Page 148 - Çevre Şehir İklim İngilizce - Sayı 1

The significance of pastures

However, Ostrom (1990), in her study, “Governing the Commons”, which
brought her the Nobel Prize for Economics in 2009, proved through various
field studies that the sustainable use of commons is possible through
collective action and mutual trust (Ostrom 1990; De Angelis and Harvie,
2014; Adaman et al, 2017). It is possible to observe the systems (e.g., society,
union, or cooperative) emerging through the self-organization of the users of
commons in the examples of livestock breeding, farming, fishing etc., which
date back to old ages (Berkes, 2009). In Ostrom’s study, she mentions “Alanya
Fishing Cooperative” as an example from Türkiye. In addition, the traditional
livestock breeding practices in Datça, Taşlıca Village in Türkiye seem to prove
her proposition (Hazar, 2018).
Pastures are protected under the 4342 num. Pasture Law (1998), but through
the legal gaps, Provincial Pasture Comissions, working under the Provincial
Directorate of Environment and Forestry, frequently allows the use of pastures
for other purposes to meet the increasing mining, tourism, energy and public
investment demands. There is around 12-13 million ha of pastures remain in
Türkiye, and they are under the risk of disappearing (Avcıoğlu et al, 2009). In
line with the pressure of increasing urbanization, the land is occupied or used
for other purposes. To avoid it, the enforcement of the law must increase, and
rural producers and local administrations should be organized. The ongoing
conflicts over pastures show that there is need for technical, legal and social
regulations and improved rural policies to reclaim the pastures and improve
the existing ones.
Preservation of pastures is important not only for livestock breeding
practices, but also for moor ecosystem (Avcıoğlu et al, 2009). Like other
factors with a direct effect on these issues, the increase in temperatures due
to climate change has serious effects on precipitation changes, drought,
extreme precipitation and agricultural production and food security. Recently
Türkiye, which is located in the east of the Mediterranean Basin, seems to be
exposed to these effects as well (Yalçın and Kara, 2014; Koç and Uzmay, 2016;
Koç et al, 2016; Ağaçayak and Öztürk, 2017; Gökkür and Uysal, 2020).

Pastures: Carbon Sinks

The role of natural meadows and pastures in tropical and mild climatic
zones in global carbon cycle has not yet been defined sufficiently (Hall and
Scurlock, 1991; Hall et al, 1995). The pasture ecosystems are by no means
homogenous (e.g., the savannahs of Africa, the moors of North America and
Russia, the pastures of Europe and Latin America, and cultivated/artificial
meadows). Tropical meadows and pastures at a regional level may cover a

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