Dear Colleagues,

This is an invitation to contribute to a Special Issue of Sustainabilty aiming at documenting the latest advancements in the design, implementation, and monitoring of interventions on the soil–vegetation system to mitigate the risks associated with natural hazards. Recent literature identifies such interventions as Nature-Based Solutions (NBS), since the overarching objective is to mitigate risks in harmony with earth system processes. To deliver effective risk mitigation, NBS need to modify patches in terrestrial landscapes, thereby requiring the consensus of entire communities. This has become an active area of research in an effort to address all the facets of a complex challenge. The design, deployment, and verification of the functioning of NBS prototypes against expected performance is a prerequisite for the evaluation of achievable risk mitigation by a system of NBS deployed in, e.g., a catchment. This geo-biophysical evidence provides a necessary reference for interactions within stakeholder communities towards the co-design and co-deployment of multiple NBS interventions within the landscape, with potential impacts on community assets and activities. Both earth system science and the sustainable use of natural resources are benefiting from such advances.

We aim at publishing manuscripts of high quality both on scientific and review contributions that highlight innovative NBS, both in terms of the bio-geophysical aspects of design, deployment, and experimental verification and the participatory processes towards consensus-building on the deployment of the NBS systems required to deliver the expected risk mitigation. Contributions on the ex-ante evaluation of benefits are particularly welcome, especially where combined with studies on the upscaling and replication of NBS prototypes.

Dr. Massimo Menenti
Dr. Silvia Maria Alfieri
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• hydro-meteorological hazards
• water resources
• extreme events
• land cover dynamics
• manipulation of the soil – vegetation system
• risk mitigation
• assessment and monitoring of vulnerability
• mitigation of impacts of extreme events