ESRC Society Today

The Rural Economy and Land Use Programme is managed jointly by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC). The rural economy and land use programme enables researchers to work together to investigate the social, economic, environmental and technological challenges faced by rural areas. The programme will encourage social and economic vitality of rural areas and promote the protection and conservation of the rural environment.

The RELU Strategic Advisory Committee has identified four interdisciplinary themes as the core areas of research for the programme:

• Theme A: Integrated solutions for land and water resource use and management 
• Theme B: The environmental basis of rural economies and regeneration 
• Theme C: Successful and sustainable food products and food chains 
• Theme D: Economic and social interactions with the rural environment   

Further information

contact: Prof Philip Lowe, University of Newcastle
tel: + 44 (0)191 222 6903
fax: + 44 (0)191 222 5411
email: relu@ncl.ac.uk or philip.lowe@newcastle.ac.uk
web: www.relu.ac.uk 

ESRC contact: Owen.Dowsett@esrc.ac.uk - Tel: 01793 444189

Data Support

• RELU Data Support Service (DSS)

Phase 1 awards

• Climate Change, Non-Point Pollution and Land Use: Modelling Interactions
• A Cross-Disciplinary Methodology to Promote an Holistic Understanding of Diffuse Pollution Issues in Rural Environments
• Co-Operative Management of the Agricultural Environment (Co-ManAge)
• Designing and Implementing Large Scale Experiments in Land Use
• Building Networks - RELU Capacity Building Programme: Exploiting Options for the Eastern US & Nearby European Continent
• Private Sector Environment Standards: Impact on Ecological Performance & International Competitiveness of UK Agriculture
• Data Resources for Rural Sustainability Research: Realising Their Combined Potential
• A Study to Generate New Understandings of Ecological, Economic and Social Interactions in a Lake District Environment
• Eating Biodiversity: An Investigation of the Links between Quality Food Production and Biodiversity Protection
• Developing an Interdisciplinary Approach to Address Environmental and Social Issues Resulting from Changes in Land Use
• Comparative Assessment of Environmental, Community & Nutritional Impacts of Consuming Fruit & Vegetables Produced Locally
• Biological Alternatives to Chemical Pesticide Inputs in the Food Chain: An Assessment of Sustainability
• Developing Tools for Interdisciplinary Research: Physical and Social Science Perspectives on the Use of Rural Catchments
• Developing Spatial Data for the Classification of Rural Areas
• Warmwater Fish Production as a Niche Production and Market Diversification Strategy for Organic Arable Farmers
• Development of a Landscape Intervention Decision Support System (LIDSS) to Maximise Net Social Benefit
• Implications of a Nutrition Driven Food Policy for Land Use and the Rural Environment
• Gentrifying Nature: An Investigation of the Social Use and Modification of Nature in a Leicestershire Village
• Achieving Sustainable Catchment Management: Developing Integrated Approaches and Tools to Inform Future Policies
• Learning and Research for Sustainable Agro-Ecosystems by both Farmers and Scientists
• Sustainable and Holistic Food Chains for Recycling Livestock Waste to Land
• Integrated Modelling and Assessment of Agricultural Sustainability - Scoping How to Support Policy Relevant Assessments
• Sustainable Upland Management for Multiple Benefits
• Integration of Social, Natural Sciences to Develop Improved Tools: Assessing and Managing Food Chain Risks
• Analysing Visual Quality in Relation to Landscape Change Scenarios: An Assessment of the Requirements
• Re-Bugging the System: Promoting Adoption of Alternative Pest Management Strategies in Field Crop Systems
• Building Capacity to Investigate the Potential Role of Sustainable Agricultural Intensification in AgroEcological System
• Integrating Spiatial Data on the Rural Economy, Land Use and Biodiversity
• RELU: The International Context
• Development of a Rural Economyand Land Use Simulation Modelling Strategy
• A Review of Recent and Current French Initiatives in Rural Economy and Land Use Research
• Soils - The Foundation of the Rural Economy?
• Calming Troubled Waters: Making Interdisciplinarity Work
• The Environmental, Economic and Social Impact of Game Shooting in the UK
• Learning from the South: Mixed Farming in Stressed Environments
• Landscape as an integrating Framework for Rural Policy and Planning

Phase 2 awards

• Managing Uncertainty in Dynamic Socio-Environmental Systems: An Application to UK Uplands
• Angling in the Rural Environment: Social, Economic, Ecological and Geomorphological Interactions
• An Integrated Analysis of Scale Effects in Alternative Agricultural Systems
• Improving the Success of Agri-Environment Initiatives: the Role of Farmer Learning and Landscape Context
• Collaborative Frameworks in Land Management: A Case Study on Integrated Deer Management
• Integrated Land & Water Management in Floodplains: Experience of Agricultural Flood Defence Schemes in England and Wales
• Understanding environmental knowledge controversies : the case of flood risk management
• Social, Economic and Environmental Implications of Increasing Rural Land Use under Energy Crops
• Catchment Hydrology, Resources, Economics and Management (ChREAM): Integrated Modelling of WFD Impacts upon Rural Land Use
• Evaluating the Options for Combining Economically, Socially and Ecologically Sustainable Agriculture
• A Landscape-Scale Analysis of the Sustainability of the Hill Farming Economy and Impact of Farm Production Decisions on Upland Landscapes and Biodiversity

Phase 3 awards

• Social and Environmental Inequalities in Rural Areas
• Memory and Prediction in Plant Disease Management: A comparative analysis of Dutch Elm Disease and 'Sudden Oak Death' in the UK
• Assessing the potential risk of, and possible responses to, zoonotic diseases on the development of recreational use of British forests and wild-lands
• Understanding and Acting Within Loweswater: A Community Approach to Catchment Management
  Developing a Catchment Management Template for the Protection of Water Resources: Exploiting Experience from the UK, Eastern USA and nearby Europe 
• Reducing Escherichia coli O157 risk in rural communities
• Growing risk? The potential impact of plant disease on land use and the UK rural economy
• Lost in Translation: a cross-disciplinary analysis of knowledge exchange and effectiveness in animal disease management
• Decision-making frameworks in management of livestock disease: interaction of epidemiology, economics and politics
• Integrated systems for farm diversification into energy production by anaerobic digestion: implications for rural development, land use and environment
• Science in the field: Understanding the changing role of expertise in the rural economy