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CIFOR–ICRAF publishes over 750 publications every year on agroforestry, forests and climate change, landscape restoration, rights, forest policy and much more – in multiple languages.

CIFOR–ICRAF addresses local challenges and opportunities while providing solutions to global problems for forests, landscapes, people and the planet.

We deliver actionable evidence and solutions to transform how land is used and how food is produced: conserving and restoring ecosystems, responding to the global climate, malnutrition, biodiversity and desertification crises. In short, improving people’s lives.

Livelihoods

Livelihoods

Taking a systems approach to achieving livelihood and conservation outcomes at landscape level, for both people and the environment.

Cocoa, timber, coffee and palm oil are the major commodities that support smallholder livelihoods, along with lesser-known tree crops and non-timber forest products such as nuts, honey, resins and natural medicines. While they can provide a diverse range of nutritious foods and other ecosystem services, their productivity is threatened by unsustainable practices, biodiversity loss and climate change.

CIFOR-ICRAF is supporting local innovations to sustainably produce food across landscapes. Through our ‘options by context’ (OxC) approach, we are helping farmers adopt agroecological and climate-smart principles and practices, while also strengthening land and resource rights for forest-dependent communities. Research migration and urbanization aims to understand how these choices affect land-use decisions, social dynamics and gender roles. We are also identifying ways to engage the private sector, as well as youth and women, in sustainable forestry and agroforestry practices to build resilient, productive communities.

Contact us

Fergus Sinclair

Director, Agroecology

Livelihoods: Fast facts

At least 2 billion people depend on the agricultural sector for their livelihoods, particularly poor and rural populations1
~80% of the world’s farms are smaller than 2 ha, but they take up only ~12% of the world’s agricultural land2
~86 million green jobs, as well as food, shelter, energy, medicines, come from forests3

 

Sources:
1 Abraham M and Pingali P. 2020. Transforming smallholder agriculture to achieve the SDGs. In Gomez y Paloma S, et al. (eds.). Springer, Cham. 173- 209.
2 Lowder SK, et al. 2016. The number, size, and distribution of farms, smallholder farms, and family farms worldwide. World Development 87: 16–29.
3 FAO. 2020. State of the World’s Forests 2020. Rome: FAO.

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