ABSTRACT
The complex landscape mosaics of semiarid Mediterranean uplands have been shaped by closely interwoven natural and cultural processes as multivariate anthropogenic functions. In these, agro-pastoral land-use impacts were major driving forces. The harsher and more fragile the independent state factors of soil parent material, relief, climate, hydrology and biota, the more far-reaching was the human impact on dependent vegetation, soil and functional/structural ecotype variables. In most landscapes a long-term homeorhetic flow equilibrium has been established between regeneration and degradation processes, leading to unique spatio-temporal dynamics and heterogeneity and ensuring evolutionary metastability and resilience. With present accelerating anthropogenic degradation, the removal of inherent natural and cultural negative feedbacks is leading to total landscape desertification. Therefore, such destroyed ecosystems cannot be restored anymore, but can be rehabilitated by multifactorial state factor modification to ensure the optimization of multi-beneficial production, regulation and carrier functions for multiple land uses. This interdisciplinary and multidimensional nature of conservation and reconstruction research and their implementation requires a holistic landscape ecological approach.
