Farmer Tree Planting Barriers to Sustainable Forest Management - Smallholder Tree Growing for Rural Development and Environmental Services - page 414

Box 20.2 Current forest plantation definitions are an artificial mix of 'observ-
ables', presumed intentions of the managers, and legal status of land
In the definition of 'forest' from the Global Forest Resource Assessment 2000
(FAO 2001) ( our emphasis ), “forest includes natural forests and forest planta-
tions. It is used to refer to land with a tree canopy cover of more than 10 per-
cent and area of more than 0.5 ha. Forests are determined both by the presence
of trees and the absence of other predominant land uses. The trees should be
able to reach a minimum height of 5 m. Young stands that have not yet but are
expected to reach a crown density of 10 percent and tree height of 5 m are
included under forest, as are temporarily unstocked areas. The term includes
forests used for purposes of production, protection, multiple-use or conserva-
tion (i.e. forest in national parks, nature reserves and other protected areas), as
well as forest stands on agricultural lands (e.g. windbreaks and shelterbelts
of trees with a width of more than 20 m), and rubberwood plantations and
cork oak stands. The term specifically excludes stands of trees established
primarily for agricultural production, for example fruit tree plantations. It also
excludes trees planted in agroforestry systems.”
Comments
The current set is a mix of:
Legal criteria - everything that the State claims to be forest land, regardless
of tree cover ('temporarily unstocked')
Intentions of the planter - planting rubber trees for timber makes it into a
'forest', if the planter also or mainly expects to be able to tap latex, these same
stands are not included
Management plans - temporarily unstocked areas can still be called forest as
long as a forester has plans to replant…
Definitions of a tree - based on plant height, which does not exclude bamboo,
and with a little stretch, could include perennials such as cassava or
sugarcane…
The definition 'also excludes trees planted in agroforestry systems ' for rea-
sons unspecified.
allow for forms intermediate between 'forest' and 'agriculture'. As there is no gen-
eral consensus on operational definitions for 'forest', 'plantations' (or even
'tree'….), we propose to start by distinguishing 'natural forest' as having no (or only
a few) planted trees, plantations as being dominated by planted trees and often con-
sisting of only one or a few planted species, and agriculture as land without trees
(Fig. 20.3, Box 20.3). In between these classes there are many combinations of tree
cover, fraction of trees that has been planted and species richness of the planted tree
combination, that all can fall under our concept of 'agroforestry'.