How Is Forest Landscape Restoration Being Implemented in Burkina Faso? Overview of Ongoing Initiatives

Barbara Vinceti,Ali Lardia Bougma,Michel Valette,Arturo Turillazzi

doi:10.3390/su122410430

Barbara Vinceti, Ali Lardia Bougma + Show 2 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/su122410430

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Abstract

Land degradation affects a significant portion of the Earth’s ice-free land area and several countries have embraced the challenge of restoring large parts of their degraded lands. Success in these efforts depends on various factors, including the amount of resources invested, the technical capacity available and the degree of involvement of stakeholders. Burkina Faso has committed to restoring 5 Mha of degraded land by 2030. We identified 39 forest landscape restoration initiatives (FLR) in this country and interviewed their managers to obtain an overview of critical aspects and constraints that could orient future efforts. Our results show a recent growth of FLR initiatives, as most of the projects examined started in the last few years; however, the scale of implementation seems incompatible with country-level targets. Funding is coming mainly from international cooperation and this may lead to risks in long-term continuity and sustainability of FLR. Furthermore, FLR projects are carried out by a multitude of agencies, with local NGOs and associations as the main players; this finding highlights the need to coordinate ongoing efforts and flag challenges in tracking progress. Tree planting is common to most FLR initiatives examined, with aspects of quality and quantity of planting material available becoming critical in ensuring success; this raises the need to ensure farmers are well-trained in its collection and handling. Finally, more homogeneous approaches in monitoring across FLR initiatives should be adopted.

Highlights

Figures are greatly debated, but global estimates indicate that land degradation affects an area ranging from less than 10 to greater than 60 million square kilometers [1]
The spatial distribution of forest landscape restoration (FLR) initiatives surveyed mirrors the patterns of land degradation in Burkina Faso, as revealed by national assessments of the Ministry of Environment, Green Economy and Climate Change [17], with restoration efforts concentrating in the Sahelian ecoregion and in the northern part of the Sudanian ecoregion, both severely affected by land degradation processes (Figure 1)
Our overview shows that most FLR initiatives in place in Burkina Faso are quite recent, reflecting a growing effort to halt environmental degradation and restore ecological functionality and production in degraded lands

Summary

Introduction

But global estimates indicate that land degradation affects an area ranging from less than 10 to greater than 60 million square kilometers [1]. New concepts have been developed to address restoration objectives at the landscape level, using different combinations of approaches, ranging from managing natural forest regrowth to tree planting [2], maximizing livelihood improvements in addition to reaching biodiversity conservation goals. The original definition of FLR describes it as “a planned process that aims to regain ecological integrity and enhance human well-being in deforested or degraded landscapes” [3,4] It is different from site-level restoration because it targets ecological processes that operate at a larger landscape scale [5,6], and it aims at optimizing the flow of ecosystem services and goods from trees in the landscape. A landscape-level management approach integrating trees, forests and forestry with other land uses has been considered likely to produce sustainable outcomes [9], especially in dryland landscapes, where forests and trees are part of a mosaic of land uses in which they play an essential role in sustaining livelihoods

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