Agroforestry systems and practice

Agroforestry is defined as:-

• a collective name for all land use systems and practices where woody perennials are deliberately grown on the same piece of land management unit as agricultural crops and/or animals either in some form of spatial mix or temporal sequences (Lundgren, 1982).
• is a land use system that involve socially and ecologically acceptable interaction of trees with agricultural crops and/or animals, simultaneously or sequentially so as to get increased total productivity of plant and animal in a sustainable manner from a unit of farm land specially under conditions of low levels of technology inputs and marginal lands (Nair, 1989).
• is sustainable land management system which increases the overall yield of the land, combines the production of crops and forest plants and/or animals simultaneously or sequentially on the same unit of land, and applies management practices that are compatible with cultural practices of local population.
• is a dynamic ecologically based management system of natural resources that through the integration of trees on farms and in the agricultural landscapes, diversifies and sustains production for increased social, economic and environmental benefits for land users at all levels (ICRAF, 1997, Leakey, 1996).

This definition implies that an Agroforestry system:

• normally involves two or more species (trees, crops or animals),
• always has one or two outputs
• the cycle of the systems has more than one year
• even the simplest system is more complex ecologically and economically than mono- cropping system