Situated at the headwaters of the Yellow River, the sedge-dominated peatlands in the Ruoergai plateau in China, store water and supply it to downstream areas. These peatlands also support endemic and endangered Himalayan species and maintain the special aspects of Tibetan culture. In the 1960-70’s, the Ruoergai peatlands, which had been drained for agriculture, began to be badly damaged by overgrazing. Assessments and field observations indicate that over 70 percent of the peatlands are severely degraded.

The report explores the evictions of pastoralists and other conflicts over pastoralists’ land in Tanzania, with focus on the past decade. 

Although most of these evictions and land based conflicts have been documented, the associated human and legal rights violations have increasingly lead to concern amongst civil society. A study was therefore commissioned to collate the available information as well as to visit affected pastoralist communities to assess the current situation faced by pastoralists in the country. 

The status of grazinglands in the USA is increasingly dynamic with large areas being converted to cropland in response to demands for increased crop production. Here we focus on two types of grazinglands: rangelands and pasturelands. Rangelands are usually defined as natural ecosystems in which the native vegetation is predominantly grasses, grass-like plants or shrubs, and are generally used for grazing livestock and wildlife. Pasturelands are areas specifically managed for the production of forage (native or introduced) for grazing livestock.

The adoption of crop-livestock integration (CLI) among smallholder farmers in the developing countries is no doubt one of the solutions to food security, risk management, and poverty alleviation in sub-Saharan Africa. However, adequate assessment on the current status of CLI becomes necessary for the development and its evolution among smallholder farmers. This article presents a basic and multi-objective linear programming (LP) model to determine enterprise combinations of crop and livestock activities that maximize total gross margin (TGM) among small farms in the Eastern Cape Province.

Tree and shrub abundance has increased in many grasslands, causing changes in ecosystem carbon and nitrogen pools that are related to patterns of woody plant distribution. However, with regard to spatial patterns, little is known about (i) how they develop; (ii) how they are influenced by grazing; or (iii) the extent to which intraspecific interactions dictate them. We addressed these questions by quantifying changes in the spatial distribution of Prosopis velutina (mesquite) shrubs over 74 years on grazed and protected grasslands.

Communities in Tigray, Northern Ethiopia, have established exclosures on formerly degraded grazing lands and other land uses to promote natural regeneration of plants. Village bylaws devised by communities govern the management of exclosures. We analysed the effectiveness of village bylaws that are used to manage exclosures in addressing forest degradation, resolving conflicts among users over natural resource use, and meeting high expectations of users to realise economic benefits from exclosures through enhancing revenue from sale of grass and dry wood.

Woody encroachment affects the biohydrology of rangelands worldwide and can increase evapotranspiration by increasing plant rooting depth, increasing the duration of the growing season, or by initiating a process of hydrologic recovery in formerly overgrazed landscapes. Eastern redcedar (Juniperus virginiana) is encroaching rapidly into rangelands in the Southern Great Plains of the USA, and beyond, including Oklahoma. However, the degree to which increasing growing season duration causes higher evapotranspiration after encroachment is not known.

The effect of canopy removal, a form of non-lethal disturbance, was assessed for the interaction between two co-occurring American East Coast salt marsh angiosperms, Schoenoplectus americanus (Pers.) Volkart ex Schinz and R. Keller and Distichlis spicata (L.) Greene, in a greenhouse replacement series experiment. In mixture, aboveground production of S. americanus was significantly higher than production of D. spicata. When plant canopy was experimentally removed, this difference was stronger (366±35gm⁻² vs. 139±41gm⁻²; P=0.0033) than when it was left intact (383±44gm⁻² vs.

This paper presents a bioeconomic analysis of a red deer population within a Norwegian institutional context. This population is managed by a well-defined manager, typically consisting of many landowners operating in a cooperative manner, with the goal of maximizing the present-value hunting related income while taking browsing and grazing damages into account. The red deer population is structured in five categories of animals (calves, female and male yearlings, adult females and adult males).

The environmental consequences of agriculture are of growing concern. One example of these consequences is the effect of agricultural pollutants on the Great Barrier Reef (GBR), a world heritage-listed ecosystem lying off the tropical north-eastern coast of Australia. Pollutants from agricultural lands (fine sediments and attached nitrogen (N) mainly from grazing lands, and dissolved N and pesticides mainly from cropping) in catchments draining into the GBR lagoon threaten the health and resilience of this ecosystem.

Understanding the relationships between biodiversity and land-use is a key element for the development of effective conservation strategies. We studied a mid-altitude steppe-like area of Southern France, the Causse de Sauveterre, that has been grazed for many centuries. The decrease of human population during the 20th century, particularly since the end of 2nd World War, and the ongoing changes in agricultural practices may have dramatic effects on many biodiversity components of these landscapes.