Despite efforts to address the global forest crisis, deforestation and degradation continue, so we need to urgently revisit possible solutions. A failure to halt the global forest crisis contributes to climate change and biodiversity loss and will continue to result in inequalities in access to, and benefits from, forest resources. In this paper, we unpack a series of powerful myths about forests and their management. By exposing and better understanding these myths and what makes them so persistent, we have the basis to make the social and political changes needed to better manage and protect forests globally.

The nature of migration–forest linkages in migrant-sending regions is underreported and poorly understood. In rural Latin America and elsewhere, out-migration, together with agricultural crises and the deterritorialization of rural livelihood, are transforming forests and the communities that manage them. Drawing on research in indigenous communities of Oaxaca (Mexico), we identify the parameters of a new landscape of forest use and conservation, finding that: migration challenges community practices for self-governance of forest resources; declines in agriculture create new spaces for forest recovery and use; and forest conservation policies create economic opportunities around both extractive and non-extractive forest use.

Implementing the Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD+) programme has the potential to significantly reduce greenhouse gases whilst also helping to maintain biodiversity. However, a proposed landscape governance approach to the REDD+ programme, encompassing all land-use activities, could alter these desirable outcomes. Under the proposed approach, governments and private entities could encourage types of land use that have the potential to threaten biodiversity and disrupt ecosystems. Yet a landscape governance approach could also stimulate governments to develop land-use management policies to facilitate adaptation to climate change. I organized focus group discussions with members of conservation groups, REDD+ scholars, and members of the REDD+ agroforestry research community at the Association of American Geographers 2016 Annual Meeting, to identify potential conservation challenges and opportunities associated with carbon-farming in grasslands and plantations under the proposed landscape governance approach to REDD+. I evaluate and synthesize this information, making recommendations for strategies to maximize the conservation opportunities and minimize the challenges. Understanding the challenges and opportunities will enable policy makers and other stakeholders to improve the presentation of their arguments in their efforts to shape the course of the REDD+ programme in the post-Paris Agreement era.

While conservation and development projects focusing on non-timber forest products (NTFPs) remain popular approaches to address complex issues of livelihood improvement and conservation, governance of NTFPs is still poorly understood. In the Atlantic Forest biodiversity hotspot of Brazil, non-governmental organizations, researchers and community leaders are encouraging the commercialization of fruit pulp-based products from the endangered palm Euterpe edulis, known as juçara, to replace income from illegal heart of palm extraction. In order to assess the governance of development of juçara pulp as an NTFP and the potential to increase conservation of juçara through management on smallholder properties, we conducted qualitative research in São Paulo State from October 2012 to October 2013. Major challenges include policy barriers, difficulties integrating production and commercialization, problematic assumptions about poverty alleviation and the inability of the most disadvantaged members of communities to benefit. These governance challenges are a function of poor access, or the ‘bundle of powers’ that enables the ability to benefit. However, engagement with juçara fruit pulp production links farmers and former poachers with sustainable agricultural concepts and with networks, changing their perceptions of conservation and enhancing ability to benefit from improved policy.