Lucas Manda's research while affiliated with University of Dar es Salaam and other places

Inclusive land restoration is increasingly considered to be a critical sustainable pathway to the achievement of sustainable development goals (SDGs) in developing countries. The literature suggests that good governance practices support successful sustainable natural resource management. The study assesses the role of landscape governance in a long-term thriving forest and landscape restoration project in Shinyanga. We apply the good governance principles, which include participation, representation and legitimacy, actor interactors, equity and fairness, accountability and transparency, and respect for local knowledge. Descriptive methods are used to analyze the data collected through focus group discussions and key informant interviews. The evidence suggests that all of the principles contributed positively to the successful restoration, except for accountability and transparency. Building on local knowledge and institutions, the local rules and norms of restoration constituted the foundation of the success. Equity and empowerment were the least influential attributes due to the exclusion of women in the management of the restoration areas. The actors identified the enhancement of the incentives, equitable benefit-sharing mechanisms, performance, and accountability instruments as the key governance aspects that would benefit land restoration at the landscape level. Furthermore, cohesion and synergies amongst the different actors, the governing structures, and recognizing formal and informal institutions’ interactions are vital determinants of restoration outcomes.

Owing to high rates of land and forest degradation, there is consensus that forest landscape restoration is a global priority with the Bonn Challenge and the New York Declaration on Forests committing to restore about 350 Million hectares by 2030, globally. However, there is a need for incentives that motivate these restoration efforts and disincentives aimed at restricting activities that result in further land degradation. We provide insights and understanding of the incentives and disincentives measures applied within the forest restoration systems through a case study in the Shinyanga region of Tanzania. Incentives that have promoted forest landscape restoration in Shinyanga include; conservation benefits, education and information, Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD+), well-defined property rights & increasing land prices and awards while disincentives include; penalties, quotas and permits. Intrinsic incentives that are derived from self-desire within an individual such as conservation benefits and education & information were more preferred within Shinyanga region compared to extrinsic incentives which relied more on external factors such as REDD+ and awards. Nonetheless, a combination of both incentives and disincentives has led to the success of restoration in Shinyanga; positive incentives worked better for privately owned lands while regulatory disincentives worked better for communally owned restoration lands. High levels of social equity and trust have enabled the functioning of these incentives while a robust governance structure at the local level has been instrumental in enforcing the disincentives. There is need for government and all stakeholders to maintain and enhance the gains from restoration, especially empowering communities further, for these incentives to work.