Collaborative Geodesign to advance multifunctional landscapes

This paper illustrates the application of Geodesign in the context of multifunctional landscape scale planning and design to optimize production of food and biofuel commodities with enhanced water quality and habitat performance. It draws on multiple disciplinary perspectives, highlighting the contributions of Geodesign in advancing stakeholder consensus in balancing natural resource protection and agricultural production priorities. The paper uses the Seven Mile Creek Fuelshed Project as a research context for examining the ways that Geodesign can enhance collaborative planning processes, build knowledge of natural and production systems at the landscape scale, and integrate consideration of feedback from multiple performance criteria into an adaptive and iterative process of landscape planning and design. The paper describes the development and application of the Geodesign system used in the landscape planning process and offers important insights into how the system contributed to the collaborative stakeholder engagement, informed stakeholder decision making, and enhanced the landscape planning outcomes. A mixed-method analytical approach is used to assess stakeholder perceptions and the outcomes of the collaborative Geodesign process.