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Forestry Practices

Agroforestry

Agroforestry is the practice of intercropping trees with other kinds of crops. Evidence suggests that agroforestry is more land-efficient that monoculture.

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Land equivalency ratios for select agroforestry systems. The LER metric indicates the yield, or land use efficiency, of the agroforestry system compared to growing all crops in separate monocultures. Sources: Bai et al. 1, Gendy et al. 2, Hasan et al. 3, Jama et al. 4, Jose and Gordon 5, Khasanah et al. 6, Rahaman et al. 7, Schneider et al. 8, Seserman et al. 9, Uddin et al. 10, Warren-Thomas et al. 11, Xu et al. 12.

A literature review has found that agroforestry tends to perform better than conventional systems on soil health, nitrogen fixation, and erosion prevention, while water consumption and runoff may be less or greater, depending on circumstances 13. Time, cost, and operational complexity are cited as barriers to adoption of agroforestry 14.

Problem:
Land Use from Agriculture
Solution:
Agroforestry

Carbon Sequestration

Forestry has the potential to sequester carbon in the biosphere as follows.

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Carbon sequestration potential of forestation: annual and overall. Sources: Bastin et al. 15, Busch et al. 16, Chazdon et al. 17, Kim et al. 18, Lal et al. 19, Lewis et al. 20.

References

  1. Bai, W., Sun, Z., Zheng, J., Du, G., Feng, L., Cai, Q., Yang, N., Feng, C., Zhang, Z., Evers, J., van der Werf, W., Zhang, L. "Mixing trees and crops increases land and water use efficiencies in a semi-arid area". Agricultural Water Management 178, pp. 281-290. December 2016. ↩

  2. Gendy, A., Nosir, W., Nawar, D. "Evaluation of Competitive Indices between Roselle and Cowpea as Influenced By Intercropping System and Bio-Fertilization Type". Middle East Journal of Agriculture Research 6(1), pp. 199-207. March 2017. ↩

  3. Hasan, M., Rahman, G., Akter, R., Hemel, S., Islam, M. "Economic assessment of lemon-based agroforestry systems established in Madhupur Sal forest area of Bangladesh". Progressive Agriculture 31(1), pp. 45-55. July 2020. ↩

  4. Jama, B., Nair, P., Rao, M. "Productivity of hedgerow shrubs and maize under alleycropping and block planting systems in semiarid Kenya". Agroforestry Systems volume 31, pp. 257–274. September 1995. ↩

  5. Jose, S., Gordon, A. Toward Agroforestry Design: an ecological approach. Springer Science & Business Media. December 2007. ↩

  6. Khasanah, N., van Noordwijk, M., Slingerland, M., Sofiyudin, M., Stomph, D., Migeon, A., Hairiah, K. "Oil Palm Agroforestry Can Achieve Economic and Environmental Gains as Indicated by Multifunctional Land Equivalent Ratios". Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems 3(122). January 2020. ↩

  7. Rahaman, A., Rahman, A., Miah, G., Hoque, A., Rahman, M. "Productivity and Profitability of Jackfruit-Eggplant Agroforestry System in the Terrace Ecosystem of Bangladesh". Turkish Journal of Agriculture - Food Science and Technology 6(2), pp.124-129. February 2018. ↩

  8. Schneider, M., Andres, C., Trujillo, G., Alcon, F., Amurrio, P., Perez, E., Weibel, F., Milz, J. "Cocoa and total system yields of organic and conventional agroforestry vs. monoculture systems in a long-term field trial in Bolivia". Experimental Agriculture 53(3), pp. 351-374. July 2017. ↩

  9. Seserman, D., Veste, M., Freese, D., Swieter, A., Langhof, M. "Benefits of agroforestry systems for land equivalent ratio - case studies in Brandenburg and Lower Saxony, Germany". In European Agroforestry Conference-Agroforestry as Sustainable Land Use, 4th. EURAF. 2008. ↩

  10. Uddin, M., Naznin, S., Kawochar, M., Choudhury, R., Awal, M. "Productivity of wheat and peanut in intercropping system". Journal of Experimental Biosciences 5(2), pp. 19-26. July 2014. ↩

  11. Warren-Thomas, E., Nelson, L., Juthong, W., Bumrungsri, S., Brattström, O., Stroesser, L., Chambon, B., Penot, É., Tongkaemkaew, U., Edwards, D., Dolman, P. "Rubber agroforestry in Thailand provides some biodiversity benefits without reducing yields". Journal of Applied Ecology 57(1), pp. 17-30. January 2020. ↩

  12. Xu, H., Bi, H., Gao, L., Yun, L. "Alley Cropping Increases Land Use Efficiency and Economic Profitability Across the Combination Cultivation Period". Agronomy 9(1):34. January 2019. ↩

  13. Karlsson, L. "Scaling Up Agroforestry: Potential, Challenges and Barriers". Commissioned by the Agroforestry Network and its partners Agroforestry Sverige, Focali, NIRAS, SIANI, SLU Global, SwedBio and Vi-skogen. September 2018. ↩

  14. MacFarland, K. "Human Dimensions of Agroforestry Systems". In: Schoeneberger, Michele M.; Bentrup, Gary; Patel-Weynand, Toral, eds. 2017. Agroforestry: Enhancing resiliency in U.S. agricultural landscapes under changing conditions. Gen. Tech. Report WO-96. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service. 2017. ↩

  15. Bastin, J., Finegold, Y., Garcia, C., Millicone, D., Rezende, M., Routh, D., Zohner, C., Crowther, T. "The global tree restoration potential". Science 365(6448). July 2019. ↩

  16. Busch, J., Engelmann, J., Cook-Patton, S., Griscom, B., Kroeger, T., Possingham, H., Shyamsundar, P. "Potential for low-cost carbon dioxide removal through tropical reforestation". Nature Climate Change 9, pp. 463–466. May 2019. ↩

  17. Chazdon, R. et al. "Carbon sequestration potential of second-growth forest regeneration in the Latin American tropics". Science Advances 2(5), e1501639. May 2016. ↩

  18. Kim, D., Kirschbaum, M., Beedy, T. "Carbon sequestration and net emissions of CH4 and N2O under agroforestry: Synthesizing available data and suggestions for future studies". Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment 226, pp. 65-78. June 2016. ↩

  19. Lal R., Smith P., Jungkunst H. F., Mitsch W. J., Lehmann J., Nair P. R., McBratney A. B., de Moraes Sá J. C., Schneider J., Zinn Y. L., Skorupa A. L. "The carbon sequestration potential of terrestrial ecosystems". Journal of Soil and Water Conservation 73(6):145A-52A. November 2018. ↩

  20. Lewis, S., Mitchard, E., Prentice, C., Maslin, M., Poulter, B. "Comment on "The global tree restoration potential". Science 366(6463). October 2019. ↩