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Although developing countries have established scores of new protected areas over the past three decades, they often amount to little more than “paper parks” that are chronically short of the financial, human, and technical resources needed for effective management. It is not clear whether and how severely under-resourced parks affect deforestation. In principle, they could either stem it by, for example, creating an expectation of future enforcement, or they could spur it by, for example, creating open access regimes. We examine the effect of Mexico's natural protected areas (NPAs) on deforestation from 1993 to 2000, a period when forest clearing was rampant and the vast majority of protected areas had negligible resources or management. We use high-resolution satellite data to measure deforestation and (covariate and propensity score) matching to control for NPAs’ nonrandom siting and for spillovers. Our broad finding is that Mexico's paper parks had heterogeneous effects both inside and outside their borders. More specifically, at the national-level, we cannot reject the null hypothesis that NPAs had zero average effect on clearing inside their borders, nor can we reject a similar hypothesis for spillover clearing outside their borders. However, we can detect statistically and economically significant inside- and outside-NPA effects for certain geographic regions. Moreover, these effects have different signs depending on the region. Finally, we find that NPAs with certain characteristics were more effective at stemming deforestation inside their borders, namely, those that were large, new, mixed use, and relatively well-funded. Taken together, these results suggest that paper parks have the potential to either reduce or exacerbate tropical deforestation and highlight the need for further research on the conditions that lead to each outcome. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Global supply chains remain a challenge to deforestation and land use conversion. • We qualitatively study Brazil's Amazon Soy Moratorium (ASM) design and longevity. • The ASM's success relies on a policy mix and other enabling factors for its formation. • A sticky alliance, yet vulnerable due to exclusiveness, leakage, and other policies. • There are limitations to the replication of the ASM's form of hybrid governance. This paper analyses the unique hybrid governance of Brazil's Amazon Soy Moratorium (ASM) in regulating soybean production in the Amazon, where private actors have created a state-like ban on commodity production to reduce deforestation that goes beyond national law. Despite existing research regarding impact assessment, the study aims to fill knowledge gaps in explaining the ASM's alliance-building processes, its longstanding maintenance, and its potential for regulatory replicability. Informed by the application of the Baptist and Bootlegger political economic theory of regulation and empirical data from qualitative interviews and document analysis, we provide an actor-centered explanation of the design, adoption, and maintenance of the ASM over a 19-year timeframe. Our results show how NGOs and businesses had opposite motivations and negotiated their roles to form a successful strategic alliance, reinforced by the inclusion of third parties (e.g., technical and governmental actors) to assist in its monitoring and transparency. Developed as an exclusive private market regulation, the ASM agreement, however, relies on a policy mix: private and public actors play a role in implementation, which includes assisting and relying on existing public policies, instruments, and official data. This policy mix was necessary for the ASM's noteworthy hybrid and long-term governance. Its successful formation in 2006 was enabled by factors including an economic crisis, foreign pressure linked with national enforcement failure, and, most importantly, the Amazon scope. Our analysis shows who gains or loses from the regulatory design. Furthermore, we shed light on the biggest regulatory spillover, to the Cerrado, where the failed attempt at replicability emphasizes the regulatory uniqueness of the ASM. The study concludes with a discussion of what will help or hinder the ASM's longevity, providing lessons for similar regulatory mechanisms on forest-risk agricultural production, such as EU's recent Regulation on Deforestation-free Products. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Deforestation and degradation are tied to a complex array of socioeconomic and political factors. Many assume that among the most important of these are the particular bundles of rights regulating who can benefit from land (tenure form) and the overall assurance that those rights will be upheld (tenure security). This paper reviews literature that connects forest outcomes and land tenure to better understand broad interactions between tenure form, security and forest change. Papers from economic theory suggest tenure is embedded in a broader socioeconomic context, with the potential for either a positive or negative conservation impact on forested land. Empirically, we find 36 publications that link land cover change to tenure conditions while also controlling for other plausibly confounding variables. Publications often investigate more than one site and more than one form of tenure, so from these we derive 118 cases linking forest change with a specific tenure form in a particular location. From these cases, we find evidence that protected areas are associated with positive forest outcomes and that land tenure security is associated with less deforestation, regardless of the form of tenure. We conclude with a call for more robust identification of this relationship in future research, as well as set of recommendations for policymakers, particularly as forest carbon incentive programs such as REDD integrate further into national policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper discusses the discourses on climate change adaptation and mitigation that are currently at the forefront in the Congo Basin. On mitigation, the forests have enormous opportunities to contribute to the reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+) mechanism. But the forest itself and its multiple dependent societies and sectors need to adapt to potential climate risks. Hence, actors are debating the design of climate change policy in the forest sector. Theoretically, we combine the agency-focus of frame analysis and discourse theory to analyze how different agents hold frames on climate change adaptation and mitigation policies in the region. This paper draws upon interviews with 103 different actors from government, international organizations, non-governmental organizations, research institutions and private sector in three countries: Cameroon, Central African Republic (CAR) and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Three discourses were found on policy response to climate change in the forest sector: mitigation policy only, separated policy on adaptation and mitigation, and an integrated policy on adaptation and mitigation. The various frames articulated around each discourse by the coalitions include elements of: costs and benefits, scale of operation, effectiveness, financial resources and implementation mechanisms. Overall, the mitigation discourse, through its mix of actors, resources and interests seems to be stronger than the adaptation discourse. The paper finally outlines a number of implications of the discourses for policy design. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Highlights • Eco-labels and certifications for agricultural crops have yet to halt land use change. • Sparse and uneven market uptake only partially explain this outcome. • Loopholes in certification standards and enforcement mechanisms also play a role. • There is little evidence that eco-labels actually encourage land conversion for agriculture. Abstract In countries marked by the growing uptake of non-state market driven (NSMD) governance for agricultural commodities (i.e., eco-labels and certification systems), forested areas are steadily decreasing while crop lands are growing. This deforestation continues despite NSMD rules aimed at prohibiting the conversion of forested land to agriculture. In this paper, we ask why the growing presence of NSMD governance has coincided with ongoing deforestation. While the seeming inability of NSMD governance to halt broader patterns of land use change can be partially explained by a lack of market uptake, there are also a range of other variables that may contribute to this relationship. We probe the plausibility of five hypotheses through comparative case studies of sustainable soy certification in Brazil, palm oil in Indonesia, and cocoa in Côte d'Ivoire. Our findings indicate that NSMD governance has neither abetted, nor hindered, the conversion of forested land to agricultural production. We find strong evidence that a lack of broad market uptake limits the effectiveness of NSMD governance. However, we also find evidence that regulatory loopholes in NSMD systems may explain the inability of eco-labels and certification systems to halt broader patterns of land use change in countries with comparatively strong market uptake. Our results highlight critical problems related to expanding the reach and stringency of NSMD governance alongside the ongoing fragmentation of global environmental governance. The study contributes to scholarship on the impacts and effectiveness of transnational environmental governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the role of aspirational capacity, one cognitive dimension of well-being, as a driver of deforestation among rural smallholders living in or near Mozambique’s portion of the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park. Integrating analyses of remote sensing, socio-economic, and semi-structured interview data within a theoretical framework drawn from Amartya Sen’s capability approach, we examine land use decisions in the context of the available options people have to choose from as well as the factors influencing their ultimate choice. Land change detection analysis indicates that more forest conversion occurs within the park, but rates show considerable variation at the community level. We find no association between economic deprivation and deforestation rates. Limited aspirational capacity, manifested in expressions of helplessness and despair, a lack of perceived choices, and fewer agentive pursuits, is one dimension of poverty that does contribute to cropland expansion. Qualitative findings indicate that a more limited capacity to set, pursue, and achieve aspirational goals perpetuates agricultural land use traps and, consequentially, higher deforestation rates. Higher levels of aspirational capacity also contribute to negative conservation outcomes as people adopt the risky but profitable activity of illegal rhino hunting as a means to obtain other valued capabilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Agricultural expansion remains the most important proximate cause of tropical deforestation, while interactions between socio-economic, technological and institutional factors represent the fundamental drivers. Projected population increases could further raise the pressure on the remaining forests, unless agricultural intensification allows raising agricultural output without expanding agricultural areas. The purpose of this article is to understand the role of institutional factors in governing the intensification process towards the goal of preserving forests from agricultural pressures, with a focus on Indigenous Peoples’ and local communities’ rights to forests (as embedded in the various tenure regimes). In this paper we adopt an international dimension and analyse the process of agricultural expansion across eleven Latin American countries over the period 1990–2010 to assess whether, in a context of agricultural intensification, different land tenure regimes impact differently on the realization of land-sparing or Jevons paradox. The results, based on a number of multivariate statistical models that controls for socio-economic factors, strongly suggest that the formal recognition of Indigenous Peoples and local communities’ forest rights has played an important role in promoting land sparing or attenuating Jevons paradox. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD+) is being proclaimed as “a new direction in forest conservation” (: 125). This financial incentives-based climate change mitigation strategy proposed by the UNEP, World Bank, GEF and environmental NGOs seeks to integrate forests into carbon sequestration schemes. Its proponents view REDD+ as part of an adaptive strategy to counter the effects of global climate change. This paper combines the theoretical approaches of market environmentalism and environmental narratives to examine the politics of environmental knowledge that are redefining socio-nature relations in the Rufiji Delta, Tanzania to make mangrove forests amenable to markets. Through a case study of a “REDD-readiness” climate change mitigation and adaptation project, we demonstrate how a shift in resource control and management from local to global actors builds upon narratives of environmental change (forest loss) that have little factual basis in environmental histories. We argue that the proponents of REDD+ (Tanzanian state, aid donors, environmental NGOs) underestimate the agency of forest-reliant communities who have played a major role in the making of the delta landscape and who will certainly resist the injustices they are facing as a result of this shift from community-based resource management to fortress conservation. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Industrial tree plantations for wood, palm oil and rubber production are among the fastest growing monocultures and are currently being promoted as carbon sinks and energy producers. Such plantations are causing a large number of conflicts between companies and local populations, mostly in the tropics and subtropics. Within a political ecology framework, the present paper investigates the nature of such conflicts as related to the alleged impacts of the plantations, the protesters involved, and the modalities of the conflicts with a special emphasis on their outcomes. Relying on the most comprehensive literature review to date, corresponding to 58 conflict cases, I find that the prominent cause of resistance is related to corporate control over land resulting in displacements and the end of local uses of ecosystems as they are replaced by monocultures. Resistance includes the “weapons of the weak” and ranges from dialogue to direct confrontation and from local to international. It often involves NGOs, especially for legal issues. Demonstrations, lawsuits, road blockades and tree uprooting have been reported in several countries. Authorities have responded by repression in about half of the cases analysed, while popular struggles have been able to stop plantations in about one fifth, mainly through winning lawsuits or massive social unrest. While these movements can be regarded as classical land conflicts, they usually also have an ecological content, corresponding to forms of the “environmentalism of the poor”. The documented large number of such conflicts suggests that policies promoting large-scale tree plantations should be reappraised. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Despite remaining uncertainties, Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation in developing countries (REDD) projects are being planned and implemented across the tropics, primarily targeting countries with high forest cover and high deforestation rates. However, there is growing recognition that REDD planning requires a broadened approach; a future REDD mechanism should incentivise emissions reduction in all developing forested countries, and should address critical non-carbon dimensions of REDD implementation—quality of forest governance, conservation priorities, local rights and tenure frameworks, and sub-national project potential. When considering this broader suite of factors, different REDD priorities can emerge, including in countries with low forest cover that would be overlooked by conventional site selection criteria. Using the Philippines as a case study, the paper highlights the importance of an enabling environment to REDD implementation, and presents a more comprehensive and inclusive approach for thinking about what comprises a “REDD country.” [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Mismatches between the spatial scales of human decision-making and natural processes contribute to environmental problems such as global warming and biodiversity losses. People damage the environment through local activities like clearing land or burning fossil fuels, but the damages only become manifest at larger regional or global scales where no one pays for them. Payments for ecological services like carbon sequestration can correct for these damages caused by scale mismatches. This paper presents a spatially explicit land-use model to investigate the consequences of scale mismatches for pollination and carbon storage services and examine the effect of payment for only carbon storage services. The model integrates processes in multiple spatial scales ranging from the parcel level used by landowners’ decision about deforestation, to the larger scale used by animals to pollinate plants, and finally to the global scale where carbon storage services are supplied. We show that payment for carbon storage services can become an effective mechanism to protect forests at the same time that it creates inequities among landowners in income level. These findings suggest that market-based approaches that focus on conservation of a single ecosystem service may reproduce unequal power relations among landowners. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The forest-transition theory of expanding forest cover after prolonged periods of deforestation has typically examined forest regeneration apart from historic land-use patterns. In the Bayano-Darién agricultural frontier of Panama, this paper observes forest-cover expansion that is simultaneous to and successive of a preceding pattern of land-use/cover change characterized by expanding ranchland and depopulation. Landsat TM satellite-imagery analysis for 1990–2000, household land-use histories since 2000 and forest plantation records for 1992–2007 illustrate reforestation occurring alongside deforestation. The findings describe a land-cover change dynamic by which a nascent pathway of reforestation assumes the characteristics of antecedent pathways of deforestation. Large-scale commercial interests dominated forestation via plantation expansion, succeeding and consolidating ranchers as ranchers previously succeeded small-scale agriculturalists. Contrary to the forest-transition theory, off-farm employment and emigration did not encourage reforestation amongst ranchers. The drivers, nature, likelihood and limitations of a nascent forest transition appear somewhat determinable by antecedent pathways of deforestation. Refocusing on regional-scale antecedent pathways of land-use/cover change promises to expose a typology of forest transitions of varied potency. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The paper analyses land use trajectories in savannah woodlands in the Central-West Region, Burkina Faso and the Upper East Region in northern Ghana by use of satellite images and historical archives. Observed trends differ in terms of spatial location and correlation with population pressure from normally accepted characterizations. Colonial forestry policies are proposed as key determinants of present-day land use patterns. However, these reinforced pre-colonial land use patterns inasmuch as land gazetted as forest reserves were tracts affected by vectors of human and livestock disease. It is suggested that the transformation of wooded agricultural landscapes in the Sudano-Sahelian region is the outcome of historically and culturally embedded interactions between complex social, economic and ecological processes which operate at widely varying scales and which change over time; the implications hereof for modelling of global environmental issues is discussed. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

• Many firms buying forest-risk products made zero-deforestation commitments (ZDCs). • To achieve conservation goals, ZDCs may exclude vulnerable producers from markets. • Following 7 policy design principles can achieve effectiveness-access equity synergies. • We evaluate 28 ZDC implementation mechanisms in 4 leading forest-risk commodities. • Companies should better support vulnerable producers in achieving compliance. In response to the clearing of tropical forests for agricultural expansion, agri-food companies have adopted promises to eliminate deforestation from their supply chains in the form of 'zero-deforestation commitments' (ZDCs). While there is growing evidence about the environmental effectiveness of these commitments (i.e., whether they meet their conservation goals), there is little information on how they influence producers' opportunity to access sustainable markets and related livelihood outcomes, or how design and implementation choices influence tradeoffs or potential synergies between effectiveness and equity in access. This paper explores these research gaps and makes three main contributions by: i) defining and justifying the importance of analyzing access equity and its relation to effectiveness when implementing forest-focused supply chain policies such as ZDCs, ii) identifying seven policy design principles that are likely to maximize synergies between effectiveness and access equity, and iii) assessing effectiveness-access equity tensions and synergies across common ZDC implementation mechanisms amongst the five largest firms in each of the leading agricultural forest-risk commodity sectors: palm oil, soybeans, beef cattle, and cocoa. To enhance forest conservation while avoiding harm to the most vulnerable farmers in the tropics, it is necessary to combine stringent rules with widespread capacity building, greater involvement of affected actors in the co-production of implementation mechanisms, and support for alternative rural development paths. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• We explore stakeholders perceptions on REDD+ finance in Brazil, Indonesia and Vietnam. • Actors agree that the lack of finance is not the most significant challenge. • Addressing funding gaps alone will not help to advance REDD+ policies. • Effective REDD+ implementation requires improved forest governance. • Recognizing and addressing drivers of deforestation are essential for REDD+ success. Financing REDD+ is complex, due to the need to seek answers not only to the question of who should finance REDD+, but also who should benefit from it. This paper examines the perceptions of REDD+ stakeholders in Brazil, Indonesia and Vietnam on different aspects of financing: who should finance REDD+ and who should receive REDD+ benefits for what. Our findings show these issues are political, driven by economic considerations at national level and – despite the narrative of inclusive, participatory decision making – are largely determined by governments. Lack of finance was thereby not always considered by national policy actors to be the most significant challenge during 2010–2019; rather other issues – like lack of knowledge on REDD+ by relevant actors; ineffective coordination between state agencies, the private sector and civil society; unclear tenure rights; ineffectively addressing the main deforestation drivers; low law enforcement capacity; and unclear benefit-sharing mechanisms – have also been perceived to impede REDD+ implementation and payment distributions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the role played by distributional factors inmediating the effects of growth and development on forest depletion in tropical developing countries. A key finding of the paper is that the distributional profile of a country significantly determines whether economic development will have either a positive or a negative effect on the rate of forest loss. In countries where levels of inequality are high, development will tend to exacerbate deforestation rateswhile in countries where distributional profiles are more egalitarian, the negative effects of growth and development on forest cover will be ameliorated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Kyoto Protocol introduces the possibility that changes in carbonstock on agricultural and forest land and soils may be counted against countries' commitments to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. Including activities related to land use change and forestry in the international climate change agreement may stimulate new incentives forsoil-conservation practices domestically. However, a primary criteria for their inclusion relates to the level of accuracy and transparency with which carbon stock changes can be assessed. Parties will alsobe concerned with the wider environmental impact of different sequestration practices, and the impact of offsets on overall emissions targets. This paper examines these issues for agricultural soils, considering recent research in North America. It is argued that incentives for carbon sequestration practices may need to be implemented independently of actual stock changes because farm-level soil monitoring would be very costly. In the USA, priority should be given to establishing incentives for cover crops and to expanding conservation tillage programs. These activities provide a range of ancillary environmental benefits. In contrast, improvements in biomass yield tend to rely on higher fertilizer inputs with their related environmental costs. Carbon accumulated through any of these activities is easily lost if the practices are discontinued, and so assessment procedures are needed that would avoid overestimating sequestration. Annual accumulation in agricultural soils could be equivalent to about 10% of Annex I carbondioxide emissions, and therefore options for limiting sink credits from soils should be considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper analyses the relationship between consumption of timber products and socioeconomic variables by estimating timber consumption functions, using fixed and random effects methods. To this end, we regress the per capita consumption of timber products (roundwoodequivalent) of a sample of developed and developing countries over the period 1976 to 1989 on various national indicators relevant to thedevelopment transition. The panel nature of the data facilitates us to track trends in consumption as economic development proceeds. The results suggest that the response of the timber consumption with respect to changes in the variables is sensitive to factors specific to the country concerned. The coefficients of all the variables are inelastic and it is found that income, density and price are the main determinant variables although other variables also affect the consumption. The observations of this study are expected to assist the policy makers in projecting future requirements of timber with more reliability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]