Landscape approaches seek to reconcile social, economic, and environmental objectives in areas where agriculture and other productive land uses compete with environmental and biodiversity goals.

The Sustainable Trade Initiative’s (IDH) pioneering role in promoting such landscape transformation is captured in the Production, Protection & Inclusion (PPI) approach – a three-pronged process that focuses on sustainably increasing productivity, protecting forests and natural resources, and including farmers and local communities for sustainable development. IDH connects these landscapes with green investment funds, such as &Green Fund, and with international commodity buyers via an online platform called SourceUp.

Evaluation

KIT conducted the end-term evaluation of the “Connecting Production, Protection & Inclusion Partnership Programme” in Indonesia, Brazil, and Liberia. This programme, funded by Norway’s International Climate and Forest Initiative (NICFI) and implemented by IDH, uses a landscape approach to secure inclusive, sustainable, deforestation-free value chains for palm oil, soy, cattle, cocoa, and rice.

The evaluation assessed the outcomes and impact of the PPI programme and IDH’s contribution to the observed changes. The international evaluation team collected evidence on the programme’s theory of change through multiple innovative remote data collection methods. This included:

• Systematic evidence review of program documentation
• Assessment of natural resource governance at jurisdictional levels using (remote) key informant interviews, focus group discussions, and Sprockler (web-based) storytelling
• Company phone survey to assess company-level behavioural change
• Geo-spatial analyses of deforestation and land cover change.

Results

Insights from the evaluation are informing the decision to fund a next phase of the programme and are used to adjust program design and implementation.