Linkage of Physiological Processes and Ecosystem Processes by Integrating Gas Exchange Chamber and Eco-Physiological Computer Simulation Model

ABSTRACT

One of the major global trends linked to the process of globalization is the expansion of agro-industry into the humid tropics. Although agro-industry is an important source of income for Brazil, it is also leading to the displacement of local populations and extensive clearing of native vegetation. In this context, we focus on a second trend resulting from globalization in which financial institutions have demonstrated increasing concern with environmental and social responsibility, notably through the inclusion of environmental and social conditions in loans to the agricultural sector. In this article, we provide an assessment of the potential for this type of economic instrument to help reduce the negative impacts of agro-industrial expansion, and how the different actors who are shaping this debate (non-governmental organizations, industries, the finance sector, government) can best help to realize this potential. We evaluate this broader question through the lens of two International Finance Corporation loans to Brazil's Grupo Maggi, the world's largest independently-held soybean exporter. We identify four areas in which private sector self-regulation can improve to realize environmental and social performance goals: (a) Financial institutions and firms can increase the clarity, quality, timeliness, and regularity of monitoring and reporting; (b) Civil society can develop a more sophisticated approach to distinguishing between companies and initiatives that essentially maintain the status quo and those that are trying to improve; (c) Civil society can help to develop simple, standard measures of environmental and social performance of agricultural lands for use by financial institutions and firms in establishing environmental and social management systems; and (d) Governments can develop strong regulations that capitalize on voluntary regulation mechanisms' flexibility and efficiency, as well as developing incentive systems for producers and firms that demonstrate high social and environmental performance in their operations.     

Consumer perceptions of environmental and social sustainability of wood products in the Finnish market

Abstract

Consumers in today's world can perceive an additional benefit associated with responsible business practices and the sustainability of purchased products. However, in Scandinavian context, there is a lack of knowledge of consumer perceptions toward environmental and social sustainability of wood products. Our data on adult Finnish consumers (private end-users) (N=227) were collected during 2004–2007 as interview exit data from home retail centers selling building materials. The perceived environmental and social sustainability of wood products was investigated using exploratory factor analysis, and the phenomenon was observed to be a two-dimensional construct consisting of “General environmental and social sustainability” and “Specific social sustainability” reflecting strong consumer need for product safety. Logistic regression analysis revealed that the “General” dimension also explains the consumer's self-declared willingness to pay for sustainable wood products. The results also indicate that the respondents may be segmented based on their perceptions on product level environmental and social sustainability: the most environmentally and socially conscious group can be profiled by gender (female), older age, and summer cottage ownership.     

Voluntary Certification Design Choices Influence Producer Participation,Stakeholder Acceptance,and Environmental Sustainability in Commodity Agriculture Sectors in Tropical Forest Landscapes

Voluntary certification programs are one type of intervention used to incentivize the agricultural commodity sector in tropical landscapes to reduce deforestation and improve sustainability. Cases of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) voluntary certification program in Indonesia and the Sustainable Agriculture Network (SAN), voluntary certification for cattle in Brazil, are used to contrast the role taken in two significantly different programs to render sustainability outcomes. While producers in both countries follow a similar path toward compliance with certification standards, only the RSPO program offers enticements for producers to participate in the intermediate stages of compliance by offering membership in its affiliated industry roundtable. Design choices about the core activities of a program (adoption, implementation, and enforcement and monitoring) that are ancillary to standards setting are found to be opportunities for providing benefits to both producers and civil society stakeholders without compromising the program’s rigor. A framework is proposed to understand voluntary certification programs as both creators and brokers of benefits between producers and other sustainability stakeholders, potentially providing an approach to simultaneously increase participation and maintain program rigor.     

Sustainable Forest Management in Tropical Rain Forests

Abstract

In planning of sustainable forest management, economic, environmental and social demands often conflict. Forest management in Southeast Asian tropical dipterocarp forests has been particularly biased towards maximizing immediate economic return from extensive logging. Overexploitation and other forms of uncontrolled land use within these forests have led to the situation where the remaining natural forests, most of them in Indonesia, will be liquidated within the next 10-15 years at the current rate of deforestation. In this paper we present an approach for sustainable forest management planning in which economic, environmental and social sustainability are considered simultaneously in order to define an optimal management strategy from a set of available alternatives.

We carried out a case study within a rain forest logging concession in Indonesian Borneo by using a participatory planning approach involving interviews of the local people, environmental assessment and economic analyses. We used the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) method for resource allocation and priority setting in order to identify an optimal strategy which yields a sustained economic output from timber production, while at the same time being environmentally and socioculturally sustainable. Despite their relatively high costs, strategies involving selective harvesting combined to complete restoration of original dipterocarp stock in logged-over areas were superior in terms of economic, environmental and social sustainability. Priorities set by local communities for the strategies to meet their socioeconomic and cultural needs coincide well with those ensuring the restoration and biodiversity.     

越南农业的改革与成就

自从８０年代实行改革开放以来,越南农业取得了巨大的成就。到９０年代中期,越南已成为世界第三大稻米出口国,亚洲第二大、世界第六大咖啡出口国,世界第三大腰果生产国和出口国,农业全面发展。     

Surviving the Transition

Summary

Community-based stewardship forestry (CBSF) on public lands in the United States is still a fledgling concept. Neither the number of projects completed nor the length of time that has passed since their initial implementation has been sufficient to draw definitive conclusions about the movement's success in improving economic, social, and environmental conditions in forest-dependent communities. What is of most concern now is whether the CBSF fledgling will have a chance to reach its full potential or will instead fall victim to organizational exhaustion, economic malnutrition, or political sniping. Experiences with stewardship collaboratives in northwest Montana have helped define 10 key factors CBSF groups must effectively address if they are to survive: (1) organizational burnout; (2) membership composition, expansion, diversification, and utilization; (3) change in organizational mission or focus; (4) financial viability; (5) responsiveness of federal decision makers to CBSF groups' legislative concerns; (6) continued skepticism among both industry and environmental communities; (7) movement from small demonstration projects to implementation on a larger scale; (8) need for procedural simplification; (9) outreach to the broader community; and (10) institutionalization of a meaningful role for communities in the natural resource policy making and management process. There are no simple solutions to these challenges, but the collective record of CBSF groups so far suggests a level of commitment and staying power sufficient to propel the fledgling through the transition and into full flight.     

Developments in Swedish forest policy and administration – from a “policy of restriction” toward a “policy of cooperation”

Abstract

New tools and forms of cooperation at the landscape level are needed in order for forestry and environmental conservation to co-exist in areas with many land owners. Awareness has existed for several years in Sweden that cooperation at the landscape level is essential for protecting areas of high environmental value. This awareness has come to expression in several projects and initiatives. One of these projects is the Östra Vätterbranterna Partnership, a successful example of the new orientation toward environmental management as formulated in the government bill Sustainable protection of nature areas: new working methods with a focus on collaboration and increased dialog by involving more actors and utilizing a greater combination of steering instruments. This development resonates with the growing trend toward deregulation and less state intervention in environmental management, implying a stronger emphasis on new governance structures and market-driven processes. This paper examines the preconditions for a development toward governance-oriented forms of steering in the area of environmental policy and law, with specific emphasis on the protection of forestry areas with high environmental value. Paralleling this development, the transformation of environmental public administration is analyzed, using a model representing three different perspectives on administration's role, values and meaning, showing state action's progressive transition from “rowing” to “steering” to “serving” and facilitating.     

Can oil palm plantations become bird friendly?

Despite the increasing claims that structural complexity in agroforestry plantations is a key variable for enhancing bird biodiversity, few studies have experimentally manipulated the understory component of structural complexity. Here, we examined the impact of removing understory vegetation from oil palm plantations on the richness and abundance of birds in eastern Guatemala, testing if bird richness and abundance are positively affected by the presence of understory vegetation. Oil palm plantations with understory hold more bird richness and abundance than those lacking it. The experimental removal of this vegetation, equivalent to a reduction in complexity, decreases bird richness but not abudance. Our analysis shows clear effects of vegetation removal on bird richness, such that removal reduces richness and abundance to levels found in areas without understory. Hence, leaving or implementing structural complexity within plantations could satisfy the current need of making commodity production a cleaner industry, fulfilling both, the production of highly demanded commodities and the conservation of biodiversity in productive landscapes. Oil palm (Elaeis guineensis) is one of the most rapidly expanding crop in tropical regions, representing the major cause of loss of natural forests and of the decline of endangered species in several countries. Enhancing understory vegetation might reduce such negative effects. This is one of the few experimental tests about how a component of the vegetation and structural complexity of plantations affects birds.     

Origin products from African forests: A Kenyan pathway to prosperity and green inclusive growth?

Many tropical countries have potential for adding market value to unique forest origin products similarly to how EU gain billions of Euro's annually from registering agricultural origin products, with Protected Denomination of Origin or Protected Geographical Indication. Following analysis of the renaissance for the global Geographical Indication (GI) regime, this article provides case-studies from Kenya – on Mwingi Honey, Kakamega Silk and institutional conditions under which producers may incorporate territory specific cultural, environmental, and social qualities of their unique products. We investigate prospects for Kenyan producers to create and capture additional monetary value for their forest related origin products, allowing smallholders to build livelihood, while stewarding natural environments. The origin products are investigated for their potential for protection with a GI, within five different dimensions of and links with the social and natural world. Our study shows that Mwingi Honey and Kakamega Silk have potential for registration under a GI regime based mainly on close links between local environment, flora and product quality, and product specificity. The institutional environment presents major challenges for the development of GI products and markets, exemplified by the Kenyan GI bill which is not yet enacted after almost a decade in the making.     

Forest Policy Evolution in Poland

Abstract

In Europe, intensive forest management has anteceded a long history of intensive exploitation. The result has been the replacement of natural forests with highly productive albeit more vulnerable forests of simplified structure. Polish forestry has followed this same pattern and the country has seen a substantial increase in forest cover over the last 50 years. The main challenge for Polish forest management comes in trying to meet growing demand for wood products while responding to increased public demand for conservation of environmental values. Poland's new Forest Act for the first time puts environmental social and productive values of the forest on an equal footing. Within the framework of the Act. the Polish Policy of Sustainable Forest Development puts special emphasis on protection of biological diversity and the promotion of environmentally safe technologies and practices. The concept of Forest Promotion Areas is the major element of the Policy. The challenge for Forest Promotion Areas and for Model Forests will be to bring together all the necessary elements: environmental, economic and social that will allow sustainable development in its broadest sense.     

Community-Based Ecosystem Monitoring

Abstract

Community-based ecosystem monitoring refers to a range of observation and measurement activities involving participation by community members and designed to learn about ecological and social factors affecting a community. This chapter presents observations from community-based ecosystem monitoring activities throughout the United States. It discusses factors leading to the emergence of community-based ecosystem monitoring, multiparty monitoring and its role in building social capital, the monitoring process, the integration of social and ecological factors, and ongoing challenges in community-based monitoring. Sidebars illustrate the chapter's central themes and lessons with examples from particular community monitoring initiatives. Community-based monitoring has been motivated by concern for special places, in response to perceived environmental threats, and as part of an effort to overcome longstanding conflict between diverse stakeholder groups. Multiparty monitoring has the potential to address each of these needs. Significant challenges include achieving effective, diverse community participation, integrating social indicators into ecosystem monitoring and analysis, identifying an appropriate level of rigor for specific monitoring objectives, and effectively integrating monitoring into an adaptive decisionmaking process.     

Forests in the Time of Violence

Summary

Forest remnants in the Colombian Amazon, Andes, and Chocó are the last repositories of a highly diverse and endemic biota. Historical changes in the Colombian landscape have been dramatic, but the magnitude and rate of change has increased over the last half century, while conflict has consumed the capacity of Colombian society to respond to environmental threats. Academic experts in the study of the Colombian conflict have explored the social, political, and economic implications of the war. However, the environmental consequences of conflict are documented only when groups in conflict target salient economic resources. This paper presents the first analysis of the geographic distribution of forest remnants in relation to armed conflict in Colombia. Results show that guerrillas and/or paramilitaries range throughout areas of human encroachment into remnant forests. The policies promoted by Colombia's irregular armed forces range from “gunpoint conservation” rarely applied by guerrillas, to the rapid conversion of forests and crops to cattle ranches and coca (Erythroxylum sp.) plantations, following paramilitary occupation. Because the rates and extent of fragmentation are linked to such land use practices, armed groups may play a crucial role in determining the fate of Colombia's forests and their endemic biota.     

兴安落叶松天然林不同分化等级林木树干液流对综合环境因子的响应

[目的]以大兴安岭北部典型寒温带针叶林优势建群树种兴安落叶松为对象,分析不同分化等级林木树干液流对环境因子的综合响应,构建不同分化等级林木树干液流模型。[方法]利用热扩散式液流监测系统和通量塔的梯度气象系统连续监测树干液流及环境因子的变化。[结果]表明:1)观测期间,优势木具有较强的蒸腾能力,其平均液流密度分别为中等木和被压木的1.9倍、2.5倍。总体上,分化程度越高的林木日树干液流持续时间越长,液流密度峰值出现时间越早,液流密度的峰值也越高。2)利用主成分分析将降雨、净辐射、空气温度、空气湿度、风速、土壤温度、土壤含水量和水汽压亏缺降维为蒸发需求因子(EDI)、土壤水热因子和降水因子。EDI(与净辐射、温湿度、水汽压亏缺显著相关)是影响该地区林木树干液流的关键环境要素,其携带环境数据信息量的45%;土壤水热因子和降水因子分别携带20%和13%。3)各分化等级林木树干液流密度对EDI呈顺时针时滞,对净辐射和水汽压亏缺则分别呈逆时针、顺时针时滞,且EDI的时滞效应明显较小。不同分化等级林木液流密度对EDI和水汽压亏缺的时滞表现一致,对净辐射的时滞则以优势木最小。4)各分化等级林木树干液流密度对EDI的响应均符合"S"型模型,即液流升高到阈值后,不再随蒸发需求的增加而增大。模型中,中等木(0.458)和被压木(0.457)的过渡斜率略高于优势木(0.443),表明优势木树干液流对环境因子的敏感性略低。该模型对不同分化等级林木液流密度的模拟精度均在90%以上,考虑EDI的时滞效应或引入土壤水热因子、降水因子对模型精度的影响较小。[结论]兴安落叶松树干液流对综合环境因子存在较强的响应性,且在不同分化等级间存在差异;利用"S"模型和综合环境因子可有效估算不同分化等级兴安落叶松的树干液流。     

Sustaining Tropical Forest Biodiversity

Abstract

Tropical forests are very rich in biological diversity and form an important economic and ecological resource. This biodiversity is of great value for communities living in or near these forests as a ready source of subsistence and cash income, and for the world at large as a source of tropical timber and non-timber products and a repository of genetic and chemical information. However, this biological complexity is diminishing rapidly. We analyze the main human (anthropogenic) actions causing loss of tropical forest biodiversity along with the strategies of management for forest biodiversity. Not only is the biophysical component important in management for biodiversity, but the action participation and support of local people, the national government and international cooperation as a whole, arc essential for an effective and sustainable development of tropical forests. This integrated development strategy ensures that socio-economic and environmental benefits are provided for present and future generations.     

Tree Life History Patterns and Forest Dynamics

Abstract

Forest trees are usually classified into broad ecological groups (e.g., pioneers vs. mature-phase species) based on the importance of natural disturbance for their regeneration. These classifications only tie into account a small component of the plant's life-cycle, usually seeds and seedlings, and therefore may over-simplify the role of natural disturbance in the evolution of life-history traits. We present a conceptual model for the study of plant demography within heterogeneous environments, and illustrate its use by reviewing how natural disturbance influences the demography of several lowland tropical tree species at Los Tuxtlas, Mexico. Our model assumes that habitat patches such as treefall gaps in tropical forests can affect a plant at all stages of its life-cycle, and reveals many potential life history patterns in relation to forest dynamics. We propose that only detailed demographic studies of whole life histories and genetics of tree populations, as well as forest disturbance regimes, will allow us to elucidate convergent life histories and the existence of discrete ecological groups among tropical forest trees.     

Climate Change Mitigation Through Forestry

Abstract

One of the tools for reducing the release of carbon dioxide (CO₂), the largest component of greenhouse gas emissions, is carbon sequestration—the accumulation of carbon in terrestrial forms. This paper explores options to mitigate global climate change through forestry, constraints to forestry's applicability, secondary environmental and social benefits, and techniques established to monitor and verify results. Twenty-five current carbon sequestration projects are listed totaling an estimated 193 million tons of carbon at an average price of approximately $2.18 per ton. However, modeling exercises demonstrate that even the theoretical upper limit of carbon sequestration through forestry is not enough to stabilize carbon emissions in the atmosphere. Non-forestry CO₂ reduction measures must be taken as well.     

Regional Comparative Advantage,Location of Agriculture,and Deforestation in Brazil

ABSTRACT

This article highlights how deforestation is not only linked to economic processes within the Amazon, but also to economic forces in the rest of Brazil. In light of recent trends in Brazil's agricultural production inside and outside the Amazon, this article maintains that the growing importance of beef production in the Amazon relative to the rest of Brazil is likely to lead to further increases in deforestation. From 1991 to 2001 the Amazon's share of the Brazilian bovine herd increased from 15% to 25%—an average change of 1% per year. With the Brazilian herd size in 2003 estimated at 196 million head of cattle, the current rate of increase implies an increase of 1.96 million cattle per year in the Amazon. At Brazil's average stocking rate of 1.1 head of cattle per hectare, it means that an additional 18,000 km² of land are needed each year in the Amazon to account for this expansion. However, Brazil has abundant agricultural land outside the Amazon to meet increases in demand for beef. The difficulty lies in the comparative advantage of these other areas in producing soy and grains as opposed to livestock. I conclude that targeting resources toward specific agricultural development opportunities outside the Amazon—especially grain-fed beef— would be an effective way to reduce incentives to clear land in the Amazon.     

Trees as an agriculture sustaining activity: the case of northern China

The nearly complete removal of forest cover from China's northern plains before the renewal of household incentives and subsequent reforestation in the late 1970s provides an unusual broad-scale opportunity to examine the impact of forest-based environmental services on long-term agricultural productivity. This paper uses a Cobb-Douglas agricultural production function with a measure of forest cover as a production shifter to test the hypothesis that forest-related environmental services make a positive contribution to agricultural output. Our evidence for Shandong province shows that agroforestry activities rapidly produced approximately ten percent increases in agricultural productivity — and their contribution probably has not reached its limit. The relevance of this finding goes beyond China's agriculture to the broader question of how world agricultural production can be sustained in the long-run — after the possible exhaustion of the contributions of current institutions and farming systems. If the opportunities for expanding the agricultural land base and for multiple cropping are small, and if ever more labor must be squeezed into the agricultural sector, then what can contribute to agricultural growth? One answer must lie in improvements to the agricultural environment, and trees may be a part of this improvement.     

Improving Markets for Ecosystem Services

Abstract

Panama contains some of the most productive and diverse ecosystems in the world, and receives many benefits from the natural services provided by those ecosystems. Yet formal markets for ecosystem services in Panama are poorly developed. We assume that functioning markets for ecosystem services would partially counter development pressures on Panama's natural forests and ecosystems, and propose a suite of policy alternatives that could help develop such markets with the expectation that revenues would fund conservation and restoration efforts. These recommendations fall into five broad categories: (1) increase conservation of existing forests; (2) promote reforestation; (3) strengthen institutional capacity; (4) lower transaction costs; and (5) build the Panama brand for environmental services. A variety of fiscal, legal, organizational, and information-based approaches are recommended. In addition, we recommend convening a national Ecosystem Services Task-Force to organize diverse stakeholders and implement policy alternatives deemed most appropriate for advancing market development. We emphasize policy alternatives that are consonant with political and economic conditions in the country, that leverage outside funding, that recognize political feasibility, and that build upon existing legal and institutional frameworks.     

Allometric equations for estimating aboveground biomass of Coffea arabica L. grown in the Rift Valley escarpment of Ethiopia

Coffee, Coffea arabica L., which is native to Ethiopia, is the world’s most widely traded tropical agricultural commodity. While much is known about the productivity and management of coffee for coffee beans little attention has been given to the plants overall biomass production and carbon sequestration. The objective of this study was to develop and evaluate allometric equations for estimating the aboveground biomass of C. arabica plants growing in indigenous agroforestry system in the Rift Valley escarpment of south-eastern Ethiopia. Coffee plays an important role in providing income and in sustaining these productive systems. Biomass harvesting of 31 plants with 54 stems was carried out in a 40 km² area varying in elevation from 1,500 to 1,900 m. The stem accounted for most (56 %) of plant biomass, followed by branches (39 %) and twigs plus foliage (5 %). Plant mean biomass was 22.9 ± 15.8 kg. Power equations using stem diameter measured at either 40 cm (d ₄₀) or at breast height (d, 1.3 m) with and without stem height (h) were evaluated. The square power equation, $ Y \; = \; b_{ 1} d_{ 40}^{ 2} $ , was found to be the best (highest ranked using goodness-of-fit statistics) for predicting total and component biomass. The reliability of the prediction decreased in the order: stem > branches > twigs plus foliage. A cross-validation procedure showed that equation parameterization was stable and coefficients reliable. Our parameterized square power equation for total aboveground biomass was also found to be better than the equations parameterized by Hairiah et al. (Carbon stocks of tropical land use systems as part of the global C balance: effects of forest conversion and options for clean development activities, International Centre for Research in Agroforestry, Bogor, 2001) and Segura et al. (Agroforest Syst 68:143–150, 2006) for C. arabica grown in agroforestry systems, confirming the importance of parameterization of allometric equations with site specific data when possible.