REGENERATIVE PLACE practices are often deeply embedded in cultural landscapes, are shaped by historical, social and political contexts and support the self-regulating regenerative capability of a living system. 

This Regenerative Place research project explores regenerative place practices cultures and systems and their contribution to human, more-than-human and planetary wellbeing. The project focuses on regenerative land practices which are place-based and shaped by their place-specific natural, social, cultural and spiritual contexts.  They are part of living systems  manifest in any place where people value their relationship with land, water and nature; where people care for and learn from the land for mutual benefit. Being regenerative describes the self-sustaining and continuing process of a living system and all its participants to co-evolve into diversity and complexity (1). Regenerative approaches respect land and nature, and position them at the center of attention. At the same time, place is more than just a designated physical location, it is a space that is uniquely created from the interactions between people, land and nature over time. Place is relational so to speak, where people, land and nature are constantly and inextricably in relation to each other. Place is alive with relationships.

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There are many different regenerative land practices. Some are relatively new while others represent tried and tested traditions or Indigenous knowledge of caring for places, which communities relied upon for centuries and millennia. Yet many such practices have either been lost or seem at odds with Western land governance and natural resource management thinking. Some of these regenerative land practices are being revived as they can offer place-based and bio-culturally appropriate approaches to communities and land managers to address a multitude of intersectional challenges. They have the potential to simultaneously address social justice, ecological and cultural issues such as land-use and access, climate change and biodiversity loss and the disconnection of people from land and nature. 

An essential step in recognising the value and potential of regenerative land practices in Western land governance and natural resource management thinking is to listen to and learn from the stories about what hinders and enables these practices within their places, cultures and living systems. Regenerative land practices that are bio-culturally relevant can contribute to healthy and sustainable communities and their future generations, while contributing to the regeneration of the global biosphere and planetary wellbeing. This project aims to distill the insights from three case studies of regenerative land practices and make recommendations for policy and decision-making about land-use, land-management and land governance systems.