CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA) Annual Report 2017
CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA) Annual Report 2017
30 August, 2018
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The CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA) contributes to 9 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), to all CGIAR Intermediate Development Outcomes (IDOs) and to 31 sub-IDOs with different levels of investment. With efforts targeted respectively at 29%, 33%, 38% across System Level Outcomes (SLOs) 1, 2 and 3, FTA balanced its work across four main production systems (natural forests, plantations, pastures and cropping systems with trees) dealing with a number of globally traded and/or locally important tree-crop commodities (timber, oil palm, rubber, coffee, cocoa, coconut, wood fuel, fruits, etc.), that form the basis for the livelihoods of hundreds of millions of smallholders. These commodities also represent an important share of the land area, including 13 million km2 of forests and 9.5 million km2 of agricultural lands (45% of the total agricultural area with >10% tree cover). Progress towards IDOs in 2017 resulted from FTA work on technical innovations and tools, as well as on value chains, and institutional and policy processes. These innovations were taken up and diffused by different actors and along value chains, and all were suited to their particular context. As 2017 is the first year of FTA’s six-year program, progress towards SLOs was aimed at the upstream level; in some cases there was already progress towards downstream uptake.
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CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA) scientist Yves Laumonier of the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) and Agricultural Research for Development (CIRAD) explains how drone technology has furthered his research work in Indonesia. Here, he teaches his fellow colleagues how to operate the technology to get closer to forests and communities on the ground.
Climate change is a reality and, for those most affected by it, it is often experienced as a change in the most basic commodity: water. Drawing on the insights of farmers and local communities, this session examines the role of forests in regulating the water cycle.
New research suggests that vegetation plays a critical role in the frequency and intensity of rainfall. This discussion forum will explore the implications on the many areas affected by these effects — land restoration, water management and climate change adaptation — toward an integrated approach for land/water and climate for the SDGs.
The discussion forum will build on a successful online symposium that took place in May 2017. The discussion will also discuss highlights of the current Global Forest Expert Panel (GFEP) on forests and water, which is expected to issue a policy relevant global assessment report in the first half of 2018.
The breadth and ambition of international commitments to restore the environment often hide the failure to consult – and directly benefit – the communities who rely on the targeted landscapes. Furthermore, past initiatives have occasionally exacerbated existing social inequities. Therefore, involving local communities, institutions and interests is necessary for a sustainable environmental agenda.
By drawing on a broad range of stakeholders in an open discussion, the forest landscape restoration (FLR) agenda aims to fully incorporate gender awareness and residents’ concerns. As a general theme, the panel sought to identify conflicts and synergies between forest restoration, tenure security and gender equality.
Inspired by the Sustainable Development Goals, the session focused on the accomplishments and future of agroforestry as a path toward sustainable landscape restoration. By offering a route to reconciliation between the frequently competing claims of agriculture and reforestation, agroforestry is playing an increasingly central role in policy-making.
The session aimed to achieve a vital exchange of knowledge on ecosystem functionality, biodiversity, livelihoods and climate change, among other topics. The forum demonstrated the potential dividends for human wellbeing offered by landscape restoration in developing countries.
FTA at GLF: From rainfall recycling to landscape restoration
FTA at GLF: From rainfall recycling to landscape restoration
16 December, 2017
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An aerial shot of Southern Nepal. Photo by Chandra Shekhar Karki/CIFOR
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An aerial shot of Southern Nepal. Photo by Chandra Shekhar Karki/CIFOR
Following the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry’s (FTA) successful involvement in the Global Landscapes Forum (GLF) Peatlands earlier this year, FTA is anticipating productive involvement once again in the upcoming GLF Bonn on Dec. 19-20, 2017.
In an article following the online symposium, FTA Director Vincent Gitz and Meine van Noordwijk, both of whom will take part in the Discussion Forum, stated that “forests and trees are drivers of key mechanisms that govern the water cycle, atmospheric moisture, precipitation and climate at the local, regional and continental levels. In other words, forests and trees can help manage the water cycle not only from the well-known watershed perspective, but from a precipitation-shed perspective, with key implications for climate regulation. Geopolitical implications are huge: Who has the right to influence rainfall elsewhere?”
As research suggests that vegetation plays a critical role in the frequency and intensity of rainfall, the Discussion Forum will examine the role of forests in regulating the water cycle. This science is relevant for policies and implementation efforts related to climate change, land restoration, landscape management and food security.
A large patch of lemongrass in the Chisapani Community Forest. Photo by Chandra Shekhar Karki/CIFOR
In particular, the session aims to display the latest scientific findings on rainfall recycling and climate regulation in relation to forests and tree cover; explore the implications of these new scientific insights on climate, land, water and related policies and actions; and sketch a new agenda on water/land and climate, for coordinated science-to-policy linkages, from cross-cutting policy integration to implementation on the ground, and triggering interest for institutional and donor support.
“These findings have significant implications for policy and action, and for research – particularly for FTA research – and what it can do or the tools it can provide to inform and underpin this new agenda,” Gitz and Van Noordwijk wrote in the article.
The GLF is expected to be a vibrant event involving world leaders, climate negotiators, policy makers, development practitioners, private sector representatives, world-class scientists, civil society and the media to accelerate action towards the creation of more resilient, equitable, profitable, productive and healthy landscapes.
For those attending the GLF in person, there will be many opportunities to see and hear from FTA scientists, including other Discussion Forums in which Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) and World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) scientists will participate. FTA will also be well-represented in the Inclusive Landscapes Finance Pavilion and Restoration Pavilion, as well as TED-style Landscape Talks on topics ranging from integrated landscape approaches to peatlands.
Many notable plenary speakers are expected at the GLF, from actor Alec Baldwin who will give a video address, to Miss Rwanda 2016 Uwase Hirwa Honorine, the President of Mauritius Her Excellency Ameenah Gurib-Fakim, UN Environment Executive Director Erik Solheim, yogi and spiritual leader Sadhguru, UN Under-Secretary and UNCCD Chief Monique Barbut, indigenous leader Marcos Terena, French intellectual Jacques Attali who will also give a video address, cultural instigator Scott Goodson and Emmy Award-winning filmmaker Rob Burnet.
Meanwhile, over 200 young people are set to play the role of ambassadors, volunteers and coordinators over the two-day event, in a nod to youth integration and mainstreaming. Indigenous leaders from North America and the Pacific will also be present at the Indigenous People’s Pavilion to share their experiences and highlight the role of pastoralism as a viable livelihood system across significant landscapes worldwide, in the context of the Sustainable Development Goals, regional and national policy.
In addition, this year’s Wangari Maathai Award recipients, in honor of the late Nobel laureate, Kenyan environmental activist and founder of the Green Belt Movement, will be announced during the GLF.
Dubbed the world’s largest gathering on sustainability issues, the GLF will welcome more than 45 different organizations, with FTA among them. The GLF’s five key themes – Food and Livelihoods, Finance, Rights, Restoration, and Measuring Progress – are set to shape the event.
With the GLF’s key themes being of direct relevance to the work of FTA, the program is well-placed to help facilitate productive and valuable discussions, both to inform its own work and to support shared goals.
FTA at GLF: From rainfall recycling to landscape restoration
FTA at GLF: From rainfall recycling to landscape restoration
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An aerial shot of Southern Nepal. Photo by Chandra Shekhar Karki/CIFOR
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An aerial shot of Southern Nepal. Photo by Chandra Shekhar Karki/CIFOR
Following the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry’s (FTA) successful involvement in the Global Landscapes Forum (GLF) Peatlands earlier this year, FTA is anticipating productive involvement once again in the upcoming GLF Bonn on Dec. 19-20, 2017.
In an article following the online symposium, FTA Director Vincent Gitz and Meine van Noordwijk, both of whom will take part in the Discussion Forum, stated that “forests and trees are drivers of key mechanisms that govern the water cycle, atmospheric moisture, precipitation and climate at the local, regional and continental levels. In other words, forests and trees can help manage the water cycle not only from the well-known watershed perspective, but from a precipitation-shed perspective, with key implications for climate regulation. Geopolitical implications are huge: Who has the right to influence rainfall elsewhere?”
As research suggests that vegetation plays a critical role in the frequency and intensity of rainfall, the Discussion Forum will examine the role of forests in regulating the water cycle. This science is relevant for policies and implementation efforts related to climate change, land restoration, landscape management and food security.
A large patch of lemongrass in the Chisapani Community Forest. Photo by Chandra Shekhar Karki/CIFOR
In particular, the session aims to display the latest scientific findings on rainfall recycling and climate regulation in relation to forests and tree cover; explore the implications of these new scientific insights on climate, land, water and related policies and actions; and sketch a new agenda on water/land and climate, for coordinated science-to-policy linkages, from cross-cutting policy integration to implementation on the ground, and triggering interest for institutional and donor support.
“These findings have significant implications for policy and action, and for research – particularly for FTA research – and what it can do or the tools it can provide to inform and underpin this new agenda,” Gitz and Van Noordwijk wrote in the article.
The GLF is expected to be a vibrant event involving world leaders, climate negotiators, policy makers, development practitioners, private sector representatives, world-class scientists, civil society and the media to accelerate action towards the creation of more resilient, equitable, profitable, productive and healthy landscapes.
For those attending the GLF in person, there will be many opportunities to see and hear from FTA scientists, including other Discussion Forums in which Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) and World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) scientists will participate. FTA will also be well-represented in the Inclusive Landscapes Finance Pavilion and Restoration Pavilion, as well as TED-style Landscape Talks on topics ranging from integrated landscape approaches to peatlands.
Many notable plenary speakers are expected at the GLF, from actor Alec Baldwin who will give a video address, to Miss Rwanda 2016 Uwase Hirwa Honorine, the President of Mauritius Her Excellency Ameenah Gurib-Fakim, UN Environment Executive Director Erik Solheim, yogi and spiritual leader Sadhguru, UN Under-Secretary and UNCCD Chief Monique Barbut, indigenous leader Marcos Terena, French intellectual Jacques Attali who will also give a video address, cultural instigator Scott Goodson and Emmy Award-winning filmmaker Rob Burnet.
Meanwhile, over 200 young people are set to play the role of ambassadors, volunteers and coordinators over the two-day event, in a nod to youth integration and mainstreaming. Indigenous leaders from North America and the Pacific will also be present at the Indigenous People’s Pavilion to share their experiences and highlight the role of pastoralism as a viable livelihood system across significant landscapes worldwide, in the context of the Sustainable Development Goals, regional and national policy.
In addition, this year’s Wangari Maathai Award recipients, in honor of the late Nobel laureate, Kenyan environmental activist and founder of the Green Belt Movement, will be announced during the GLF.
Dubbed the world’s largest gathering on sustainability issues, the GLF will welcome more than 45 different organizations, with FTA among them. The GLF’s five key themes – Food and Livelihoods, Finance, Rights, Restoration, and Measuring Progress – are set to shape the event.
With the GLF’s key themes being of direct relevance to the work of FTA, the program is well-placed to help facilitate productive and valuable discussions, both to inform its own work and to support shared goals.
Ensuring quality of research for development: The MELIA system
Ensuring quality of research for development: The MELIA system
05 October, 2017
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The CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA) is an integrated global research initiative that aims to enhance the use, management and governance of forests, agroforestry and tree genetic resources as a way to improve livelihoods and the integrity of the environment. To test methods, approaches, partnerships and engagement strategies, and to seek the most effective means of achieving positive change, the program uses an innovative system to ensure the quality of its research, to monitor, evaluate and assess the outcomes (defined as changes in technical, social and economic behavior) and impact (defined as changes in actual environmental quality and human wellbeing) of its work.
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An estimated 1.6 billion people worldwide depend in various ways and to different degrees on forests, trees and agroforestry for their livelihoods. Forests, trees and agroforestry have the potential to address many sustainable development challenges. Achieving this potential, providing appropriate solutions and leveraging opportunities requires understanding the complex roles of gender and other factors of social differentiation, such as age, in shaping livelihood and resource management decisions, governance, and the distribution of benefits from tree-based systems. This is why gender and social analyses are embedded into each domain of the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA).
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The CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA) works on tree genetic resources (TGR) to bridge production gaps and promote resilience to provide solutions for the more effective safeguarding, domestication and delivery of these resources by and to farmers, foresters and other stakeholders. This leads to diversified and more productive options for farming systems, to more varied diets and improved nutrition, to strengthened value chains for tree products, and to increased smallholder farm incomes. Importantly, the right TGR management decisions play an important role in enhancing the adaptive capacity of farm and forest ecosystems to cope with climate change and in countering landscape degradation.
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Reducing poverty, ensuring food and nutrition security for all, addressing climate change, protecting natural resources and ecosystem services, and achieving sustainable production and consumption are among the greatest challenges of our time, from the local level to a global scale. The CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA), led by the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), is the worlds largest research for development partnership recognizing that forests, trees and agroforestry are central to solving these challenges.
CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA) Annual Report 2016
CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA) Annual Report 2016
26 September, 2017
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2016, the last year of the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry’s Phase 1, saw significant achievements in output, outcome and impact terms as detailed in this Annual Report. Overall Phase 1 FTA results contributed to placing the program, for its Phase 2, as a potential key provider of knowledge and solutions for the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Paris Agreement.
The many achievements in 2016 offered potential for scaling up and out and showed recognition of FTA’s work by partners. The program was also impacted by the efforts from senior management to develop the FTA Phase 2 proposal.
What are the priorities for relevant, legitimate and effective forest and tree research? Lessons from the IUFRO congress
What are the priorities for relevant, legitimate and effective forest and tree research? Lessons from the IUFRO congress
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A pisciculture research station is seen in Yaekama, DRC. Photo by A. Fassio/CIFOR
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A pisciculture research station is seen in Yaekama, DRC. Photo by A. Fassio/CIFOR
We can all agree that forests and trees play a vital role in sustaining life on earth. Addressing climate change – both mitigation and adaptation, something that few sectors can do simultaneously – ensuring food security and nutrition, and preserving biodiversity will not be possible without the full spectrum of solutions that forests, trees and agroforestry offer.
At the International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO) 125th Anniversary Congress, held on Sept. 18-22 in Freiburg, Germany, by one of the world’s oldest international scientific institutions, more than 40 scientists affiliated with the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA) presented their latest results and findings.
FTA senior scientist Ramni Jamnadass of the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) presented on safeguarding forest food tree diversity in a session on food trees in forests and farmlands, while her colleague Sonya Dewi presented about ICRAF’s workoncombining remote sensing, crowdsourcing big data and multi-objective modelling to inform landscape approaches, during a session on forest restoration policy assessment in the tropics.
In a significant joint effort on the final day of the congress, IUFRO and FTA cohosted a subplenary session titled Research for sustainable development: Forests, trees and agroforestry, aimed at discussing main research and knowledge gaps in forest and tree science in relation to the sustainable development goals (SDGs), and how to address them.
Forest and trees are central to many of the challenges of our time. This raises new questions every day, as the IUFRO congress showcased. But this makes the prioritization of issues both more difficult and more necessary. What is needed most and where we should start? How should we, as researchers and research institutions, conduct research in order to best enable impact?
We faced the same issue when constructing the second phase of FTA, with a very long shortlist of 100 critical knowledge gaps and key research questions, from genetic resources to value chains and institutions.
I wonder if this centrality of forests and trees to so many challenges could not be an overarching guide to orient research prioritization. We need to fully embrace the fact that forest and tree research has to address a complex set of objectives, because forests and trees are not only concerned with SDG15 on life on land, but also with the 16 other goals. Integration is key. So the overarching issue might be how we can integrate the different dimensions of sustainable development and different objectives into the research questions, research methods and solutions we develop in practice.
For example, thanks to the integration of the work of very different scientific disciplines – tree biology, atmospheric biogeochemistry, climatology, hydrology and dendrology – there is now convincing convergent evidence on the role of forests in atmospheric water circulation, at continental scales. Forests enable rain to occur downwind at continental scales, and can help to preserve so-called bread baskets.
But we still need more work on the science base and, at the same time, on the types of institutions, policies and economic instruments to be developed so that action leads to outcomes for farmers in the field. This shows the need for integration between disciplines, scales and actors. In this particular domain, the Global Expert Panel on Forests and Water launched by IUFRO will be of tremendous use and I am particularly glad that it is being co-led by former FTA senior scientist Meine van Noordwijk, who recently retired but brought so much to FTA.
This question of the integration of objectives, of research domains and across scales, has important methodological implications, in terms of the solutions to be developed, how, with whom and for whom. It can, for a program as broad as FTA, lead to deciding to orient the priority support toward work that constructs linkages between research domains and system approaches.
The Rupa Lake cooperative improves farmers’ livelihoods and helps preserve the lake’s ecosystem. Photo by B. Saugat/Bioversity
There are two other critical dimensions to integrate:
First is the requirement to work on the full continuum from technical options to management, policy, governance and appropriate institutional arrangements. Looking at the enabling environment, such as institutional arrangements, incentive schemes and adapted business models, will facilitate upscaling and outscaling of technical options.
Second is the need to work on the “research for development” continuum, from upstream research to how the actors use this, and integrating stakeholders from the framing of questions to the development and implementation of solutions.
This implies, as spearheaded by Brian Belcher, FTA’s monitoring, evaluation and learning and impact assessment head, the need to revisit what we mean by “quality of research”, enlarging it to four dimensions. The traditional dimensions of relevance and scientific credibility need to be completed by legitimacy and effectiveness.
Legitimacy means that the research process is fair and ethical, and perceived as such, with consideration of the interests and perspectives of the intended users.
Effectiveness means that research has high potential to contribute to innovations and solutions. It implies that research is designed, implemented and positioned for use, which implies work along what we call a “theory of change”.
We can complement CGIAR by embracing this framework to define and measure the quality of research for development. This requires building appropriate partnerships, starting with development actors, and working on the enabling environment to translate knowledge to use. In FTA, for a substantial part of our research, we embed research in development projects. We aim at doing research “in” development, rather than research “for” development.
To enable this, FTA aims at playing the role of a boundary institution:
To understand the frontiers of science, working with universities, research institutions
To understand the need of beneficiaries, working with local stakeholders, governments
To understand the priorities of funders
To organize the dialogue between the three, and provide packages that bring them all together
This is a good reason why, in the future, we at FTA would like to further strengthen our relations with IUFRO.
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The CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry’s (FTA) work on sustainable value chains and investments to support forest conservation and equitable development is one of its five research themes. This work facilitates innovations in public policy, business models, private investments and finance to stimulate the sustainable supply of timber from natural and planted forests, enhance the sustainable production of high-value tree crops and reduce the impacts of agricultural expansion in forests.
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The CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA) works on enhancing all possible contributions of forests, trees and agroforestry to sustainable development. In this context, climate change is a major focus of FTA’s work, through one of its five research domains and across the program.
Restoration 
Plantations and tree crop commodities 
Enhanced nutrition and food security 
Biodiversity, safeguarding and conservation 
Nationally determined contributions 
Bioenergy and biomaterials 
Blue carbon and peatlands 
Climate change adaptation 
Landscape governance 
Gender 
Silvopastoral systems 
Market-based agroforestry-forestry 
Farm-forest policy interface 
Agroecology 
Livelihood trajectory modelling and assessment 
Inclusive finance and business models 
Innovating finance for sustainable landscapes 
Public and private commitments to zero deforestation 
Orphan tree crops 
Effectiveness of approaches to sustainable supply 
Quality of FTA research for development 
Sentinel landscapes 
Foresight 
Seeds and seedlings delivery systems 
Smallholder tree-crop commodities 
