Presented by Terry Sunderland, from the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), at the 125th Anniversary Congress of the International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO), on September 18, 2017 in Freiburg, Germany. Panel: Multifunctional tropical forest landscapes: Finding solutions in science and practice. Applying ecosystem service approach in navigating forest contributions to rural livelihoods.

1. Terry Sunderland, Principal Scientist, CIFOR
IUFRO 125th Anniversary Congress, 18-22 September, 2017
Freiburg, Germany
FORESTS, FOOD AND NUTRITION:
A POLICY PERSPECTIVE

2. FORESTS IN LANDSCAPES: WHAT DO WE KNOW?
• One billion+ people rely on forest products
for consumption and income in some way
(Agrawal et al. 2013)
• Safety-net during times of food and income
insecurity (Wunder et al. 2014)
• Wild harvested meat and freshwater fish
provides 30-80% of protein intake for many
rural communities (Nasi et al. 2011;
McIntyre et al. 2016)
• 75% of world’s population rely on
biodiversity for primary health care (WHO,
2003)
• 40%-80% of global food production comes
from diverse smallholder agricultural
systems in complex landscapes (FAO
2011; IFAD 2016)
• Long tradition of managing forests for food
– e.g. shifting cultivation (van Vliet et al.
2011)
• Forests sustaining agriculture through
ecosystem services provision (Reed et al.
2017)

3. FOREST FUNCTIONS AND LINKS TO FSN

4. “Forests are a major repository
of food and other resources that
play a crucial role in food
security. In addition, maintaining
diversity in agricultural
production systems leads to
increased resilience to shocks
particularly in the context of a
changing climate”. Editorial:
Arnold et al. 2011

5. “Our main findings can be summarized as follows: there is a statistically
significant positive relationship between tree cover and dietary diversity;
fruit and vegetable consumption increases with tree cover until a peak of
45% tree cover and then declines; and there is no relationship between
animal source food consumption and tree cover. Overall our findings
suggest that children in Africa who live in areas with more tree cover
have more diverse and nutritious diets”. Ickowitz et al., 2014

6. “The relationship between biodiversity and nutrition, suggests that we need to
pay close attention to the potential of integrated approaches. We must
also seek to understand what the implications are for policy and what the
messages to policy makers should be. Primarily, it suggests there is a
need for more systems and multi-sectorial approaches to address the
contemporary concurrent challenges of sustainable food systems that
include forestry, conservation, agriculture, food security and nutrition”.
Powell et al., 2015

7. “Areas of swidden/agroforestry, natural forest, timber and agricultural
tree crop plantations were all associated with more frequent
consumption of food groups rich in micronutrients. The
swidden/agroforestry land class was the landscape associated with
more frequent consumption of the largest number of micronutrient rich
food groups. Swidden cultivation in is often viewed as a backward practice
that is an impediment to food security in Indonesia and destructive of the
environment. If further research corroborates that swidden farming actually
results in better nutrition than the practices that replace it, Indonesian policy
makers may need to reconsider their views on this land use”. Ickowitz et al.,
2016

8. "Our findings suggest that deforestation and land use change may have
unforeseen consequences on the quality of local people’s diets. A better
understanding of the contribution of forest foods to local diets is needed to
understand the true impact that the loss of forests may have for nutrition in
the face of agricultural expansion. If indeed forests substantially
contribute to dietary quality in some areas as the results here imply,
forest loss may result in unforeseen, adverse consequences on
nutrition for local people." Rowland et al. 2016

9. FORESTS SUSTAINING AGRICULTURE
How does landscape configuration maximise the provision of these
goods and services for both forestry and food production???
Water regulation
Climate regulation
Pollination
Pest control

10. “When incorporating forests and trees within an appropriate and
contextualized natural resource management strategy, there is
potential to maintain, and in some cases, enhance agricultural yields
comparable to solely monoculture systems”. Reed et al. 2017

11. IUFRO GLOBAL FOREST EXPERT PANEL REPORT - 2015
“The assessment report provides comprehensive
scientific evidence on how forests, trees and landscapes
can be – and must be - an integral part of the solution
to the global problem of food security and nutrition”.

12. SUSTAINABLE FORESTRY FOR FOOD SECURITY AND
NUTRITION REPORT
• Much of the recent work on forests and food
security has influenced the drafting of the
HLPE Report: “Sustainable forestry for food
security and nutrition” for the Committee on
World Food Security (CFS)
• At e-consultation stage, many individuals,
civil society and governments provided
formal review and feedback: e.g. Russian
Federation, Australia, Brazil, Nigeria, India,
US & the Netherlands
• Report released in June 2017; policy review
at CFS Annual Congress in October
• Probably greatest opportunity to get forests
and food security and nutrition onto global
food security agenda and policy arena

13. KNOWLEDGE EXCHANGE: SHARING THE EVIDENCE
• IUFRO: Getting the forestry
community to understand the
importance of forest
management for food security
and nutrition
• CFS: Getting the nutrition and
food security community to
understand the role of forests for
food security and nutrition
• Next stage: How to influence the
policy arena?
• SDG’s??

14. FORESTS AND FOOD SECURITY: WHAT VISION?
• Diverse forest and tree-based production systems offer
advantages over monocropping systems because of their
adaptability and resilience.
• There are a multitude of ecosystem services provided by
forests and trees that simultaneously support food production,
nutrition, sustainability and environmental and human health.
• Managing landscapes on a multi-functional basis that combines
food production, biodiversity conservation and the maintenance
of ecosystem services can contribute to food and nutritional
security
• Forests and trees alone will not achieve global food security,
but can play a major role: discourse has started to change
• The right to food? How does this interplay with conservation?

15. THINKING beyond the canopy
t.sunderland@cgiar.org
@TCHSunderland