ASEAN-Swiss Partnership on Social Forestry and Climate Change (ASFCC) Phase 3

Across Southeast Asia, 300 million people live in rural areas and up to 70 million people rely on forests for their livelihoods, nutrition and food security. For centuries, local people have used and managed forests in various ways: enhancing natural forest ecosystems for food, timber and other non-timber products, as agro-forest systems planted with mixed food and commodity crops, and as forest fallows in swidden systems for maintaining environmental services. These systems have long been adaptive to changing market and socio-demographic demands, and more recently subjected to intensive policy and economic drivers. Against this setting, the formalization of social forestry or community-based forestry has become an increasing feature of forest management in the region. As efforts to combat climate change get underway, social forestry is an important component in the portfolio of forest management practices for channeling incentive mechanisms such as REDD+ (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation plus enhancing forest carbon stocks). As part of the ASEAN-Swiss Partnership on Social Forestry and Climate Change (ASFCC), the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) is undertaking research to better understand swidden systems as a social forestry practice and their relevance for REDD+ and livelihoods. CIFOR’s research aims to understand how local knowledge, practices and social networks can be incorporated into the design of REDD+ projects to ensure that swidden communities can participate meaningfully in and benefit from REDD+. in Phase III, CIFOR will expand research on livelihood risk and coping, adaptive governance and adaptive capacity in response to climate change and other emerging drivers impacting on ASEAN landscape, leveraging on the longitudinal data collected from field sites and at national level in Indonesia, Vietnam and Lao PDR over Phase I and Phase II. These analyses will generate evidence for design of policies and incentives on social forestry, climate change and development at the national and sub-national levels that can support livelihood and forest resilience. CIFOR will extend its policy analyses of at the national-level to understand the different the different enabling factors and constraints to effective and equitable policy design and implementation, and generate insight for assessing policy performance and outcomes for social forestry and climate change mitigation and adaptation. Myanmar will be include in the this study.