Understanding the contribution of Agroforestry

Agroforestry represents one of the climate change adaptation measures, contributing to restoration of degraded land, preventing forest fires while providing livelihood and food security for people. The main agroforestry practices include silvoarable agroforestry, riparian buffer strips, silvopasture, forest farming, and multipurpose trees. Currently, agroforestry is only applied in less than 10 % of agricultural land in Europe.

FOREST EUROPE (or Ministerial Conference on the Protection of Forests in Europe) is the pan-European voluntary high-level political process for dialogue and cooperation on forest policies in Europe. FOREST EUROPE Work Programme for 2016-2020 includes a specific activity focused on sharing expertise and experience on agroforestry as a way on how to contribute to climate change adaptation.

The Ministry of Agriculture of Hungary hosted in Budapest, on 9-10 October 2018, the joint Forest Europe and FAO Workshop “Understanding the contribution of Agroforestry to landscape resilience in Europe”, with the aim to put into practice the Madrid Ministerial Resolution 2 Protection of forests in changing environment.

Around 80 people attended the workshop “Understanding the contribution of Agroforestry to landscape resilience in Europe”, and considered it a milestone in European agroforestry. Our researcher Mercedes Rois was there also and presented the driving forces of farmers to implement agroforestry and the AFINET agroforestry innovations in Finland.

As output of the Workshop, FOREST EUROPE has published in March 2019 the conclusions report, Understanding the Contribution of Agroforestry to Landscape Resilience in Europe: How can policy  foster agroforestry towards climate change adaptation? The report highlights recommendations for (i) strengthening inter-sectoral cooperation and coordination in the field of agroforestry, (ii) strengthening policy and legal framework in agroforestry, (iii) strengthening communication and promotion of agroforestry at all levels, and (iv) strengthening research and innovation, education and training in agroforestry at all levels.

Photo by STUDIO GRAND OUEST, Adobe Stock