Carbon sequestration from common property resources: Lessons from community-based sustainable pasture management in north-central Mali

Carbon sequestration in soils has been presented as it potential mechanism to enhance productivity in semi-arid lands ill Africa while contributing to the mitigation of greenhouse emissions. Most of the literature, however, focuses Oil assessing the capacity of existing technology to sequester carbon in soils. There is much less discussion in the literature oil the social and institutional elements that need to be in place to realize the potential benefits of carbon sequestration. This paper contributes Insights in this direction by analyzing it case of community-based pasture management in north-central Mali. The case study challenges common assumptions in carbon sequestration efforts, namely that land resources are devoted to it single use by resident users; have distinct boundaries and fall within identifiable territorial and administrative jurisdictions, and are subject to widely recognized claims and free of conflict. We suggest that this is not always the case. Findings indicate that carbon sequestration projects centered oil rangelands need to allow for flexibility in livestock movements and resource availability and to account for the diverging interest of multiple stakeholders, including different types of pastoralists and farmers. We conclude that social capital formation and conflict management are key elements of it carbon sequestration strategy in supports of sustainable and equitable development in the Sahelian region. (C) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.