Project final report

Improving Agroforestry Policy for Sloping Land in Fiji - Final Report

Date released
28 June 2023
ISBN
978-1-922983-24-4
Publication Code
FR2023-028
Authors

Tyron Venn, Hilary Smith, Robert Harrison, Steve Harrison, and Jack Baynes

Overview

This project aimed to identify policy, institutional, and governance options to encourage the adoption of sloping land silvopastoral systems in Fiji and provide decision-support information for government agencies, landholder communities, and individual farmers on silvopastoral system design and expected financial and economic cost-benefit performance.

Given limited project resources the research has focussed on Viti Levu and the financial performance of silvopastoral systems has been estimated for a case study site northwest of Nadi. The project has addressed four objectives:

  1. Examine the barriers and constraints to sloping land agroforestry in Fiji, and identify gender-inclusive policy and institutional frameworks and instruments to overcome these and facilitate the establishment of silvopastoral systems.
  2. Identify potentially suitable combinations of pasture, livestock, and tree species for silvopastoral systems on seasonally dry, sloping land areas on Viti Levu and Vanua Levu. Given the large variation in previously published estimates of sloping land with agroforestry potential, this objective included a geospatial analysis to improve land availability estimates.
  3. Collate production, cost, and revenue data for individual tree and livestock species, and evaluate the financial performance (from a landholder perspective) of selected silvopastoral systems for alternative business models.
  4. Develop and evaluate a regional-scale silvopastoral system adoption scenario.

View the project page