Most plants or seeds involved in international seed transfer are agricultural or horticultural. Quarantine/phytosanitary regulations are designed to reduce the risk of introducing pests and pathogens across borders. Regulatory measures in most countries target only known pest and pathogens. Trade in seeds is rarely considered to be a major pathway of pest and pathogen introduction and seeds are, therefore, generally considered to represent a relatively low phytosanitary risk (Willan, 1988). However, there are examples of temperate tree seed for which trade in seed is restricted (Franic, 2019) and some tropical trees (Willan, 1988).
Tag: conservation
PATSPO Newsletter April 2023
Climate-Smart Conservation Agriculture, Farm Values and Tenure Security: Implications for Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation in the Congo Basin
Background and Research Aims: Agriculture through deforestation is an important threat to biodiversity conservation in the Congo Basin’s tropical forest. The policy challenge is not only to promote adaptation to perceived climate change but also to promote forest conservation. The aim of this study is to provide empirical evidence on the impact of farm-level investments in climate-smart agricultural practices related to conservation agriculture in some Congo Basin countries. The hypothesis is that property rights to land and trees play a fundamental role in governing the patterns of investment, forestland management for conservation, as well as in the profitability of agriculture. Methods: A Simulated Maximum Likelihood Estimation using a Mixed Logit model is used to test farmers’ choice of agricultural system and a farmland value model for each agricultural system which includes determinants of tenure or property rights, climate, soils, and socioeconomic variables such as education and gender. The data was collected from more than 600 farms covering 12 regions and 45 divisions in 3 countries, Cameroon, the Central African Republic and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Results: Farmers choose one of three agricultural systems to maximize farm profit mindful of the current tenure regime and environmental conditions. Conservation agriculture techniques within climate-smart practices show benefits for smallholder farmers through improvements in soil health, soil moisture retention and enhanced crop yields. The rights to access, withdraw, manage, as well as exclude others from land and trees affect both the farmers’ choice of system and the profit earned from the chosen system. Conclusion: Farm-level investments improve farm incomes and enhance conservation effort for farmers perceiving climate change. Implications for Conservation: Climate change adaptation through planting of trees improves soil stability, restores ecosystems and creates a safe haven for biodiversity. Secure land tenure promotes better forestland management and reduces land degradation in vulnerable communities.
The Role of Agroforestry Systems for Enhancing Biodiversity and Provision of Ecosystem Services in Agricultural Landscapes in Southeast Asia
Biodiversity has a pivotal role to play in providing ecosystem goods and services, which is under threat due to various anthropogenic activities. This chapter is based on literature review to assess the role of agroforestry to enhance biodiversity and ecosystem services in Southeast Asian agricultural landscapes. The reviewed literature was analysed through narrative qualitative and narrative comparative methods. The review provides substantial evidence that agroforestry systems can conserve species diversity and enhance ecosystem services. Farmers’ cultivating diverse species in agroforestry is the key to enhance biodiversity on farmlands that can also lessen the pressure on local forest. Careful agroforestry plantation design will not only increase the multiple ecosystem functions but can also create corridors and buffer zones to support natural habitats, to reduce human and wildlife conflict. The case of human conflicts with Asian elephants is an obvious example. From ethical ground to support elephant’s right to survive, further research on agroforestry modelling is required to benefits both humans and elephants.
National Strategy for Mangrove Ecosystem Management: A reference for the conservation and rehabilitation of coastal areas to achieve Sustainable Development Goals and Low Carbon Development
Sustainable Development Goals and Low Carbon Development are global- and national-scale development agendas Indonesia is currently applying. Mangrove ecosystems are included to achieve the targets within the same time frame, and a coordinated strategy and integrated planning are necessary.
The National Strategy for Mangrove Ecosystem Management clearly separates between conservation and rehabilitation goals of coastal region rehabilitation objectives as they involve extremely different ecosystem
conditions, in both biophysical and social terms, as well as economic opportunities. Mangrove conservation should be prioritized, bearing in mind the huge threats and the challenges involved in conducting rehabilitation and restoration, which are more technically challenging and involve greater costs.
For mangrove conservation and rehabilitation to be transparent for all stakeholders, a monitoring and evaluation, reporting, and verification system is required. This mechanism should cover all aspects of conservation and rehabilitation, including accountability over funding, and the performance (successes and failures) of conservation and rehabilitation efforts.
Multidimensional forests: Complexity of forest-based values and livelihoods across Amazonian socio-cultural and geopolitical contexts
Research on the contribution of forests to local livelihoods has so far had a strong focus on quantifying the monetary value of forest-derived products and services. In this paper, we move beyond monetary valuation and integrate the less tangible and sometimes culturally complex dimensions through which forests support local livelihoods. We look at four local contexts in the Brazilian, Bolivian and Ecuadorian Amazon, which differ markedly in terms of their biophysical, sociocultural and geopolitical settings. Combining economic and anthropological data, we used quantitative and qualitative methods, and measures of the ecological impacts of local forest uses. Quantitative analyses drew on datasets from 48 communities, and 510 households, while the qualitative analyses relied on semi-structured interviews with 78 families in 22 communities. Forest-based livelihoods exhibited complex portfolios, diversified production systems, seasonal variation of activities, and different specialization strategies. Beyond a source of subsistence and cash incomes, forests were locally valued by people across all sites in terms of identities, worldviews, territorial attachment, governance, and conservation. Populations with a longer history of interactions with the environment displayed more complex forest-related cultural systems, but even among people who had migrated into the forest in a more recent historical period, forest-based self-cultural identification was evident. At all sites, forests were unanimously recognized as critical to people’s health and wellbeing, despite substantial differences in local histories, policy and market environments. The findings underscore the persistent importance of non-economic values of forests as both Indigenous and non-Indigenous groups constantly adapt their forest and land use practices based on transcultural exchange and changing conditions. A focus on economic value as the rationale for forest conservation disregards the striking resilience of cultural values in promoting forest conservation and use by diverse local and Indigenous communities, especially when supported by favorable policies and markets.
Forty-year multi-scale land cover change and political ecology data reveal a dynamic and regenerative process of forests in Peruvian Indigenous Territories
This article explores deforestation and reforestation dynamics over 415,749 hectares of 25 titled Indigenous Community Lands (ICLs) in the Peruvian Amazon over forty years at three scales: total area, regions, and communities. We focus on ICLs as the territorial unit of analysis, as they are increasingly discussed regarding their importance for conservation. Additionally indigenous communities (ICs) are a too-marginalized group in the Amazon that merit more attention. Analyses of this kind are often short-term and use only large-scale Earth Observation methodologies. We use a multi-method approach linking remote sensing with ground verification, and qualitative historical political ecology work with ICs. We find that overall accumulated deforestation was low at 5%, but that when reforestation is considered, net deforestation was only 3.5%. At the community level deforestation and afforestation dynamics are complex, except for one period that indicates a macro state driver in the region. Results suggest inadequate accounting for forest regeneration in deforestation analyses and challenge the notion that presenting stakeholders with accumulated forest loss values is helpful in tropical areas where forests and people are dynamic. Furthermore, our work with communities highlights that categorizing them and their lands as pro-environment or not in general terms is unhelpful for determining fund flows to ICLs for environmental or development purposes.
Changes in mangrove coverage classification criteria could impact the conservation of mangroves in Mexico
Accurate estimates of habitat extent and rates of change are crucial inputs for the global, regional, and national assessments that guide policy-making and prioritize strategies. This can contribute to an understanding of ecosystems in the landscape for their use, management, and preservation. Mangroves are one of the types of ecosystems in which estimation discrepancies have been analyzed to determine the impacts of data quality on conservation and policy-making. We identify significant discrepancies in the extent of the last map of Mexican mangroves (i.e., 2020) produced by the Mexican Mangrove Monitoring System (MMMS). We performed a comparative assessment between the 2020 and 2015 maps by using geographical information systems to analyze the spatial extent across these years and estimate the accuracy of map changes with airborne data. We observed a spurious gain of 129,531 ha between 2015 and 2020, including 102,610 ha (79% of total changes) in the Sian Ka’an Biosphere Reserve and its surroundings. Furthermore, the mangrove definition changed, causing the MMMS to map other coastal wetlands with the presence of Rhizophora mangle scrubs dispersed in the landscape. The analysis of MMMS airborne data demonstrates that this significant increase is due to changes in mangrove mapping criteria and definitions. The definition and spatial delimitation of “mangrove” (i.e., mangrove community or stands forest) has implications relevant to the conservation policy of these coastal wetlands/coastal resources. MMMS discrepancies in mangrove extent could generate misleading perspectives on different sectors. A cartographic solution is to separate the other coastal wetland areas with the presence of R. mangle from all MMMS products and reclassify them as “other wetlands with the presence of R. mangle.” Robust ecosystem extent data is crucial for the design and implementation of efficient land use and conservation policies.
Evenness mediates the global relationship between forest productivity and richness
Biodiversity is an important component of natural ecosystems, with higher species richness often correlating with an increase in ecosystem productivity. Yet, this relationship varies substantially across environments, typically becoming less pronounced at high levels of species richness. However, species richness alone cannot reflect all important properties of a community, including community evenness, which may mediate the relationship between biodiversity and productivity. If the evenness of a community correlates negatively with richness across forests globally, then a greater number of species may not always increase overall diversity and productivity of the system. Theoretical work and local empirical studies have shown that the effect of evenness on ecosystem functioning may be especially strong at high richness levels, yet the consistency of this remains untested at a global scale. Here, we used a dataset of forests from across the globe, which includes composition, biomass accumulation and net primary productivity, to explore whether productivity correlates with community evenness and richness in a way that evenness appears to buffer the effect of richness. Specifically, we evaluated whether low levels of evenness in speciose communities correlate with the attenuation of the richness–productivity relationship. We found that tree species richness and evenness are negatively correlated across forests globally, with highly speciose forests typically comprising a few dominant and many rare species. Furthermore, we found that the correlation between diversity and productivity changes with evenness: at low richness, uneven communities are more productive, while at high richness, even communities are more productive. Synthesis. Collectively, these results demonstrate that evenness is an integral component of the relationship between biodiversity and productivity, and that the attenuating effect of richness on forest productivity might be partly explained by low evenness in speciose communities. Productivity generally increases with species richness, until reduced evenness limits the overall increases in community diversity. Our research suggests that evenness is a fundamental component of biodiversity–ecosystem function relationships, and is of critical importance for guiding conservation and sustainable ecosystem management decisions.
Drones, communities and nature: pitfalls and possibilities for conservation and territorial rights
Since the early 2010s, small drones have become key tools for environmental research around the globe. While critical voices have highlighted the threat of ‘green securitisation’ and surveillance in contexts where drones are deployed for nature conservation, Indigenous peoples and local communities (IPLCs) worldwide have also begun using drones – most often in alliance with non-governmental organisations or researchers – exploring this technology’s potential to advance their own territorial, political and socio-ecological goals. Against this backdrop, this paper examines six different experiences in five countries where communities are using small drones in areas of high ecological and cultural diversity with international significance for nature conservation. We highlight the ways that communities deploy drones – both in terms of their motivations and actual use strategies. We also reflect upon the opportunities and barriers that IPLCs and their collaborators encounter in designing and implementing meaningful drone strategies, explicitly considering social, economic and political challenges. Finally, we consider the socio-ecological outcomes that community drone use enables across these sites along with the ways that drones engender more biocultural and territorial approaches to conservation through IPLC-led monitoring and mapping efforts. In conclusion, we suggest that effective, meaningful and appropriate deployment of drones, especially with IPLCs as protagonists in their use, can support nature conservation together with the recognition and protection of biocultural and territorial rights. Given the mounting demands for conservation to counter intertwined global socio-environmental crises, community drones may play a role in amplifying the voices and territorial visions of IPLCs.