Doctoral Dissertation Research: Evaluating Conservation and Livelihood Outcomes from Community-Based Forest Management

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This doctoral dissertation research project will examine the effectiveness of the United Nations' Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) program, which is an international funding mechanism to reduce emissions from tropical deforestation and degradation by simultaneously attaining emission-reduction, biodiversity-conservation, and livelihood-improvement goals. The project will investigate the REDD+ principles that giving local people the rights and powers to manage forest resources while promoting equitable sharing of carbon revenues will sustainably avoid tropical deforestation and forest degradation. This doctoral dissertation research project will assess the degree to which current REDD+ expansion in more than 60 tropical developing countries is occurring without sufficient understanding of whether and how to enhance simultaneous achievement of multiple outcomes. To contribute in filling these gaps, the doctoral student will conduct comparative case study assessment of communities with and without REDD+ interventions. He will combine mixed methods from the social and forest ecological sciences to empirically explore two research questions: (1) How do specific REDD+ interventions affect carbon, livelihood, and conservation outcomes separately and jointly? (2) What are the trade-off and synergistic relationships between carbon, conservation, and livelihood outcomes? The student will conduct a case study of REDD+ implementation in Tanzania, which was one of the first nine countries to pilot this program starting in 2009. Qualitative narratives will be used to explain the specific REDD+ interventions using data from focus group discussions, in-depth interviews, participant observations, and review of literature. Assessment of livelihood outcomes will rely on data from 240 household socioeconomic surveys. Assessment of carbon and conservation outcomes will use data from 60 systematic forest inventories. Appropriate statistical analysis will be used to determine relationships and statistical significance of differences in carbon, conservation, and livelihood outcomes between villages.This project will analyze two emerging approaches to renewable resource management, payment for environmental services (PES) and recently decentralized community-based forest management (CBFM) programs, in order to assess whether and how their combination under REDD+ has avoided tropical deforestation. Successful REDD+ interventions promise affordable significant emissions reductions options for industrialized nations while protecting biodiversity and improving livelihoods of millions of forest dependent communities. The research will help formulate empirical policy recommendations to improve REDD+ effectiveness in nations piloting that UN program under similar PES and CBFM arrangements. The doctoral student will help develop a community level forest governance educational tool for tracking REDD+ impacts. As a Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement award, this project will provide support to enable a promising student to establish an independent research career.