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The number and sizes of informal settlements are expected to increase drastically in the future, and dramatically so in Sub-Saharan Africa, where migration from rural to urban areas is increasing, and poverty and food insecurity threaten livelihoods. Data sources explaining livelihood factors in informal settlements are scarce, and often highly disputed. In this study, Kibera is investigated, one of the largest informal settlements in Africa. The main aim is to analyze differences in livelihood factors across the villages in Kibera, and to explain some of the existing discrepancies in food security levels among its population. In particular, livelihood factors such as tribe, welfare and trust can explain some of the variation in food security across 12 of the 13 villages located in Kibera. The analyses inform of significant differences across the villages when it comes to, among others, income, food insecurity, ownership of land in rural areas, tribal background and trust levels in strangers and community leads. To reach the millions of people living in informal settlements now, and increasingly so in the future, it is advised that research and implementation go hand in hand, with enhanced understanding of the complexities within rural–urban food systems to ensure solutions that are affordable and accessible to low-income groups. On this pathway to fight poverty and hunger in the future, today’s policies and programs must take such complexities into account to positively contribute to strengthening the resiliency and sustainability of rural–urban food systems by ensuring an increase in welfare levels with zero climate impact.

As a consequence of climate change and urbanization, many cities will have to deal with more flooding and extreme heat stress. This paper presents a framework to maximize the effectiveness of Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) for flood risk reduction and thermal comfort enhancement. The framework involves an assessment of hazards with the use of models and field measurements. It also detects suitable implementation sites for NBS and quantifies their effectiveness for thermal comfort enhancement and flood risk reduction. The framework was applied in a densely urbanized study area, for which different small-scale urban NBS and their potential locations for implementation were assessed. The overall results show that the most effective performance in terms of flood mitigation and thermal comfort enhancement is likely achieved by applying a range of different measures at different locations. Therefore, the work presented here shows the potential of the framework to achieve an effective combination of measures and their locations, which was demonstrated on the case of the Sukhumvit area in Bangkok (Thailand). This can be particularly suitable for assessing and planning flood mitigation measures in combination with heat stress reduction.

Current industrial production is driven by increasing globalization, which has led to a steady increase in production volumes and complexity of products aimed at the pursuit of meeting the needs of customers. In this context, one of the main tools in the management of customer value is Lean Manufacturing or Production, though it is considered primarily as a set of tools to reduce the total cost of the resources needed to achieve such needs. This philosophy has recently been enriched in the literature with case studies that link Lean Management (LM) with the improvement of environmental sustainability. The consequence is an expansion of the Computer Integrated Manufacturing (CIM); indeed, CIM, currently, combining and integrating the key business functions (e.g., business, engineering, manufacturing, and information management) with a view of the life cycle, does not highlight the strategic role of the environmental aspects. In order to deal with the increasingly rapid environmental degradation that is reflected in society, in terms of both economy and quality of life, Industrial Ecology (IE) introduced a new paradigm of principles and instruments of analysis and decision support (e.g., Life Cycle Assessment—LCA, Social Life Cycle Assessment -SLCA, Material Flow Account—MFA, etc.) that can be considered as the main basis for integrating the environmental aspects in each strategy, design, production, final product, and end of life management, through the re-engineering of processes and activities towards the development of an eco-industrial system. This paper presents the preliminary observations based on a analysis of both theories (LM-IE) and provides a possible assessment of the key factors relevant to their integration in a “lean environmental management”, highlighting both positives (lights) and possible barriers (shadows).

Strategic environmental assessment (SEA) is a widely applied policy tool that aims to aid decision-makers in making informed, higher-quality decisions that minimize negative environmental impacts. However, different types of uncertainties complicate the ex ante assessment of environmental impacts. Literature suggests uncertainties are often not well addressed, resulting in inaccurate and even unreliable SEAs. At the same time, SEA literature offers limited guidance in how to systematically identify and deal with uncertainties. Therefore, in this paper, we present an analytical framework for characterizing and classifying different forms of uncertainty in SEA, and for identifying strategies for dealing with these uncertainties. The framework is based on literature on uncertainties in other subdomains of the environmental sciences. The framework is applied to five case studies of SEAs for spatial planning in The Netherlands in order to illustrate and critically reflect on our framework, and to bridge the gap between theory and practice. Based on these case studies we concluded the following: (1) The framework is useful for identifying uncertainties in SEA in a systematic way; (2) There is a discrepancy between how uncertainties are dealt with in theory and in practice; (3) In practice, uncertainties seem to be dealt with in a rather implicit way. The framework may help dealing with uncertainties more systematically and more proactively; (4) The most successful way of coping with uncertainties seems to be the application of multiple strategies.

Sustainability usually refers to the ability to maintain a certain standard of human lifestyle without causing environmental damage or any other destruction to nature and biodiversity. It is beneficial for human health and well-being in addition to socio-economic benefits and contributes to environmental integrity. However, as Robert Swan (1956) once stated: “the greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it”—this is true even today; namely, there are still serious threats to the planet and there is “a short time period” for action. We all have to be obliged to save the planet in which we live throughout our daily and local activities. In this study, the authors provide an overview of the meaning of sustainable tourism and its relationship to all global Sustainable Development Goals established by UN (2015) as one way to achieve a brighter sustainable future and society for everyone, leaving no one behind. More specifically, the case of Kosovo and its potential for the development of sustainable tourism is analyzed. In this case, the authors aim to present the potential to serve the local tradition, culture, diversity, and inclusiveness through sustainable actions in the tourism and hospitality sector.

Africa has experienced unprecedented growth across a range of development indices for decades. However, this growth is often at the expense of Africa’s biodiversity and ecosystems, jeopardizing the livelihoods of millions of people depending on the goods and services provided by nature, with broader consequences for achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Encouragingly, Africa can still take a more sustainable path. Here, we synthesize the key learnings from the African Ecological Futures project. We report results from a participatory scenario planning process around four collectively-owned scenarios and narratives for the evolution of Africa’s ecological resource base over the next 50 years. These scenarios provided a lens to review pressures on the natural environment, through the drivers, pressures, state, impacts, and responses (DPSIR) framework. Based on the outcomes from each of these steps, we discuss opportunities to reorient Africa’s development trajectories towards a sustainable path. These opportunities fall under the broad categories of “effective natural resource governance”, “strategic planning capabilities”, “investment safeguards and frameworks”, and “new partnership models”. Underpinning all these opportunities are “data, management information, and decision support frameworks”. This work can help inform collaborative action by a broad set of actors with an interest in ensuring a sustainable ecological future for Africa.

Growing scientific evidence for the indispensable role of environmental sustainability in sustainable development calls for appropriate frameworks and indicators for environmental sustainability assessment (ESA). In this paper, we operationalize and update the footprint-boundary ESA framework, with a particular focus on its methodological and application extensions to the national level. By using the latest datasets available, the planetary boundaries for carbon emissions, water use and land use are allocated to 28 selected countries in comparison to the corresponding environmental footprints. The environmental sustainability ratio (ESR)—an internationally comparable indicator representing the sustainability gap between contemporary anthropogenic interference and critical capacity thresholds—allows one to map the reserve or transgression of the nation-specific environmental boundaries. While the geographical distribution of the three ESRs varies across nations, in general, the worldwide unsustainability of carbon emissions is largely driven by economic development, while resource endowments play a more central role in explaining national performance on water and land use. The main value added of this paper is to provide concrete evidence of the usefulness of the proposed framework in allocating overall responsibility for environmental sustainability to sub-global scales and in informing policy makers about the need to prevent the planet’s environment from tipping into an undesirable state.