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This paper examines the factors that influence rural household decisions to clear forestland. We use a large dataset comprising 7172 households from 24 developing countries. Twenty-seven percent of sampled households had converted forest to agriculture during the previous 12 months, clearing on average 1.21 ha. Male-headed households with abundance of male labor, living in recently […]

Climate change, land degradation and drought affect millions of people living in drylands worldwide. With its food security depending almost entirely on irrigated agriculture, Central Asia is one of the arid regions highly vulnerable to water scarcity. Previous research of land and water use in the region has focused on improving water-use efficiency, soil management […]

An essential task of participatory action research is to help close the policy implementation gap that leads to large discrepancies between policy frameworks and local practices. Too often, official regulations, laws and decrees fail to translate into concrete action on the ground. Loose institutional linkages between research, extension and local communities are often blamed as […]

By Suzannah Goss, UNEP The inaugural UN Environmental Assembly which took place in Nairobi, Kenya, (June 23-27) represented the coming of age of the environment as a world issue, placing environmental concerns on the same footing with peace, security and finance. UNEA delegates promote the Sustainable Development Goals through global political guidance combined with a […]