Forest Resources and Landscape Quality

Global, Regional and Local Challenges
1. Auflage 2026
ISBN: 978-87-438-1333-0
Verlag: River Publishers

Buch, Englisch, 154 Seiten, Format (B × H): 156 mm x 234 mm

Reihe: River Publishers Series in Social, Urban, Economic and Environmental Sustainability

This book examines the growing vulnerability of rural regions and natural habitats in advanced economies as social, economic, and climatic pressures reshape local systems.

Demographic change, shifting production patterns, and evolving land use are contributing—often in complex and non-linear ways—to the gradual degradation of forest, agricultural, and natural ecosystems. These dynamics are not always immediately visible, but they are steadily transforming rural landscapes.

Addressing these challenges requires a multidisciplinary approach that integrates economics, ecology, forest science, spatial planning, and advanced analytical methods. By combining these perspectives, the book explores how environmental protection, risk prevention, and climate adaptation strategies can be developed.

Through this integrated framework, the book highlights pathways to strengthen the resilience of rural landscapes and the communities that depend on them.

Zielgruppe

Academic, Postgraduate, and Professional Practice & Development

Autoren/Hrsg.

D’Agata, Alessia

Imbrenda, Vito

Konaxis, Ioannis

Fachgebiete

• Naturwissenschaften Biowissenschaften Biowissenschaften Biowissenschaften, Biologie: Sachbuch, Naturführer
• Naturwissenschaften Biowissenschaften Biowissenschaften Ökologie
• Geowissenschaften Geographie | Raumplanung Wälder

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Chapter 1. The Impact of Socio-ecological Forces on Rural and Natural Landscapes Chapter 2. Assessing Landscape Quality with Quali-quantitative Measures Chapter 3. Urban Expansion, Accessibility, and the Contribution of Spatial Analysis to Land Use Science Chapter 4. Thematic Mapping for Landscape Analysis and Spatial Planning Chapter 5. Ecological Analysis and the Role of Forest Inventories Chapter 6. Monitoring Climate–Forest Relationships: The Role of Ecological Networks Chapter 7. Key Landscape Indicators Estimating Early Desertification Risk

Über Autor(innen)

Alessia D’Agata is a visiting scholar at the Department of Geography, Autonomous University of Barcelona, and a doctoral candidate at the Department of Methods and Models for Territory, Economy and Finance, Faculty of Economics, Sapienza University of Rome, Italy, supported by a prestigious fellowship. She holds a master’s in building engineering and architecture and a master’s in GIScience for the integrated management of land and natural resources. Her main research interests include urban planning and policy, agricultural and environmental sustainability, official statistics, and normative approaches to sustainable development. She has published articles in top-field scientific journals dealing with land-use change and forest dynamics.

Vito Imbrenda graduated in environmental engineering (2003), obtained a PhD in environmental engineering from the University of Basilicata, Italy (2012). Since 2018 he has been a staff researcher at the Institute of Methodologies for Environmental Analysis of the National Research Council of Italy (IMAA-CNR, Tito Scalo). His activities focus on the study of complex phenomena involving land systems (land degradation, urban sprawl, climate change impacts) with the potential socioeconomic implications through the use of landscape ecology tools and Earth observation techniques. He is the current IMAA-CNR focal point in the National Working Groups “Drought, scarcity and water crisis”, “Internal areas, marginal and outermost regions”, and in the IRIDE project, European Earth Observation satellite programme (ESA - ASI).

Ioannis Konaxis, PhD, is assistant professor of sustainable eco-tourism and nature conservation at the Business School of the public University of Piraeus, Greece. He teaches several classes of tourism business and economics, ecological conservation of protected areas, landscape and sustainable development. He has published theoretical and applied research in sustainable tourism management in prestigious international journals and book series.