Elsevier

Forest Ecology and Management

Volume 333, 1 December 2014, Pages 9-21
Forest Ecology and Management

The management of tree genetic resources and the livelihoods of rural communities in the tropics: Non-timber forest products, smallholder agroforestry practices and tree commodity crops

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foreco.2014.01.021Get rights and content
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Highlights

  • The benefits from trees and their genetic resources are often not well quantified.

  • We review what is known about value and management for tropical rural communities.

  • Challenges to ‘conventional wisdom’ on tree resource use and management are presented.

  • Constraints and opportunities to maintain and enhance value are described.

Abstract

Products and services provided by trees in forests and farmland support the needs and promote the wellbeing of hundreds of millions of people in the tropics. Value depends on managing both the diversity of tree species present in landscapes and the genetic variation within these species. The benefits from trees and their genetic resources are, however, often not well quantified because trade is frequently outside formal markets, there is a multiplicity of species and ways in which trees are used and managed, and genetic diversity within species is frequently not given proper consideration. We review here what is known about the value of trees to rural communities through considering three production categories: non-timber products harvested from trees in natural and managed forests and woodlands; the various products and services obtained from a wide range of trees planted and/or retained in smallholders’ agroforestry systems; and the commercial products harvested from cultivated tree commodity crops. Where possible, we focus on the role of intra-specific genetic variation in providing support to livelihoods, and for each of the three production categories we also consider wider conservation and sustainability issues, including the linkages between categories in terms of management. Challenges to ‘conventional wisdom’ on tree resource use, value and management – such as in the posited links between commercialisation, cultivation and conservation – are highlighted, and constraints and opportunities to maintain and enhance value are described.

Keywords

Agroforestry tree products
Farm-forest linkages
Livelihoods
Non-timber forest products
Tree commodity crops
Tree genetic resources

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