ORIGINAL ARTICLE Developing sustainable water and land management options: reflections on a transdisciplinary research process Carsten Mann 1 • Martina Scha ¨fer 1 Received: 22 July 2016 / Accepted: 22 June 2017 Ó Springer Japan KK 2017 Abstract Knowledge production for sustainable land management requires close cooperation between research and practice. Drawing on insights from the ELaN project, which has developed a set of products to foster integrated water and land management in Northeast Germany, this paper compares two specific transdisciplinary research processes, seeking to obtain a clearer picture of what influences the acceptance and up-take of generated research products beyond methodological considerations of transdisciplinary research design and stakeholder interac- tion. We highlight differences in intensity of transdisci- plinary interaction and resulting product quality with regard to two main project outcomes: a manual for administrators and a decision-support system (DSS) for farmers. While the development of the manual was char- acterised by intensive exchange with practitioners, co- production of knowledge and mutual learning, the design and development of the DSS was mainly pushed by researchers with sporadic practice interaction. Beside dif- ferences in participatory design, the practical relevance of the manual increased throughout the project due to political changes on the European level, whereas socio-political demand for the DSS did not change substantially. We discuss the relevance of appropriate transdisciplinary pro- ject management versus the significance of surrounding context conditions for increasing the societal relevance of outcomes and formulate recommendations for enhancing transdisciplinary research. Keywords Transdisciplinary research Á Participation Á Knowledge integration Á Meta-reflection Á Sustainable land management Á Risk assessment Á Decision-support system Á Water reuse Introduction Continuously pressing environmental problems, such as climate change, biodiversity loss, natural resource exploitation, and land degradation, underline the need for creating integrated land management and policy solutions (West et al. 2014). While the surrounding policy discourses on sustainable land management serve as global socio- political orientation for national governments, it is mainly on the local level where farmers, foresters, agencies, NGOs, businesses, or members of civil society encounter concrete development demands and where policy and management systems have to balance the trade-offs between them. Landscapes managed for multi-functionality provide a range of landscape functions, services and ben- efits for various local needs—ranging from economic production to cultural identity—while at the same time contributing towards meeting international commitments such as the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions (Thax- ton 2015) or demands of the EU water directive. The local actions of resource managers are, thus, closely related to national and international policy targets and processes. Conflicts of use and ambiguous visions about future development constitute inherent elements of land and water management that are likely to increase in the future (DeLonge et al. 2016). Therefore, the design of Handled by Arnim Wiek, Arizona State University, USA. & Carsten Mann carsten.mann@hnee.de 1 Center for Technology and Society (ZTG), Technische Universita ¨t Berlin, Hardenbergstr. 16-18, 10623 Berlin, Germany 123 Sustain Sci DOI 10.1007/s11625-017-0451-3