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The fruit industry relies on a small number of varieties and a decreasing number of chemicals, presenting serious challenges for future sustainable growth. No suitable high-quality varieties with resistant to pests and diseases are available. This is coupled with climate change where unpredictability in phenotypic expression is resulting at both small and large spatial scales. The ultimate aim of much of the research, therefore, is to understand the development of phenotype and to facilitate knowledge-based breeding of sustainable high quality resistant soft fruit varieties through the
To enable the uptake of measures that will improve water management, both to improve water quality and to contribute to flood risk management. This RD examines the options to improve water management in the complex socio-economic and policy settings of 'real world' catchment management. Separate projects within this RD range in their focus from reviewing lessons from water management in other countries, through to lessons that can be derived from ongoing work in Scottish catchments, and in synthesising evidence and providing tools that can help policy and practitioners to select, target and
There remain large gaps in understanding how changes in management and the environment alter community composition and, hence, ecosystem functions. This Research Deliverable (RD) addresses how ecosystem functions are regulated by the traits of species present, and how potential limits for the maintenance of ecosystem function can be captured in ecosystem health metrics. It also has the aim of identifying indices of ecosystem function that can be applied to assess ecosystem health at a range of scales (from field to national) so that management actions can be targeted to improve ecosystem
Ecosystem services provision: To develop an in-depth understanding by 2021 of the impacts of selected management interventions (including restoration) on Ecosystem Service (ES) flows and of the associated trajectories of change. This will be linked to decision making and reporting towards international commitments at the national level, and help develop our impact and collaborations in the international scientific community.
Resilience of ecosystems and biodiversity. This work aims to study the different aspects of resilience of widlife species and natural ecosystems to improve our understanding of how biodiversity and ecosystems are likely to change in response to environmental and climate change, and how to manage them to increase their resilience to change.
The aim of this research is to evaluate the potential to manage trade-offs and deliver multiple benefits from natural assets at the landscape scale. Focussing on agri-environment and woodland expansion schemes, together with integrated catchment management, the research uses practical examples to explore trade-offs and impacts taking into account social and cultural values as well environmental considerations in relation to land use and land use change. We provide practical guidance to land managers and other stakeholders and illustrate how existing and novel policy measures can improve the
Identifying and understanding multiple benefits and trade-offs – this work aims to have developed approaches that will support integrated decision-making to protect multiple natural assets and maximise benefits in socially acceptable ways. We will have identified and quantified impacts on, and trade-offs among, multiple ecosystem services (ESS) generated by land use and land management change across spatial scales. This will entail: The identification of gaps in the current delivery of multiple benefits from the land -contact Alessandro Gimona The identification of opportunities to increase
Natural Asset Inventory and Natural Capital Accounts: the aim is to develop a spatially-referenced register of Scotland’s natural assets and contribute to a set of natural capital accounts for Scotland that can over time track the progress of Scotland's green growth aspirations.
Biodiversity management To deliver research that helps Scotland meet biodiversity goals as set by the Aichi Targets, the EU Biodiversity Strategy and, specifically, the Scottish Biodiversity Strategy. It will do this by considering the effectiveness of alternative biodiversity/land management measures and potential options for safeguarding against biodiversity loss. These measures and options can then be integrated into future policy development.