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 specific
to sloping lands
Provision of water
Purification of water
Erosion control: conservation of soils
Flood prevention
Conservation of soil nutrients
Maintenance of habitats
Carbon sequestration
Maintanence of regional
precipitation patterns
Human-centered values and services
Others

• 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

Environmental
Relationship 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