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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Sustain. Food Syst.

Sec. Land, Livelihoods and Food Security

Volume 9 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fsufs.2025.1685945

This article is part of the Research TopicIndigenous and Local Knowledge as a Catalyst for Sustainable Agriculture and Food SecurityView all 21 articles

Future-scaping: Lessons learned from co-visioning a resilient future within an integrated landscape-seascape approach in eastern coastal Taiwan

Provisionally accepted
Paulina  G. KarimPaulina G. Karim*Kuang-Chung  LeeKuang-Chung Lee
  • National Dong Hwa University, Shoufeng, Taiwan

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

This study addresses knowledge gaps in long-term integrated landscape–seascape approaches (ILSA) by examining the facilitation of future-scaping—a participatory method for co-visioning futures and setting actionable goals—in the Xinshe "Forest–River–Farmlands–Ocean" Eco-Agriculture Initiative in eastern coastal Taiwan. Drawing on facilitator perspectives since 2016, we show how future-scaping tools helped the Dipit and pateRungan Indigenous tribes, government agencies, and the local school articulate 2026 and 2050 visions and translate them into 19 priority objectives. The process revealed shared aspirations for ecological integrity, sustainable agriculture, cultural revival, youth return, and equitable governance; fostered inclusive knowledge weaving; and enabled adaptive shifts in the initiative's concluding phase. Lessons learned are discussed through the Problems, People, and Process dimensions of the Xinshe ILSA's 5P+S model, emphasizing structured flexibility to bridge aspiration–implementation gaps, sustained inclusivity across knowledge systems, and facilitation as a key boundary function. As a model for rural transformation, the Xinshe ILSA affirms co-produced, iterative approaches as vital for navigating nexus challenges and advancing toward living in harmony with nature.

Keywords: integrated landscape-seascape approach, future-scaping, participatory co-visioning, adaptive co-management, Indigenous and local knowledge

Received: 14 Aug 2025; Accepted: 24 Sep 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 Karim and Lee. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: Paulina G. Karim, scapeslab@gms.ndhu.edu.tw

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