechanisation and new terracing techniques in the Mediterranean, including land-levelling, the introduction of new crops like vines and almonds, and less stable, bulldozed 'bench' terraces. This shift from pre-20th century 'traditional' terracing had major environmental consequences, causing widespread erosion and impacting soil health and drainage. Better understanding of how historic periods of transformation in farming impacted the land are essential to provide better information with which to underpin future sustainable land-use and create informed policies for future resilience, particularly in the face of increasing demand for food and climatic instability. Such needs are not limited to Europe and can be identified around the world. TerraSAgE's research, though conducted in Europe, will have relevance for global terrace conservation and management. In this sense, the project will contribute to progress towards the UN Sustainable Development Goals (for example Goal 2 'Zero Hunger' and Goal 15 'Life on Land', which are both concerned with the sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems). Because the approach of TerraSAgE will examine the relationships between environmental concerns about soil, water and management and cultural heritage issues, the project will also contribute towards the implementation of the European Landscape Convention (which has been signed and ratified by all the countries where the project will work), whose revolutionary definition of landscape emphasises the indivisibility of its natural and cultural aspects.

Planned Impact

- Who might benefit from this research?

TerraSagE is designed to benefit several different audiences besides academic researchers.
- The first audience is members of local communities in the project's Case Study areas, including farmers and landowners.
- The second category includes organisations which function at a broader geographical scale, including agricultural collectives and regional government officials in the Mediterranean, and engagement with education in schools in the UK.
- The third potential group of beneficiaries is national and international policy makers with responsibility for guiding strategies for rural landscape management.

- How might they benefit from this research?

The project includes a series of engagement activities at different geographical scales which are designed to reach different types of stakeholders. Activities are designed to avoid simple 'top-down' dissemination of scientific results, but to promote active engagement and where possible the establishment of dialogue between communities with different responsibilities. The ultimate ambition is for the research to influence policies and practices at local, regional and international levels which will deliver benefits to different stakeholders through new types of engagements with terraced landscapes and their management.
- At the local level, the project's community engagement workshops will invite local stakeholders to contribute their knowledge and experience of terraced landscapes to inform 'collective community maps'. These will be used later to inform dialogue with regional/national agencies (alongside the research results) and to promote the local values of terraced landscapes - including cultural values as well as economic and environmental ones - in regional and national policy-making. The research results themselves will be discussed during multi-stakeholder follow-up workshops, to raise awareness of the historic character of the Case Study landscapes and consider potential management strategies.
- At the regional level, collective bodies (such as farming cooperatives) and local/national government agencies (such as heritage departments and ministries) will be invited to the follow-up workshops, each of which will be designed to address specific issues relating to the individual Case Study regions. These workshops will provide a forum to debate the project results in the context of local and regional priorities, with the ultimate goal of promoting sustainable management strategies with local buy-in which maximise the benefits to a range of interested communities. Such strategies would be applicable at regional as well as local levels, and could inform the development of future policies at regional and national scales.
In the UK, the research results will be used to create interactive workshops on sustainable landscape management for schools which will be disseminated through the University of St Andrews' 'GeoBus' initiative. These activities will reach up to 10,000 young people each year from 2022: they will promote awareness of the possibility of addressing gobal issues through local actions, and the role of research in addressing global challenges.
- At national and international scales, TerraSAgE will seek to engage policy makers responsible for sustainable landscape management, environmental risk and planning, and rural development. The project results will be presented through policy briefing notes and policy briefing workshops to relevant officers from national and international government bodies and funding agencies. The team will highlight the potential of future policies based on the research results to contribute to the achievement of international goals such as UN Sustainable Development Goals 2 and 15, and to the implementation of international treaties such as the European Landscape Convention. Our aim is to feed in to future policy, for example revisions to the Common Agricultural Policy.
 
Description The history of agricultural terraces remains poorly understood, due predominantly to problems in dating their construction and use. This has hampered broader research on their significance of terracing, limiting knowledge of past agricultural practices and the long-term investment choices made by rural communities. We have applied OSL profiling and dating to the sediments associated with agricultural terraces and earthworks across the Mediterranean region to date their construction and use.

Preliminary results from widely-dispersed pilot studies reveal that although many terraces were used in the first millennium AD, the most intensive episodes of terrace building occurred during the later Middle Ages (c. AD 1100-1600). This innovative approach provides the first large-scale evidence for both the longevity and medieval intensification of Mediterranean terraces.
Exploitation Route Progress on the research is behind schedule owing to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on the fieldwork schedule.
Nevertheless, preliminary results clearly indicate potential for the research to have positive impact as several levels through collaborations which target key beneficiary groups.
• Early results show that scientific impact should be significant: dating of terraces from case-studies in Naxos and Croatia show widespread early construction and development
• Structured engagement with local communities in case-study areas;
• Knowledge-exchange targeting regional stakeholders including planning authorities and agricultural collectives;
• Informing and influencing policy at national and international levels, particularly in relation to environmental sustainability.
We anticipate that the project will have societal and economic impacts from local farms to international policy through activities designed to cultivate ongoing engagement and promote communication between stakeholders in terraced landscapes with different responsibilities, for example farmers and heritage managers.
Sectors Environment

Culture

Heritage

Museums and Collections

 
Description Biocultural heritage
Amount £20,555 (GBP)
Organisation National Trust 
Sector Charity/Non Profit
Country United Kingdom
Start 11/2022 
End 02/2023
 
Description CaDHoKHUL: Characterising and dating Hong Kong's upland historic landscapes
Amount € 337,400 (EUR)
Funding ID 101023818 
Organisation European Commission H2020 
Sector Public
Country Belgium
Start 01/2021 
End 12/2024
 
Description Horizon 2020 Marie Sklodowska Curie Individual Fellowship
Amount € 212,934 (EUR)
Funding ID 890561 
Organisation European Commission 
Sector Public
Country European Union (EU)
Start 09/2020 
End 09/2022
 
Description Horizon 2020 Marie Sklodowska Curie Individual Fellowship
Amount € 224,934 (EUR)
Organisation European Commission 
Sector Public
Country European Union (EU)
Start 05/2021 
End 05/2023
 
Description Terraced landscapes of Jabal Akhdar, Oman
Amount £14,150 (GBP)
Organisation Society of Antiquaries of London 
Sector Charity/Non Profit
Country United Kingdom
Start 01/2021 
End 12/2023
 
Title HiLSS Project 
Description This repository is periodically updated. Historic Landscape and Soil Sustainability (MSCA-IF-2019 - Individual Fellowships) The HiLSS Project aims to investigate the relationships between sustainability and landscape heritage with particular reference to soil loss and degradation over the long term. The project will take a multidisciplinary approach that combines archaeology, Historical Landscape Characterisation (HLC), geosciences, and computer-based geospatial analysis (GIS - Geographical Information Systems) and modelling (RUSLE - Revisited Universal Soil Loss Equation). The research objectives of the HiLSS project are to quantify the impact of human activities during the Late Holocene in order to create spatial models which can inform the development of sustainable conservation strategies for rural landscape heritage. This project will focus on two mountainous regions that present historical and cultural similarities but located in different climatic zones of Europe (1- Tuscan-Emilian Apennines, Italy; 2- Northern-mid Galicia, Spain). In previous HLC studies, land-use has been evaluated from the perspective of cultural heritage, whereas RUSLE have used it as a proxy for the land-cover of an area and its effect on soil erosion. The HiLSS project will propose an innovative methodology that combines both the historic/cultural values and the environmental values of land-use to inform development of a model for the sustainable conservation. By considering the different agricultural land-use HLC types in GIS-RUSLE modelling, it will be possible to quantify the effect on soil loss for each HLC type and consequently to devise more environmentally sustainable management for each type. Environmental sustainability and historic landscape conservation are typically treated as two separate fields, but the HiLSS project will develop a transformative model for interdisciplinary research, proposing a new way to embrace both cultural and natural values as components of the same landscape management plans. HLC_RUSLE.zip The R script code was developed by dr. F. Brandolini (Newcastle University, UK) to accompany the paper: "Brandolini, F., Kinnaird, T.C., Srivastava, A., Turner S. - Modelling the impact of historic landscape change on soil erosion and degradation. Sci Rep 13, 4949 (2023)". List of files included in HLC_RUSLE.zip: R_script_code named "HLC_RUSLE" in .rmd format Output folder: Figures folder: .png products of the R script code Rasters folder: .png products of the R script code Tables folder: .pdf products of the R script code GeoTiff folder (.TIFF file format): Regional RUSLE Data GPKG: HLC dataset and Region Of Interest file in .gpkg format Spatial statistics to reveal patterns and connections in the historic landscape The R script code was developed by dr. F. Brandolini (Newcastle University, UK) to accompany the paper: " F. Brandolini & S. Turner (2022) Revealing patterns and connections in the historic landscape of the northern Apennines (Vetto, Italy), Journal of Maps, DOI: 10.1080/17445647.2022.2088305. ". It is available at: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5907229 Supplementary material_Land _SI_Historic Landscape Evolution.zip Supplementary Materials to accompaing the paper: The evolution of historic agroforestry landscape in the Northern Apennines (Italy) and its consequences for slope geomorphic processes, submitted to Land, Special Issue Historic Landscape Transformation. Project_Publications.zip List of .pdf file included in the folder: 1) Brandolini F, Domingo-Ribas G, Zerboni A and Turner S. A Google Earth Engine-enabled Python approach for the identification of anthropogenic palaeo-landscape features [version 2; peer review: 2 approved, 1 approved with reservations]. Open Res Europe 2021, 1:22 (https://doi.org/10.12688/openreseurope.13135.2) 2) Brandolini F., Turner S. 2022 - Revealing patterns and connections in the historic landscape of the northern Apennines (Vetto, Italy), Journal of Maps, (https://doi.org/10.1080/17445647.2022.2088305) 3) Brandolini, F., Kinnaird, T.C., Srivastava, A., Turner S. 2023 - Modelling the impact of historic landscape change on soil erosion and degradation. Sci Rep 13, 4949 (2023), (https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-31334-z) 4) Brandolini, F., Compostella, C., Pelfini, M., and Turner, S. 2023 - "The Evolution of Historic Agroforestry Landscape in the Northern Apennines (Italy) and Its Consequences for Slope Geomorphic Processes" Land 12, no. 5: 1054. (https://doi.org/10.3390/land12051054) 
Type Of Material Database/Collection of data 
Year Produced 2022 
Provided To Others? Yes  
URL https://zenodo.org/record/6622607
 
Description Calabria - Arena 
Organisation University of Siena
Country Italy 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution Fieldwork and analysis of fieldwork data
Collaborator Contribution Securing permissions, project management, fieldwork and analysis of fieldwork data
Impact n/a
Start Year 2023
 
Description Osor, Cres and Lusinj 
Organisation University of Vienna
Country Austria 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution Collaboration on landscape research in the northern Adriatic, and research student training
Collaborator Contribution Collaboration on landscape research in the northern Adriatic
Impact Fieldwork report
Start Year 2023
 
Description Pollentia project, Mallorca 
Organisation University of Barcelona
Country Spain 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution Fieldwork seasons, workshops and seminars; student training
Collaborator Contribution Fieldwork seasons, workshops and seminars; student training
Impact n/a
Start Year 2020
 
Description University of Granada 
Organisation University of Granada
Country Spain 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution Our team is leading this collaborative project, including planning and delivering fieldwork, geoarchaeological lab analyses and GIS/spatial analysis. We have overall responsibility for delivery of the work programme including training and activities designed to increase the impact of the research with policy makers and citizens.
Collaborator Contribution University of Granada play a key role in designing and delivering the engagement strategy for the project. This includes community engagement workshops in each case-study area, coinciding with field survey and sampling. Specific activities in each workshop include activities such as participatory mapping and workshops in the field.
Impact The project is at a relatively preliminary stage so outputs are currently pending.
Start Year 2019
 
Description Escuela de Balates - dry-stone terrace school 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Regional
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact On the 29th and 30th of January, the "Escuela de Balates" (dry-stone balates school) took place in the municipality of Jérez del Marquesado, Granada. More than 70 people from different disciplines and interests participated in the recovery of the cultivation area around the Alcázar tower. The activity was organised by the Biocultural Archaeology Laboratory (MEMOLab), coordinated by Professor Dr. José María Martín Civantos, from the Department of Medieval History and CCTTHH of the University of Granada. The Jérez del Marquesado Town Council and the Irrigation Community of Jérez del Marquesado have collaborated in this project.
The local drystone master taught how to build these dry stone walls, recovering a large part of the cultivation terraces of the Alcázar ravine. In addition, one of the branches of the Alcázar irrigation channel that supplied water to the terraces has been recovered and rebuilt using the traditional dry stone walling technique (traditional knowledge declared Intangible Heritage of Humanity in 2018: Knowledge and techniques of the art of building dry stone walls - intangible heritage - Culture Sector - UNESCO). Finally, a dozen chestnut trees were planted to restore part of this productive space that had been totally abandoned.
During the month of February, students from the SENED Rural Public School in Jérez del Marquesado, accompanied by researchers from MEMOLab and the Irrigation Community of the municipality, will plant chestnut, walnut and rowan trees, thus recovering this abandoned space.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2022
 
Description TerraSAgE - Chalki High School presentation 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Local
Primary Audience Schools
Results and Impact Presentation and workshop with secondary school students in central Naxos, presenting results from local case-study area
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2021
 
Description TerraSAgE Naxos - public event 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Regional
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Public presentation (in English and Greek) of the TerraSAgE project in November 2021, and in particular the work undertaken in Naxos in June 2021. Presentation of results and discussion/consultation concerning next steps.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2021
 
Description Wine and terracing workshop 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Local
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact This event was designed to enable engagement with memebrs of the Donja Banda wine cooperative on the Peljesac peninsula (in Orebic municipality, Dubrovnik-Neretva county of south Dalmatia) in the project's second case-study area (Croatia). The event took place at the wine cooperative's outlet between Županjo Selo and Golubinica on Peljesac. The team presented key results from the project to local wine-growers with the aim of encourgaing them to incorporate the insights from the project into the branding and marketing of local wine produced on terraces from the Plavac Mali grape.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2023