Award details

RCUK-CIAT Newton Fund Towards BIO-smart livestock farming in Colombia: cultural landscapes, silvo-pastoral systems and biodiversity

Reference	BB/R022852/1
Principal Investigator / Supervisor	Dr Maria Escobar-Tello
Co-Investigators / Co-Supervisors	Professor Andrew Barnes, Dr Michael Garratt, Dr Jill Thompson
Institution	University of Bristol
Department	Clinical Veterinary Science
Funding type	Research
Value (£)	85,256
Status	Completed
Type	Research Grant
Start date	01/04/2018
End date	30/04/2019
Duration	13 months

Abstract

unavailable

Summary

Colombia is the second most biodiverse country in the world with a rural population of small-holder, low income farmers. As the demand for meat and dairy increases, livestock farming continues to expand onto land that is not apt for farming, causing environmental damage through forest clearance, loss of biodiversity and land degradation. Different national initiatives aim to encourage more sustainable farming that support farmers' livelihoods, and protect the environment and its rich biodiversity. Silvo-pastoral farming is one of those initiatives as it combines forestry and grazing. The international Centre for Tropical Agriculture CIAT runs two interrelated projects, "Livestock Plus" and "Sustainable Amazon Landscapes" to encourage the adoption of silvo-pastoral farming. However, farmers find silvo-pastoral farming changes the landscape of their farm in ways that conflict with their ideas of what 'a good farm' should look. These social factors, in combination with possible economic and agronomic influences, may limit the uptake of sustainable silvo-pastoral practices. This interdisciplinary project brings together cultural geography, environmental economics and agricultural ecology to investigate the cultural and socio-economic reasons for low adoption of silvo-pastoral livestock farming practices that have been designed to protect and restore biodiversity in Colombia. It will also quantify the benefits of silvo-pastoral farming for plant and insect biodiversity, both for their intrinsic value but also the contribution it may make to support long-term sustainable production. In doing so, this research will provide evidence to underpin effective policy that allows intensification of livestock farming while supporting environmental priorities. This may encourage farmers to adopt more sustainable and biodiversity enhancing silvo-pastoral systems.

Impact Summary

Our project will support the economic and welfare needs of Colombia by contributing evidence to support the sustainable intensification of pasture farming in Colombia, particularly through the improved implementation of CIAT's Sustainable Amazonian Landscape project. This project will provide national environmental authorities and farmers in Colombia with scientific evidence about the role that more sustainable land management methods can play in enhancing their capacity to mitigate and adapt to climate change, while improving ecosystem services and socio-economic benefits for farmers. By supporting the evidence gathering and implementation for this wider project, our proposal will deliver impact and support the environmental and socio economic benefit of farmers in Colombia. Our project activities will deliver impact by benefitting: i) Farmers by providing evidence for a better appreciation of their relationship with biodiversity and of the direct role of retaining forest in and around their farms on improved production as well as of the wider social and environmental benefits of biodiversity protection. ii) Policy makers by providing evidence of farmer perception of ecosystem service value of natural forest and biodiversity and the role of cultural ideas on farmer adoption of silvo-pastoral livestock systems so that it may inform policies which promote effective farm scale and landscape scale management. iii) Colombian researchers will benefit from an increased capacity to deliver research that considers cultural contexts, measurement of biodiversity and other ecosystem services and production measures. Thus, the project will support the widespread implementation of methods to measure the impact forest conservation and improved silvo-pastoral management on biodiversity, which could be rolled out across the wider networks of farms involved in projects such as the Sustainable Amazonian Landscapes Project and other similar initiatives lead by CIPAV. Our project will contribute elements for public policy that better considers the farmer and local community perception of forest conservation as well as an understanding of how to work with farmers to protect and enhance biodiversity and forest areas. The implementation of a more effective, nuanced and considerate government policy for landscape scale management would be a long-term impact of this research.

Committee	Not funded via Committee
Research Topics	X – not assigned to a current Research Topic
Research Priority	X – Research Priority information not available
Research Initiative	Newton Fund Open Call (NF) [2015]
Funding Scheme	X – not Funded via a specific Funding Scheme

I accept the terms and conditions of use (opens in new window)

export PDF file

back to list new search