The Case for Engaging Smallholder Farmers in Assisted Natural Regeneration of Trees and Forests Across the Global Tropics and Subtropics

Robin L. Chazdon

doi:10.1007/s11842-026-09627-8

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The Case for Engaging Smallholder Farmers in Assisted Natural Regeneration of Trees and Forests Across the Global Tropics and Subtropics

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The Case for Engaging Smallholder Farmers in Assisted Natural Regeneration of Trees and Forests Across the Global Tropics and Subtropics

Robin L. Chazdon

Small-Scale Forestry, Vol.Advanced access

17-Mar-2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11842-026-09627-8

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Abstract

ecosystem restoration

farmer-managed natural regeneration

forest and landscape restoration

Smallholder farmers manage a significant portion of the world’s agricultural land, with smallholdings composing over 76% of agricultural land in Asia and 60% in Africa. By adopting assisted natural regeneration (ANR) practices, smallholder farmers and millions of land users across the global tropics and subtropics can become agents of restoration without having to abandon their farmland or rural livelihoods. Smallholder farmers are often family farmers that live close to their fields; they have a vested interest in reversing land degradation and have deep-rooted motivations for sustainability. Smallholder farms are generally unmechanized and are more likely to adopt diverse, sustainable, and agroecological practices that support higher levels of biodiversity than large-scale industrialized monocultures. In addition, smallholder farms are often situated within a landscape matrix composed of agricultural land amidst remnant forest patches. These attributes signal a high potential for natural regeneration on many smallholder farms and a high capacity for smallholders to implement farm-based ANR practices within larger-scale forest and landscape restoration initiatives.

Details

Title: The Case for Engaging Smallholder Farmers in Assisted Natural Regeneration of Trees and Forests Across the Global Tropics and Subtropics
Authors: Robin L. Chazdon (Corresponding Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast
Publication details: Small-Scale Forestry, Vol.Advanced access
Publisher: Springer Dordrecht
DOI: 10.1007/s11842-026-09627-8
ISSN: 1873-7854
Copyright note: This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
Data Availability: No datasets were generated or analysed during the current study.
Organisation Unit: Tropical Forests and People Research Centre; Forest Research Institute
Language: English
Record Identifier: 991217259602621
Output Type: Journal article

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