Policy forum: Shifting cultivation and agroforestry in the Amazon: Premises for REDD+

Abstract

Evidence shows that there is a close link between the intensification of shifting cultivation (SC) and the Amazon forest resilience. However, SC, to this day, is a widely implemented agricultural practice around the Amazon region due to its cultural, social, and economic relevance. In pristine indigenous communities, which have not experienced Western influence, SC will continue to be the main livelihood as part of the conservation of a patrimony of the humanity. Nevertheless, the main adverse effects of SC on ecosystems (i.e. forest degradation), particularly on Amazon forests, are our grounds to justify the implementation of public policies aiming to the substitution by agroforestry systems (AFS) as a sustainable food system. In this context, we propose linking AFS to Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD+ strategies) in shifting cultivation landscapes where there is high local-scale expansion and intensification of SC. AFS has higher potential as sustainable food systems for degraded forest rehabilitation and reduction of the expansion and intensification of SC. Consequently, AFS reduce deforestation of new forest areas for SC, meanwhile, sustainable management of second-growth forests could also be implemented through improved fallows, increasing the planting density of long-cycle agroforestry tree species. AFS should be implemented in local communities, in particular, those undergoing human-modified Amazon landscapes, where there is a high intensification of SC.