Chapter 10 Agroforestry
by Katja Schiffers , Eike Luedeling and Cory Whitney
Agroforestry refers to a land-use system that integrates trees or shrubs into agricultural land and/or livestock farming. By diversifying production it can generate social, economic and environmental benefits. Agroforestry is also increasingly recognized as one of the most promising land-use options for addressing multiple Sustainable Development Goals and confronting the challenges of climate change mitigation, food security, soil degradation, decline of biodiversity and desertification.
10.1 Instructions
This week we want to develop a causal diagram depicting and summarizing the effects of integrating trees into farming systems and to a gain mechanistic knowledge of the components, interlinks and dynamics in an agroforestry system. Please read the four publications (see below, you can divide the reading among you) and watch the video. For the group work on Thursday, we will bring flip-charts, post-its, pens…
10.2 Materials
Here is a collection of four publications regarding the effects of integrating trees into farming systems on economic and environmental benefits (on eCampus):
Vandermeulen_etal_2018_AnimProdSci
And here a short youtube video on causal diagrams: Video on causal diagrams
10.3 Literature for discussion
This paper is on farmer’s reasoning behind the uptake of agroforestry and quite interesting to discuss:
Rois-Díaz_etal_2018
10.4 Term paper topics
1. The challenges of agroforestry modeling
2. Barriers to agroforestry adoption in Germany (or elsewhere)