Continued overexploitation of natural resources and the associated impacts of climate change threaten the sustainability and biodiversity of our global social-ecological systems. ‘Integrated landscape approaches’ are governance strategies that attempt to reconcile multiple and conflicting land-use claims to harmonize the needs of people and the environment and establish more sustainable and equitable multi-functional landscapes. Such approaches have gained prominence in recent conservation and development discourse, but critics have suggested a need for evidence of effectiveness to bridge knowledge-implementation gaps. Here we review the recent literature to provide a brief update on developments in the science and practice of landscape approaches, primarily in the tropics. We show that despite considerable enthusiasm for landscape approaches, the evidence base within the scientific literature remains poorly developed. Future application of landscape approaches requires concerted transdisciplinary actions that connect scales of governance to address the complex political economies in contested tropical landscapes. We highlight important challenges and opportunities for landscape approach implementation, particularly related to bridging sectorial and disciplinary divides, engaging the private sector, and monitoring landscape performance.
Tag: biodiversity
Learning pathway: Course flows & blueprint
This course is a pivotal contribution to FAO’s vision of fostering a Better Environment, particularly focusing on Biodiversity for food and agriculture. Aligned with FAO’s strategic initiatives, the course is fortified by the approval of the FAO Strategy on Mainstreaming Biodiversity Across Agricultural Sectors and the 2021-23 Action Plan, emphasizing the importance of targeted policies and practices for sustainable use, conservation, and restoration of ecosystems.
Ant assemblage composition explains high predation pressure on artificial caterpillars during early night
1. Predator–prey interactions, especially those involving herbivorous insects, are of great importance in maintaining biodiversity. Predation pressure varies temporally in response to prey availability and activity. However, little is known about the patterns and drivers of fluctuations in predation pressure at fine temporal scales. 2. Artificial caterpillars (placed on plant leaves at breast height) were used to assess changes in predation pressure across four time intervals of the day in a monsoonal tropical rainforest in south-west China. The study examined how assemblage composition of arboreal ants, the dominant predators, changed across the same time intervals. The potential linkages between biotic (arboreal ants) and abiotic (temperature and light intensity) factors with predation rate were evaluated. 3. Predation rate on caterpillars during the early part of the night (19.00–01.00 hours) was significantly higher than in the morning, afternoon, or late night. Ant assemblage composition, rather than species richness or total abundance, best explained the variations in predation rate on artificial caterpillars. 4. The results help to strengthen understanding of trophic interactions by demonstrating that predation pressure fluctuates at finer timescales than previously tested, and that a particular set of ant species may play major roles in predation on caterpillars and possibly other organisms. © 2019 The Royal Entomological Society
Long-term thermal sensitivity of Earth’s tropical forests
The sensitivity of tropical forest carbon to climate is a key uncertainty in predicting global climate change. Although short-term drying and warming are known to affect forests, it is unknown if such effects translate into long-term responses. Here, we analyze 590 permanent plots measured across the tropics to derive the equilibrium climate controls on forest carbon. Maximum temperature is the most important predictor of aboveground biomass (-9.1 megagrams of carbon per hectare per degree Celsius), primarily by reducing woody productivity, and has a greater impact per °C in the hottest forests (>32.2°C). Our results nevertheless reveal greater thermal resilience than observations of short-term variation imply. To realize the long-term climate adaptation potential of tropical forests requires both protecting them and stabilizing Earth’s climate.
Protected Areas and Food Security: Unravelling the Issues
Recent research has highlighted the contributions of forests and tree-based systems to both dietary diversity and nutrition as well as agricultural production in the form of tree-based ecosystem services. Wild foods provide a significant nutritional contribution to the diets of rural dwellers, the majority of whom would be classified as some of the world’s poorest. In addition, it is now known that agricultural systems in the proximity of natural forest formations can exhibit greater productivity in terms of both yield and resilience to environmental shocks, as well as higher nutritional values. Yet, despite the important human-forest interactions and relative degrees of forest dependency, access to much of the global forest estate is increasingly regulated under the guise of biodiversity conservation. How this restricted access plays out when the ‘right to food’ is a deeply enshrined human right has been deeply contested. This chapter will outline the critical issues related to the right to food in the context of the growing call for the annexation of land for conservation.
Using field experiments to quantify risk and time preferences of Ugandan coffee farmers in participating in forest landscape restoration
The objectives of this study hence are (1) to elicit both risk and time preferences of smallholder coffee farmers in eastern Uganda by using lottery-based experiments, and (2) to investigate key attributes or features of companion trees in coffee agroforestry systems that are preferred by farmers using a discrete choice experiment (DCE). We investigate farmer preferences related to six companion tree attributes: tree products provided, regulating ES provided, growth rate, seedling price, provision of quality shade for coffee, and maximum tree height.
The Trees on Farms Project: Indonesia
Agroforestry is a cultivation system that involves planting trees and other plants on farms to reduce poverty, to protect the environment, and to improve food security and nutrition.
The Trees on Farms Project: Honduras
Livestock farming is a lifeline for many Hondurans – it is estimated that 200,000 direct jobs and 400,000 indirect jobs are generated from a round 100,000 farms operating in the country.
Field Guide to Common Homegarden Crops of Southwestern Uganda
Uganda’s homegardens are highly diverse small-scale farming systems. They provide the majority of the food consumed by local people and preserve a large number of traditional crops. This booklet provides a guide to common crops found in southwestern Uganda’s homegardens. It features descriptions and uses for 68 crops divided into four sections according to crop type (annual crops, perennial herbaceous crops, shrubs and trees). Crops are ranked according to their ethnobotanical importance. Each section begins with the most important crop. Each page has four photos of the crop and includes the most common local names (in Runyankole and Luganda), as well as the common English and botanical names. Additional information on the uses and occurrences is provided as well. We hope that this booklet will be of interest to a broad community of people interested in sustainable agriculture, food systems and food security issues: e.g. both Ugandan and international academics, non-government and government actors.
Ecological challenges for the buffer zone management of a West African National Park
In sub-Saharan Africa, the management of buffer zones around protected areas does not often take into serious account the needs of resource exploitation by the local populations or the conservation needs of these areas. We described the ecological characteristics and management issues affecting the buffer zone around the Fazao-Malfakassa National Park; a 192,000-ha protected area in central-western Togo of utmost conservation importance within the Dahomey Gap region. Within the buffer zone (10 km radius, 334,800 ha), we focussed on four high conservation value areas totalling 65,594 ha (20% of the total buffer zone area). Using 2015 sentinel-2 images we analyzed land cover patterns and described existing ecological zones. We complemented these with field surveys and interviews with 300 people living in 22 villages within the buffer zone to describe the conditions affecting the resident human population. Although over 60% of the total buffer zone area is degraded, we identified four areas of high conservation value (total area = 65,594 ha). Interviewees recognized that slash-and-burn was the most common form of land use, followed by agroforestry practices. Agriculture, charcoal, and firewood production were the main drivers affecting habitats, and land conflicts were recurrent due to the rise in human population. The decline in agriculture, reported by interviewees in some sectors, was attributable to ravages of crops by elephants. Three independent diversity indices showed that, in preserved zones, a greater diversity of animals (with similar utilization frequencies) were hunted than in degraded sites (where grasscutters were the dominant hunted species). There were also significant differences between degraded and preserved zones in terms of plants used for charcoal production and for non-timber forest products. We advocate the development of community-controlled hunting areas to enhance the conservation value of the four well-preserved zones. Instead, promoting sustainable agricultural production systems in the degraded areas can help to further stabilize the agricultural front and reduce land pressure on the park.