This working paper compiles research on one of the most challenging development goals in sub-Saharan Africa – increasing agricultural production without doing so at the cost of forests. The working paper compiles lessons learned from work in Zambia and Ethiopia and identifies 10 elements essential to balancing conservation and agriculture in the region.

Agricultural expansion is the greatest driver of the loss of nature and its biodiversity and ecosystem services worldwide. This briefing explains basic concepts of better trade-off management and identifies four key changes in policy and practice needed to conserve nature as well as increase agricultural production.

Boosting agricultural production to meet the food demands of growing and more prosperous populations increasingly comes with a cost to the ecosystems upon which human life more broadly depends. This paper summarizes key concepts relating to trade-offs and synergies, including trade-off analysis and management, to make approaches and methods more accessible.

In Ethiopia, as in many countries in Africa, policymakers need to better understand and manage the major trade-offs — existing and future — between two competing objectives: increasing agricultural production to meet growing domestic food demand and conserving nature. This briefing explores this issue within the national context in Ethiopia, and makes suggestions for the way forward.