Submit Manuscript | http://medcraveonline.com Introduction Plantation forest of exotic tree species are one form of forests in Ethiopia. 1–3 They deliver a wide range of social, economic and environmental benefts. 4 The importance of plantation forests is increasing as the demand for forest products is rising and the supply from the natural forests is decreasing. Accordingly, the areas under manmade forests have been increasing from an estimated cal. 190,000 hectare (ha) in 1990 to cal. 972,000 ha in 2011 in the country. 1 Of these, about 20% of the plantations are classifed as commercial plantations. 1 The remaining 80% are non industrial plantations, mainly woodlots and trees on farms. Plantation forests are important to meet wood requirements for local use, such as for construction material and for wood fuel 5,6 and thereby helping the rural people improving their livelihood through the contribution to household economy in Ethiopia. 7–9 Furthermore, in Ethiopia, plantations of some tree species can also provide important recognized Non–timber Forest products (NTFPs), 10 including the natural rubber. Natural rubber is a major industrial raw material with benefcial economic and ecological impact, 11 harvested from the rubber tree. Rubber tree, Heavea brasiliensis, is one of the world’s important crops, with 8,000, 000 ha under cultivations 12 and can be grown in plantation as a commercial tree worldwide. 11 The tree is native to South America but can grow in any area with an altitudinal range of 600–900 meters above sea level (masl), except in the arid regions. The species requires 180–250 cm of rainfall per year and a temperature of 25–35 °C. Today, H. brasiliensis has become a development instrument tree for developing countries and a good way to fght against deforestation and soil erosion, which are critical problems in tropical countries like Ethiopia. It also reduces human pressure on natural forests by supplying an excellent timber. 13,14 In Ethiopia, Heavea brasiliensis tree plantation has been conducted mainly in the south western part of the country, where this region is considered the most suitable for rubber cultivation. The cultivation practices are raised under rainfed conditions and the practice mainly is undertaken by the state. Now attempts are being made to extend the practice towards farm level by the rural communities at the potential rubber growing areas over the country. Although the interest of enhancing this in the country is well recognized, the development of Heavea brasiliensis plantations has been lower than anticipated, particularly at farm levels by the rural communities. This might be due to the fact that no emphasis was placed on understanding the perceptions of local people on H. brasiliensis tree species. Thus, the future plan may largely depend on addressing farmer’s perception as well as the identifcation of factors that encourage or discourage rubber tree planting on their farms. Also, insight about the above issues will be helpful in designing effective out–growers scheme for rubber tree plantations by the farmers, thereby contributing to the betterment of the livelihood and ultimately rural developments in the country. Thus, the general objective of this study is to identify the factors that underlie farmer’s decisions to engage in rubber tree plantation and to understand farmers’ perception towards the forest resources in their Forest Res Eng Int J. 2018;2(4):192‒196. 192 © 2018 Dejene et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and build upon your work non-commercially. Farmers’ perception towards farm level rubber tree planting: a case study from guraferda, south–western Ethiopia Volume 2 Issue 4 - 2018 Tatek Dejene, Berhane Kidane, Zewdu Yilma, Busha Teshome Central Ethiopia Environment and Forestry Research Center, Ethiopia Correspondence: Tatek Dejene, Central Ethiopia Environment and Forestry Research Center. P.O. Box 30708, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Tel +2519 1191 0829, Email tdejenie@yahoo.com Received: June 21, 2018 | Published: July 20, 2018 Abstract IIn Ethiopia Heavea brasiliensis tree plantation has been mainly conducted by the state. Now a day, attempts are being made to extend the practice towards farm level by the rural communities. Then the future plan may largely depend on addressing farmer’s perception as well as the identification of factors that encourage or discourage rubber tree planting on their farms. Also, insight about the above issues will be helpful in designing effective out–growers scheme for rubber tree plantations by the farmers, thereby contributing to the betterment of the livelihood in the country. Thus, the general objective of this study was to identify the factors that underlie farmer’s decisions to engage in rubber tree plantation and to understand farmers’ perception towards the forest use and conservations in the study area. The study was conducted in Guraferda Woreda, in Southwestern part of Ethiopia. We used informal discussion and semi–structured questionnaire survey. The result indicated that all the respondents were farmers, self–employed in farming. They grow cash crops, food crops, rearing animals and daily labor were their livelihood activities and sources of income. The concept of conservation and forest development is supported by the majority of the respondents and about 40% are dependent on the forests for income generation. Majority of the respondents (68%) expressed their willingness to plant rubber tree on their farm. However, land availability, market for the products, gestation period of the investment, lack of technical knowhow and nearness to resource such as seedlings are discouraging factors for the engagement of rubber plantations by farmers in the study area. Thus, taking all these as opportunities could help us to devise strategies such as rubber tree agroforestry, which probably intensify the farming system and results willingness to plant rubber trees by farmers in the study area. Keywords: Heavea brasiliensis, agroforestry, farmers, perception, out–growers Forestry Research and Engineering: International Journal Research Article Open Access