THE TRANSFORMATION OF LANDSCAPE: MODELING POLICY AND SOCIAL IMPACTS ON THE AGRICULTURAL LANDSCAPE OF LESVOS.

The term landscape is more and more used as an "umbrella" concept, covering a series of cultural, productive and ecological processes. In order to uncover mechanisms, monitor transformations and predict changes, a complicated set of interacting factors has to be taken into account. This paper presents a model for estimating social and policy impacts on agricultural landscapes, based on the assumption that agricultural landscapes are shaped at "macro" (landscape) level by "micro" interventions at farm level. The model consists of three parts: an "ecological processes" part, which deals with processes that shape the ecological and aesthetic value of a landscape, a "population dynamics" part, which examines farmer population dynamics and a "policy impact" part, which deals with direct or indirect impacts on farming systems and farmer dynamics and refers to CAP Rural Development Measures. The model is applied for the olive and graze land agricultural landscapes of Lesvos (Greece). Results, apart from revealing landscape change patterns; help to illustrate some mechanisms behind this change and indicate that Rural Development Measures are inherent with minor but important malfunctions that cannot lead to sustainable landscape management and rural development in the area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]