What is it? Agriculture incorporated into forest ecosystems.

​
What does it do? It fits our growing systems into the natural food web for fully functioning ecosystems that are also productive. E.g. incorporating honey, mushrooms, understory medicinal products, small wood coppicing, fruits, nuts, and some animals into a forest area.

 

Why? It is more resilient to climate change, diversifies production, maintains forest areas where it is implemented, and increases rural/forester income. “The introduction of intensive and diverse agroforestry systems is one avenue for resilience-based management in the face of continued population growth” (Chapin et. al., 2009, 262).

​​

Does it produce value? Yes. It creates a diverse number of products including food, tools, and medicine. There is something for everyone. It also works with ecosystems to create a kind of “greater wealth” for wildlife, forest culture, climate resilience, and local communities.

 

How is this different from other methods? It synthesizes production with ecology. Farms destroy ecosystems for intensive production. Modern forestry focuses primarily on timber harvest and only secondarily with mitigating some of the environmental impact. Preservation prohibits extraction. Conservation frequently pays landowners in return for prohibiting important activities like commercial plant growing while permitting logging (USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, 2008). Permaculture frequently emphasizes non-native and invasive species, does not so significantly emphasize native ecosystems, and is generally more intensive.

​

How does it compare to farming? It is less human controlled but this is an advantage because clever biological processes provide additional control. Let nature do the work! It produces more diverse products in overlapping ways. Also, there is a huge amount of available area:  “Millions of acres of former farmland are now covered by forest.” (DeGraaf, 2006). For example, Connecticut has 381,539 acres of farmland (National Agricultural Statistics Service, 2017). But it had 1,763,459 acres of forest in 2020 (USDA Forest Service, 2020). Producing income on only a percentage of forest land could contribute significantly to rural economies with lower ecological damage relative to farming. It would provide supplemental income; depend upon and therefore protect forest ecosystems; and avoid harmful clearing, plowing, fertilizers, pesticides, nitrates and nitric acid pollution. This may help us to synthesize socioeconomic activity with ecological processes.

 

How do trees compare to grain? Tree crops can be problematic. They take longer to breed and reach production age, may succumb to disease, and may not have commercially viable results. This is especially true when compared to the massive expansion of annual agriculture production in the United States over the last century, especially corn and grains. However, those crops have significant disease issues requiring pesticides, require heavy fertilization, and do not form a sustainable ecosystem like trees. Economically, they depend on policies like subsidies that cause overdependence on a single crop, distort global markets, damage poor growers/consumers, and support crops that may not fit local conditions, which causes further ecological damage (Chapin et. al., 2009, 273, 279). So they are also not cheaper when considering food quality, environmental damage, the cost of subsidies, and the impact of corporate/global systems. Agroforestry can provide a supplementary income, apply to marginal sites, and compliment/amplify other growing systems (animal shelter/fodder, orchard pollination, soil building).

​

What is the cost over time? Agroforestry systems require some judgment and work to establish, but since they become autonomous systems of production, the cost is significantly reduced over time while returns increase. There are also low input ways to begin.

​

Is it less intensive? Yes. Methods are less intensive and this is a great advantage, reducing inputs and spreading activity over space and time. This can reduce initial cost, mainenance.

 

How is it financially viable? It works through a combination of low cost, breadth, and diversity. It can overlap with productive areas but also apply to marginal areas. It may provide easy supplemental income. It can produce more diverse products to hedge risk. It does so over a longer period for long-term investment.

How do economics fit in? Production is embedded and more cleverly integrated into global ecology to produce unique benefits. Therefore, finance is no longer isolated, unlimited, or conflicting with nature. It is not ignored, either. It works in tandem with the natural world around us.

Who can do it? Anyone with access to forest land. It is uniquely applicable to small operations that want to experiment and supplement income with reduced exposure. A large percent of New England is forest is in small holdings. Absentee landowners are common and may especially adopt this method for interesting benefits with little commitment. Even land lease and guerrilla gardening may apply.

​

What if I don’t have good land? These practices are valuable for production on the margins. A farmer takes a degraded area or perhaps a useful section with the potential for overlap, performs a simple setup and lets it develop with minimal maintenance, and then receives a benefit as well as the ecosystem. It is also possible to contract with landowners to build and maintain agroforestry systems on their land for a share of the profits.

How can we make products affordable to consumers? Develop products as more common alternatives in stores. Expand production through frequent, small-scale individual experiments; support government investment in the industry for expanded implementations; appeal to larger forestland owners to produce and thus reduce cost.

How can we make it profitable to producers? Increase cultural awareness of the new, rare, unique, extremely ecological and high-quality products. Support university, government, artist/celebrity, advertising, news, and industry support for appeal. Promote lifestyle culture of adoption for benefits to health, wildlife, and climate. It could be the new organic.

 

Is there a market? “The growing movement towards local agricultural production of grass-fed meat and dairy, diversified fruits and vegetables, and the use of local timber and fuelwood have the potential to expand and revitalize open and successional habitats regionally” (Foster, 2020).

​

References

Chapin III, F. S., Kofinas, G. P., & Folke, C. (Eds.). (2009). Principles of ecosystem stewardship: resilience-based natural resource management in a changing world. Springer Science & Business Media.

​

DeGraaf, R., Yamasaki, M., Leak, William B., Lester, Anna M. (2006). Technical Guide to Forest Wildlife Habitat Management in New England. University of Vermont Press.

​

Forest Service. (2020). Forests of Connecticut, 2019 (Resource Update FS-240). U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service. 2p. https://doi.org/10.2737/FS-RU-240.

​

National Agricultural Statistics Service. (2017). 2017 Census of Agriculture (Publication No. AC-17-A-51). United States Department of Agriculture. https://www.nass.usda.gov/Publications/AgCensus/2017/Full_Report/Volume_1,_Chapter_1_US/usv1.pdf

 

Natural Resources Conservation Service (2008). Healthy Forests Reserve Program, Conservation Easement Deed (Form NRCS-CPA-260). U.S. Department of Agriculture.