Agroforestry Essay (Essay Sample)

Table of Contents TOC \o "1-3" \h \z \u Introduction PAGEREF _Toc317585053 \h 21. Types of agroforestry and their benefits PAGEREF _Toc317585054 \h 3i) Silvopasture Agro Forestry PAGEREF _Toc317585055 \h 3ii) Silvoarable Agro Forestry: PAGEREF _Toc317585056 \h 3iii) Forest Farming PAGEREF _Toc317585057 \h 4iv) Forest Gardening: PAGEREF _Toc317585058 \h 42. Some Practices in Agroforestry and their benefits PAGEREF _Toc317585059 \h 63. Mitigation and adaptation impact on Climate Change PAGEREF _Toc317585061 \h 7(i) Reduced or changed fertilizer use PAGEREF _Toc317585062 \h 7(ii) Increasing carbon sequestration and conservation PAGEREF _Toc317585063 \h 7(iii) Use of renewable energy PAGEREF _Toc317585064 \h 8(vi) Improved energy efficiency PAGEREF _Toc317585065 \h 8(v) Use of bioenergy PAGEREF _Toc317585066 \h 9(vi) Controlled environments PAGEREF _Toc317585067 \h 9(vii) Anaerobic digestion of waste PAGEREF _Toc317585068 \h 10(viii) Modified livestock management PAGEREF _Toc317585069 \h 104. Summary of Benefits PAGEREF _Toc317585070 \h 125. Potential impacts of agroforestry can include: PAGEREF _Toc317585071 \h 14Conclusion PAGEREF _Toc317585072 \h 15References PAGEREF _Toc317585073 \h 16
Task:
Discuss how agroforestry has contributed to mitigation and adaptation impact on climate change in developing countries.
Introduction
Agroforestry is an integrated approach of using the interactive benefits from combining trees and shrubs with crops and/or livestock. It combines agricultural and forestry technologies to create more diverse, productive, profitable, healthy and sustainable land-use systems.
Due to global warming and other factors, climate change is affecting the whole world but most affected are the developing countries which have limited resources to counteract the effects of climate change. While climate change and desertification seem to be constant and a global problem, the only option to survive through this is by developing mitigation and adaptation methods to it.
In addition to climate change mitigation, adaptation to the impacts of climate change is also very important. Adaptation relates not only to technical measures aimed at infrastructure, such as higher flood dams, levees and landslide barriers, but also to enabling activities and frameworks that enhance ecosystems’ resilience to cope with altered climatic conditions.
Examples of adaptation measures include revegetating slopes threatened by flood erosion,
and maintaining the natural biodiversity of ecosystems to reduce their vulnerability. Adaptation
projects are therefore very suitable ways of achieving the complementary objectives of the Rio Conventions. The forestry and agriculture sectors are important reference points for adaptation activities, mainly through maintaining functions (such as biological and crop diversity and water generation cycles) that help determine an ecosystem’s ability to withstand climate change.
Agroforestry has a great impact on the mitigation and adaptation to climate change. We shall look at various benefits of agroforestry that, if adopted in to use, the developing countries will be able to tackle the impacts of climate change in their economic growth.
1. Types of agroforestry and their benefits
i) Silvopasture Agro Forestry
This type of agro forestry came into being by the combination of trees and plants such as forest and the animals that feed on the grass. The animals are commonly called as domesticated animals. Silvopasture combines livestock grazing on forage crops or pasture within actively managed tree or shrub crops. Cattle, sheep and goats are the most common livestock incorporated into silvopasture systems and they may be deployed entirely within a private farm/woodlot silvopasture or through collaborative arrangements between forest licensees and livestock producers on public lands (e.g. in British Columbia, sheep grazing is used as a vegetation management tool in young forest plantations).
This type of agro forestry helps in reducing the soil erosion and also support in producing the products and environment for a long time. Though climate change may lead to soil erosion, due to desertification, with this kind of agroforestry, the problem of soil erosion will be tackled and the soil will not lose its nutritional value. Hence it remains productive for a long time.
Virtually no productivity is lost and as the trees start to influence the micro-climate the paddock becomes more and more productive.
ii) Silvoarable Agro Forestry:
Silvoarable agroforestry is a type of agro forestry which is formed as a result of combining the forest land and the different type of cultivating crops. It greatly helps in production of new variety of different types of plants and horticultural crops. Land quality is improved by introduction of different varieties of plants. In addition, despite the changing climate, farmers who practice this kind of agroforestry will benefit from diversing their variety of production which will address any associated effects by climate change.
Silvoarable mixes trees amongst arable or horticultural crops. Alley cropping, sometimes referred to as 'sun systems', is a form of intercropping, and can be applied by farmers as a strategy to combat soil erosion, to increase the diversity of farmland, as a means for crop diversification and to derive other integrated benefits. In this practice, crops are planted in strips in the alleys formed between rows of trees and/or shrubs. The potential benefits of this design include the provision of shade in hot, dry environments (reducing water loss from evaporation), retention of soil moisture, increase in the structural diversity of the site and wildlife habitat. The woody perennials in these systems can produce fruit, fuelwood, fodder, or trimmings to be made into mulch.
For instance, Inga alley cropping has been proposed as an alternative to the ecological destruction of Slash-and-burn farming. The Inga tree is a genus of small tropical, tough-leaved, nitrogen-fixing tree.
iii) Forest Farming
The type of forestry in which different types of cultivated plants are used to cultivate in the area of forest is called as forest farming. Forest farming, also known as 'shade systems', is the sustainable, integrated cultivation of both timber and non-timber forest products in a forest setting.[6] Forest farming is separate and distinct from the opportunistic exploitation / wild harvest of non-timber forest products. Successful forest farming operations produce: mushrooms, maple and birch syrup, native plants used for landscaping and floral greenery (e.g. salal, sword fern, bear grass, cedar boughs and others), medicinal and pharmaceutical products (e.g. ginseng, goldenseal, cascara or yew bark), wild berries and fruit.
As we know that the amount of rain fall in the forest is higher as compared to other lands or area so, the soil of the forest is much fertile then other farms so it is quite easy to develop the farm there. Cultivating in a forest will be much productive than insisting on infertile land where rain is less and the land unproductive.
iv) Forest Gardening:
The branch of agro forestry which is used to manage the replacement of wild plants with the cultivated plants such as fruit plants, vegetables, herbs, shrubs etc is referred as forest gardening. Forest gardening is a food production and land management system based on woodland ecosystems, but substituting trees (such as fruit or nut trees), bushes, shrubs, herbs and vegetables which have yields directly useful to humans. Making use of companion planting, these can be intermixed to grow on multiple levels in the same area, as do the plants in a forest.
This is a very useful branch of agroforestry that the developing countries can place into practice and yield lots of benefits despite the desertification and climate change threat.
2. Some Practices in Agroforestry and their benefits
(i) Contour buffers - Contour buffer strips are rows of trees or shrubs planted in rows across slopes to reduce soil erosion and give wind protection.
(ii) Fertility plantings - Nitrogen-fixing trees and shrubs are planted with the main aim of improving nutrient input into the land and hence improve its productivity
(iii) Riparian buffers - Riparian buffers are managed forest and shrubs belts in areas bordering lakes, streams, rivers, and wetlands. Integrated riparian management systems are used to enhance and protect aquatic and riparian resources as well as generating income from timber and non-timber forest products. Similar to shelter and timberbelts, integrated riparian management systems can employ a wide variety of tree and shrub species, with specific plantings tailored to suit the specific growing conditions and production opportunities.
(iv) Windbreaks - A windbreak is a plantation usually made up of one or more rows of trees or shrubs planted in such a manner as to provide shelter from the wind. Remember wind is a very common feature in arid areas, whose desertification may have resulted from climate change.
Agroforestry practices may also be employed to realize a number of other associated environmental aims, such as:
* Carbon sequestration
* Odour, dust, and noise reduction
* Waste water or manure management (e.g. utilizing urban waste water on intensive, short rotation forests for wood fibre production)
* Green space and visual aesthetics.
* Enhancement or maintenance of wildlife habitat.
3. Mitigation and adaptation impact on Climate Change
(i) Reduced or changed fertilizer use
There are several ways of reducing the use of fertilizers, and thus reducing emissions from their production and application. The quality and long-term viability of soil can be improved by improving the nutrient balance through the timing of fertilizer applications, the use of nitrification inhibit...