Forest

Forest pattern, not just amount, influences dietary quality in five African countries

Dietary diversification is central to improving dietary quality and nutrition. Forests provide access to diverse and nutritionally important foods. We linked forest metrics and food consumption data across five African countries. One additional …

Agriculturally productive yet biodiverse. Human benefits and conservation values along a forest-agriculture gradient in Southern Ethiopia

Context. It remains unclear how agricultural landscapes can best serve multiple purposes such as simultaneously maintaining agricultural productivity and conserving biodiversity. Objectives. Our objective was to assess how important components of …

Soil organic matter underlies crop nutritional quality and productivity in smallholder agriculture

Global crop yield gains have not be associated with increases in the many macro- and micro-nutrients needed for a balanced human diet. There is thus growing interest in improving agricultural practices to increase nutrient availability to people. …

Retaining forests within agricultural landscapes as a pathway to sustainable intensification. Evidence from Southern Ethiopia

There are increasing calls in Africa for 'sustainable intensification' of agriculture with the aim of increasing productivity whilst minimizing the negative environmental and social impacts. This paper questions whether adopting a landscape …

A methodological approach for assessing cross-site landscape change. Understanding socio-ecological systems

The expansion of agriculture has resulted in large-scale habitat loss, the fragmentation of forests, significant losses in biological diversity and negative impacts on many ecosystem services. In this paper, we highlight the Agrarian Change Project, …

Indirect contributions of forests to dietary diversity in Southern Ethiopia

We assess whether forests contribute indirectly to the dietary diversity of rural households by supporting diverse agricultural production systems. We applied our study in a landscape mosaic in Southern Ethiopia that was divided into three zones of …