Land Use Change and Trends

Initiative pour la restauration des forêts et paysages forestiers en Afrique (Initiative for the restoration of forests and forest corridors in Africa)

The authors present an overview of the African forest landscape initiative, a cooperatoin between WRI, NEPAD, BMZ and The World Bank. The document reviews opportunities and challenges for forest land restoration projects in Africa as well as opportunities for collaboration with governments, NGOs, and intergovernmental agencies.

 

 

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Quelles sont les causes de la déforestation dans le bassin du Congo? Synthèse bibliographique et études de cas (What are the causes of deforestation in the Congo Basin? Bibliographic synthesis and case studies)

The article presents a literature review of different factors affecting deforestation rates in the Congo (especially Cameroon and Gabon), the most devastating of which they identified as agriculture. The authors argue that the Congo Bassin is one of the most important and best preserved ecosystems on earth. Finally, the author calls for moe studies of socio-economic factors representing the different stages of degradation, so as to better inform policy.

 

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Pratiques de restauration des zones degradees d’Afrique de l’Est (Restoration practices in degraded landscapes of Eastern Africa)

The author provides an introduction to the state of the land, i.e. extent of degradation in eastern Africa. He then goes on to discuss restoration practices and for degraded landscapes in eastern Africa. The author also provides an evaluation of reforestation practices currently in use. The author ends by reviewing successful technologies for reforestation in eastern Africa and offering suggestions for scaling up.

 

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Reverdir le Sahel: Le succès de la régénération (Regreening the Sahel: Regeneration success)

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Mise à échelle du reverdissement: six étapes vers le succès--une approche pratique pour la restauration des forêts et des paysages (Scaling up Regreening: Six Steps to Success--A Practical Approach to Forest and Landscape Restoration)

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Using Lightweight Unmanned Aerial Vehicles to Monitor Tropical Forest Recovery

Background

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Enjeux fonciers, exploitation des ressources naturelles et Forêts des Communautés Locales en périphérie de Kinshasa, RDC (Land Issues, Exploitation of Natural Resources, and Local Community Forests on the Outskirts of Kinshasa, DRC)

background

The authors discuss factors affecting peri-urban forests that surround Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo and identify mismanagement of forest resources by local authorities as well as the willingness of local communities to take part in forest management.

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The Political, Social, and Ecological Transformation of a Landscape

Background

In 1951 the Chinese Government issued the Decision on Cultivating Rubber Trees, which resulted in the establishment of large-scale rubber plantations in the tropical regions of China, including Xishuangbanna in southern Yunnan. These rubber plantations, worked by relocated Han Chinese, were a manifestation of state power on the landscape.

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Land Cover Change in Colombia: Surprising Forest Recovery Trends between 2001 and 2010

background

This study mapped annual land-use and land-cover from 2001 to 2010 in Colombia using MODIS (250 m) products coupled with reference data from high spatial resolution imagery (QuickBird) in Google Earth.

Research Goals & Methods

The authors evaluated land cover change at four spatial scales: country, biome, ecoregion, and municipality.

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Sixty-Seven Years of Land-Use Change in Southern Costa Rica

Background

Habitat loss and fragmentation of forests are among the biggest threats to biodiversity and associated ecosystem services in tropical landscapes. This paper uses the vicinity of the Las Cruces Biological Station in southern Costa Rica as a regional case study to comment on seven decades of land-use change in one of the most intensively studied sites in the Neotropics.

Open access copy available
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