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  • Revisiting the ‘cornerstone of Amazonian conservation’: a socioecological assessment of Brazil nut exploitation

Revisiting the ‘cornerstone of Amazonian conservation’: a socioecological assessment of Brazil nut exploitation

18 September, 2017
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FTA COMMUNICATIONS TEAM

The Brazil nut (the seeds of the rainforest tree Bertholletia excelsa) is the only globally traded seed collected from the wild by forest-based harvesters across the Amazon basin.

The large geographic scale of Brazil nut exploitation and the significant contributions to local livelihoods, national economies, and forest-based development over the last decades, merit a review of the “conservation-through-use” paradigm. We use Elinor Ostrom’s framework for assessing sustainability in socioecological systems: (1) resource unit, (2) users, (3) governance system, and (4) resource system, to determine how different contexts and external developments generate specific conservation and development outcomes.

We find that the resource unit reacts robustly to the type and level of extraction currently practiced; that resource users have built on a self-organized system that had defined boundaries and access to the resource; that linked production chains, market networks and informal financing work to supply global markets; and that local harvesters have used supporting alliances with NGOs and conservationists to formalize and secure their endogenous governance system and make it more equitable.

As a result, the Brazil nut model represents a socioecological system that may not require major changes to sustain productivity. Yet since long-term Brazil nut production seems inextricably tied to a continuous forest cover, and because planted Brazil nut trees currently provide a minimal contribution to total nut production basin-wide, we call to preserve, diversify and intensify production in Brazil nut-rich forests that will inevitably become ever more integrated within human-modified landscapes over time.

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  • What a difference 4 decades make: Deforestation in Borneo since 1973

What a difference 4 decades make: Deforestation in Borneo since 1973

31 July, 2017
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FTA COMMUNICATIONS TEAM

In 1973, 55.8 million hectares (76%), of Borneo was old-growth rainforest. About 19.5 million ha of old-growth forest area was destroyed between 1973 and 2016 by fire and agricultural expansion. By 2016, 50% of the island remained forested.

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  • “To me, the keyword of this Summit is integration”: Peter Holmgren at Asia-Pacific Rainforest Summit 2016

“To me, the keyword of this Summit is integration”: Peter Holmgren at Asia-Pacific Rainforest Summit 2016

09 August, 2016
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FTA

CIFOR’s Director General Peter Holmgren delivers a keynote address on 3 August 2016 at the Asia-Pacific Rainforest Summit in Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei Darussalam, an important event under the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry.

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  • Asia-Pacific Rainforest Summit invitation video

Asia-Pacific Rainforest Summit invitation video

25 July, 2016
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FTA

Hon. Dato Ali Apong, Minister of Primary Resources and Tourism for Brunei Darussalam invites you to the Asia-Pacific Rainforest Summit 2016.

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  • FTA at Asia-Pacific Rainforest Summit: Empowering smallholders

FTA at Asia-Pacific Rainforest Summit: Empowering smallholders
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Originally published at CIFOR’s Forests News

Mediating the push and pull of agricultural expansion and conservation is no easy task. Add to that smallholders – who play a crucial role in producing agricultural commodities but whose economic disenfranchisement can incline to unsustainable practices – and the situation becomes even more complex.

With increasing corporate commitments to eliminate deforestation from supply chains, the integral, and precarious, situation of smallholders must be addressed. But how can companies help to empower them, disincentivizing deforestation and unsustainable practices? What must government, civil society and the financial sector do? And, what would a successful smallholder empowerment project look like?

At the upcoming Asia-Pacific Rainforest Summit in Brunei from 3 to 5 August, these questions will be discussed by diverse representatives from government, business, civil society and the research community.

Pablo Pacheco is principal scientist with the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) and coordinator of the Trade, Investment and Governance theme of the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry. He will be chairing the smallholder session at the summit. In an interview on the sidelines of the recent Global Landscapes Forum: The Investment Case he addressed the thorny question of smallholders, investing and sustainability.

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  • Measure it and manage it: Terra-i forest monitoring goes global

Measure it and manage it: Terra-i forest monitoring goes global

Members of the Terra-i team discuss the Terra-i deforestation monitoring system, which can zoom-in on Latin America's forest to track deforestation in near real-time. Photo: Neil Palmer/CIAT
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By Ruben Echeverria, Director General, Center International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT)

Members of the Terra-i team discuss the Terra-i deforestation monitoring system, which can zoom-in on Latin America's forest to track deforestation in near real-time. Photo: Neil Palmer/CIAT
Members of the Terra-i team discuss the Terra-i deforestation monitoring system, which can zoom-in on Latin America’s forest to track deforestation in near real-time. Photo: Neil Palmer/CIAT

The Amazon rainforest is often described as the ‘lungs of the Earth’. But the forests of South East Asia and Africa are also vitally important – and among the most at risk. That’s why a deforestation early-warning system that’s proving so successful in Latin America will soon be monitoring all the world’s tropical forests – from space. By combining detailed satellite images with a lot of number crunching, the deforestation monitoring system Terra-i harnesses the power of big data to help protect forests, biodiversity, ecosystem services and livelihoods.

With images updated and scrutinized every 16 days, it can distinguish between recent and historical deforestation back to 2004, giving a frighteningly accurate story of forest clearance. It also enables users to identify the drivers of forest loss – from agriculture to mining, road building, urbanization and more.

Launched in Latin America in 2012, the Government of Peru adopted Terra-i as its official deforestation monitoring system two years later. Since then it has been keeping watch over its share of the Amazon rainforest, and flagging new drivers in 2015. Several countries in Central America are poised to adopt it.

Last year also saw a lot of hard work to prepare for the launch of Terra-i in SE Asia and Africa – a move that means the system will soon be watching over all the world’s tropical forests. In SE Asia, we expect early adopters to be Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia – where deforestation rates are among the highest in the world.

The system will also track forest clearance and vegetation change Africa, specifically in the enormously rich, diverse and important Congo Basin.

While some of the images generated by the system can be unnerving, the team behind Terra-I know that when it comes to deforestation, if you can’t measure it you can’t manage it. By giving a clearer idea of where the hotspots are, and what’s likely to be causing them, Terra-i enables governments to develop more robust policies on forest protection.

It can also help them quantify the enormous carbon dioxide emissions generated by forest clearance, meaning they can put a more accurate price on conservation.

The private sector can benefit from Terra-i too, with businesses better able to assess the environmental impact of their activities, which in turn can feed into their corporate social responsibility programs.

These activities go to the heart of the important issues that the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry is committed to tackling.

The expansion of Terra-i to SE Asia and Africa represents a big step towards uniting scientists and policymakers across the tropics behind a common goal: the protection and management one of our most precious and vulnerable resources.

Terra-i is the result of collaboration between CIAT, Kings College London and the University of Applied Sciences of Western Switzerland (HEIG-VD). It is funded by The Nature Conservancy, The World Resources Institute, Global Forest Watch and the CGIAR Research Program on FTA.

http://geodata.policysupport.org/terra-i

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