Sub-theme 3: Land use controversies and reindeer husbandry

Participants: Per Sanström (lead), Vera Hausner, Patrik Lantto, Else Grete Broderstad

Objectives: To produce maps over multiple land uses significant for the reindeer husbandry, and to examine how these maps are taken into account in planning processes both by the reindeer husbandry itself and by the public planning authorities.

Local and Indigenous communities face opportunities as well as major challenges when it comes to adapting and responding to different development and in some cases exploitation projects like mining, power lines and plants, forestry, cabin sites, roads, railroads, and planned wind turbines. For local municipal politicians these projects and prospects promise a golden age of revenues and employment. For those living of the land, like the reindeer herders, such activities already add to heavily exploited land areas. The multiple land uses have impacts on reindeer pastures and traditional land use activities, increasing the risk for land use conflicts (Kivinen 2015; Sandström 2015). Maps have been produced on pastures and multiple land uses by governmental agencies at different levels, but the total impact of e.g. industrial exploration and development activities on reindeer husbandry still assert itself. It also unclear to what extent the maps produced reflects reindeer herders’ knowledge and needs of the pastures and their perception of risks related to multiple land uses (Turi & Keskitalo 2014). In Sweden general overview plans for reindeer husbandry is maintained by the Sami Parliament. But more importantly, more detailed reindeer husbandry plans are now developed by each individual reindeer herding community (Sandström et al. 2003). Sandström (2015) present a new approach by co-producing maps in dialogue with reindeer herders by use of pGIS in Sweden. This work also speaks to the OECD processes mentioned in sub-theme 2. In Norway, the 2007 Reindeer Husbandry Act requires districts to make rules and a land use plan including seasonal pastures, migratory corridors and resources available. Furthermore, regional plans that could be used to balance traditional use and other land use activities are currently developed in Troms County in Norway. Meanwhile it is unclear to what extent land use planning in the two countries include knowledge and maps produced by reindeer herders themselves. In this sub theme we will study the governance system of land area planning in Norway and Sweden in relation to the multiple land use which can have cumulative impacts on traditional land use activities. We will compare governance interactions on multiple levels pertaining to the increase in resource exploitation, piecemeal development and fragmentation of pasturelands and subsequent land use conflicts with reindeer husbandry. We will study the process of co-producing the reindeer land use plans on local level in both countries. On the Norwegian side we will study the governance interactions resulting from the participatory process of developing a new regional plan for reindeer husbandry in Troms County. A smaller case study will include a pGIS study for comparison to the Swedish case (Sandström, 2015). We will study the different land use planning systems and evaluate how the maps serve as a conflict resolution tool between the reindeer husbandry, public authorities and extractive industries.