Long-term interventions by conservation and development projects support successful recovery of tropical peatlands in Amazonia

Abstract

Sustainable management of non-timber forest products, as a means to increase the value of standing forest, has long been a goal of conservation in the tropics. However, there are few studies of the long-term ecological, social, and economic impacts of sustainable management initiatives. This study addresses this issue in the context of fruit harvesting of the arborescent palm, Mauritia flexuosa. In Amazonia, M. flexuosa grows naturally at high densities in carbon-rich peatland ecosystems and its fruit is an important resource for local communities. Typically, the fruit has been harvested by felling the trees. However, over recent decades, some communities have adopted climbing techniques to harvest the fruits. We analyse for the first time the potential of M. flexuosa populations and fruit production to recover in two rural communities in Peruvian Amazonia where climbing palms was adopted between 1999 and 2002. Since then, these communities have been supported by conservation and development projects. In both communities, we conducted interviews to assess the perceptions of change after the introduction of climbing and carried out forest inventories to estimate changes in two socio-economic indicators (volume of harvested M. flexuosa fruits and income) and three ecological indicators (pole stem density of M. flexuosa, seedling and sapling density, and the sex ratio of adult palms). Our results highlight the positive impacts of the use of climbing to harvest fruits on a range of both ecological and socio-economic indicators in these communities. These results demonstrate that sustainable fruit production is a viable way to conserve the forests, the high carbon stocks beneath the ground and the livelihood of people living in these ecosystems. These findings therefore will be of interest to a wide range of researchers, policymakers, and practitioners seeking to promote sustainable practices in these, and similar, ecosystems across the world and provide support for community-led conservation across the tropics.