Landcare and inclusive agriculture: achieving socio-ecological balance to shape our future

Pre-Conference Training: 6 – 7 July 2026
A two-day Landcare-LIFE Training session, led by Global Landcare, will introduce principles and applications of the Landcare-LIFE approach. This will be by invitation. Enquiries welcome. 

Conference Dates: 8th – 10th July 2026, FNU Namaka Campus, Nadi, Fiji

‘All Pacific peoples have an undeniable connection to their natural environment, resources, livelihoods, faiths, cultural values and traditional knowledge… we have a deep concern for and commitment to the need for urgent, immediate and appropriate action to combat the threat and impacts of climate change; biodiversity and habitat loss; waste and pollution; and other threats.’      (- 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent)                                                                                                                       

Background

How can we best shape our future in a world of increasing complexity? This will require dynamic and reciprocal collaborations that draw on diverse perspectives and people-centered responses. An integrated landscape management approach is needed, one that strikes a socio-ecological balance to engage communities and support strengthened institutional arrangements, whilst responding to emerging land, water, and climate challenges.

Tropical ecosystems host an incredible array of biodiversity found in diverse habitats that exist in contrasting land use types. Aside from their inherent ecological value, these ecosystems and their biodiversity also provide significant ecosystem goods and services, promoting economic and other livelihood opportunities. These ecosystems are the foundation of agricultural systems in these regions.

Despite the major benefits for humans of these ecosystem goods and services, ecosystem and landscape degradation by human activity and changes in land-use, climate, and population do compromise their ecological functioning. Using multiple lines of evidence and drawing on collective experience from multidisciplinary research work, focused on the tropical landscapes, we find that it is timely to come together on a platform to identify the major challenges and opportunities for translating research from these landscapes into better-informed choices for communities and supporting service providers. This way, we expect that the sharing and discussions in this conference will support a dialogue for the transformation of agricultural systems in tropical landscapes.

We invite and call upon interested researchers, policymakers, practitioners, and farmers to come together and share experiences in adopting a Landcare-LIFE or other locally developed Landcare approach working at the nexus of rural community livelihoods and the management of the landscape on which they depend in the Indo-Pacific region and across the globe.

What is Landcare and LIFE?

🌱 Landcare is based on the notion that caring for land and water is underpinned by the values of community empowerment and collective action for innovative solutions to natural resource management challenges. The model has origins in Australian communities in the 1980s that evolved to a fully-fledged national program that enjoyed bipartisan support from the Government. The spread of Landcare values and practices internationally has been supported by Global Landcare and its partners, but without any systematic coordination or scaling-up strategy to date. This organic spread may be due in part to the compatibility of the Landcare approach with existing programs and traditional community values.

🌾 LIFE (Livelihood Improvement through Facilitated Extension) is a model that draws on Landcare-based extension principles. The model evolved from ACIAR-supported research in the Philippines that highlighted how certain types of community-based extension principles can rapidly enhance agricultural livelihoods.

While the conference draws on Landcare and LIFE models, it also welcomes insights from other inclusive, participatory or community-led approaches to extension and natural resource management and Landcare-based or informed programs from around the globe.

Objectives of the Conference

1. Increase awareness of the importance of interdisciplinary research on agriculture and natural resource management to enhance sustainability and resilience across the Indo-Pacific region.
2. Showcase best practices for promoting evidence-based interdisciplinary research outputs (biophysical, social, economic) for sustainable landscape management in the Indo-Pacific region.
3. Provide an opportunity for global networking and knowledge exchange of interdisciplinary approaches across academics, partners, practitioners, and farmers that support livelihood improvement, climate adaptation, and biodiversity.
4. Create a sustainable platform for a livelihood-focussed transdisciplinary ag-extension network for Indo-Pacific exchange and learning, with global reach where appropriate.