No abstract

Traditional agroforestry landscapes play a critical role in conserving biodiversity and sustaining rural livelihoods through multiple products and services. However, an unprecedented rise in the unsustainable utilisation and management of provisioning ecosystem services from these landscapes contributes to forest biodiversity loss and impacts livelihood efforts. The objective was to evaluate the link between distance and socio-ecological determinants and the provisioning ecosystem services consumption behaviour. This study tested whether "rural people's preferences and extent of PESs harvesting decrease as the distance from the village to forest patches increase, regardless of the prevalent socioecological conditions'. Using a structured questionnaire survey, data were collected in 882 households in four villages of Thulamela Municipality, Limpopo Province in South Africa. The data were analysed using Chi-square, Fidelity level, Use-value, Friedman test, and Generalised linear model. Consistent with the hypothesis, the results showed that local people harvest most of the provisioning ecosystem services at an immediate (1 st ) level, followed by intermediate (2 nd ) and far distance (3 rd ) levels. This study further revealed the existence of 108 useful tree species in the study areas. This study also found that although socio-ecological determinants influence consumption behaviour, the influence of specific socio-ecological determinants was not consistent across the different regimes of distance from the forest resources. The fact that there is a preference to use and harvest provisioning ecosystem services from the distance regime closest to the household, shows a concerted effort to conserve and enhance the abundance of multipurpose tree species in homesteads and the immediate areas.

Tree species richness is a critical element concerning trees on farms, on communal land and in protected areas to support biodiversity and socio-economic livelihoods in traditional agroforestry landscapes. Tree species richness is directly linked to the use of provisioning ecosystem services and to management practices in traditional agroforestry landscapes. The study aimed to investigate the link between socio-ecological and conservation strategies regarding tree species richness in traditional agroforestry landscapes. The study was conducted in the Damani, Thenzheni, Tshiombo and Tshipako villages located in Thulamela Municipality of the Vhembe Biosphere Reserve, South Africa. The data were collected using a mixed method approach combining forestry inventory and focus group discussion. The study recorded a total number of 126 tree species: 83 communal-land-hosted species, 68 species of trees on farms and 81 species in the protected areas. The indigenous species Englerophytum magalismontanum (Sond.) T.D.Penn. was the most cited (62%) by interviewees, with a primary use for wild fruits, followed by Pteleopsis myrtifolia (M.A. Lawson) Engl. & Diels. (57%) for fuelwood, Combretum molle R.Br. ex G.Don (36%) for traditional medicine and Albizia adianthifolia (Schumach.) W.F.Wight (12%) for fodder. Species richness was found to be commonly driven by provisioning ecosystem services with trees on farms and on communal land. Distance was found to be major driving factor of species richness in protected areas. This study found that the local people have no conservation strategy and practices targeting the enhancement of tree species richness in the traditional agroforestry landscape. This study advocates for the establishment of a conservation strategic framework for restoring tree species richness by targeting traditional agroforestry landscapes.

Traditional agroforestry has been recognised to contribute to biodiversity conservation; however, biodiversity strategies often lack information about drivers of tree species diversity loss, which is crucial for decision-making. Anthropogenic disturbance has positive and negative effects on tree species richness and diversity. This study was conducted in Vhembe Biosphere Reserve, Limpopo Province, and used distance from the nucleus of the community to the forest as a parameter to assess tree species richness and diversity. Vegetation data were collected using three transects of 150 m in each distance level and sampled a total area of 1000 m2 by sampling five rectangular plots of 20 m2 × 10 m2 (200 m2). Data analysis was conducted using Chao1, PERMANOVA, nMDS, PERMDISP, DISTLIM, dbRDA and SIMPER. The findings are in consonant with distance decay of community similarity hypotheses, with estimated tree species richness of 76, 93 and 95 species in an immediate distance, intermediate distance and far distance, respectively. Moreover, the highest species variation was observed at an intermediate distance, which indicates that there is greater species composition at an intermediate distance compared to immediate and far distances. The results confirm that the distance and associated factors have major detrimental effects on tree species richness and biodiversity in traditional agroforestry landscapes. Harvesting of provisioning ecosystem services is found and known to be extremely high in the study area. Effective interventions such as planting indigenous trees and conserving the existing vegetation must be implemented to reduce and halt overexploitation.