Secondary forest on bauxite in Bahia: methods and protocol

Dary Rigueira, Brazilian ecologist at the Universidad Federal da Bahia, Salvador. Dary and myself designed a survey protocol that we hope will suggest suitable species for restoration

Dary Rigueira and myself designed a sample protocol for characterising the vegetation growing on disturbed sites on bauxite. We are hoping that by contrasting sites of different ages and disturbance histories we will be able to identify patterns which point to what determines the assemblages of species growing at a site and help us identify species which may be suitable for the rehabilitation of mined sites.  Our 44 study plots are between 3 and 20 years of age since deforestation and in which deforestation had been accompanied by top soil removal or burning and conversion to pasture or simply allowed to recover.

Monitoring our progress

Jazmín Daza is a vital part of our team and engages with the four communities in a participative manner, collecting baseline data and facilitating the decision-making within each community needed to make sure that our agroforest plots are serving their purpose

As highlighted in an earlier post the use of Agroforests have not been widely adopted in Latin America. Whilst we don’t know why this is we intend to maximise its chance of success in the Amazon by ensuring that the communities who adopt it are fully engaged and in control of how it is delivered. This we hope will make it more likely to keep it going once our intervention is complete. This approach involves participative monitoring of progress and consultation over where plots are located and what crops are grown as well as the provision of training that will see them masters of the technology and potential teachers to other communities in the region.

Our strategy for delivering Inga agroforests

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By working through the process of producing an agroforest with each community and having them make key decisions at each step we aim to generate capacity as well as buy-in for this attempt at permaculture

Agroforests were first promoted in the 1980’s but have never taken off in Latin America despite substantial investment through the World Agroforestry Centre. We don’t know why this is the case: whether too much burden of risk was placed on poor farmers, whether there was not enough engagement with farmers or whether the investment just never made it to the ground.  To try and avoid the same fate  we aim to