SEES Fellows: Interacting Effects of Public Policy and Cash Crop Expansion on Forest Conservation

该项目得到了NSF科学，工程和教育可持续发展研究员（SEES研究员）计划的支持，其目标是帮助实现所需的发现，为导致环境，能源和社会可持续性的行动提供信息，同时创造必要的劳动力来应对这些挑战。可持续发展科学是一个新兴的领域，它解决了在不损害环境的情况下满足人类需求的挑战，并且不牺牲后代满足其需求的能力。一个强大的科学队伍需要在跨学科研究和思维方面受过教育和培训的个人，特别是在可持续发展科学领域。在SEES奖学金的支持下，该项目将使一个有前途的早期职业研究人员能够在与可持续发展相关的独立研究生涯中确立自己的地位。该研究员的项目将研究经济作物生产如何影响生态系统服务付费（PES）计划下的森林保护。森林提供了许多宝贵的服务，如土壤侵蚀控制和生物多样性，这对附近的农业非常重要，以及碳固存，这有助于减缓全球气候变化。生态系统服务补偿方案利用奖励措施敦促土地所有者在其土地上种植和维护森林，以创造这种效益。然而，这些计划的成功是多种多样的，似乎取决于社会和经济因素，没有得到充分的理解-特别是土地使用和资源使用之间的权衡。科学家们现在正在争论经济作物的生产是否可以通过减少从森林中开采资源的压力来加强森林保护。该项目采用跨学科方法，研究经济作物与森林再生之间关系的社会经济和生态层面。更好地了解家庭决策、公共政策和森林状况之间的联系有助于完善森林保护方案，使其最大限度地提高人类和环境的福祉。这项研究将探讨在中国的退耕还林绿色计划下，经济作物采用的不同模式如何影响森林。将在云南省维西县选取10个社区，根据社区是否集体组织种植和销售经济作物、家庭是否单独种植经济作物或没有经济作物而定。将收集数据以检验三个核心假设：（1）在家庭一级，经济作物生产导致森林资源减少;（2）在各个社区，没有经济作物的地方森林使用强度最大，集体采用经济作物的地方最小;（3）植物多样性和碳固存与森林资源使用强度呈负相关。数据收集将包括家庭生计调查;资源使用情况次级调查，包括由调查对象主导的森林使用情况绘图;在选定的人工林中进行实地测量，以控制海拔、坡度、坡向和与原有森林的接近程度;以及遥感卫星图像。分析将评估家庭和社区因素对不同资源使用的影响及其与小区和景观一级森林措施的关系。通过比较景观中的社区，这项研究将捕捉到迄今为止区域和家庭研究所忽视的中观机制。

The project is supported under the NSF Science, Engineering and Education for Sustainability Fellows (SEES Fellows) program, with the goal of helping to enable discoveries needed to inform actions that lead to environmental, energy and societal sustainability while creating the necessary workforce to address these challenges. Sustainability science is an emerging field that addresses the challenges of meeting human needs without harm to the environment, and without sacrificing the ability of future generations to meet their needs. A strong scientific workforce requires individuals educated and trained in interdisciplinary research and thinking, especially in the area of sustainability science. With the SEES Fellowship support, this project will enable a promising early career researcher to establish himself in an independent research career related to sustainability. This Fellow's project will examine how cash crop production affects forest conservation under Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) programs. Forests provide many valuable services, such as soil erosion control and biodiversity, which can be very important for nearby agriculture, and carbon sequestration, which can help slow global climate change. PES programs use incentives to urge landowners to plant and maintain forests on their land in order to create such benefits. However, the success of such programs is varied and appears to depend on social and economic factors that are not fully understood - particularly the tradeoffs between land-use and resource-use. Scientists now debate whether the production of cash-crops can enhance forest conservation by reducing the pressure to extract resources from forests. This project employs an interdisciplinary approach to study both the socioeconomic and ecological dimensions of the relationship between cash-crops and forest regeneration. A better understanding of the linkages between household decision-making, public policy, and forest conditions could help refine forest conservation programs so that they maximize both human and environment wellbeing. This research will examine how varying patterns of cash crop adoption affect forests under China's Grain-to-Green Program, which compensates households for planting forests on retired farmland. Ten communities will be selected in Weixi County, Yunnan Province, varying by whether the community organizes collectively to plant and market cash crops, households individually adopt cash crops, or cash crops are absent. Data will be gathered to test three core hypotheses: (1) at the household level, cash crop production leads to less withdrawal of forest resources; (2) across communities, forest use intensity is greatest where cash crops are absent and least where cash crops are adopted collectively; and (3) plant diversity and carbon sequestration correlate negatively with intensity of forest resource use. Data collection will include a survey of household livelihoods; a sub-survey on resource use, including respondent-led mapping of forest use; field measurements in planted forests selected to control for elevation, slope, aspect, and proximity to pre-existing forests; and remotely sensed satellite imagery. Analyses will assess effects of household and community factors on different resource uses and their relationships with forest measures at plot and landscape levels. By comparing across communities in a landscape, this research will capture meso-level mechanisms that regional and household studies have neglected so far.