Authors | IGES

Peer-reviewed Article

April 2025

Cultivating Collaborative Food Futures: Analyzing How Local Actions Address Interconnected Food Challenges

In Sustainability

The global food system confronts critical challenges, including food insecurity, small-scale producer vulnerability, and environmental degradation. While locally led initiatives emerge as potential solutions, they face obstacles, such as participant bias and scaling limitations. This study analyzes 157 international and 91 Japanese locally led food...

Peer-reviewed Article

April 2025

3-30-300 Benchmark: An Evaluation of Tree Visibility, Canopy Cover, and Green Space Access in Nagpur, India

In Urban Science

Urban green spaces (UGSs) are vital in enhancing environmental quality, social well-being, and climate resilience, yet their distribution and accessibility remain uneven in many rapidly urbanizing cities. The 3–30–300 rule offers a structured guideline with which to assess urban greenness, emphasizing tree visibility, canopy cover, and green space...

Keywords:

3–30–300 rule; SDG11; urban environment; Global South; Indian cities; urban greening

Peer-reviewed Article

March 2025

The Costs of Overcoming Social and Institutional Barriers to Implementing Co-Benefit Solutions in Thailand’s Transport and Residential Energy Sectors: Methods and Applications

In Climate

Interest in co-benefits—the multiple benefits from mitigating climate change while addressing other sustainability challenges—has grown as policymakers seek to lower the costs of decarbonization. Much of this interest stems from data-driven models that quantify how much improved air quality, better health, and other co-benefits can offset those...

Keywords:

Climate change mitigation

Peer-reviewed Article

March 2025

Exploring the Interplay Between Food Provision and Habitat Quality Assessment for Sustainable Coexistence in the Bioproduction Systems of the Philippines

In Resources (MDPI)

Balancing human activities and ecosystem health is critical amid increasing biodiversity concerns. This study explores the relationship between food provision and habitat quality in bioproduction systems in the Philippines, focusing on the Pagsanjan-Lumban Watershed (PLW) and the Baroro Watershed (BW). Using the TerrSet Land Change Modeler for LULC...

Keywords:

habitat conservation; correlation analysis; trade-offs and synergies; InVEST model; ecosystem services; ecosystem health

Book

February 2025

Learning from COVID-19 for Climate-Ready Urban Transformation/ Element in the Third Assessment Report on Climate Change and Cities (ARC3.3)

Cities have suffered from three years of the COVID-19 pandemic and are increasingly experiencing exacerbated heatwaves, floods, and droughts due to climate change. Going forward, cities need to address both climate and public health crises effectively while reducing poverty and inequity, often in the context of economic pressure and declining...

Keywords:

Climate Change and Cities

resilient cities

COVID-19

Peer-reviewed Article

January 2025

How the Concept of “Regenerative Good Growth” Could Help Increase Public and Policy Engagement and Speed Transitions to Net Zero and Nature Recovery

In Sustainability

Just and fair transitions to low-carbon and nature-positive ways of living need to occur fast enough to limit and reverse the climate and nature crises, but not so fast that the public is left behind. We propose the concept of “Regenerative Good Growth” (RGG) to replace the language and practice of extractive, bad GDP growth. RGG centres on the...

Keywords:

Regenerative Good Growth

bad GDP growth

climate crisis

nature crisis

renewable assets

public engagement

story and hope

social tipping points

backlash

green authoritarianism

Net zero

Peer-reviewed Article

December 2024

Putting power in perspective: a systematic review of power dynamics in social-ecological traps

In Discover Sustainability

This paper explores the use of power and politics in empirical literature on social-ecological traps. Social-ecological traps describe conditions where self-reinforcing interactions between social and ecological elements perpetuate a system in an unfavorable or undesirable state. Researchers across disciplines have theorized the nature and...

Peer-reviewed Article

November 2024

A blue–green ratio of urban wetlands as an ecosystem healthindicator: the case of urban sprawl in Nagpur, India

In Environmental Hazards

Rampant urban sprawl has affected the structure and function of existing urban green and blue spaces, exposing developing cities to unexpected disaster events. Drawing on a mixture of secondary information supported by GIS and field-based studies, we assessed the impact of growing impervious surfaces on the dynamic zones of urban wetlands in Nagpur...

Keywords:

Urban wetlands; Dynamic zone; Flash floods; Blue green buffer; Nagpur City

Peer-reviewed Article

September 2024

Human–nature connectedness is positively correlated with the perceived value of nature regardless of urbanization levels

In Sustainability Science

Urbanization has affected the economy, ecosystem, and human health. In addition to these direct and physical impacts, urbanization is suggested to affect our preferences and valuation with respect to nature, including people’s perceived values of nature and human–nature connectedness (HNC). Perceived values of nature and HNC are essential for...

Keywords:

Human–nature connectedness

Urbanization levels

Value perception

IRelational valuenstrumental value

Peer-reviewed Article

August 2024

Assessing the Economic and Environmental Impacts of Anaerobic Digestion for Municipal Organic Waste: A Case Study of Minamisanriku Town, Japan

In Sustainability

Anaerobic digestion (AD), or biogas technology, is an optimal method for municipal organic waste (MOW) treatment, recovering both material and energy. This study takes a life cycle assessment perspective and examines the economic and environmental impacts of a BIO facility in Minamisanriku Town, Japan, which has utilized MOW (kitchen/food waste and...