Sustainable Mountain Development and the key - issue of Abandonment of Marginal Rural Areas

by Giorgio Conti | Laura Fagarazzi

The article aims at providing an interdisciplinary overview of the phenomenon of land abandonment, currently affecting wide European mountain marginal regions and the extent of which is described by considering wood expansion figures. The main environmental, social and economic consequences of land abandonment are taken into account, with particular regard to the impacts on landscape heterogeneity and the resulting bio and eco-diversity depletion. The article is especially addressed to planners: on the one hand the wide-spread disregard they often showed towards marginal mountain territories is seen as one of the main causes at the origin of the current state, while on the other hand their pivotal role in determining the future evolution of mountain territories is highlighted. inquire