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Options for Climate-Smart Agriculture at Kaptumo Site in Kenya

January 1, 2014

This report identifies and assesses climate-smart agricultural practices through participatory appraisal tools with experts and farmers, as part of the MICCA pilot project in Kaptumo, Kenya. The aim is to highlight and add climate-smart practices within the ongoing development programme which aims to integrate climate change adaptation and mitigation with improving livelihoods and productivity of the dairy farming system.

Twenty Years of Working Towards a Sustainable Southeast Asia: 1993 -- 2013

January 1, 2013

The Southeast Asia program first set about testing hypotheses applicable to each of the three ecosystem zones. On the forest margins, the hypothesis was that complex agroforests provided a superior alternative for small-scale farmers to either food-crop systems or monocultural plantations of perennials. As an alternative to slash and burn, complex agroforests increased production sustainability, increased biodiversity, reduced production risks and increased returns to labour compared to continuous food crops or monocultural plantations. The second hypothesis stated that rehabilitating Imperata grasslands with small-scale agroforestry systems would be superior to plantation reforestation in terms of production, equitability and participation. For hilly farmlands, the team hypothesised that there were several pathways to sustainable farming. Among these, contour hedgerow systems initiated through natural vegetative strips provided distinct advantages as a superior, least-cost foundation upon which to build agroforestry-based, conservation farming.

Promised Land: Palm Oil and Land Acquisition in Indonesia - Implications for Local Communities and Indigenous Peoples

January 1, 2006

International concern has been growing about the impacts of the continuing expansion of oil palm plantations. The spread of oil palm has been blamed for extensive forest destruction, uncontrolled forest fires, loss of precious wild species and the undermining of environmental services. Yet already in Indonesia some 5 million people are involved in estates and mills as labourers or their families and as many again are tied to large estates as smallholders. Palm oil has major social as well as environmental impacts.World markets for edible oils are set to double in the next twenty years, implying a doubling of the area under oil palm if market share is maintained. New markets for 'biofuels' also provide scope for increased palm oil sales. Indonesia's national development plans are designed to secure it a large share of these markets.