Restoring African degraded landscapes with plant biodiversity and livestock management

通过植物生物多样性和牲畜管理恢复非洲退化的景观

• 批准号: BB/S014934/1
• 负责人: Mariana Rufino
• 金额: $ 146.69万
• 依托单位: Lancaster University
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2019
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2019 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=BB%2FS014934%2F1
• 关键词: Restoring; African; degraded; landscapes; plant

Across Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) approximately 660 million hectares of land is degraded, leading to low land productivity, poor and variable biomass production, inability to graze livestock and lack of resilience of agriculture to climate extremes. Land degradation is a major factor in the instability of crop and livestock production, leading to a significant burden of food and income security. Extensive forest areas of East Africa have been converted to grasslands and to agriculture, largely driven by the expansion of crop-livestock farming, a preferred livelihood option in these regions to minimize the impacts of climatic risks. Once land is converted for agriculture, a combination of low input of nutrients and high grazing pressure, with social and climatic changes leads to this land becoming degraded. Once degraded is it extremely difficult to recover the functionality of the land leading to a downward spiral of productivity and resulting in systems that are less resilient to climate extremes. Local farmers, who rely on livestock for their livelihoods, seek new land for grazing within natural ecosystems. As a consequence, high livestock densities have led to larger loads of nutrients and sediments entering water systems and are releasing greater emissions of harmful greenhouse gases.Land restoration must be a priority if we are to secure future food supplies, and protect high carbon and high biodiversity ecosystems across East Africa. This project seeks to explore the use of a novel combination of different local grassland plants species, coupled with new livestock management models to help farming communities in Kenya to recover degraded grazing lands. Working in partnership with local farmers and community based organisations, the project team aims to improve grassland productivity, thereby increasing the quality of livestock fodder, and nutrient content of manure. This will lead to restored functionality of soils for future plant production and a greater degree of resilience to future climate shocks. Specifically, this interdisciplinary project will use a multi-scale approach to: 1) Study the primary productivity and state of degradation of land at two contrasting sites of the densely populated highlands of Kenya; 2) Explore the biological and socio-ecological characteristics of these different sites and use complimentary field and plot scale studies to identify the mechanisms involved in a process of successful restoration using plant biodiversity and; 3) Explore alternative management and regulatory scenarios with local farmers and stakeholders, highlighting the benefits for livestock production and for ecosystem conservation.4) Engage key stakeholders to understand restoration needs and constraints and to build the necessary capacityHalting and reversing land degradation in Africa is urgent given the projections of human population increase, the large proportion of the African population living in a rural setting, and the prominence of agriculture as a source of income across the continent. Single interventions such as increasing mineral fertiliser use or the supplementation of livestock feeds are unlikely to be sufficient to achieve nutritional security given the large scale of the problem, and the increases in productivity and new land that may be required. Protecting natural ecosystems such as forests and grasslands, and restoring soil resilience is also needed to reduce negative feedbacks on the regional climate system including livestock production of greenhouse gases and buffering negative impacts of climate change on the water cycle.

在整个撒哈拉以南非洲(SSA)，约有6.6亿公顷土地退化，导致土地生产力低、生物量产量低且变化大、无法放牧，农业缺乏对极端气候的适应能力。土地退化是农作物和畜牧业生产不稳定的一个主要因素，导致粮食和收入安全的重大负担。东非广大林区已被改造成草地和农业，这主要是由于扩大了作物-畜牧业，这是这些地区为尽量减少气候风险的影响而首选的生计选择。一旦土地被转化为农业，低养分投入和高放牧压力，加上社会和气候变化，导致这片土地退化。一旦退化，就极难恢复土地的功能，导致生产力螺旋式下降，并导致系统对极端气候的适应能力降低。依赖牲畜为生的当地农民在自然生态系统中寻找新的土地放牧。因此，高牲畜密度导致更多的营养物质和沉积物进入水系统，并释放更多有害的温室气体。如果我们要确保未来的粮食供应，并保护整个东非的高碳和高生物多样性生态系统，土地恢复必须是优先事项。该项目旨在探索使用不同当地草原植物物种的新组合，并结合新的牲畜管理模式，帮助肯尼亚的农业社区恢复退化的牧场。该项目团队与当地农民和社区组织合作，旨在提高草原生产力，从而提高牲畜饲料的质量和粪便的营养含量。这将使土壤恢复功能，用于未来的植物生产，并在更大程度上适应未来的气候冲击。具体地说，这个跨学科项目将使用多尺度方法：1)研究肯尼亚人口稠密高地两个不同地点的初级生产力和土地退化状况；2)探索这些不同地点的生物和社会生态特征，并利用免费的田野和地块规模研究，以确定利用植物生物多样性成功恢复过程中涉及的机制；3)与当地农民和利益攸关方探讨替代管理和监管方案，强调对畜牧业生产和生态系统养护的益处。4)让主要利益攸关方参与，以了解恢复需要和制约因素，并建设必要的能力；(3)鉴于人口增长的预测、非洲大部分人口生活在农村地区以及农业作为整个非洲大陆收入来源的突出地位，迫切需要遏制和扭转非洲的土地退化。考虑到问题的规模，以及可能需要的生产力和新土地的增加，增加矿物质化肥使用或补充牲畜饲料等单一干预措施不太可能足以实现营养安全。还需要保护森林和草原等自然生态系统，恢复土壤韧性，以减少对区域气候系统的负面反馈，包括畜牧业生产温室气体和缓冲气候变化对水循环的负面影响。