Context-specific Knowledge and Values of Rural Activities on Hillsides

in Taiwan
Li-Pei Peng1* and Yu-Yu Lin2
Abstract
The social-ecological system is a complex adaptive system, the intertwined process and
result of the interaction between humans and nature. Hillsides are usually located at the boundary
of human-nature interaction, and the location of rural activities on hillsides is a frontier and rich
field worth observing. This study argues that identifying the values of different context-specific
knowledge can help understand the complex adaptive system of SES, thereby obtaining insights
and implications for moving towards sustainability. In this sense, this study aims to understand
the multiple stakeholders' identification in different locations and with the ability of various
context-specific knowledge to identify the value of rural activities. Identify rural activities with
multiple stakeholders to understand their value and spatial attributes. Simultaneously, the SolVES
model combines the locations of rural activities with environmental variables can understand the
attributes and spatial distribution characteristics of rural activities on hillsides. This helps grasp
the specific context of Taiwan's rural activities and provides references for policymakers in rural
planning and environmental governance.
Keywords: Context-specific Knowledge, Rural Activity, Social Values, Social-ecological System,
Zhuoshui River Basin
1. Introduction
The social-ecological system (SES) is a complex adaptive system intertwined by humans and
nature. The value identification with different context-specific knowledge helps understand the
complex adaptive system of SES, which gains research insights and implications towards
sustainability (Schoon et al., 2015; Preiser et al., 2018; De Vos et al., 2019; Schlüter et al., 2019).
It is worth observing the fringe areas between humans and nature on hillsides due to the significant
connections of rural activities. Although rural activities on hillsides can manifest the importance
of frontier context-specific knowledge, previous SES studies have addressed less co-creating
knowledge through a participatory approach to understanding multiple stakeholders’ value of
rural activities. Therefore, this study assumes that the connections can be understood through
multiple stakeholders' identification of the values of rural activities. This study aims to understand
the multiple stakeholders' identification in different areas and with education levels which proxy
the ability of various context-specific knowledge in identifying the value of rural activities.
2. Methodology
This study first inventoried the theoretical literature on rural activities and held a local
workshop of multiple stakeholders to collect representatives of rural activities in the Zhuoshui
River Basin. We obtained consensus and summarized eight types of rural activities: A. Hunting
and gathering, B. production and selling, C. facility maintenance, D. Leisure, E. experiencing, F.
education, G. place attachment, and H. local belief. Secondly, use an overlay of the township

1
* Professor, Department of Bio-Industry Communication and Development, National Taiwan
University. Corresponding author: lipei@ntu.edu.tw
2
Research Assistant, Department of Bio-Industry Communication and Development, National
Taiwan University.
boundary land use data 2015 and GIS data of the Zhuoshuixi watershed area as the primary map
for space identification in workshops. Third, the PPGIS workshop on rural activities on sloping
land in the Zhuoshuixi River Basin invites residents and community leaders to conduct rural
activity surveys and location identification. Finally, the SolVES model incorporates
environmental variables to understand rural activities' attributes and spatial distribution on
hillsides.
2-1. Study area
This study focuses on the rural hillside activities in the Zhuoshui River Basin. The river is
the longest in Taiwan, totalling 187 kilometers. The basin covers an area of more than 3,000
square kilometers. The basin covers several counties and townships. It is an important agricultural
production area in Taiwan, and the small farming society is dominant. The various industrial
characteristics such as primary, processing and services diversify rural activities, and various
industrial operations, social and cultural activities are relatively abundant, which can be described
as the epitome of Taiwan's hillside countryside. Therefore, this study analyses this area as the
scope to explore the attributes and spatial distribution of rural activities on hillsides. (Figure 1)

Figure 1 The study area and the PPGIS workshops

2-2. PPGIS
For a deeper understanding of the characteristics and distribution of rural activities on hillsides in
the Zhuoshui River Basin, this study adopts PPGIS workshops, inviting multiple stakeholders to
identify the value of rural activities and understand the living experiences regarding spatial
location of multiple stakeholders in participatory manner perceptions (Chung et al., 2019). We
selected Zhushan, Lugu, Shuili, Xinyi, Yuchi and Renai Townships to hold PPGIS workshops on
rural activities. The invited participants are residents, farmers, community leaders, etc.,
representing a well understanding of local rural activities and environments. Three stages method
is implemented: 1) briefing operation processes, 2) filling out the consent form for participating
in the workshop and the questionnaire, and 3) using Google Earth to identify the location of the
rural activity spaces. Restate Peng (2023), this study divided Renai-Xinyi, Shuili-Yuchi and Lugu-
Zhushan districts into three groups based on geographical characteristics, held 6 PPGIS
workshops, and interviewed 54 stakeholders to obtain a total of 2,479 points of rural activity value.
2-3. Assessing the values of rural activities
The social values for ecosystem services model (SolVES) is a GIS application for evaluating
the value of cultural services of ecosystem services. Previous studies used spatial mapping to
construct a methodology incorporating social values into ecosystem assessment (Brown, 2004;
Sherrouse et al., 2011), presenting the results as the measure of non-monetary benefits, the spatial
relationship between physical environment conditions and social values in the study area.
By using SolVES, this study applies similar conceptual manipulations to the quantification
and spatial assessment of the values of rural activities to reveal the attitudes and preferences of
respondents and to illustrate the links between the value, environmental characteristics and
location of their rural activities and analyze the trade-off relationship between the value of rural
activities multiple stakeholders. They integrate and quantify the spatial information on the value
of rural activities and provide decision-makers with assessment tools for rural activities and
environmental variables.
This study uses the respondents’ education level to distinguish between high education, e.g.,
less context-specific knowledge and low education, e.g., more context-specific knowledge. The
analysis of the value identification differences of multiple stakeholders and various groups is
tested through the SolVES model. This study integrates the data from the National Land
Surveying and Mapping Center of the Ministry of the Interior and the Taiwan Agricultural
Research Institute into 12 environmental variables.
3. Findings and Discussions
The values of leisure and education activities are important for all districts' results (Figure
2). Respondents with high education levels in Renai and Xinyi areas identified more emphasis on
education activities, while those with low education levels paid more attention to local belief
activities; respondents with high education had less focus on gathering and hunting activities,
while respondents with low education levels presented contrary. Both education levels of
respondents in Shuili and Yuchi identified the importance of production and selling activities,
speculating that rural production and selling activities are highly dependent on environmental
conditions. Respondents with high education levels in Lugu and Zhushan areas identified
importance to production and selling activities, while respondents with low education levels may
have been farming for a long time and deeply connected with the local context; they identified
importance to recreational activities and experience activities. This study confirms that material
values dominate the primary rural production and selling activities in environmentally sensitive
areas. At the same time, the long-term connection of aboriginal people and local knowledge in a
specific context, although not supported by higher formal education, still helps rural activities of
local beliefs and leisure towards spiritual value. The contribution of environmental variables
represents the degree of influence of land use on rural activities, and the higher the value, the
greater the influence. We found that the variables, e.g., built land, recreation land and facility land,
significantly contribute to rural activities in all districts. Leisure and education activities in Renai
and Xinyi areas mainly contributed from the variables of built and facility lands such as local
temples and churches, sacrificial places, or sacred trees. Slope and orchard land variables
primarily affect production and selling activities in Yuchi and Shuili areas. The leisure and
experiencing activities in the Lugu and Zhushan areas contributed to recreation and facility land
variables. In contrast, the production and selling activities are affected by the variables of bamboo
lands elated to the abundant bamboo industries.

Fig. 2 Spatial distribution of rural activity values for leisure and education and maximum values
 Table 1 The contribution of environmental variables on rural activities
District Renai & Xinyi Yuchi & Shuili Zhushan & Lugu
Edu. Highly Low Highly Low Highly Low Low
educated educated educated educated educated educated educated
Env. (Education) (Religion) (Production (Production (Production (Leisure) (Experienc
variable & Selling) & Selling) & Selling) ing)
Paddy field 0.2 *15.2 4.5 5.5 13.5 4.6 2.3
Upland field 0.1 0.9 0.9 ***34.1 *15.4 5.4 4.9
Orchard *23.5 9.3 ***65.0 **28.5 **17.9 4.3 7.2
Bamboo 1.1 1.7 0.9 1.9 ***23.1 **14.8 *12.9
Forest 1.7 1.1 1.3 1.6 2.1 2.9 4.5
Built ***28.7 **19.1 0.5 6.5 0.3 4.6 0.8
Traffic 11.2 0.4 0 0.8 0.1 1.1 6.7
Recreation 1.1 7.3 0.7 0.5 0 *8.3 **16.7
Facility **29.9 ***32.3 1.3 0.4 11.1 ***42.6 ***24.0
Water 0.6 1.6 1.4 4.5 1.7 0.5 1.6
Other 0.6 3.4 *12.7 2.5 12.5 7.9 7.3
Slope 3.2 8.1 **20.6 *13.2 2.7 4.4 11.4
Note: ***Highest, **Second highest, *Third highest; Unit: ％
4. Conclusions
This study highlights the significant connections of fringe areas between humans and nature
with various geographical characteristics on hillsides, filling the gap in its limited understanding
of context-specific knowledge and values of rural activities. This study provides empirical
evidence from PPGIS reflecting the complex adaptive system of SES on hillsides in Taiwan. In
particular, for the planning discipline, we illustrate the spatial identifications and associated
environmental variables of the respondents with different levels of education. This insight offers
in mastering the various context-specific knowledge features on sustainable land use policy. The
results can be adopted as a reference for relevant rural planning and environmental governance.
Acknowledgements
This study was funded by Taiwan’s Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST 109-2621-
M-002-007-MY3; MOST 110-2321-B-002-017-).
References
1) Brown, G. (2004). Mapping Spatial Attributes in Survey Research for Natural Resource Management:
Methods and Applications. Society & Natural Resources, 18 (1),17-39.
2) Chung, M. K., Lu, D. J., Tsai, B. W., & Chou, K. T. (2019). Assessing Effectiveness of PPGIS on
Protected Areas by Governance Quality: A Case Study of Community-Based Monitoring in Wu-Wei-
Kang Wildlife Refuge, Taiwan. Sustainability, 11(15), 4154-4173.
3) De Vos, A., Biggs, R., & Preiser, R. (2019). Methods for understanding social-ecological systems: a
review of place-based studies. Ecology and Society 24(4): 16.
4) Peng, LP. (2023) Understanding leverage points of rural activities on hillsides in Taiwan. Sustain Sci.
5) Preiser, R., Biggs, R., De Vos, A., & Folke, C. (2018). Social-ecological systems as complex adaptive
systems: organizing principles for advancing research methods and approaches. Ecology and Society
23(4): 46.
6) Schlüter, M., Haider, J., Lade, J., Lindkvist, E., Martin, R., Orach, K. and Wijermans, N. and Folke, C.
(2019). Capturing Emergent Phenomena in Social-Ecological Systems: An Analytical Framework.
Ecology and Society 24(3):11.
7) Schoon, M. and Van der Leeuw, S. (2015). The shift toward social-ecological systems perspectives:
insights into the human-nature relationship. Natures Sciences Sociétés 23: 166-174.
8) Sherrouse, B. C., Clement, J. M., & Semmens, D. J. (2011). A GIS application for assessing, mapping,
and quantifying the social values of ecosystem services. Applied Geography, 31(2), 748-760.