Kunming Expert Meeting

Forests and Water: From Research to Application 3/24/14

CIFOR/ICRAF Sloping Lands in Transition (SLANT) Project

2 very relevant CIFOR-led projects

SWAMP (D. Murdiyarso and all)

Sustainable Wetlands Adaptation and Mitigation Program

Goals: To quantify GHG emissions

arising from both intact and degraded wetlands undergoing different trajectories of land cover change

To quantify the carbon stocks of the representative tropical wetlands of the world – (peat swamp forests and mangroves of Asia, Africa and Latin America–South America, Central America, and the Caribbean)

…

SLANT

Sloping Lands in Transition: Optimizing policies of re/afforestation of upland smallholdings for local livelihoods and ecosystem services

Partnership with China’s Forest Economics and Development Research Center to assess monitoring of Conversion of Cropland to Forest Program (CCFP), which is mostly implemented on sloping lands.

What led to SLANT?

CCFP background

Aim to reduce flooding & soil erosion, revised to emphasize economic dev. & poverty alleviation

Started in 1999, fully rolled out by 2002

- Phase I: 1999-2007

- Phase II: 2008-2016

Payments to smallholders to convert sloping cropland to forests (>25° in Yangtze River & 15° elsewhere).

- Grass: 2 yrs

- Economic forest: 5 yrs

- Protection forest: 8 yrs

>25 M ha (~3% total land area)

- ~65% for protection/conservation

- ~40% cropland vs. 60% ‘barren’ land

25 provinces, 2500 counties & >32 million hhs

Photos: China Forest Economics and Development Research Center

Photos: China Forest Economics and Development Research Center

Photos: China Forest Economics and Development Research Center

Country profiles: China, India, Indonesia, Thailand,

Nepal & Philippines, Vietnam

CIFOR/ICRAF SLANT (Sloping lands in transition) scoping study

Forest transition in Asia

Source: FAO FRA 2010, author’s analysis

To understand implementation of programs promoting forestry for provision of ecosystem services in smallholder-occupied hilly and mountainous lands in Asia/Pacific

to assess their socio-economic and biophysical effects, including their under-studied effects on resilience of community subsistence systems and capacity for adaptation

to share this knowledge regionally with the aim of improving subsequent interventions and policies.

SLANT Aims & objectives

Sloping lands provide specific ecosystem goods and services. For that reason (actual or claimed) governments/agencies adopt policies promoting reforestation, afforestation, forest management and integration of trees on farms on these lands.

Why policies on sloping lands?

Ecosystem services specificto sloping lands

Provision of waterPurification of waterErosion control: conservation of soilsFlood preventionConservation of soil nutrientsMaintenance of habitatsCarbon sequestrationMaintanence of regional precipitation patternsHuman-centered values and servicesOthers

• China: Conversion of Cropland to Forest Program (CCFP)

• India: Hydroelectric development, cash crop production in the North and northeast, biodiversity conservation in the south and southwest

• Thailand: Water provision for lowland rice cultivation

• Indonesia: Reforestation for PES, timber production

Examples of interventions…

We are interested because sloping lands are home to specific groups of people, often to some extent marginalized (but sometimes well off or even privileged).

How do those “upland” people experience government programs and development efforts specifically targeting sloping lands to produce ecosystems goods and services?

What are existing local practices addressing these issues, and how are those affected by external intervention as well.

Social aspects of SLANT

What defines our “sloping lands”?– High mountain areas (including valleys?)

– Slope of occupied area (e.g. >25%)?

– Some social identity criteria?

Who are “smallholders & communities” in hilly and mountainous lands in Asia?– Swiddeners

– Farmers

– Forest managers

Landscapes– Managed forest

– Agroforestry systems

– Traditional land management systems

Definitions

EnvironmentalRelationship between upland farming systems (e.g. shifting

cultivation vs. intensification) and:

Social & political

Soil (nutrients and erosion Marginalization of ethnic groups living on marginal (sloping) lands

Water (quantity and quality) to downstream Demise of swidden agriculture in Asia/Pacific

Carbon emissions Rights of local communities & urbanization

Biodiversity Food security

Timber and NTFP production

Government reforestation, afforestation, and forest restoration programs in uplands

Provision of ecosystem services by traditional upland land management systems

Ecocompensation to upstream farmers & communities

Community-based natural resource management in uplands

Watershed management of headwaters by indigenous/local people

A glance at the scope of existing literature

How effective are sloping land forest restoration programs in providing water ecosystem services?

– Flood mitigation

– Erosion prevention

– Water provision

– Water quality

What is the effect of water use for plantation establishment?

How does altered water availability affect local agriculture and food supply?

Local/regional effects, & transboundary (e.g. river basin) effects

Water related research questions

Thank you