- Title Pages
- Illustrations
- Acknowledgments
-
1 * From Fragmentation to Forest Resurgence - Rethinking Social Lives and Forest Transitions
-
2 * False Forest History, Complicit Social Analysis -
3 * Stories of Nature’s Hybridity in Europe -
4 * Adam Smith in the Forest -
5 * Jungles, Forests, and the Theatre of Wars -
6 * Mutant Ecologies -
7 * Pan-Tropical Perspectives on Forest Resurgence -
8 * The Social Lives of Forest Transitions and Successions -
9 * Paradigms Lost -
10 * Effects of Human Activities on Successional Pathways - Human-Forest Relationships and the Erasure of History
-
11 * Constructing Nature -
12 * Culturing the Rainforest -
13 * Residual Effects of Agroforestry Activities at Dos Hombres, a Classic Period Maya Site in Belize -
14 * Forest as Faunal Enclave: Endangerment, Ecology, and Exclusion in India -
15 * Amazonia - Market Dynamics and Regional Change
-
16 * The Fate of the Branded Forest -
17 * Gendered Knowledge and the African Shea-Nut Tree -
18 * Ancient Forest Tea -
19 * The Production of Forests -
20 * From Swidden to Rubber - Institutions
-
21 * A Forest for My Kingdom? “Forest Rent” and the Politics of History in Asante (Ghana) -
22 * The Invisible Map -
23 * Re-Greening the Sahel - Urban Ecologies
-
24 * Amazonia 1492 -
25 * Urban Residence, Rural Employment, and the Future of Amazonian Forests -
26 * From Fallow Timber to Urban Housing -
27 * Forest Resources, City Services -
28 * Chicago Wilderness - References
- Contributors
- Index
* Re-Greening the Sahel
* Re-Greening the Sahel
Linking Adaptation to Climate Change, Poverty Reduction, and Sustainable Development in Drylands
- Chapter:
- (p.303) 23 * Re-Greening the Sahel
- Source:
- The Social Lives of Forests
- Author(s):
Chris Reij
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
This chapter focuses on forest recovery in Niger, one of the poorest countries in Africa. Although Niger is perceived as environmentally degraded and in permanent crisis, there has been large-scale landscape recovery even in the absence of significant government or foreign aid interventions. Recent analysis of long-term trends in agriculture and environment found large-scale on-farm re-greening, especially in regions with dense populations. In itself this is not surprising, as increasing population densities can induce farmers to intensify agriculture and trees, but the scale of this farmer-managed re-greening is unexpected and significant. Using soil conservation techniques based on local knowledge and farmer-managed natural regeneration, 5 million hectares have been recovered in open forests. A significant factor promoting on-farm re-greening has been the perceived shift in rights to trees from state-owned to private ownership, often largely managed by women. Once farmers recognized that they held exclusive rights to trees, the stage was set for revival of several traditional modes of water conservation that have proven beneficial to natural regeneration and management of indigenous multi-use trees. These new institutional arrangements and coincident forest recovery improved livelihoods, crop yields, and local biodiversity.
Keywords: Sahel, Niger, indigenous knowledge, forest recovery, gender, tree rights, soil conservation
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- Title Pages
- Illustrations
- Acknowledgments
-
1 * From Fragmentation to Forest Resurgence - Rethinking Social Lives and Forest Transitions
-
2 * False Forest History, Complicit Social Analysis -
3 * Stories of Nature’s Hybridity in Europe -
4 * Adam Smith in the Forest -
5 * Jungles, Forests, and the Theatre of Wars -
6 * Mutant Ecologies -
7 * Pan-Tropical Perspectives on Forest Resurgence -
8 * The Social Lives of Forest Transitions and Successions -
9 * Paradigms Lost -
10 * Effects of Human Activities on Successional Pathways - Human-Forest Relationships and the Erasure of History
-
11 * Constructing Nature -
12 * Culturing the Rainforest -
13 * Residual Effects of Agroforestry Activities at Dos Hombres, a Classic Period Maya Site in Belize -
14 * Forest as Faunal Enclave: Endangerment, Ecology, and Exclusion in India -
15 * Amazonia - Market Dynamics and Regional Change
-
16 * The Fate of the Branded Forest -
17 * Gendered Knowledge and the African Shea-Nut Tree -
18 * Ancient Forest Tea -
19 * The Production of Forests -
20 * From Swidden to Rubber - Institutions
-
21 * A Forest for My Kingdom? “Forest Rent” and the Politics of History in Asante (Ghana) -
22 * The Invisible Map -
23 * Re-Greening the Sahel - Urban Ecologies
-
24 * Amazonia 1492 -
25 * Urban Residence, Rural Employment, and the Future of Amazonian Forests -
26 * From Fallow Timber to Urban Housing -
27 * Forest Resources, City Services -
28 * Chicago Wilderness - References
- Contributors
- Index
