ABSTRACT
The macro settings The need for differentiated planning processes and implementation practices that can be scaled across systems at risk has been emphasized. The degree to which these processes and practices can be ‘joined up’ in a coherent approach to land and water management to achieve desired environmental outcomes will be determined by two factors. First, the urgency of the environmental problem and the political attention it attracts. Second, the competence of the institutional arrangement to address public good concerns. Contextual approaches that relate to specific scales may be nested
and orderly in a well-defined and agreed planning framework. In practice, it has
proved difficult to extend and sustain natural resource governance from national
institutions down to local land and water management to the point where social and economic benefits can be spread and environmental trends can be reversed. Much of
the ‘blame’ could be levelled at the institutions (public and private) that are responsible for making decisions over land and water use.
