Topics

There is increasing consensus over the inclusion of smallholder farmers in REDD + (Reduced Emissions through reduced Deforestation and Degradation) initiatives, expected to be one essential component within the new set of “Flexible Mechanisms” in the post-Kyoto Climate Change Agreement. However, with few long-term REDD + pilot projects implemented with smallholders, this paper attempts to […]

his study investigates four decades of socio-economic and environmental change in a shifting cultivation landscape in the northern uplands of Laos. Historical changes in land cover and land use were analyzed using a chronological series of remote sensing data. Impacts of landscape change on local livelihoods were investigated in seven villages through interviews with various […]

Fires in humid tropical forests are increasingly frequent due to severe dry seasons, forest degradation and agricultural expansion. One agent implicated in current discourse surrounding tropical forest fires is the small-scale farming peasantry who rely on fire in swidden (shifting cultivation, slash-and-burn) agriculture. The environmental degradation associated with fire has led to government responses at […]

By Barbara Fraser LIMA, Peru — Legislation aimed at giving Bolivia’s Indigenous communities the right to extract resources from their forests has solidified land tenure, but conflicts with long-standing forest-management practices, according to a study of the Yuracaré people. Under land and forest reforms passed in 1996, the Yuracaré, who live in the Amazon Basin […]

Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation and enhancing forest carbon stocks (REDD+) is a performance-based payment mechanism currently being debated in international and national environmental policy and planning forums. As the mechanism is based on conditionality, payments must reflect land stewards’ level of compliance with carbon-efficient management practices. However, lack of clarity in land […]

This article describes various opportunities but also constraints to greater crop diversification, and the impact on local sustainability in the Khorezm province of Uzbekistan in the Aral Sea basin. At present, approximately 70% of the area in this study region is sown to irrigated cotton and winter wheat under the so-called state mandate. We present […]