Definitions and Classification of Agroforestry Systems

Abstract

Several definitions have been proposed to agroforestry, of which the most commonly used are those of Lundgreen and Raintree (Agricultural research for development: potentials and challenges in Asia, 1982, pp 37–49) and Leakey (Agroforest Today 8:1, 1996). Agroforestry is any land-use system, practice or technology, where woody perennials are integrated with agricultural crops and/or animals in the same land management unit, in some form of spatial arrangement or temporal sequence. Agroforestry is also a dynamic and ecologically -based natural resource management system. Agroforestry refers to the deliberate introduction or retention of trees on farms to increase, diversify, and sustain production for increased social, economic, and environmental benefits. Agroforestry system classification can be based on vegetation structure, function of woody perennials in the system, levels of management input, and environmental conditions and ecological suitability of the system. Agroforestry practices rather than systems are also used as the unit of an ecologically -based classification that is rooted in the role of trees in agricultural landscape.