The Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR and World Agroforestry (ICRAF) joined forces in 2019, leveraging a combined 65 years’ experience in research on the role of forests and trees in solving critical global challenges.
Youth leaders learn about restoration and sustainable mountain livelihoods to maintain biodiversity, in preparation for the COP CBD.
I stood on the rooftop of the Honghe Centre for Mountain Futures, gazing at the valley below. It had rained the night before. Water droplets still clung to leaves and branches. A man walked over and together we watched the forest canopy shimmer under the late-morning sun.
‘When I was a kid, golden pheasants could be found everywhere in these hills,’ said the Honghe County government official beside me. ‘People would catch them, bring them back to the village and raise them as pets. Now, they are a protected species. Poaching is illegal. We’ve established nature reserves for their conservation.’
On 6 July 2021, 20 youth leaders of China visited the Centre for Mountain Futures in Honghe County, Yunnan Province in China’s southwestern region as part of the Youth Scientific Exploration Event co-sponsored by China’s Ministry of Ecology and Environment as well as Polar Hub, a non-governmental organization based in Tianjin dedicated to fighting climate change and promoting sustainable development.
The visit was one in a series of events organised as part of the lead-up to the UN Biodiversity Conference (Fifteenth Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity or CBD COP15 for short), which is being hosted by Kunming City, the capital of Yunnan Province, in October 2021. In Kunming, delegates from signatory countries to the CBD will debate, refine and finally agree upon the framework for the next decade of global biodiversity policy.
These 20 young individuals would likely comprise the future leaders of China. Many were accomplished students with impressive research credentials; others were entrepreneurial pioneers in the private sector; and some were already at the vanguard of China’s national conservation efforts. They were all involved in one way or another in the global effort to safeguard the planet’s biodiversity. And so, we waited on the rooftop for their arrival, contemplating the future of the golden pheasant in one of China’s poorest regions.
I panned my camera lens across the verdant landscape. Then, a jeep rounded the corner of the road below, followed by a convoy of smaller vehicles and two shuttle busses. They had arrived.
Professor Jianchu Xu, director of the Centre for Mountain Futures and country head of the CIFOR-ICRAF China Programme, received the group at the bottom of the hill.
‘You’ve all travelled a long way by car to get here. How about we stretch our legs a bit?’ he said, smiling as they staggered out of the buses.
While leading the group uphill, Professor Xu paused several times to point out plant species cultivated along the road. Many of them had unique and important functions in sustainable agriculture. Of particular note was the Calotropis plant cultivated nearby, which ICRAF China scientists believe will be crucial as an efficient livestock-feed additive and multipurpose plant in mixed cropping systems.
By the time we reached the Centre at the top of the hill, we were famished and dug into the simple but hearty lunch with great aplomb. While eating, I chatted with two of the young leaders: Xinyi Yu, a 24-year-old Master’s student at the University of Sydney with a Nature publication already under her belt; and Yuhan Bao, a 25-year-old PhD candidate at Tsinghua University, who acted as a youth representative in ministry-level ecology talks between Korea, China and Japan. Both made a deep impression as knowledgeable, ambitious and compassionate individuals with roles to play in the years to come.
After lunch, Professor Xu began his lecture. He spoke at length on the ecological principles undergirding circular agriculture and agroforestry as well as the mission of the Centre for Mountain Futures to meaningfully integrate efficient, sustainable and commercially responsible practices into its own cropping systems. These systems rely upon adeptly mixing plant and animal species to form self-sufficient networks of interdependence.
One clear example of this is the Mountain Futures Insect Breeding Facility. The facility was designed to operationalise black soldier flies (Hermetia illucens) to organically degrade garbage and animal waste, producing protein-rich insects usable as feed for fish and chickens as well as enriching organic fertilisers using insect frass. Such an innovative system can play a vital role in introducing circular agriculture to Honghe, jumpstarting sustainable agricultural practices in the historically impoverished and underdeveloped area.
After the talk, on-site agroecologists at the Centre launched into the afternoon’s activity. The visitors were to lend a hand in restoring a parcel of degraded land. Dr Li, an ecologist, and Dr Zhao, a postdoctoral researcher in soil biology, introduced a list of agroforestry crops — which featured specialised adaptation to the hot and dry climate and produce synergistic benefits when used in tandem — that had been selected for the activity.
After the introduction, the 20 young visitors were divided into small groups and led to the fallow slope nearby. Each group was provided farm tools, organic fertiliser, woody debris, mulch and live worms. They were given 15 minutes to discuss which combination of species would be most suitable for their allocated plot of land. After, they leapt into action.
Under the fierce Honghe sun, groups debated the pros and cons of different planting strategies, with Centre agroecologists providing words of guidance or caution when needed. The activity was designed to instil the importance of teamwork. The increased efficiency of a collaborative approach was on full display that afternoon, with all groups successfully planting appropriate combinations of tree species.
It is this spirit of teamwork in Honghe that must be increased in scale to form a global network of conscientious, involved people to build a truly sustainable society, if the UN Biodiversity Conference is to succeed.
In addition to highlighting teamwork, the activity hammered home the need to consider the particular conditions of any given landscape, as there is no ‘one size fits all’ approach to sustainable land restoration. Tenets of agroforestry can provide general guidelines, but landscapes in their totality are the infinitely complex products of numerous variables in constant flux: temperature, elevation, humidity, soil nutrients, native fauna and flora, human disturbance, socio-economic needs and much, much more contribute to this complexity. Through participating in the lecture, discussion and tree-planting, the young leaders also learned first-hand the challenge of selecting crops that can flourish under local conditions and generate healthy ecological feedback loops, ultimately safeguarding biodiversity.
I thought back to my conversation with the government official earlier that morning. If 10, 20, 30 years from now, these slopes shone emerald green as they had once before, could the golden pheasants of his childhood re-enter and thrive in the mountain forests?
Many uncertainties face us in the future. Waning planetary health, declining biodiversity and a rapidly changing climate will usher in civilization-level challenges. How we respond to them will shape the course of human development in a future that is approaching at an alarming rate.
Peppering the animated discussions about how to re-build a healthier world, much laughter was also heard on the mountain that day. Two of the young leaders will speak at the Biodiversity Conference on behalf of China’s youth. They have important things to say to the world. I fully believe that the 18 who do not speak at the Conference, though, will also make each of their unique voices heard, one way or another. If they are the future, then there is great hope indeed for a brighter one.
World Agroforestry (ICRAF) is a centre of scientific and development excellence that harnesses the benefits of trees for people and the environment. Knowledge produced by ICRAF enables governments, development agencies and farmers to utilize the power of trees to make farming and livelihoods more environmentally, socially and economically sustainable at multiple scales. ICRAF is one of the 15 members of the CGIAR, a global research partnership for a food-secure future. We thank all donors who support research in development through their contributions to the CGIAR Fund.