Smallholder tree plantations are seen as promising routes to alleviating poverty and increasing forest area among the countries in Southeast Asia. However, implementation has been disappointing, which led scientists at the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) to consider a scenario exercise as a way to mitigate the risk of unwanted outcomes. The study had a characteristic that it shares with many other studies: close interaction of larger-scale processes and trends (global markets, national policy) with smaller-scale systems (regional and local policy, farmer livelihoods). The authors therefore felt than an explicitly multi-scale approach was called for. To keep close to the well-known practice, we made a modest extension to a conventional scenario logic approach, and introduced a nested, and multi-scale scenario logic. While modest, we believe that the modification is useful, and the method could be used in other studies, in particular climate adaptation studies. We applied the method during two scenario workshops held to explore the use of smallholder tree plantations in efforts to improve rural livelihoods; each workshop considered two different localities. While the scenario frameworks resulting from the workshops were similar between the localities, we believe that the nested scenario framework served to structure the process and revealed meaningful contextual differences. From these experiences, we discuss and critique the method
Tag: livelihoods
Are local people conservationists? Analysis of transition dynamics from agroforests to monoculture plantations in Indonesia
Cash crops are developing in the once forested areas of Indonesia in parallel with market and economic improvements. Perennial crops such as coffee, cocoa, and rubber were first planted in estates by private or public companies. Local people then integrated these crops into their farming systems, often through the planting of agroforests, that is, intercropping the new cash crop with upland rice and food crops. The crop was generally mixed with fruit trees, timber, and other useful plants. A geographic specialization occurred, driven by biophysical constraints and market opportunities, with expansion of cocoa in Sulawesi, coffee in Lampung, and natural rubber in eastern Sumatra. However, during the past three decades, these agroforests have increasingly been converted into more productive monoculture plantations. A common trajectory can be observed in agricultural landscapes dominated by a perennial cash crop: from ladang to agroforests, and then to monoculture plantations. This process combines agricultural expansion at the expense of natural forests and specialization of the land cover at the expense of biodiversity and wildlife habitats. We determined the main drivers of agricultural expansion and intensification in three regions of Indonesia based on perception surveys and land use profitability analysis. When the national and international contexts clearly influence farmers’ decisions, local people appear very responsive to economic opportunities. They do not hesitate to change their livelihood system if it can increase their income. Their cultural or sentimental attachment to the forest is not sufficient to prevent forest conversion
Farmers’ perspectives about agroforests conversion to plantations in Sumatra: Lessons learnt fro m Bungo district (Jambi, Indonesia)
Located on the fringe of the last tropical rainforests of Sumatra, rubber agroforests are known to conserve the main ecological functions of the primary forest, including a large part of its biodiversity. Nowadays these smallholder plantations are under threat. The regular rise of natural rubber and crude palm oil prices has been a major incentive for farmers to convert their agroforests into clonal rubber and oil-palm plantations. However, some areas seem to resist conversion. A multidisciplinary approach combining perception surveys and satellite-image analysis was designed to find out the reasons for these differences. In 12 villages grouped in 3 categories according to their agroforest conversion rate between 1993 and 2005, farmers were queried about the pros and the cons of the major cropping systems, their attitude towards conservation, and how they envisaged the future of their landscape. This method enabled us to elaborate the most likely scenarios of landscape evolution for the coming years.
Chopping for chips: An analysis of wood flows from smallholder plantations in Vietnam
This paper aims to provide a better understanding of the wood flows from smallholder plantations to industrial buyers in the Binh Dinh and Phu Tho provinces of Vietnam. It describes the actors involved in the market chains, their respective roles, the value added to the wood in the market chain and the distribution of costs and benefits. Various differences between the two provinces exist. In Binh Dinh, wood flows are relatively direct and the market price information is transparent. There are various end-buyers but most are buying bark-clean logs. The division of labour is clear among actors. Plantation wood brings substantial income for the tree growers, yet there is great potential to improve their income through better marketing. In the Phu Tho province, the situation is more complex with various levels of intermediaries. The most striking difference is that most actors have poor access to price information, even in the wholesale market. Markets are more varied with four main types of wood; the most prominent are woodchips and bark-clean logs. The end-buyer market of these products is dominated by Bai Bang Paper Mill because it is located close to the tree growers. At site level, the division of labour is not as clear as in Binh Dinh. The farm gate price in Phu Tho is much lower than the price in Binh Dinh, thus tree growers in Phu Tho have a lower income from wood sales. Plantation wood plays an important part in local livelihoods, but there is still room for improvement.
Financing household tree plantations in Vietnam: Current programmes and future options
Access to external finance critically influences farm households’ ability to establish and manage commercial tree plantations in Vietnam, as it does elsewhere. The Vietnamese government has recognised the importance of household tree plantations and, in particular, the benefits of giving households access to external finance. Not only has the government transferred around a quarter of Vietnam’s forestland to households, but it also offers them exceptional access to financial support through targeted programmes and the state-owned banking system. This report analyses the mechanisms used in 5 programmes that currently provide finance to households. It compares the 5 mechanisms against 7 criteria: availability; financial and operational sustainability; leakage to other productive activities; household access; cost to households; risk to households; and match with households’ finance requirements. In addition, it considers the finance requirements of 3 types of households, differentiated according to their investment rationales. The report finds that Vietnam’s policymakers face critical choices when they design finance programmes to support household tree plantations. The most critical trade-offs are between financial sustainability and the provision of accessible, affordable and low-risk support, between wide geographical coverage and match with farm households’ finance requirements, and between leakage and financial sustainability. The report highlights the benefits of adopting a loan-based approach to providing external finance to households managing commercial tree plantations in Vietnam. It also identifies specific conditions for plantation loans for different types of households and for the transition towards long-rotation plantations.
Practical Guide for Proper Milk Cooling and Storage – Rwanda
The agriculture sector in Rwanda plays a crucial role in the country’s economy, contributing over 31% to the national GDP and employing more than 70% of the workforce. However, challenges such as a rural-based economy and a 2.3% population growth rate put pressure on agricultural sustainability. The National Agricultural Policy (2018) aims to modernize the sector, shifting from subsistence farming to a knowledge-driven approach. The dairy industry, vital for food security, is a key focus of government investment, with targets to increase milk production and contribute 173 billion RWF to the GDP by 2022. Despite its current contribution of 10.5% to agricultural GDP (117 billion RWF annually), production faces hurdles like poor infrastructure and inconsistent supply chains.
To boost dairy production and reduce poverty, the Government of Rwanda has introduced targeted programs such as ‘One Cow per Poor Household’ (Girinka), alongside support from NGOs that strengthen Milk Collection Centres (MCCs). The ‘Practical Guide for Proper Milk Cooling and Storage – Rwanda’ provides MCC operators with strategies to maintain milk quality, offering guidance on cooling technologies, temperature control, storage design, energy efficiency, and quality monitoring. These interventions aim to enhance dairy sector efficiency, improve livelihoods, and ensure sustainable food production in Rwanda.
Multistakeholder Engagement to Scale Soil Health Globally: The Coalition of Action 4 Soil Health
Healthy soil plays a vital role in ecosystem restoration, climate change mitigation, biodiversity conservation, water cycling, farmer livelihoods, and food security. Despite its significance, soil health has often been overlooked, though recent global initiatives, such as the Nairobi Declaration and the EU Soil Mission, signal growing momentum. The UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration launched in 2021, alongside the UN Food Systems Summit (UNFSS), which advocated for coalitions of action to transform food systems. In response, the Coalition of Action 4 Soil Health (CA4SH) was established to raise awareness, enhance collaboration, and scale healthy soil practices. Since its inception, CA4SH has expanded to nearly 200 members across public and private sectors, NGOs, research institutions, and farmer organizations, with a strong focus on gender equity and social inclusion (GESI). The Coalition builds partnerships to overcome economic, technical, and institutional barriers, facilitating evidence-based policy implementation and supporting financial investment in soil health. Through multinational dialogues, CA4SH has contributed to key climate policy frameworks, including COP27, COP28, and the UNCCD COP16 Riyadh Action Agenda. Positioned within the global environmental transition, CA4SH aims to drive soil health improvements for food systems transformation, economic resilience, and climate adaptation.
Agroforestry for sustainable livelihoods: role of geo-informatics, ICT, and citizen science
Agroforestry is an integrated land use system that combines trees, crops, and livestock, providing essential ecological and socioeconomic benefits that contribute to sustainable agriculture and climate resilience. This approach enhances biodiversity, improves soil structure and water management, supports livelihoods, and reduces market vulnerabilities. Recognized for its role in advancing sustainable development goals, agroforestry promotes carbon sequestration, food security, and ecosystem services, aligning with global restoration efforts such as the United Nations Decade of Restoration. In India, agroforestry practices are adapted to various agroclimatic zones, supplying approximately 70% of the country’s timber needs and significantly bolstering the rural economy. Recent technological advances in geo-informatics and data analytics have strengthened agroforestry implementation by enabling efficient monitoring, species mapping, and site suitability assessments. However, challenges such as data accessibility and integration persist, requiring investment in digital technologies and public-private partnerships to maximize agroforestry’s potential in sustainable development. This chapter explores the multifaceted benefits of agroforestry, the role of technological innovations in its expansion, and strategies to overcome implementation barriers, offering a comprehensive perspective for policymakers, researchers, and practitioners.
Utilization of research knowledge in sustainable development pathways: Insights from a transdisciplinary research-for-development programme
This study contributes to the ongoing discussion on how to attribute and evaluate the contribution of transdisciplinary research to sustainable development. As co-created knowledge is a key product of transdisciplinary research, we tested the hypothesis that the extent to which this knowledge is utilized beyond the project consortia, in different areas – from scientific methods and insights to policy decisions – and across a continuum of geographical scales can be used to identify potential impact pathways. For this purpose, we developed an analytical framework that links the transdisciplinary process to six possible utilization stages, which we used as indicators of the usability of co-created knowledge. We gathered data from 22 research projects active in 36 countries using a survey and semi-structured interviews. Our results show that even during implementation of the projects, co-created knowledge is utilized by multiple actors at different stages, in all areas and at all scales simultaneously, suggesting multiple impact pathways. Project knowledge is predominantly utilized for national-level policymaking, and research partners named co-creation of knowledge with key stakeholders as the most frequently used mechanism for promoting knowledge utilization. Closer analysis revealed different understandings of and approaches to knowledge co-creation. These can be linked to weaker or stronger definitions of transdisciplinarity. The analysis shows that researchers using strong transdisciplinarity approaches typically face challenges in encompassing multiple epistemologies and facilitating dialogue. Some results suggest that inclusion and collaboration in co-creating knowledge can empower actors otherwise excluded. Our research shows that although transdisciplinary projects have nonlinear impact pathways, these can be partially assessed using the proposed analytical framework. Further, our results indicate a link between usability, inclusion, and collaboration in transdisciplinary research. We conclude with the observation that transdisciplinarity and its requirements still need to be better understood by actors within and beyond the research community.
Determinants and constraints of integrating natural acacias into mechanised rain-fed agricultural schemes Sennar State, Sudan
Agroforestry practices in Sudan take on various forms across the country, depending on the arrangement, distribution and integration of trees with agricultural crops and/or livestock. The study aimed to describe and analyse the arrangement of acacia trees with crops on parklands in El Dali and El Mazmum areas in Sennar State, Sudan. Specifically, an attempt was made to identify the determinants of integration of natural acacia trees with crops in mechanised rain-fed agricultural schemes forming agroforestry parklands. Another specific aim was to determine farmers’ perceptions about the constraints of adopting such agroforestry practices were also determined. Data was collected using a social survey method, in which 50 % of the total numbers of villages was randomly selected after classification into small, medium and large villages. Moreover, 5 % of the heads of households in the selected villages were interviewed face to face. The number of respondents was 281. Logistic regression model results indicated that the number of household members, the administrative unit, the incentive received from agricultural union and the land size were the main determinants for integrating acacia trees with agricultural crops in mechanised rain-fed agricultural schemes forming the agroforestry parklands. Constraints related to the prevalence of agroforestry practices included the absence of extension services and planting materials, unfavourable tree tenure, the destruction of trees/crops by animals, and the practice of renting land for sole crop cultivation. Several suggestions are given increased adoption of sustainable agroforestry for more production farming. As a priority land tenure and tree tenure issues must be clarified.