Implementing Green Infrastructure in Spatial Planning in Europe

Elin Slätmo, Kjell Nilsson and Eeva Turunen
Additional contact information
Elin Slätmo: Nordregio, Box 1658, 11186 Stockholm, Sweden
Kjell Nilsson: Nordregio, Box 1658, 11186 Stockholm, Sweden
Eeva Turunen: Nordregio, Box 1658, 11186 Stockholm, Sweden

Land, 2019, vol. 8, issue 4, 1-21

Abstract: Interest in green infrastructure (GI) has grown in research, policy and planning in recent decades. The central idea behind GI is the understanding of the physical non-built-up environment as an infrastructure capable of delivering a wide variety of benefits to society, including the ability to preserve biodiversity; to provide food, feed, fuel and fibre; to adapt to and mitigate climate change and to contribute to enhanced human health and quality of life. The European Union (EU) has had a GI strategy since 2013, and member states are involved in several strategic and applied GI initiatives and projects. The aim of this study is to explore if and how the European strategy has been implemented. The study adds to the body of knowledge of current GI policies and measures in Europe via an online survey and insights into previous research. The survey reveals that GI is integrated into one or more policy sectors in all 32 countries covered. In 11 of the 32 countries, GI-specific policies are already in place or are being drawn up at a national level. In general, the respondents see the responsibility for GI policy and strategy as a matter of national governments and the implementation as a matter of local governments. They also see the LIFE+ and Horizon 2020 project funds, the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD), as the most important EU funding sources for the implementation of the GI strategy. The study also identifies availability of georeferenced information, zoning and biotope area factor as three of the spatial planning tools used to implement GI.

Keywords: green infrastructure; policy; spatial planning; Europe (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (13)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/8/4/62/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/8/4/62/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jlands:v:8:y:2019:i:4:p:62-:d:222542

Access Statistics for this article

Land is currently edited by Ms. Carol Ma

More articles in Land from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().