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Towards low-emission landscapes in Viet Nam
Abstract and Figures
This book covers some of ICRAF Viet Nam’s key research over the past decade. We selected work that contributed to integrated land-use planning for low-emission and sustainable development strategies in rural landscapes. The research has been inclusive, integrative and informative. Inclusive because the research includes strategies for both forest and agricultural land, for socio-economic and environmental objectives including hydrological functions, and was developed through participatory processes that took into account the perspectives and expectations of smallholders, local and national authorities, and scientists. Integrative because the research integrates diverse factors when assessing the impact of the strategies on the multiple functions of landscapes. Informative because the approaches were scientific and the findings were provided to national and provincial authorities and local communities. ICRAF's work continues to bring evidence to policy dialogues, including assessing the possible roles of agroforestry for Viet Nam’s targets to international conventions, such as the Nationally Determined Contributions.
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... Using an agroforestry system can protect and conserve biodiversity [25,35,36], reduce the negative impacts of natural disasters, protect the environment [37][38][39], and serve other ecosystem services [35,[40][41][42][43]. It can also help land adapt to and mitigate climate change [44][45][46] and help in sustainable agriculture development [47]. In addition, agroforestry can also conserve and use local or indigenous knowledge [28]. ...
... The total agroforestry area in Vietnam was estimated by ICRAF to be about 900,000 ha, and 10 million ha were identified as being suitable for agroforestry [49]. Moreover, further work by ICRAF continues to bring evidence to policy dialogs, including assessing the possible roles of agroforestry for Vietnam targets to international conventions, such as the Nationally Determined Contributions [45]. At the global level, many symposia have brought together agroforestry researchers, academicians, planners, policymakers, and administrators to discuss agroforestry research for sustainable development and to address future scenarios [46]. ...
Vietnam’s Central Highlands, under the ‘boom’ of increased immigrant populations, forest loss, and agriculture expansion, have been facing unbalanced and unsustainable development. This study determines the existence of agroforestry in the region and how farmers responded to the expansion of agriculture over decades by secondary and survey data from 248 households of 20 communes in five provinces. After decades of mono-agriculture development, farmers faced a range of problems and consequently began applying agroforestry practices. About 65% of the surveyed households applied agroforestry and multi/inter-crop systems, but almost all the households were small farms. Agroforestry at both the farm and landscape levels existed and featured diversity. Plant and animal diversity in the agroforestry systems of the households was rich. We recommend that upgrading the agroforestry level can likely cope with the requirements of market-based production and also provide basic benefits. Thus, to help conserve the forests, improve the farmers’ livelihoods, and protect the ecosystem in the Central Highlands and the whole of Vietnam, a National Agroforestry Policy and technical guides for agroforestry at both the farm and landscape levels should be launched together to approach the market-based productions of cash crops and agricultural circular economic development in Vietnam and tropical regions.
Smallholder farmers are key to food security in sub-Saharan Africa where two thirds of the population depend on small-scale, rain-fed farming as their main source of food and income. Critical farming and household decisions depend upon the weather, for example, how much rain falls, the length and start date of the rainfall season and the timing of dry spells. Such aspects of the weather vary considerably from year to year.
The Participatory Integrated Climate Services for Agriculture (PICSA) approach aims to facilitate farmers to make informed decisions based on accurate, location specific, climate and weather information; locally relevant crop, livestock and livelihood options; and with the use of participatory tools to aid their decision making.
Considering farming and livelihood options in the context of climate is crucial for making good decisions. A farmer in Matumba village in central Tanzania expressed this notion perfectly when he said, “We should select crops that look like the climate”.
The PISCA approach has been designed with field staff in mind, and aims to support you to do your job better by providing you with improved resources and information.
This field manual is a step by step guide to working though the PICSA approach with farmer groups. It is primarily for the use of facilitators (e.g. NGO and extension field staff who have received training in the use of the PICSA approach). The PICSA approach is divided into twelve steps to be carried out with groups of farmers. Due to the location specific nature of PICSA there are a number of preparatory activities that need to be completed before field staff are trained in the approach. The details of these activities can be found in the document ‘Preparing for PICSA’ on the PICSA website (http://www.walker-institute.ac.uk/research/PICSA).
The Compendium provides examples of more than 20 different approaches of how agricultural extension can support climate-smart agriculture, with contributions from seventeen institutions and over 30 contributors worldwide.
Forest-driven water and energy cycles are poorly integrated into regional, national, continental and global decision-making on climate change adaptation, mitigation, land use and water management. This constrains humanity's ability to protect our planet's climate and life-sustaining functions. The substantial body of research we review reveals that forest, water and energy interactions provide the foundations for carbon storage, for cooling terrestrial surfaces and for distributing water resources. Forests and trees must be recognized as prime regulators within the water, energy and carbon cycles. If these functions are ignored, planners will be unable to assess, adapt to or mitigate the impacts of changing land cover and climate. Our call to action targets a reversal of paradigms, from a carbon-centric model to one that treats the hydrologic and climate-cooling effects of trees and forests as the first order of priority. For reasons of sustainability, carbon storage must remain a secondary, though valuable, by-product. The effects of tree cover on climate at local, regional and continental scales offer benefits that demand wider recognition. The forest-and tree-centered research insights we review and analyze provide a knowledge-base for improving plans, policies and actions. Our understanding of how trees and forests influence water, energy Adaptation Sustainability and carbon cycles has important implications, both for the structure of planning, management and governance institutions, as well as for how trees and forests might be used to improve sustainability, adaptation and mitigation efforts.
My Loi village is located in the uplands of Ky Son commune, Ky Anh district, Ha Tinh province on the north central coast of Viet Nam. In 2014, it was chosen as a site for Climate-Smart Village because of its exposure to multiple extreme weather events (temperature and water stress, storm and typhoon) and the potential for climate-smart solutions. The purpose of situation analysis and needs assessment was to understand the current situation at the village and province levels, on a number of issues, including food security and natural resources management, and to identify and prioritize the needs for My Loi to develop agriculture and livelihoods in synergy with climate adaptation and mitigation interventions. Data collection was conducted in October 2014 alongside a Village Baseline Study. The findings were shared during a feedback meeting in December 2014. The major findings for My Loi Village included: 1) main livelihood sources are in forestry (140 ha acacia and eucalyptus planted in near 200 ha) and rainfed agriculture (55 ha, paddy rice, peanut, maize, green bean, and sweet potato); 2) main constraints for production are water scarcity and poor soil quality; 3) livestock was promoted to improve livelihood diversification; Low investment capital and diseases are the households’ main challenges for expansion from an average of 1-2 cows per household. Larger herds could open up opportunities for biogas production. Feed sources, however, are unclear. The villagers identified 21 stakeholders active within food security (the majority), food crisis and natural resource management. The village experienced temporary periods of food insecurity during natural disasters. While the main issues relating to natural resources were pollution (mining) and land degradation, there was little awareness of the potential impacts due to progressing climate variability and change. The CCAFS CSV projects, therefore, are a timely complement to help implement the province action plan and policies in response to climate change.
https://cgspace.cgiar.org/handle/10568/76324
Within a region plagued by deforestation, Vietnam has experienced an exceptional turnaround from net forest loss to forest regrowth. This so-called forest transition, starting in the 1990s, resulted from major changes to environmental and economic policy. Investments in agricultural intensification, reforestation programs, and forestland privatization directly or indirectly promoted natural forest regeneration and the setting-up of plantation forests mainly stocked with exotic species. Forest cover changes, however, varied widely among regions due to specific socio-economic and environmental factors. We studied forest cover changes (including natural and planted forests) and associated drivers in Vietnam’s provinces from 1993–2013. An exhaustive literature review was combined with multivariate statistical analyses of official provincial data. Natural forest regrowth was highest in northern mountain provinces, especially in the period 1993–2003, whereas deforestation continued in the Central Highlands and Southeast Region. Forest plantations increased most in mid-elevation provinces. Statistical results largely confirmed case study-based literature, highlighting the importance of forestland allocation policies and agroforestry extension for promoting small-scale tree plantations and allowing natural forest regeneration in previously degraded areas. Results provide evidence for the abandonment of upland swidden agriculture during 1993–2003, and reveal that spatial competition between expanding natural forests, fixed crop fields, and tree plantations increased during 2003–2013. While we identified a literature gap regarding effects of forest management by para-statal forestry organizations, statistical results showed that natural forests increased in areas managed for protection/regeneration. Cover of other natural forests under the organizations’ management, however, tended to decrease or stagnate, especially more recently when the organizations increasingly turned to multi-purpose plantation forestry. Deforestation processes in the Central Highlands and Southeast Region were mainly driven by cash crop expansion (coffee, rubber) and associated immigration and population growth. Recent data trends indicated limits to further forest expansion, and logging within high-quality natural forests reportedly remained a widespread problem. New schemes for payments for forest environmental services should be strengthened to consolidate the gains from the forest transition, whilst improving forest quality (in terms of biodiversity and environmental services) and allowing local people to actively participate in forest management.
Agroforestry systems and tree cover on agricultural land make an important contribution to climate change mitigation, but are not systematically accounted for in either global carbon budgets or national carbon accounting. This paper assesses the role of trees on agricultural land and their significance for carbon sequestration at a global level, along with recent change trends. Remote sensing data show that in 2010, 43% of all agricultural land globally had at least 10% tree cover and that this has increased by 2% over the previous ten years. Combining geographically and bioclimatically stratified Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Tier 1 default estimates of carbon storage with this tree cover analysis, we estimated 45.3 PgC on agricultural land globally, with trees contributing >75%. Between 2000 and 2010 tree cover increased by 3.7%, resulting in an increase of >2 PgC (or 4.6%) of biomass carbon. On average, globally, biomass carbon increased from 20.4 to 21.4 tC ha−1. Regional and country-level variation in stocks and trends were mapped and tabulated globally, and for all countries. Brazil, Indonesia, China and India had the largest increases in biomass carbon stored on agricultural land, while Argentina, Myanmar, and Sierra Leone had the largest decreases.
Agroforestry is known to have multiple economic and environmental benefits. Despite this, the adoption of agroforestry in Viet Nam is limited both in extent and diversity of components and practices. Our study identified gaps for agroforestry adoption in current policies and policy implementation. National policy and provincial instructions and decisions were reviewed and discussed during ten stakeholders’ consultation workshops. The review and workshops concluded that there were no specific national and few provincial specific policies promoting agroforestry. In addition, the segregation of policies into agriculture and forestry, promoted monoculture practices and discouraged the integration of mixed annual and perennial tree species. Completing the forestland allocation process was considered essential for long-term investment on land and providing collateral for loans. More holistic policies, such as a provincial strategy for agroforestry development that would enable flexible integration of agriculture, forestry and livestock were perceived to be more effective and inclusive to poor and non-poor farmers. Specific cross-cutting budget allocation would be necessary for capacity building, upscaling agroforestry models, procurement of high-quality inputs, and establishing post-harvest processing and marketing investments.
This paper presents a literature review and case study on constraints to smallholder's tree planting in northern mountainous areas of Viet Nam. It reveals that existing literature primarily highlights constraints within the 'input domain' that relates to inputs to tree system establishment such as land availability, or 'output domain' associated with market of tree system products, but sparsely report constraints within 'knowledge domain' namely knowledge in tree management practice. Our case study exploring farmer's perspectives also finds those related to input and output domain but identified lack of knowledge as the prime constraint, especially to poor farmers and ethnic minorities. We recommend that the dissemination of knowledge on tree system management, farmer's skill capacity building, and improvement in the national extension system as well as its linkage with research and education, be placed in the forefront of policy to sustainably expand and intensify tree planting in the country.
