Agricultural development with rainforest conservation: methods for seeking best bet alternatives to slash-and-burn, with applications to Brazil and Indonesia.

This paper sets out a conceptual framework for comparing the impacts of different land use systems and agricultural practices at the margins of tropical rain forests in terms of the concerns and objectives of two key interest groups: small-scale farmers seeking livelihoods at the forest margins and the 'international' interests in the global public goods and services supplied by tropical rain forests. This framework should be useful to a third key group, the national and regional policy makers who must consider these and other policy objectives and then decide on courses of action. The paper identifies data needs and analytical methods capable of supplying an empirical base for this conceptual framework, based on quantifiable indicators. It then presents preliminary results of the application of this conceptual framework in Indonesia and Brazil in association with a global, collaborative, multidisciplinary research programme. Even using preliminary order-of-magnitude estimates (to be replaced by more precise measurements as they become available), this conceptual framework presents results in ways that allow researchers and policy makers to select clear 'best bets' for development, when they exist, and to assess tradeoffs and options for complementary policy action and research efforts, when they do not.