Professor Paxie W Chirwa
Professor Paxie W Chirwa is Director of the SAFCOL Forestry Research Chair in the Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences. The scientists and postgraduate students in the Chair’s group have a range of research projects in remote regions of South Africa, in the Miombo forest ecosystem covering most of the dry forest and woodlands of southern Africa, and in the Sudanian and Sahelian regions of West Africa. The research aims to understand the linkage of people to natural resource governance, resource use and interventions that will succeed in promoting sustainable forest management. This includes a focus on the drivers of land cover change and the modelling of carbon dynamics in natural woodland systems and forest plantations.
Recent research findings show that while agricultural expansion and demand for wood-fuel are identified as major drivers of deforestation, the restoration of degraded dry forests, woodlands and parklands of the Sahel through natural regeneration was the best silvicultural intervention. This is the basis for the promotion of the so-called Farmer Managed Naturally Regenerated Woodlands, with the potential for mitigating climate change. Other research evaluates the impact of participatory forest management on the livelihoods of rural communities and the effect of climate change on forest-based communities.
Researchers and postgraduate students have contributed substantially to the productivity of the SAFCO Research Chair through published work, the preparation of a technical paper for the South African Development Community secretariat on Measuring Non-Carbon Benefits of Bio-Carbon Projects in Southern Africa, and presentations at the World Congress held in Africa in September 2015, titled Forests and People: Investing in a Sustainable Future.
