Friday, 4 October 2013

Putting natural in its place : A new definition for New Zealand's natural character


The Nature of Natural: Defining natural character for the New Zealand context

Froude, V,A., Rennie, H,G & Bornman, J,F. (2010) The nature of natural: Defining natural character for the New Zealand context. New Zealand Journal of Ecology,34(3),332-341

 

Since the 1970's, New Zealand has had policies to protect its remaining natural character of its coastal, riparian and other fresh water environments. Although there has been a long-standing statutory policy in place for protecting natural character, there has been no authoritative definition of what natural really is. As a result, there have been no methods developed to measure natural character and its changes. Having a definition of natural character is also important for a plethora of purposes such as: using as part of conservation criteria and providing guidance for inventories and resource management. This forum paper aimed to find that much needed definition relevant to our unique New Zealand context. This was achieved through a literature review of natural character and related concepts from a spread of disciplines such as conservation biology, landscape planning and philosophy.


What most would consider to be an untouched natural landscape of podocarp forest
http://www.nzpcn.org.nz/c/content/L-Matheson-01a.jpg
 

A set of criteria were set up to find up the most suitable definition. These were:

 

·         Definition will apply to a wide scale of environments from untouched to modified

·         Human structures and activities should be included

·         New Zealand's unique naturalness will be considered

·         Covers all ecosystem types

·         Can be easily measured for monitoring purposes

·         Allows for the use of reference markers to which change can be measured

 

A total of nine suitable definitions from all natural definition contenders were narrowed down by the judges based on their match to the set criteria. A selection of highlights follows...................

 

Interpretation One: Natural character is naturalness that is a part of nature

This contender sees natural as being completely void of human interference. Natural character is derived from physical or biological elements, patterns or processes of nature that are indigenous to that specific environment.

 

 

Interpretation Two: Naturalness includes humans and their activities

The 'new ecology' approach. This interpretation sees humans as part of the complex and changeable biophysical systems. This concept stems from many indigenous cultures that see humans and nature as being intertwined.

 

Interpretation Three: Naturalness as a contrast to 'artifactuality'

This one is quite simple. The level of naturalness depends on how far removed it is from human-made objects established for specific functions.

 

Interpretation Four: Naturalness as historical independence from human ecosystems

Areas where there has been none-very little human modification would be considered natural. This contender therefore excludes restored areas as natural, so not the best contender.

 

Interpretation Five: Naturalness is where ecosystem processes occur without human intervention

This interpretation is another failed contender. Its definition disregards past influences and focuses on present and future human intervention.

 

Interpretation Six: Naturalness that includes ecologically harmonious human influence or interactions

This interpretation is the peacemaker between human and environmental naturalness. A possible winner as it includes ecological restoration as natural, but would need to be careful around how much human impact was OK.


Results of restoration at Mimimoto Lagoon
http://ecan.govt.nz/advice/biodiversity/restoration-trail/pages/mimimoto-lagoon.aspx






Interpretation Seven: Naturalness only includes humans if they are in a closed system

This interpretation would only work if New Zealander's were totally dependent on that ecosystem and would maybe have worked pre-European arrival (although in saying that, Maori were in a relatively closed-ecosystem and look at the damage that followed).

 

Interpretation Eight: Naturalness as a possession of features and properties found in an ideal ecosystem

 

A good idea, but what is ideal? Another forum would need to be carried out to define that too.

 

Interpretation Nine: Naturalness as a similarity of biotic structure, composition and physical/ecological process compared with historical benchmarks

This interpretation uses these criteria as representation of good ecological character. Areas that are most natural will have retained their biotic structure, composition and physical/ecological processes to levels that were similar to a determined pre-human benchmark. A bright contender for the final interpretation, although it fails to distinguish between naturalness of preserved verse restored ecosystems.

 

After a hard decision-making process, many interpretations had to be let down. It was interpretations 8 and 9 that met all the natural criteria, but didn't meet the human element criteria. This was best addressed by interpretation 3.

 

The winning definition:

 

The natural character of a site at any scale is the degree to which it is part of nature (particularly indigenous nature), free from effects of human activities and artefacts, exhibits the environmental factors chosen for reference conditions and exhibits ecological and physical process comparable with reference conditions.

 

A footnote to go with this choice is that human perceptions of natural character of a site will be a product of its biophysical attributes and will depend on personal / cultural context.

 

Discussion group reception:

 


There was a general consensus that the judging panel for selecting a definition for natural did well. Although the definition was complex it was recognised that the description had to fit a complex environment. The selection process was very thorough and covered all aspects of natural from all contexts. The group felt this was  crucial for the definition as it covers a very broad scope of disciplines; being able to define one definition that suits fits to all of those disciplines will create a controls for policy making. There were concerns around the inclusion of human perception of natural in the definition. Some felt that including this as a side note may allow lawyers to ease their way out of environmental breaches in court. Others suggested that this wouldn’t be a problem because it wasn’t quantifiable but still needed to be considered, especially for cases such as parks and reserves.

The hot topic in the room was in relation to interpretations that classified humans as being natural.  We can justify our actions by saying they are natural but without having morals we could drive the natural resources we rely on to extinction. Some agreed with Lovelock (2000) and see us as being part of nature. We are just another species, but we are the only species that are aware of our effects on the environment and have morals. Therefore, we are natural BUT what we do to the environment is often not natural, or is detrimental to natural.

The group was interested to see if the definition had been used in recent years to help with quantifying natural. Although the definition has been used to back up some current literature on defining natural, It has yet to be used in a more practical sense.

 
Questions:

Q. Should human perception be removed from the definition?

Q. Are humans natural? Or are we a component of nature?
 

 

References:

Froude, V,A., Rennie, H,G & Bornman, J,F. (2010) The nature of natural: Defining natural character for the New Zealand context. New Zealand Journal of Ecology,34(3),332-341

Lovelock, J. (2000) Gaia- a new look at life on earth, 4th edition, Oxford University press, 148



 

2 comments:

  1. In response to the question: should human perception be removed from the definition?
    This is a tricky one but personally I think there is probably nothing to be gained by removing it. My justification for this is that human perception will always be involved in any decisions that are made by humans, regardless of if it being included in the definition or not. You can try and reduce bias by having specific, clearly defined guidelines, which is what has been done in this paper.

    A good example of a highly valued so called 'natural ecosystem' is the tussock grasslands in the MacKenzie Basin (the part below the alpine zone). These grasslands are indigenous and are largely perceived as a natural area worthy of protection (from irrigation schemes and dairying etc.) but most New Zealander's don't realise that it's natural state (below alpine zone) was actually beech forest, prior to burning by Maori in pre-European times. Under the author's criteria these ecosystem's would not be considered worthy of protection, I wonder how many other communities fit into this 'grey area'?


    Are humans natural or are we a component of nature?
    We are most certainly natural and a part of nature, we have evolved alongside and interacting with the natural world.
    However you could also argue that we are circumventing some aspects of the natural world such as natural selection etc. by discovery of medicine and so on. We are over-exploiting the natural world in such away that it may seem that we are in control and separate from it but at the end of the day, we are very much apart of it and we will be brought back down to it's carrying capacity one way or another, Hopefully this well happen by our own choices before we are forced.

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  2. I agree with Monique. Although humans are natural, our actions are decidedly unnatural. Therefore it would be folly to include us in the definition of naturalness. Inclusion of humans would merely open up legislation to exploitation (leading to the advancement of human interests at the expense of nature). Hence I was pleased at the inclusion of the "free from effects of human activities and artefacts" specification.

    While it has been shown who that an individual’s level of concern for the environment is related to the sense of connectedness the individual feels with nature (Vining 2000). I believe that connectedness with nature should be supported in non-legislative ways (its sort of a separate issue).

    Vining, J., Merrick, M.S. & Price, E.A. (2008) The distinction between humans and nature: human perceptions of connectedness to nature and elements of the natural and unnatural. Research in Human Ecology, 15, 11p.


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