Work

Governing saline landscapes: Policy and institutional pathways for agroforestry in Pakistan's Indus Basin

Year: 2026

Type: article

Abstract: Salinity threatens agricultural sustainability in Pakistan's Indus Basin, yet approaches to mitigate it remain fragmented and poorly implemented. This study explains why saline agroforestry, an established nature-based solution, has not scaled despite policy attention. Using an integrated Social–Ecological Systems (SES) and Policy Coherence and Multi-Level Governance (PCMLG) framework, we combine a review of federal and provincial policies with stakeholder evidence from 16 focus group discussions across Sindh and South Punjab. Findings show a systemic governance misfit associated with a range of constraints, including the dominance of technocratic salinity management, weak institutional and fiscal support for agroforestry, coordination failures and accountability and learning deficits. These reinforcing constraints suppress institutional adaptiveness and disconnect ecological feedbacks from decision-making. We propose a sequenced governance pathway to embed saline agroforestry within land, water, forestry and climate adaptation agendas, contributing to Earth System Governance debates on coherence, adaptiveness and institutional transformation in degraded agro-ecosystems.

Source: Earth System Governance

DOI: 10.1016/j.esg.2026.100355