NEWS

By Emilie Vansant

I am so excited to share at last some of the results from my PhD research on land use and nutrition, published today in Nature Food – Open Access! Here, we show how sourcing food from on-farm trees can benefit people’s diets in rural Malawi.

In countries like Malawi, where most rural households rely on rain-fed agriculture, people’s diets can depend on what crops they grow. Yet, policies designed to improve food security often focus on increasing the productivity of calorie-rich staple grains, which have done little to address the country’s high rates of malnutrition (as far more people suffer from micronutrient deficiencies than hunger).

Trees are an important source of nutrient-dense foods, yet if and how they can support dietary quality remains poorly understood. Through linking tree cover estimates from high-resolution satellite imagery with detailed food consumption data in Malawi, our research evidences how sourcing food directly from trees on farms can support women’s micronutrient adequacy across dry and wet seasons.

For example: Compared to women without food trees, women who sourced food from their own trees had on average 8-15% higher levels of zinc, vitamin A, iron and folate adequacy in the dry season, and 6-12% higher levels of zinc, vitamin A and folate adequacy in the wet season.

To tackle the interconnected problems of climate change, food insecurity, and biodiversity loss, we need solutions that address environmental and human health in tandem. It is clear that trees can and must play a role in such solutions.

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Together with Prof. Ingo Grass from the University of Hohenheim in Germany – and 57 co-authors, we examined the effects of agricultural diversification strategies on both environmental and social outcomes. We did so by harmonizing data from 24 studies across 11 countries. We found that farmers who implemented multiple diversification strategies in tandem had more win-win outcomes.

We examine the empirical relationship between having forests and trees in the surroundings and the probability of children consuming nutritious foods. We do so by combining detailed tree cover estimates based on PlanetScope imagery (3 m resolution) with Demographic Health Survey data from >15,000 households.

We find that even low levels of tree cover improve the likelihood of children aged 12–59 months consuming vitamin A–rich foods. Moreover, we observe that the effects of tree cover vary across poverty levels and ecoregions. The poor are more likely than the non-poor to consume vitamin A–rich foods at low levels of tree cover in the lowland forest-savanna ecoregions, whereas the difference between poor and non-poor is less pronounced in the Sahel-Sudan. These results highlight the importance of trees and forests in sustainable food system transformation, even in areas with sparse tree cover.

Even low levels of tree cover improve dietary quality in West Africa

Abstract. Forests are attracting attention as a promising avenue to provide nutritious and “free” food without damaging the environment. Yet, we lack knowledge

We show how forest regrowth in Nigeria has affected people’s dietary quality. We do so by combining a new map on forest regrowth with food consumption panel data from over 1100 households.

We use a a combination of regression and weighting analyses to generate quasi-experimental quantitative estimates of the impacts of forest regrowth on people’s food intake. We find that people living in areas where forest regrowth has occurred have a higher intake of fruits and vegetables and thus higher dietary diversity.

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Research on how to improve food and nutrition security has the potential to make real-life contributions for local communities suffering from nutrient deficiencies. Yet, most research remains inaccessible to people who could benefit from it. To elevate the impacts of research beyond a scientific paper, we developed and distributed a children’s book on wild foods in Malawi and Tanzania.

The book contents are based on results obtained from data on wild food consumption in Malawi and Tanzania, collected by PhD students Emilie Vansant and Rasmus Skov Olesen. Together they surveyed more than 1000 households across 16 sites in the two countries. The book is designed to educate young children in rural Africa about how wild foods from the forest can contribute to healthy diets. The illustrations were developed in collaboration with graphic facilitator Mette Jeppesen and highlight the importance of consuming foods rich in micronutrients, such as Vitamin A. To better acquaint children with their surrounding landscape, it features common tree species (e.g. wild custard apple, wild java plum) and green leafy plants (e.g. wild cow peas, black jack) and their various functions, including providing nutrient-rich fruits and vegetables.

We traveled to Tanzania and Malawi in March 2023 and distributed the book to ~1500 children across 16 schools through interactive workshops designed to engage students with the book’s contents. When distributing the book to school children, the book was first read out loud to the children with the help of local research assistants. Graphic Facilitator Mette sketched a human body and explained how eating nutritious fruits and vegetables can be good for your eyesight, strength and health. The workshops finished with a drawing activity, where the children were invited to pick certain leaves and fruits to draw together on large sheets of paper. These collective ‘nutritious landscape drawings’ were then left to decorate the classrooms.

Achieving food and nutrition security for the world’s population while at the same time reversing and minimizing damage to the natural environment is a grand societal challenge. A growing body of evidence has shown that access to forests can support food security in some settings, but the linkages between forests and people’s diets are not well understood. The goal of this review is to provide an overview of the explanations behind observed associations between forests and food and nutrition security. We found that 77% of publications show that forests contribute positively to food and nutrition security. The two main explanations are (1) the direct provision of forest foods and (2) indirect effects from forest-based ecosystem services on surrounding agriculture. Our findings suggest that it is pertinent to rethink the dichotomy between agriculture and nature and move toward more integrated nutrition-sensitive landscapes.

Forests support people’s food and nutrition security through multiple pathways in low- and middle-income countries

Strategies to improve food security in low- and middle-income countries continue to
promote increasing food production via agricultural intensification. Limited attention
is given to the role of forests, despite a growing body of literature showing how
forests can improve people’s diets. Here, we br…

A new paper was published in People & Nature by Emilie Vansant in collaboration with a team of scientists at CIFOR-ICRAF. The study reviews literature linking tree-based farming systems and dietary quality in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). The synthesis of 36 studies finds:

1. Maintaining trees in and around farmland – and using these trees for both the direct provision of foods and as a source of income – can serve as a key strategy for households to diversify food consumption and improve dietary quality.
2. How much a tree-based farming system can influence diets is dependent on policies and institutions at the national scale, bioclimatic and geographical factors at the landscape scale, as well as socioeconomic factors at both the landscape and household levels.
3. Indigenous populations practicing traditional forms of tree-based farming (which are often diverse systems integrated with wild landscapes) seem to maintain high levels of dietary quality through sourcing food from both wild and cultivated areas

The existing evidence, though limited, points at important knowledge gaps – namely the lack of a typology of tree-based farming systems to facilitate objective comparisons across cultural and geographical contexts. Additionally, there is a paucity of research that explicitly examines the role of non-forest trees in influencing dietary quality. By recognizing the potential of trees to contribute to positive nutritional outcomes in rural communities, this study supports the development of nutritionally-sensitive landscapes in LMICs.

Promotion of the article in CIFOR’s Forest News blog:

Why trees on farms make a win-win for people and nature – CIFOR Forests News

Trees on or around farms can improve soil health, regulate microclimates, enhance carbon sequestration, and improve biodiversity at multiple scales. However, the ways in which tree-based farming systems affect the diets of rural populations is less well understood. Today we are producing more food t…

Read the full article here.