Agroforestry : Essential for Sustainable and Climate-Smart Land Use?

Over the past four decades, a solid body of research has revealed the potential of agroforestry for increasing or maintaining system productivity while protecting natural resources and providing environmental services, including pollination, pest control/prevention, carbon sequestration, and the conservation of soil health, water quality, and biodiversity. Thus, agroforestry is well suited as a central tool for "sustainable intensification" within a land use paradigm that should be based, in alignment with a recent call by FAO, much more on biology and agroecology, rather than on chemistry and fossil fuels. With success stories from around the world and new methodological tools for valuing also environmental services, we can now apply these tools to design practices and systems that match the outputs of sustainable crop, tree, and animal agroforestry systems to the local needs. To custom-tailor the systems to the respective environmental and socioeconomic conditions, and rise to the challenge of sustainably producing more food that is less contaminated and less contaminating, we should advance in the following directions: (i) expand the species characterizations, (ii) widen the scope of plants and animals used and include "neglected and underutilized species" (NUS), (iii) intensify work on "using" beneficial soil organisms for soil and plant health, (iv) optimize the system design and management to maximize resource use efficiency and minimize pest incidence (v) create climate-smart and pest-suppressive landscapes, and, finally, (vi) advance toward more holistic socioeconomic assessments including an improved valuation of environmental services. A call is made to apply also relevant experiences from other fields such as biointensive or organic production, urban agriculture, and permaculture.

Bibliographic Details

Main Author:	97703 Muschler, Reinhold G
Format:	Texto biblioteca
Language:	eng
Published:	Heidelberg (Alemania) : Springer-Verlag , 20
Subjects:	ARBOLES ROMPEVIENTOS, SISTEMAS SILVOPASCICOLAS, DOMESTICACION DE PLANTAS, AGROFORESTERIA,
Online Access:	http://repositorio.bibliotecaorton.catie.ac.cr:8080/bitstream/handle/11554/8309/Agroforestry_essential_for_sustainable.pdf http://hdl.handle.net/11554/8309
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