Ecosystems are the foundations of human civilisations. Biodiversity is the variety of life and their interrelationships on the planet. Forests including trees in landscape are important components of biodiversity and constitute vita ecosystems sustaining food, livelihoods, culture and mitigate climate change.
The recent report of Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) has shown that one million species of plants and animals are being threatened with extinction. It says that natures dangerous decline is unprecedented, threatening all vital systems of human and nature. Ecosystem services and biodiversity are vital component of livelihoods of people around the world, and one billion poor people live directly on forest ecosystem services in the developing world. While policy and management solutions are emerging, the world community is still lagging behind considering the urgency of the problem.
IFSD is committed to work with partners and clients to test, develop and upscale policy and management solutions through action research, science-policy dialogues, and stakeholders engagement.
Our particular strengths include:
- designing and implementing community based systems of forest restoration and biodiversity conservation
- creating and supporting pro-poor natural resources management systems and practices
- designing forest management systems for triple win benefits: community livelihoods, biodiversity conservation, and carbon sequestration
- integration of indigenous, scientific, policy, and entrepreneurial knowledge in environmentally sustainable development
Adaptation Funding can Exacerbate Vulnerability if Not Managed Carefully
By Hemant Ojha A group of 20 experts, led by Siri Eriksen, have published a research article in World Development, sending a very strong message to the climate change adaptation donor community: That the
Conservation Agriculture can Aid Recovery from COVID-19 in the Indo-Gangetic Plains
IFSD has just launched a new Policy Insight paper the topic of conservation agriculture and how it can aid in the COVID-19 recovery process in the Indo-Gangetic Plains. The authors argue that conservation agriculture benefits
Co-evolving dynamics in the social-ecological system of community forestry—prospects for ecosystem-based adaptation in the Middle Hills of Nepal
Authors: Prativa Sapkota, Rod Keenan, and Hemant Ojha This paper analyses prospects for ecosystem-based adaptation, through examining diverse forest-people interactions in Nepal’s community forestry as a social-ecological system (SES). They examine the linkage between
Green and Inclusive Urbanisation
As nearly half of the people live in the cities, human’s relationship with trees has become primarily an urban phenomenon. In the urban landscapes, every tree and its parts are considered in the design
IFSD Contributes to Himalayan Assessment led by ICIMOD
Background and purpose of the Himalayan Assessment Himalayan waters are a source of local livelihoods, way of life for a myriad of communities, and are also the subject of many geopolitical divisions. The glaciers that feed these
How Can Nepal’s Community Forestry be Adapted to New Federal System?
By Dr Hemant R Ojha When Maoists rebellion was attacking all aspects of state and society in the decadal war the sparked in 1996, community forestry (CF) was one of the few things that