0 BENEFITS DERIVED FROM REHABILITATING A DEGRADED SEMI-ARID RANGELAND IN COMMUNAL ENCLOSURES, KENYA

ABSTRACT

Combating land degradation in the semi-arid rangeland of sub-Saharan Africa is essential to ensure long-term productivity of these environments. In the Lake Baringo Basin in Kenya, communities and individual farmers restored indigenous vegetation inside enclosures in an effort to combat severe land degradation and address their livelihood problems. This study quantified the benefits of rangeland rehabilitation using yearly communal enclosures’ utilisation data compiled by Rehabilitation of Arid Environments (RAE) Trust over a 6 year period (2005–2010). Results showed that communal enclosures provide a source of income through the sale of fattened livestock, harvested grass seeds, hay, honey and charcoal, among other products. Regression analysis showed an increasing total enclosure income with time. The enclosures also provide grasses for thatching, livestock feed and dry season grazing. Indirect products like milk, blood and meat are essential for household nutrition and food security. These benefits reinforce the management through incentive to maintain existing enclosures and establishing new ones, and therefore, the increasing trend in rangeland enclosure. Increased soil and biomass carbon storage could come with other indirect environmental benefits including improvement in soil quality, land productivity for pasture production and food security, and prevention of land degradation, thus leading to economic, environmental and social benefit for the local agro-pastoralist communities. Copyright: John Wiley & Sons, 2014.

Keywords:

• environmental services;
• Kenya;
• land management;
• pastoral livelihoods;
• reseeding;
• semi-arid rangeland

See Full Paper in Land Degradation & Development

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0 Film Primiere "Let's Talk About Soil"

Soils are fundamental pillars of sustainable development. They are essential for food security, support human well-being, and provide further ecosystem services, such as carbon storage.

They are not only essential but also severely threatened, suffering a continuous decline in quality and being taken over by urban sprawl.

Even though soils are managed and owned locally, their degradation is a key global issue, as their functions transcend national boundaries.

Therefore, we urgently need to upscale actions towards sustainable soil management.

The First Global Soil Week will provide a platform to initiate follow-up actions on land and soil-related decisions made at the Rio+20 Sustainable Development Conference and will take place within the framework of the FAO’s Global Soil Partnership.

The First Global Soil Week offers a forum of interactive exchange and dialogue.

Stakeholders from science, government, business and civil society will come together to share their land and soil-related experience and expertise, and to develop future plans of action for sustainable land/soil management and governance.

The animated film LET’S TALK ABOUT SOIL emphasizes human dependence on soils and describes how sustainable development is threatened by certain soil use trends; the film offers options to make the way we manage our soils more sustainable.

LET’S TALK ABOUT SOIL was produced by designer and animator Uli Henrik Streckenbach for the Global Soil Week and the Global Soil Partnership with the support of the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies (IASS) – Global Soil Forum, the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and the Deutsche Welle.

0 Restoring The Ecology Can Boost The Economy

Research co-authored by Bournemouth University (BU) Professor Adrian Newton and published in the journal Science shows that ecological restoration in areas of environmental degradation can help reverse global biodiversity losses, as well as promoting recovery of ecosystem services.

However the research also showed that measures of biodiversity and ecosystem services are higher in pristine land, freshwater and marine systems than in restored systems.

Examples of ecosystem services include improved water quality and increased carbon storage, services which benefit human well-being.

The research was carried out by an international team from the University of Alcalá in Spain, the UK’s Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, and Bournemouth University in the UK.

Professor Newton, an environmental conservation expert from BU’s Centre for Conservation Ecology and Environmental Change said: "These results highlight the importance of ecological restoration approaches for addressing the environmental degradation that has occurred in many parts of the world. The research suggests that restoration can offer a 'win-win' solution, by increasing the provision of environmental benefits to people, while at the same time increasing biodiversity."

Lead author, Professor José M. Rey Benayas from the University of Alcalá and President of the International Foundation for Ecosystem Restoration said: "In addition to the improved biodiversity resulting from ecological restoration, our findings show that such restoration also has benefits for ecosystem services. These services can act as an engine of economy and a source of green employment, so our results give policymakers an extra incentive to restore degraded ecosystems.”

Ecological restoration is widely used to reverse the environmental degradation caused by human activities. However, the effectiveness of restoration actions in increasing provision of both biodiversity and ecosystem services has not previously been evaluated systematically.

The research team analysed results from 89 restoration assessments carried out in a wide range of ecosystem types across the globe. On average, ecological restoration increased provision of biodiversity and ecosystem services by 44% and 25% respectively. Increases in biodiversity and ecosystem service measures following restoration were positively correlated. However, values of both remained lower in restored than in intact (undamaged) reference ecosystems.

The results indicate that restoration actions focused on enhancing biodiversity should support increased provision of ecosystem services, particularly in tropical terrestrial areas, which hold the largest amounts of biodiversity and are usually subject to high levels of human pressure."

Co-author, Professor James Bullock from the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology said: "We have shown that across the globe restoration projects are able to help reverse loss of the biodiversity and ecosystem services in areas degraded by human activities. While restoration can help reverse losses, this research shows it is critical for human well-being that we conserve pristine habitats and the biodiversity and ecosystem services they provide."

Source: Bournemouth University (2009, August 31). Restoring The Ecology Can Boost The Economy. ScienceDaily. Retrieved September 8, 2012, from http://www.sciencedaily.com­/releases/2009/08/090828150735.htm

Journal Reference: Benayas et al. Enhancement of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services by Ecological Restoration: A Meta-Analysis. Science, 2009; 325 (5944): 1121 DOI:10.1126/science.1172460

0 Ecosystem Services for Poverty Alleviation (ESPA)

The Ecosystem Services for Poverty Alleviation (ESPA) research programme aims to deliver high-quality, cutting-edge research that will improve our understanding of the way ecosystems function, the services they provide and their relationship with the political economy and sustainable growth.

The research will provide the evidence and tools to enable decision-makers to manage ecosystems sustainably and in a way that contributes to poverty reduction.

ESPA is a seven year, £40.5 million interdisciplinary research programme funded by the Department for International Development (DFID), the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), as part of the UK’s Living with Environmental Change partnership.  

The ESPA programme will issue a series of competitive calls for proposals. In addition to the main ESPA call in 2010 for consortium projects, there will be additional opportunities in 2011 and 2013 for smaller projects designed to complement ESPA’s initial research investments. The ESPA Directorate will issue a series of calls for proposals covering activities including capacity building, research into use, knowledge synthesis and evaluation.

ESPA’s goal is to ensure that, in developing countries, ecosystems are being sustainably managed in a way that contributes to poverty reduction as well as inclusive and sustainable growth.

Read more here.......

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