This paper examines technical efficiency in farming activities and its implication on forest conservation in Kilosa District. The empirical analysis is based on data collected from 301 households selected randomly from five villages in Kilosa district, of which three villages were under the REDD+ project. Two empirical models were estimated: stochastic frontier Translog production function, and forest resources extraction model.

Promotion and supporting the adoption of land management and conservation technologies (LMCTs) among poor farming households has been considered to improve crop yields as well as production technical efficiency (TE). This article compares production efficiency between adopters and nonadopters of LMCTs in Tanzania. Using national panel data, the study applied stochastic frontier model to estimate the TE of adopters and nonadopters. The findings show that adopters of LMCTs had a relatively significantly higher TE (0.73) than their nonadopter counterparts (0.69).

Land use is regulated through various mixes of command-and-control interventions that directly affect land use via land use restrictions, and other public interventions that indirectly affect land use via agricultural, forestry, trade or macro-economic policies.

More recently, coalitions of public and private actors have designed market-based and/or demand-led policy instruments to influence land use—e.g., eco-certification, geographical indications, commodity roundtables, moratoria, and payments for environmental services.

Protected areas are a cornerstone of forest conservation in developing countries. Yet we know little about their effects on forest cover change or the socioeconomic status of local communities, and even less about the relationship between these effects. This paper assesses whether “win-win” scenarios are possible—that is, whether protected areas can both stem forest cover change and alleviate poverty. We examine protected areas in the Peruvian Amazon using high-resolution satellite images and household-level survey data for the early 2000s.

Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation, or REDD, is a mechanism for providing financial rewards to countries that reduce carbon emissions caused by the loss and degradation of their forests. In concept, REDD resembles other Payment for Environmental Services (PES) programs. However, REDD emphasizes a reduction in deforestation and degradation rates from expected levels, also known as avoided deforestation and degradation.

This book is about land tenure policies from an international perspective. It adds on the first book published by Holden and Otsuka entitled The Emergence of Land Markets in Africa: Assessing the Impacts on Poverty, Equity, and Efficiency (2009) in a much deeper way with a stronger and clearer focus on policy issues.

Rigorous, objective evaluation of forest conservation policies in developing countries is needed to ensure that the limited financial, human, and political resources devoted to these policies are put to good use. Yet such evaluations remain uncommon. Recent advances in conservation best practices, the widening availability of high-resolution remotely sensed forest-cover data, and the dissemination of geographic information system capacity have created significant opportunities to reverse this trend.

The expansion of a given land use may affect deforestation directly if forests are cleared to free land for this use, or indirectly, via the displacement of other land-use activities from non-forest areas towards the forest frontier. Unlike direct land conversion, indirect land-use changes affecting deforestation are not immediately observable. They require the linking of changes occurring in different regions.