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Research shows that awarding formal land titles to local communities and indigenous groups can protect forests.
Read alongside that study that says that planting trees might save the planet, yes?
via @jnoisecat
pnas.org/content/early/…
Read alongside that study that says that planting trees might save the planet, yes?
via @jnoisecat
pnas.org/content/early/…
The study in question:
A new satellite imaging study suggests that forest restoration “isn’t just one of our climate change solutions, it is overwhelmingly the top one,” — says Prof Tom Crowther at ETH Zürich, who led the research
theguardian.com/environment/20…
A new satellite imaging study suggests that forest restoration “isn’t just one of our climate change solutions, it is overwhelmingly the top one,” — says Prof Tom Crowther at ETH Zürich, who led the research
theguardian.com/environment/20…
The challenge is that just planting trees doesn’t necessarily work
Just look at the Great Green Wall scheme
“If all the trees that had been planted in the Sahara since the early 1980s had survived, it would look like Amazonia.”
—Chris Reij
It does not.
smithsonianmag.com/science-nature…
Just look at the Great Green Wall scheme
“If all the trees that had been planted in the Sahara since the early 1980s had survived, it would look like Amazonia.”
—Chris Reij
It does not.
smithsonianmag.com/science-nature…
China too has been planting a “Great Green Belt” to hold back the Gobi desert.
Problem: it tends towards monoculture.
As such, “In 2000, one billion poplar trees were lost to a disease (Anoplophora), wiping out 20 years of planting efforts.”
theepochtimes.com/desertificatio…
Problem: it tends towards monoculture.
As such, “In 2000, one billion poplar trees were lost to a disease (Anoplophora), wiping out 20 years of planting efforts.”
theepochtimes.com/desertificatio…
High modernist central planning does not work:
Stalin’s 1948 Great Plan for the Transformation of Nature “achieved an astounding failure of less than 2% survival rate in tree planting on the dry steppe zone, and has now become a textbook example of ecological plunder.”
—H. Jiang
Stalin’s 1948 Great Plan for the Transformation of Nature “achieved an astounding failure of less than 2% survival rate in tree planting on the dry steppe zone, and has now become a textbook example of ecological plunder.”
—H. Jiang
What does? As @jnoisecat says, local management.
In the Sahel, that’s simple water harvesting techniques, such as deep ‘zai’ planting pits — and protecting the trees that emerge naturally on people’s land (which French colonial laws had made farmers remove), reports @jimmor12
In the Sahel, that’s simple water harvesting techniques, such as deep ‘zai’ planting pits — and protecting the trees that emerge naturally on people’s land (which French colonial laws had made farmers remove), reports @jimmor12
NB: Back in 2003, satellite imaging studies of land use *couldn’t see this was happening*
smithsonianmag.com/science-nature…
smithsonianmag.com/science-nature…
16 years of satellite imaging & machine learning research later, I don’t doubt that the ETH Zurich team are using enormously better technology.
But it’s still a view so far removed it’s literally in space.
Grand visions may get trees planted. But their survival needs local ppl.
But it’s still a view so far removed it’s literally in space.
Grand visions may get trees planted. But their survival needs local ppl.
ty to @jnoisecat for sparking this train of thought, & check out his reporting on local, indigenous forest management in the US here:
And Mordecai Ogada, last week, arguing that conservation isn’t about nature or charismatic megafauna — but rather the people who live there: “our land, our heritage, our culture, our languages, our beliefs…it is about US.”
(via @metaleptic)
theelephant.info/culture/2019/0…
(via @metaleptic)
theelephant.info/culture/2019/0…
