The persistent conflict between strict conservation and community welfare highlights the growing need to address sustainable livelihoods in forest protection programs. The Natural Forest Protection Program (NFPP) is a comprehensive forest protection...
The emerging risks and impacts of climate change and extreme weather events on forest ecosystems present significant threats to forest-based livelihoods. Understanding climate change and its consequences on forests and the livelihoods of forest-depen...
Community forests are a crucial component of farming systems and people’s livelihoods in the rural middle hills of Nepal, where the population depends upon the forest for fuelwood, fodder, and leaf litter for their daily needs. This study aims...
Smallholder teak (Tectona grandis) plantations have been identified as a potentially valuable component of upland farming systems in northern Laos that can contribute to a “livelihood transition” from subsistence-oriented swidden agriculture to a mor...
The realization of forest ecological product value has been promoted as an important pathway for reconciling ecological conservation with rural prosperity. However, it remains unclear whether the growth of forest ecological product value has been syn...
Vietnam’s forests have experienced a notable transformation over the past 20 years from net deforestation to reforestation and expanding forests. Continued reforestation that aims to achieve further economic and environmental benefits remains a...
Forest utilization makes a significant economic contribution to the livelihoods of rural households, especially those living in developing countries. This study was conducted to determine the absolute and relative forest income and measure the distri...
With ~70% of the sub-Saharan population living in rural areas, more than 90% of rural African households depend on natural forest products. Although several studies in other parts of South Africa have looked into the use of natural forest products in...
As one of the countries which has been experiencing a forest transition, China provides important insights into and theoretical and empirical knowledge of forest transition. In this study, through the framework of Sustainable Livelihood Analysis (SLA...
Some forest-dependent rural communities participate in the Collaborative Forest Management (CFM) program in South Korea, which provides the local people with access to national forests for the collection of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) in retur...
While forests’ contribution to rural livelihoods has been unearthed scientifically, the patterns, determinants and forest conservation policy implications of livelihood diversification still beg for more scientific and policy edification. This paper...
Background and Objectives: Plantation forests remain a highly contested element of rural development. Successive reviews of large-scale plantations established under land concessions identify predominantly negative impacts on local farmers’ liv...
Charcoal production is an essential energy source and income source for many people in low-income countries, such as Africa. Charcoal production is also associated with deforestation—a global issue that significantly affects the environment and...
Forestry projects have long faced the inherent tension between stringent conservation objectives and the enhancement of human well-being, making it increasingly important to assess the sustainable livelihoods of participating households. The Natural...
To promote the sustainable development of state-owned forest areas, the Chinese government announced the reform of state-owned forest areas in 2015. It mainly includes the logging ban of natural forests and the separation of government and enterprise...
Small-to-medium-sized forest enterprises (SMFEs) offer numerous benefits to rural communities and society as a whole. Less attention has been paid to the sustainability of SMFEs in terms of improving the livelihood of rural communities. This study ai...
Myanmar’s forests are socially and economically significant to the country because over 70% of the country’s population depends on natural resources for daily needs. We conducted this study with the aim of assessing the extent to which di...
Researchers increasingly investigate ecosystem services to assess their role in supporting livelihoods, well-being and economic value in order to inform decision-making. Many studies have explored links between ecosystem services and community-based...
Land degradation, especially natural forest land degradation (NFLD), is a severe environmental concern in China. This natural disaster itself and its derivative control policies have caused some impacts on surrounding farmers’ livelihood level and st...
Ecologically fragile regions face the dual challenge of environmental conservation and improving rural livelihoods. Forest-dependent households are especially exposed to ecological restoration constraints, market fluctuations, and limited institution...
Forestland concession has been the dominant governance tool for the acquisition of natural state-owned forest resources in many tropical countries, including Bangladesh. Moreover, the forestland concession process confers the holder a bundle of right...
The rate of landcover change linked to deforestation and forest degradation in tropical environments has continued to surge despite a series of forest governance policy instruments over the years. These informed the launch of one of the most importan...
This study investigates the sustainable livelihoods of households in the coastal forest regions of Quang Tri Province, Vietnam, focusing on identifying the key factors that shape household resilience in the face of socio-economic and environmental ch...
Payments for ecosystem services (PES) is widely employed in various settings; however, whether, and in what contexts, PES programs achieve their objectives by improving local livelihoods and conservation goals is still being debated. This paper aims...
Forest ecological compensation policies (FECPs) are a key institutional arrangement for balancing ecological conservation and farmers’ development needs in national parks. Existing research has often treated such policies as a homogeneous whole...
Community forestry is widely promoted as a mechanism for improving rural livelihoods while strengthening sustainable forest management. However, empirical evidence on the income effects of community forestry remains limited in fragile and conflict-af...
Forest resources remain vital to the survival of many rural communities, though the level of forest reliance varies across a range of sites and socio-economic settings. This article investigates variation in forest utilization across households in th...
Climate variability coupled with land use and land cover changes have resulted in significant changes in forest reserves in Ghana with major implications for rural livelihoods. Understanding the link between climate variability, land use and land cov...
Tropical forest provides a crucial portion of sustenance in many rural communities, although it is increasingly under pressure from appropriations of various scales. This study investigated the impacts of medium-scale forestland grabbing on local liv...
Research Highlights: Recently, there has been a growing interest in the contribution of Non-Wood Forest Products (NWFPs) to livelihoods and food security among local populations in Tunisia. NWFPs have gained special attention given the relevance of t...
Forest-dwelling residents frequently collect non-timber forest products (NTFPs) for various reasons, such as food, medicine, firewood, religious reasons, or handicrafts. This study examines the multiple benefits derived from NTFPs and how they contri...
The degradation of wetlands and forests is still a threat to the supply and recovery of ecosystem services in the tropics. Studies comparing restoration measures and ecosystem service recoveries are fragmented. This study investigated the spatial ext...
Forest conversion for agriculture is the most expansive signature of human occupation on the Earth’s surface. This paper develops a conceptual model of factors underlying frontier agricultural expansion—the predominant driver of deforestation worldwi...
The complex relationship between local development and current large scale investments in natural resources in the Global South for the purpose of conservation and carbon sequestration is not fully understood yet. The Reducing Emissions from Deforest...
Deforestation and forest degradation mostly caused by human interventions affect the capacity of the forest ecosystem to provide ecosystem services and livelihood benefits. Forest and landscape restoration (FLR) is an emerging concept that focuses on...
This paper critically assesses the institutional structure of the Benefit Sharing Mechanism (BSM) under the Reducing Emission from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in the global south, managing forest sustainably to conserve carbon (REDD+) in Ind...
In this study, we assessed the impact of the Billion Trees Afforestation Program (BTAP) on the livelihood of local household in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province (KPK). BTAP is the largest ban-logging afforestation program in Pakistan, which aims to conser...
Understanding the direct and positive impact of conservation incentive programs in the tropics is essential. Typically, conservation incentive programs in the tropics aim to enhance residents’ access to material resources, with the ultimate goa...
Forests are viable tools in combating the impacts of climate change, as they are capable of sequestering atmospheric carbon and storing it in different pools. This study aimed to examine the carbon sequestration potential of community-managed Shorea ...
Rural households depend on forest resources for cash and subsistence needs. Thus, forests represent a valuable natural capital for the rural economy, particularly in developing countries. However, depending on various factors, there are dissimilariti...
Forest certification is promoted as a market-based mechanism for strengthening sustainable forest management; however, evidence on stakeholder-perceived benefits and challenges remains limited in Rwanda. In this study, we assessed stakeholder percept...
Livelihoods and agrarian change processes across upland South-East Asia have been explored for decades. Yet, knowledge gaps remain about contemporary livelihood strategies and land dependence in areas previously inaccessible to academic research, suc...
The Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation program, or REDD+, has been the international community’s first real attempt to create a global forest governance system which would impact countries on national, regional and even loca...
Currently, many studies on benefit sharing mechanisms (BSM) and the Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation programme (REDD+) focus on poverty alleviation and livelihood development. However, relatively few studies incorporate an...
In nearly all parts of the world, an important part of people’s livelihood is derived from natural resources. Gender is considered one of the most important determinants of access and control over forests. It is thought that women and men within hous...
Forests managed by Indigenous and other local communities generate important benefits for livelihood, and contribute to regional and global biodiversity and carbon sequestration goals. Yet, challenges to community forestry remain. Rural out-migration...
Climate change continues to pose a constant threat to nature and human beings, and thus demands adaptability and flexibility in forestry and domestic land use management. In this context, the Reducing Emission from Deforestation and Forest Degradatio...
Forest and landscape restoration in the tropics is often undertaken by groups of smallholders and communities whose livelihoods are primarily agricultural and forest-based. In the Philippines, the implementation of forest restoration programs involvi...
Golden camellia is a highly valued commercial plant owing to its flowers’ medicinal substances. One species of golden camellia, Camellia quephongensis Hakoda et Ninh, is used as a non-timber forest product for value-chain forestry (VCF) in Que...
The urban trade in non-timber forest products (NTFPs) plays a key role in sustaining livelihoods in the Global South, while also suggesting potential pressure on resource supply systems. This study provides an integrated analysis of NTFP diversity, m...
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