Regulation of land use conflicts at indigenous peoples lands based on blockchain platform, russian arctic case study

Introduction. Territories of traditional nature use (TTNU) of indigenous population are among the most vulnerable to nature management conflicts of different origin: socioeconomic, ecological, institutional. These risks are connected with future changes of nature management practices within the 8 advanced development zones foreseen by the recently adopted Strategy of socioeconomic development of the Russian Arctic till 2035.This document mentions indigenous population rights in the course of the planned land use changes. Nevertheless, indigenous communities may be involved in land use conflicts at TTNU because of the overlapping by new land use patterns of new stakeholders. Another problem concerns land use adaptation to modern climate change. Accumulation of appropriate information for indigenous communities’ decision making is very often a difficult process: it is very diverse and scattered. Modern approaches to database composition enable to elaborate a statistical, institutional and spatial data platform for information support of territorial planning procedures at TTNU, especially helpful for indigenous communities living at remoted territories. The goal of this investigation is the elaboration of a multi-functional information platform based on blockchain principles needed to achieve adaptive development of TTNU involved in the process of land use patterns transformation. Blockchain methodology helps to arrange the accumulated data connected with nature management practice and receive a new knowledge for practical use and scientific research development independent from stakeholders lobby groups.

Study area. The study area includes territories of the 8 advanced development zones in the Russian Arctic with Saami, Komi-Izma, Nenets, Enets, Nganasan, Sel’kups, Evenk, Reindeer Yakut, Cuckchi, Dolgans population living there. It is about 3,2% from the region’s population. Up to 25% of the indigenous population is occupied in traditional economy. The study area is situated in the Subarctic and Arctic geographical zones with severe climatic conditions. The dominant environment includes tundra of different types and forest-tundra with rare patches of northern taiga at the southern limit. The geological and tectonic structure of the territory provokes a possibility of earthquakes. Permafrost disruptions are typical. It is stimulated by climatic warming which also causes a risk of radical changes in traditional occupations :loss of hunting and fishing resources, reindeer pastures productivity, etc. Changes of ecological situation may be mainly connected with modern air and water pollution in industrial impact zones and mechanical disruptions. This diverse information is needed for adaptive spatial planning procedures at TTNU to follow the principles of sustainable development disclosed by the Arctic Council documents.

Materials and methods. The investigation is based on the recently published socioeconomic, environmental, ecological statistical and spatial data, field experience in the region as well as in joint international projects with RAIPON. The theoretical fundamentals of the work are based on several concepts of WEF blockchain building, approaches to system analysis in ecology and ecological-economic basic concepts.

Results. The origin of nature management conflicts, is usually connected with an excessive exploitation of regulation and provisioning ecosystem services’ pools. Patterns of such conflicts were presented. Rare are relevant remarks concerning information (spiritual) ecosystem services supporting social cohesion, cultural traditions, sense of place, etc., important for indigenous communities to preserve their identities. This topic was discussed separately. The Federal legislation guarantees the rights of indigenous communities, but to protect themselves they need to consider various data. Similar data is necessary for them to manage TTNU, regarding present climatic changes. This information is necessary to promote adaptive regional development beneficial for regional sustainability. The procedure of conflict detection and forecast for a certain territory is based on separate data sets analysis by independent stakeholders. But nowadays regional data sets are centralized, often not updated in time, not easy to reach. Blockchain structure may be useful to avoid such obstacles, especially when a certain database will be used to record operational processes and ongoing changes in land use connected with their new patterns and climate change. Blockchain methodology may be used to elaborate a distributed register of large various data sets, including visualization of statistics, which may be very helpful for decision making by stakeholders at TTNU and reliable accounting of ongoing land use changes. Blockchain transaction model for nature management at TTNU was elaborated. Data on possible land cover transitions and their results at TTNU were analyzed. Blockchain users were outlined and necessary datasets were described. The structure composition of the suggested model was connected with available information for sets saturation and may be enlarged in future. Obstacles in blockchain approach use at TTNU were discussed.

Discussion. Blockchain technologies proved to be useful in many spheres of economic activities. Examples of blockchain use in nature conservation practice, green energy development, pollution control, etc. were presented as well as blockchain technologies use to solve ecological problems highlighted by the Fourth World Economic Forum. The presented here blockchain structure corresponds to these challenges. But its structure at the same time it is different from the “entirely ecological” direction of blockchain use. Additional information is necessary for nature management, i.e. integrated data processing concerning economic, ecological, environmental, ethniccultural, etc. data. The proper nature management needs interdisciplinary solutions which are reflected in our assets structure. Interdisciplinary solution includes information about specific “revolt” factors in panarchy social-ecological nature management systems (when fast, small events overwhelm large, slow ones). This information is often connected with industrial and transport infrastructure development and should be considered to provide sustainability to indigenous population living at the territories of the advanced economic development as well as demonstrate risks to TTNU connected with climate change and other natural hazards.

Conclusion. Blockchain technology characterize the Fourth Industrial Revolution meeting the challenges of present and future time. The advantages of blockchain approach use at TTNU include the following: — providing a multi-functional platform necessary to ensure multistakeholders’ interests, indigenous communes being among them. — arranging data bases for territorial and local (within TTNU) planning practice contributing to sustainable development and adaptation to modern climate change. — supporting temporal-spatial data assets independent storage and their constant updating available for indigenous communities (and other stakeholders). — supplying new data necessary to forecast nature management conflicts at TTNU. Blockchain solution presented here may promote sustainable pattern of the Arctic zone pioneer economic development regarding indigenous population well-being and ensure optimal use of its nature capital via public-private collaboration.

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