Implications of Land Use Change in
the Mekong region for Upland
Forests and their Services
Dietrich Schmidt-Vogt
ICRAF East- and Central Asia Node
Kunming, China

Presentation Outline
• The Mekong Region
• Land Use Change in the Mekong Region
• Implications of Land Use Change for Forest
Cover, Livelihoods and Biodiversity

Forest Cover in the Mekong Region

Forest Cover of GMS (GMS Atlas of the Environment, 2004)
• Forest is the natural land cover of the GMS
and would have covered nearly 100% of the
land are before human interventions.
• Today, continuous forest occurs mainly in
the uplands.
• Countries of the GMS differ significantly with
respect to extent of forest cover and forest
cover dynamics.
• Basic typologies distinguish forest types
according to canopy characteristics
(open/closed) which are often used as
indicators of primary forest and secondary
forest.

Shifting Cultivation in the Uplands of the
Mekong Region
In the uplands of Mekong region large areas have in recent decades undergone
conversion from swidden landscapes with a large share of secondary forests to other
land uses.
Swidden cultivation is an
agricultural system in
which land under
natural vegetation is
cleared, burned and
cultivated with crops for
a few years, and then
left untended while the
natural vegetation
regenerates during a
fallow period.

Land Conversion in Swidden
Landscapes

From shifting cultivation to permanent
farming

Rubber Expansion in Xishuangbanna
1988-2010

Land Use Change in Manlin and Man
Sai

Expansion of Rubber into Upper
Elevations of Xishuangbanna
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
0
20,000
40,000
60,000
80,000
100,000
120,000
400-500 500-600 600-700 700-800 800-900 900-1000 1000-1100 1100-1200 1200-1300 1300-1400
percentageofrubberplantations(%)
rubberplantationarea(ha)
Area 1988 Area 2002 Area 2010 Percentage 1988 Percentage 2002 Percentage 2010
elevation (m)

Proportion (%) of Rubber Plantations With
Respect to Rubber Net Present Value (NPV)
NPV
(US$ ha-1)
1988 2002 2010 2010
Close canopy rubber Open canopy rubber
< 0 3.7 3.3 8.4 8.1 10.7
0-20,000 30.4 34.1 39.6 38.4 49.5
20,000-40,000 57.4 57.8 46.9 48.7 32.5
40,000-63,080 8.5 4.8 5.1 4.8 7.3
Sub-total 100 100 100 100 100

Countries with Large Net Changes in Forest
Area 2000-2005 (FRA 2005)

10
15
20
25
Great
Leap
Forward
Household
Responsibility
System
Yangtze
Flood 2009
Goal:
23%
Goal:
26%
1958 1981 1998 2009 2020 2050
Sources: Zhang (1949); Forestry Surveys (1976-2009); Forestry Ministry (2020, 2050)
Forest cover change in China
Goal reached:
20% by 2009
Turning point in 1981:
12% forest cover

Forest Cover Change in Xishuangbanna

Secondary Forests in the Mekong region
Wangpakapattanawong，P., Kavinchan， N. ,
Vaidhayakarn，C., Schmidt-Vogt， D., Elliott，
S. 2010: Fallow to forest: applying indigenous and
scientific knowledge to tropical forest restoration.
Forest Ecology and Management 260, pp. 1399-1406
Secondary forests in swidden
landscapes can be comparable to
natural forests in terms of species
diversity and have a high potential for
conservation.

0
1 2
2 4
3 6
4 8
6 0
0 2 0 4 0 6 0 8 0 1 0 0 1 2 0
D is ta n c e ( k m )
Forestconditon
(basalaream2/ha)
0
2
4
6
8
1 0
Locallivelihood
(averageincomeperyear-
millionkips)
F o re s t c o n ditio n
L o c a l live lih o o d
Heinimann, A., Messerli, P., Schmidt-Vogt, D.,
Wiesmann, U. 2007: The dynamics of secondary
forest landscapes in the Lower Mekong Basin: a
regional scale analysis. In: Mountain Research and
Development 27 (3), pp. 232-241.
Thanichanon, P., Schmidt-Vogt, D., Messerli, P.,
Heinimann, A., Epprecht, M. Secondary forests and
local livelihood along a gradient of accessibility: a
case study in Luang Prabang, Lao PDR. Applied
Geography (submitted September 2011, under
review)
Secondary Forests in the Mekong Region :
Landscape Level
Secondary forest are declining all over the
Mekong region mainly as a result of
Improved accessibility.

Conclusions
• The upland portions of the Mekong region
experience land use change on a massive scale
and rapid rate.
• A significant portion of land use change is from
traditional land use of natural/semi-natural forest
to commercial tree crops.
• While this type of change may go hand in hand
with maintenance of even increase of forest
cover (depending on forest definition), it poses
risks for biodiversity and livelihoods.

Thank you