ANALYSIS Indigenous livelihoods, slash-and-burn agriculture, and carbon stocks in Eastern Panama Petra Tschakert a, ⁎ , Oliver T. Coomes b , Catherine Potvin c a Department of Geography/Alliance for Earth Sciences, Engineering, and Development in Africa (AESEDA), Pennsylvania State University, 315 Walker Building, University Park, PA 16802-5011, USA b Department of Geography, McGill University, 805 Sherbrooke Street West, Montreal, Canada, QC H3A 2K6 c Department of Biology, McGill University, 1205 Dr. Penfield, Montreal, Canada, QC H3A 1B1 ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT Article history: Received 28 March 2005 Received in revised form 22 December 2005 Accepted 2 February 2006 Available online 3 April 2006 Improved crop–fallow systems in the humid tropics can simultaneously sequester atmospheric carbon emissions and contribute to sustainable livelihoods of rural populations. A study with an indigenous community in eastern Panama revealed a considerable biophysical potential for carbon offsets in small-scale slash-and-burn agriculture through longer fallow periods, improved fallow management, secondary forest development, and agricultural intensification. Based on soil and biomass carbon measurements, estimated annual sequestration rates amount to 0.3-3.7 t C ha - 1 yr - 1 . Despite such potential, the economic benefits of initiatives aimed at sequestration of carbon in the community are likely to be rather unequally distributed within the community. Heterogeneity in livelihood strategies and uneven asset endowments among households – factors often overlooked in the ongoing carbon and sustainable development debate – are expected to strongly affect household participation. Indeed, only the better-endowed households that have also managed to diversify into more lucrative farm and non-farm activities are likely to be able to participate in and thus benefit from improved crop–fallow systems that capture carbon. Economic, ethical, institutional, and technical concerns need to be taken into account when designing community carbon management and investment plans. © 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Keywords: Indigenous smallholders Livelihood diversification Crop–fallow systems Soil and biomass carbon Panama 1. Introduction Secondary forests – a key feature in forest landscapes and slash- and-burn agriculture of small-scale farmers in the tropics – are not only increasing in extent worldwide but also receiving growing attention with respect to their potential ecosystem services and contributions to sustainable livelihoods. Defined as woody vegetation on agricultural land or other lands where previous forest cover has been eliminated (de Jong et al., 2001; Smith et al., 1997), secondary forests covered 165 million ha in 1990 in Latin America alone (de Jong et al., 2001; FAO, 1996). Annual carbon (C) sequestration rates in tropical forest fallow are estimated to account for 25–90% of C losses due to biomass burning in forests (Hughes et al., 1999; Lugo and Brown, 1992; Naughton-Treves, 2004). In addition to global environmental services such as C storage and biodiversity conservation, secondary forests and forest fallows contribute to improved local ecological conditions, including erosion control and watershed protection (Smith and Scherr, 2003). However, gains from secondary forest expansion are perceived to be evanescent due to the agricultural practices of shifting cultivators. Shifting cultivation, also referred to as ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS 60 (2007) 807 – 820 ⁎ Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 814 863 9399; fax: +1 814 863 7943. E-mail address: petra@psu.edu (P. Tschakert). 0921-8009/$ - see front matter © 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.ecolecon.2006.02.001 available at www.sciencedirect.com www.elsevier.com/locate/ecolecon