Cultivating change: Addressing shifts in knowledge and skills required for landscape-scale nature recovery

Davis, Joshua M ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9499-4285 (2026) Cultivating change: Addressing shifts in knowledge and skills required for landscape-scale nature recovery. Ambio. doi:10.1007/s13280-026-02404-z (In Press)

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Abstract

Delivering landscape-scale nature recovery depends on the effective acquisition and development of skills across agricultural, environmental, and governance contexts. This study draws on 25 semi-structured interviews with farmers, land managers, and intermediary organisations (delivery partners, bridging organisations, extension/advisory services) across England to examine how skills are acquired and developed in practice. Informed by taskscapes literature and structured around a novel five-domain analytical framework—systems thinking, lifelong and life-wide learning, collaborative partnerships, agri-environmental entrepreneurship, and technical expertise—findings highlight the centrality of collaborative, entrepreneurial, and technical capacities. They also reveal core tensions and misalignments: between (1) policy ambition and institutional capacity; (2) fragmentation of learning pathways caught between standardisation and flexibility; and (3) entrepreneurial initiative within compliance-oriented governance structures. The research underscores the need for tailored skill frameworks spanning formal, informal, and non-formal learning pathways to support adaptive knowledge exchange and the practical delivery of landscape-scale nature recovery.

Item Type:	Article
Article Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Nature based recovery; Agriculture; Farming; Landscape
Subjects:	S Agriculture > S Agriculture (General) > S589.75 Agriculture and the environment S Agriculture > S Agriculture (General) > S589.7 Agricultural ecology (General) S Agriculture > S Agriculture (General) > S604.5 Agricultural conservation
Divisions:	Schools and Research Institutes > Countryside and Community Research Institute
Depositing User:	Nick Lewis
Date Deposited:	08 May 2026 09:13
Last Modified:	08 May 2026 09:30
URI:	https://eprints.glos.ac.uk/id/eprint/16256

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