Expanding a blueprint for sustainable landscapes

Two project team members stand under a low, green canopy of trees

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Blueprint Project Staff. © Sustainable Agriculture Network

Project overview

This project continues the development of the SAN Blueprint tool, which aims to assess the sustainability of entire landscapes, rather than of individual production units like farms. The original project built a comprehensive website and Blueprint dashboard to publicly display all results and data publicly to all users.

In this latest project, the Blueprint landscape sustainability assessment tool was applied and adapted for the use of an external partner organisation (Swisscontact) and in a new region of Colombia (the Apartadó Municipality). Geographic Information System (GIS) and official secondary data was combined with the perspectives of a range of local stakeholders to give a better local understanding of the condition of a jointly defined territory.

The long-term aim is to support deforestation-free and climate-friendly cocoa supply chains from smallholder communities in Apartadó.

People sat in chairs watch a presentation of various maps

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Project staff present at a Blueprint workshop. © Sustainable Agriculture Network

Key Learnings

The SAN Blueprint Methodological Guide proved to be a valuable tool for assessing social, environmental, and economic issues, building understanding of community capitals and needs, and offering strategic insights for development priorities. This project provided a strong foundation for replicating the Blueprint approach in other landscapes, production systems, and partnerships.
Participatory action research methods of the Blueprint toolkit were positively received by community members and stakeholders in Apartadó and Zona Bananera.
Adopting a participatory landscape sustainability assessment framework for a new region optimized the Blueprint toolkit, making it more efficient and precise for landscape sustainability assessments.
The existing toolkit was enhanced with various new data sources. This included high-resolution Planet Scope images comparing local land use (2019 and 2023) and real-world observations collected through a Landscape Immersion Walk.

Approx. 15 people sit around white tables, watching a presentation

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A workshop run by the Blueprint project. © Swisscontact

Impact

The Blueprint methodology provides accurate insights into both a territory's and individual production unit’s socio-economic and environmental realities, through efficient data collection, high-resolution land use comparisons, and adoption-observation methods for assessing farm’s performance. By involving local stakeholders and reflecting community values and aspirations, Blueprint ensures context-specific responses to risks like deforestation, livelihood gaps, and climate adaptation. Co-designed with Colombian farming communities, it leverages local assets and cultural strengths to develop actionable strategies and a Common Territorial Agenda, driving sustainable landscape management.

Download project outputs

Final report and case-study

Expanding the Blueprint tool: final report and case study

From September 2023 - May 2024, Sustainable Agriculture Network applied their Blueprint landscape tool and adapted it for the use of an external partner organisation (Swisscontact) and in a new region of Colombia (the Apartadó Municipality). Geographic Information System (GIS) and official secondary data was combined with the perspectives of a range of local stakeholders to give a better local understanding of the condition of a jointly defined territory.

The Final Report below details the results of this project and next steps for the Blueprint tool.

The Case Study explores the learning from the original Blueprint project, and details how the tool was adapted to the Apartadó Municipality.

Final report

This page contains the final project outputs of the Expanding the Blueprint tool project, run by Sustainable Agriculture Network from September 2023-May 2024.

PDF

1.71 MB

Case Study

This page contains the final project outputs of the Expanding the Blueprint tool project, run by Sustainable Agriculture Network from September 2023-May 2024.

PDF

2.35 MB

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