EARTH STEWARDSHIP EARTH STEWARDSHIP EARTH STEWARDSHIP Earth Stewardship of rangelands: coping with ecological, economic, and political marginality

www.frontiersinecology.org © The Ecological Society of America R – including grasslands, shrublands, savannas, deserts, prairies, steppe, and tundra – comprise 30–40% of Earth’s ice-free terrestrial surface (depending on one’s definition and data sources; Asner et al. 2004) and account for 91% of the world’s grazing lands (Reid et al. 2008). Encompassing watersheds for vast downstream populations and containing approximately 30% of the world’s soil carbon (FAO 2009), rangelands are also highly diverse, biologically and otherwise. The estimated extent (and definition) of rangeland degradation varies widely, from as little as 10–20% to as much as 70–80% (MA 2006). An estimated 1 billion people depend on rangelands for their livelihoods, primarily through extensive livestock production, and roughly twice that number derive animal protein, water, or other resources from these biomes (MA 2006; FAO 2009). Importantly, rangelands are often defined negatively, as a residual category for areas that are not defined as something else (eg forest, woodland, agriculture, urban). Much of the world’s prime cropland (such as the corn and wheat belts of central North America) was once rangeland, for example, but no longer counts as such in many land-type classifications. This is not simply a classificatory peculiarity. Rather, it reflects actual land-use dynamics and economic valuation; in a real sense, rangelands are lands that have not (yet) been converted to other uses with higher rates of economic production and return, and their extant ecological diversity persists precisely because they have not been altered by more intensive land uses, which typically result in simplification. With few exceptions, rangeland inhabitants are politically and economically marginalized, limited by low perhectare economic output and small or dispersed populations. Drylands (a highly overlapping though not identical land type) correlate closely with global poverty (Verstraete et al. 2009), and are judged to be among the most imperiled biomes on Earth due to low inherent productivity and rapid population growth (MA 2006). The aggregate economic value of rangeland production may be quite high (FAO 2009), but it is spread across large areas where collective action to address competing land uses is difficult. Moreover, rangeland inhabitants have often been labeled “traditional” or “backward”, blamed for rangeland degradation (often erroneously; NiamirFuller 1999; Goldman et al. 2011), and targeted for “modernization” or “development” programs. Although a few of these programs have narrowly benefited some rangeEARTH STEWARDSHIP EARTH STEWARDSHIP EARTH STEWARDSHIP