Agroforestry - Benefits and Practices
Agroforestry, in layman’s terms is a science that combines trees and agriculture crops (food, fruit, vegetables, fodder and forage etc.) together in the same land at the same time.?
The term “Agroforestry” was outlined by an American economic geographer J. Russell Smith, in 1929 who viewed, ‘tree-based, “permanent agriculture” as a solution to the destructive erosion that often followed the cultivation of sloping lands.’
His contributions were largely overlooked during the green revolution of the 1960s and early 70s but in 1977, the Canadian International Development Research Centre released a report called Trees, Food and People describing the critical role of trees in sustaining agricultural production in the tropics.?
This led to the establishment of the International Council for Research in Agroforestry (ICRAF) which, in 1982, launched the journal Agroforestry Systems.
Benefits of Agroforestry:
? Improve livelihoods through enhanced health and nutrition.
? Increased economic growth
? Strengthened environmental resilience
? Ecosystem sustainability
? Agroforestry offers great promise for the sustainable production of specialty nut and fruit crops.
领英推荐
? Long-term carbon sequestration, soil enrichment, biodiversity conservation, and air- and water-quality improvements.
? High-value medicinal, dairy and beef cattle, sheep, goats, and biomass for biofuel.
? Optimize mutualism and commensalism.
? Minimize predation on crops and livestock.
Agroforestry Practices:
Agroforestry systems are intensively managed to maintain their productive and protective functions. Even though the American and Canadian nomenclature for agroforestry differs from that used in the tropics & Europe, there are five temperate-zone agroforestry practices that are generally recognized worldwide are:?