1) The document compares the costs and ecological impacts of rubber monoculture versus rubber agroforestry in Yunnan, China using spatially explicit modeling. 2) It finds that while rubber monoculture is more economically productive, rubber agroforestry stores more carbon and provides better ecological functions and values. 3) The balance of economic and ecological benefits depends on carbon market prices; at higher prices, agroforestry systems provide more combined economic returns from rubber and carbon storage. Maintaining agroforestry is the most implementable policy given existing supports.

1. Rubber monoculture or rubber agroforestry:
are there implementable policy-supports based
on result from spatially explicit models?
YI Zhuangfang 依庄防,
World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF), China
Center for Montain Ecosystem Studies
Kunming Institute of Botany,
Chinese Academy of Sciences

2. Traditional & non-traditional
rubber-growing regions
Rubber agroforestry only exists in
Thailand Indonesia (Old Rubber)
etc. now, but it’s been gradually
conversed into rubber
monoculture or plantations of
other cash crops.
Li and Fox, 2012

3. Study Site
Yunnan
,China
Data from: World Agroforest center, China Program and KIB

4. Man-made plantations: rubber
monoculture and rubber
agroforestry
Rubber
agroforestry
Rubber
monoculture

5. Rubber Expansion
87,226 ha
153,613 ha
438,015 (23%)
Data from: World Agroforest center, China Program and KIB
Data from: Agro-forest center China

6. The trend of Rubber
plantations
1200
1000
Inferior rubber
plantations
800
600
Medium-favorable
rubber plantations
400
200
0
3
Favorable rubber
plantations
1400m*****
Rubber plantations have already been expanded to 1600m

7. Questions
1.
Which is more cost-efficient between
rubber monoculture and rubber
agroforestry?
2.
Which has better ecological
functions/values?
3.
Is there a balance between economic
return and ecological functions/values?
And which is more implementable based
on existing policy-support?

8. Question 1
1. Which is more cost-efficient between rubber monoculture
and rubber agroforestry?

9. Methodology and Data
1. Compiling the cost and productivity observations from
field surveys, interviews and literatures;
Rubber productivity among different cropping
systems
4000
Rubber in KG/ha
3500
3000
2500
2000
1500
1000
Rubber
monoculture gets
highest rubber
productivity but
also the highest
overall cost
500
0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
Jungle rubber
rubber agroforestry(tea+fruit trees)
rubber monoculture
Data source: Feng (2007); Wuland and Joshi (2013); Wibawa, unpublished.

10. Methodology and Data
2.
Simulating the land use scenarios based on land use map in 2010, including nonrubber scenarios:1) (Non-Rubber), 2)Conservation Oriented Scenario(COS), 3) land
use map in 2010, 4) 2010 Agroforestry, 5)Business-as-usual Scenario (BAU), 6)BAU
Agroforestry, 7)Economic Oriented Scenario (EOS), and8) EOS Agroforestry.
Current situation
Care about forests
2)
1)
3)
The future
5)
4)
Only rubber
6)
7)
8)

11. Answer to question 1
We calculated the economic returns for each land use scenario, and we found: plant more
rubber (EOS, Economic Oriented Scenario) would have more economic return from
rubber. However, we are going to lose all ecosystem services in the future, e.g. clean
water, biodiversity etc.
Rubber economic returns in Billion USD
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1

12. Question 2
2. Which has better ecological functions/values?

13. Existing carbon markets
Climate change, 1997 Kyoto Protocol, 2007 Bali Action.

US

Europe

Australia

China: to reduce 40-45% of carbon emission
a)
Beijing Environmental Exchange
b)
China Environment & Energy Network in Shanghai
c)
Tianjin Climate Exchange
d)
A new domestic market will be established in Guangdong
province

14. Carbon storage of different types of land use and land cover
Landuse and
Carbon
Landuse and
Carbon
cover types
Storage(t/ha)
cover types
Storage
(t/ha)
Seasonal rainforest
122
Paddy field
5
Mantane rainforest
116
Tea plantations
14
Evergreen broad-leaf
105
Favorable RP
35
Pinus forest
32
Unfavorable RP
15
Alnus forest
60
Residential area
0
Mossy evergreen broad
80
Water body
0
forest
-leaf forest
Shrub and grass land
15
Li et al 2008; Xi 2009;Song and Zhang 2010; Zhang et al. 2011

15. Answer to question 2
Plant less rubber, we will gain more carbon storage
Carbon storage in Million Ton
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Non-rubber
COS 2010 Land use Map
2010 Agroforestry BAU BAU Agroforestry EOS EOS Agroforestry

16. Question 3
3. Is there a balance between economic return and
ecological functions/values? And which is more
implementable based on existing policy-support?

17. Rubber monoculture or rubber
agroforestry?
Rubber and Carbon economic return
in Billion USD
return in Billion USD
Rubber and Carbon economic
return in Billion USD
Rubber and Carbon economic
return in Billion USD
Economically, only carbon market would bring more economic returns to compete with rubber
profit. So we combine both rubber profit with carbon value for each land use scenario. We
found
1. When the carbon
Carbon price is 5$/ ton
20$/ ton
market brings
10
16
14
8
higher carbon
12
6
10
4
8
market, people
2
6
0
4
would benefit
2
0
more from
maintaining and
protecting forest.
2. The easiest way
30$/ ton
10$/ ton
25
for
10
20
8
Xishuangbanna to
6
15
go in the future
4
10
2
would be 2010
5
0
0
agroforestry

18. Rubber and Carbon economic
return in Billion USD
Answer to question 3
16
2nd
14
12
10
1st
8
6
4
2
0
Non-rubber
COS
2010 Land
2010
use Map Agroforestry
BAU
BAU
Agroforestry
EOS
EOS
Agroforestry
Rubber Agroforestry would bring more benefits overall, including rubber and carbon
economic returns, than rubber monoculture from rubber.
The low-hanging-fruit for Xishuangbanna would be “go for rubber agroforestry first (2010
Agroforestry scenario)” and then “switch to conservation oriented scenario gradually when
the carbon market gets better in the future”

19. Conclusion and discussion

Rubber agroforestry would potentially benefit better than
rubber monoculture;

However, the benefits only come from:
- better clone of crops combination in the agroforestry, e.g.
plant new rubber clone 77-4, 77-2 instead of old clone GT1;
and to select high market value indigenous timber and fruit
species;
- Future environmental market, especially, carbon market
would play a big role for supporting agroforestry;
- Higher education and training for farmers will be needed to
better manage their agroforestry and to improve household
socioeconomic and ecological benefits.

20. If you have further questions please contact:
Zhuangfang Yi
Yi.zhuangfang@gmail.com
yizhuangfang@mail.kib.ac.cn
Facebook: Zhuangfang Nana Yi
Personal website:
https://sites.google.com/site/zhuangfangnanayi
T HANK YOU FOR YOUR TIME !
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