Linking Cork to Cork Oak Landscapes: Mapping the Value Chain of Cork Production in Portugal

Irene Holm Sørensen,Tobias Plieninger,José Muñoz-Rojas,Cristina Quintas-Soriano,Mario Torralba

doi:10.3389/fsufs.2021.787045

Abstract

Traditional farming landscapes in South and Central Portugal, known as montados, are affected by global socio-economic and biophysical pressures, putting the sustainability of the systems in jeopardy. Cork oak trees (Quercus suber L.) are characteristic features of these complex agro-silvo-pastoral agroforestry systems, delivering a globally important product, cork. The increasingly distant, global scale of decision making and trade can consequently be observed on the local, landscape, scale. In this study, we use a value chain approach to test the concept that landscape products can ensure sustainable management of the landscape of origin. We interviewed agents—cork producers, intermediaries, industrial transformers, and winemakers—about the challenges they perceived in the business and how these were connected to the landscape of origin. We illustrate the network of agents and sub-actors involved in the sector and highlight the most prominent concerns. We conclude that this approach can reveal the major points for determining the future of the montado, and we suggest that collaboration amongst value chain agents can be a pathway to landscape sustainability.

Highlights

Traditional farming landscapes worldwide bear many relevant environmental and social values, but are threatened by multiple socio-economic and biophysical pressures (Plieninger et al, 2006)
We argue that the value chain of cork and the interconnectedness with the montado landscape have a high potential to illustrate the positive impact of value chains for the sustainability of producer landscapes, and to reveal leverage points for influencing landscape sustainability outcomes along the value chain
The novelty of our approach is that we address these three goals from a landscape sustainability perspective, under which cork is considered a landscape product contributing to the sustainability of its landscape of origin, the montado

Summary

Introduction

Traditional farming landscapes worldwide bear many relevant environmental and social values, but are threatened by multiple socio-economic and biophysical pressures (Plieninger et al, 2006). Defined as low-intensity systems characterised by a continuation of practices across generations (Bignal et al, 1996), these extensive farming systems are influenced by socio-economic factors and political decisions These have often affected the local landscape negatively by eradicating smallscale landscape structures i.e., homogenisation and agricultural intensification as well as forest degradation and landscape simplification (Ingram et al, 2018). In such a context, fertile lands are either intensified or converted into urban settlements and marginal farming land is abandoned as a consequence of lack in profitability and rural outmigration (Plieninger et al, 2016). Global supply and trade in alternative energy (i.e. biofuels), foodstuffs, and textiles is booming in an attempt to keep up with

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