Farm Level Tree Planting in Pakistan: The Role of Farmers’ Perceptions and Attitudes

Abstract

The low proportion of forested land and continuing degradation of existing forest cover are serious threats to the sustainability of forestry in Pakistan. Farm forestry has been identified as a feasible solution, particularly in the plain areas. Applying the Theory of Planned Behaviour in a survey of 124 farmers in Dera Ismail Khan district of Pakistan's North West Frontier Province showed that farmers' willingness to grow trees on their farms is a function of their attitudes towards the advantages and disadvantages of growing trees, their perception of the opinions of salient referents and factors that encourage and discourage farm level tree planting. Farmers viewed farm forestry as economically beneficial and environmentally friendly. Tree planting was perceived as increasing income, providing wood for fuel and furniture, controlling erosion and pollution and providing shade for humans and animals. Farmers saw hindrance in agricultural operations and the harbouring of insects, pests and diseases as negative impacts of tree planting; however, these were outweighed by their perceptions of positive impacts. Tree growing decisions of farmers were influenced by the opinions of family members, owners/tenants, fellow farmers and village elders. The factors that significantly predicted farm level tree planting were availability of barren land, lack of markets, lack of nurseries and damage caused by animals and humans. Farm forestry programmes are more likely to be successful if they acknowledge and address the factors which underlie farmers' reasons for planting or not planting trees.

Asset-building payments for ecosystem services: assessing landowner perceptions of reforestation incentives in Lebanon

“…This is particularly critical for less experienced tree planters who may underestimate the level of difficulty or work involved, which is especially relevant for those that are quite aged. Reasons why landowners in our study (particularly full-time farmers) would opt out of schemes accord with other studies, particularly if livelihoods would be affected by having native species on farms, such as loss of tenure and negative perceptions of biodiversity (Zubair & Garforth, 2006). More recent studies have also indicated that uptake of assetbuilding PES initiatives depends more on landowner attitudes and perceptions of how such policies affect future livelihoods (Trevisan et al, 2016).…”

The role of knowledge, attitudes and perceptions in the uptake of agricultural and agroforestry innovations among smallholder farmers in sub-Saharan Africa

“…These examples are described here and explore the perceptions farmers have about certain agroforestry practices, their impact and management (Douthwaite et al 2002, Mekoya et al 2008, Sileshi et al 2008b). There are a few more examples of studies outside of sub-Saharan Africa which set out to measure attitudes towards agroforestry and the environment and link these to the decision to adopt (Sood and Mitchell 2004, Zubair and Garforth 2006, McGinty et al 2008; however, these are not discussed here as they are beyond the scope of this paper.…”

Towards an improved understanding of farmers' behaviour: The integrative agent-centred (IAC) framework

“…Willock et al, 1999;Burton, 2004). Examples of this approach are related to the application of the Theory of Reasoned Action and the Theory of Planned Behaviour (Ajzen, 1991;Fishbein and Ajzen, 1975;Burton, 2004) to pesticide use (Heong and Escalada, 1999) and to agro-forestry practices (Zubair and Garforth, 2006).…”

“…Heong and Escalada, 1999;Heong et al, 2002), the social context (e.g. Nkamleu and Adesina, 2002), imitation of peers (Schmit and Rounsevell, 2006), attitudes and perceptions (Zubair and Garforth, 2006) and the role of specific contingencies which might influence farmers in an action context, e.g. inadequate risk communication (e.g.…”