TUL-SEA - Trees in multi-Use Landscapes in South East Asia

The management of natural resources in multi-use landscapes can only be successful if conflict is avoided.

ICRAF Southeast Asia is making cost-effective and appropriate tools available, across the region, to help analyse trade-offs and assist with natural resource management negotiations.

The Trees in multi-use landscapes in Southeast Asia (TUL-SEA) project will trial and adapt a number of previously developed natural resource management tools over three years in China, Indonesia, Laos, Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam.

The ‘negotiation support toolbox' includes the following tools:

• Rapid Marketing Assessment;
• Rapid Hydrological Assessment (to assess watershed function);
• Rapid Carbon Stocks Assessment;
• Rapid Land Tenure Assessment (to identify the nature of land tenure conflicts); and
• Rapid Agrobiodiversity Assessment.

These tools are aimed at helping to appraise the likely impacts of new technologies and changes in market access as well as supporting negotiations on contentious issues.

The use of these tools and a ‘negotiation support approach' has been developed by ICRAF Southeast Asia to reduce conflict in multi-use landscapes. Such an approach helps to bridge perception gaps between different stakeholders and allows all involved to jointly analyse different plausible scenarios. It identifies the tradeoffs between economic and environmental impacts at the landscape scale.

The first stage in the TUL-SEA project involves developing, documenting and updating the generic tools, models and approaches that will be used.

The second stage is one of capacity building, with training workshops planned for early 2008 in each of the participating countries. Participants will include staff from research institutions, universities and government offices.

Each of the tools will then be tested at the landscape level for its cost-effectiveness and applicability. This will involve documenting the process by which it is used, validation and assessing stakeholder acceptance.

All of the tools, manuals and training materials will be freely available from the ICRAF web site. A selection can already be accessed by searching for the tool name in the publications section of the ICRAF-SEA website.

The project will also encourage knowledge sharing between and within participating countries.

The TUL-SEA project is funded by the Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ).

World Agroforestry Centre
ICRAF Southeast Asia Regional Office
Jl. CIFOR, Situ Gede
Sindang Barang, Bogor 16115
PO Box 161 Bogor 16001, Indonesia
Ph: +62 251 8625415, fax: +62 251 8625416
Email: icraf-indonesia@cgiar.org