Evaluation of sustainable landscapes for people and nature
We did an independent evaluation of the ‘One Thousand Landscapes for One Billion People’ project in the design, testing, and demonstration phase to enhance co-design for effective long-term impact.
Project team members
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DateMarch 2023 - December 2023
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Area of expertiseClimate, Energy, and Nature
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Client
IKEA
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CountriesKenya , Indonesia , Vietnam , Colombia
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KeywordClimate and Economic Inclusion
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OfficesOPM United Kingdom , OPM Kenya
The ‘One Thousand Landscapes for One Billion People’ (1000L) initiative is convened by EcoAgriculture Partners and co-led with Rainforest Alliance, Commonland, Conservation International, the United Nations Development Programme, and information technology leader Tech Matters. More than 20 partners are sharing technical and financial expertise, and a dozen landscape partnerships are co-designing the initiative.
The IKEA Foundation provided USD3.2 million in funding from 2021 to mid-2024 to support the design, testing and demonstration phase of the 1000L initiative, commissioning this independent, external evaluation with a view to generating insights on the achievements of this phase.
The strategy of the 1000L initiative is to advance joint action on integrated landscape management (ILM) as a solution for sustainable livelihoods. The initiative promotes system changes that strengthen landscape partnerships, championing locally led decision-making and locally owned solutions; offering tools and services that reduce costs and increase local capacities to manage long-term landscape partnerships; and simplifying and increasing access to appropriate finance for integrated landscape investment.
This evaluation, commissioned by IKEA, focused on potential for achievement of the project objectives, relevance of the 1000L for its partners and other landscape stakeholders, understanding the potential for scaling and recommending adjustments for elements that needed course-correction. It also assessed the relevance of the work of 1000L to the IKEA Foundation’s strategy on agricultural livelihoods.
Challenges
The project is responding to the fact that our planet is facing a dual crisis of rapid climate change and massive biodiversity loss. And to avert the dramatic consequences thereof that face humans and other living things, the environment needs to be restored and protected so that it can continue to provide the resources and ecosystem services we need. The overall goal of the project is thus to reverse unsustainable practices in landscapes towards sustainable landscape management for humans and biosphere.
The project recognises that across the globe, farmer organisations, NGOs, local governments and businesses are increasingly seeing the need to work together to meet resource and development challenges, but not without various difficulties that are hindering progress. While the number of integrated landscape management partnerships is growing, they also continue to run into difficulties of accessing financial, market and policy support for their vision of sustainable integrated landscape restoration.
If landscapes are to continue to provide food, fiber, clean water and air, biodiversity, and cultural values, and to sustain robust employment and dignified livelihoods for a growing population, collective action at the landscape level is required at scale for impact.
Expertise
The strategy of the 1000L initiative is to advance joint action on integrated landscape management (ILM) as a solution for sustainable livelihoods. The 1000L initiative promotes system changes that strengthen landscape partnerships, championing locally led decision-making and locally owned solutions; offering tools and services that reduce costs and increase local capacities to manage long-term landscape partnerships; and simplifying and increasing access to appropriate finance for integrated landscape investment.
To achieve the objectives of the evaluation, we utilised document reviews, key informant interviews, field observations based on the evaluation criteria laid down by IKEA Foundation i.e. effectiveness of proposed approaches, relevance, potential for scaling and lessons learnt from the initial phase. The evaluation team also applied three key strategies:
- Reviewing the achievement of the Laudes Foundation criteria, indicators and rubrics on system change
- Assessing progress to date against intermediate outcome indicators (to end of 2023) in the 1000L results framework
- Undertaking a stock take on lessons learned in ILM approaches – as well as a mapping of other comparable ILM initiatives
Impact
The project aims to achieve three key positive impacts informed by the recommendations from our evaluation study:
- Landscape partnerships under the project start delivering sustainable landscape solutions contributing to Sustainable Development Goals and aligning actions to meet global targets for tackling food and water insecurity, biodiversity loss, land degradation and climate change.
- The Terraso digital platform created as part of the initiative efficiently enables easier and more effective application of the Integrated Landscape Management process, with enhanced impacts across the landscapes and partners.
- Institutional innovations across the finance system increase private and public financial flows to pipelines of projects in 1000+ locally led landscape investment portfolios.
The study was conducted by Oxford Policy Management. Tom Blomley was the Technical Lead. Hausner Wendo, Doris Cordero, Julia Latham, and Blair Palmer provided expertise to the study.
Banner image: Unsplash