THE ROLE OF HORSE KEEPING IN TRANSFORMING
PERI-URBAN LANDSCAPES
Monica HAMMER, Madeleine BONOW & Mona PETERSSON
Södertörn University, Sweden, monica.hammer@sh.se, madeleine.bonow@sh.se & mona.petersson@sh.se
Horse keeping provide a number ecosystem services to society and also affect the
environment in various positive and negative ways. During recent decades, the number
of horses has increased rapidly both in Europe and Northern America, but now in a
different role as providers of cultural and recreational services for human well-being.
In this case study of the peri-urban areas of Stockholm, Sweden, we analyze this
ongoing transformation and the implications for landscape planning through the lens of
ecosystem services, including cultural services. The peri-urban landscape is
characterized by a diversified and fragmented land-use with strong relations to functions
belonging to an urbanized society with urban, mobile life-styles. At the same time, there
are long traditions of agriculture in the urban periphery of Stockholm. The rapidly
increasing number of horses affect land use and ecological status in different ways.
Horse farms and their associated functions occupy large land surfaces in peri-urban
areas where the competition for land is already high. The growing number of horses has
promoted a development of "horsiculture" with many horses grazing outdoors on land
formerly used as agricultural land and for grazing of life-stock. Also, recreational riding
demands access to land for riding trails. However, so far horse keeping is rarely explicitly
included in physical planning. We discuss the need for more comprehensive practices
for including horse keeping in landscape planning taking all types of ecosystem services
and key interlinkages between them into account.