“Instead of barren land, we now have trees on it. Wherever we have put the trees, we can see the moisture and organic content when we touch the mud. It is richer. I can also see birds and snakes. So much biodiversity. More alive” said Suresh Reddy, an IT professional from Bangalore, who has now decided that his native village land cannot remain barren anymore.
Managing a farm while doing a corporate job is a tough prospect but he has other family members back in the village who are helping him. He explains, “I am doing an IT job in the city, the tree plantation on my farm is managed because my brother-in-law is there. He is taking care of the farm full time. I am making a trip to the farm weekly once or biweekly once. Many of them (farmers in my village) after seeing the trees in my farm, they are also taking the tree saplings”
The day I met him, Suresh was at the Isha Nursery to buy another lot of saplings for a specific part of his land which was still barren. “Today, we have decided to take 5 varieties of saplings – teak, sandal, mastic, vanne (khejri) and sitaphal (custard apple).” he shared.
I helped him load the saplings onto his hatchback. His farm is only a few kilometers away from the Isha Nursery located at Chikkaballapur, a small town 65 kilometers from India’s IT hub, Bengaluru. Isha Nursery offers him high-quality tree saplings for a meagre price of 3 INR per sapling. Moreover, the nursery team provides him with a free, personalized consultation for his tree plantation based on the soil, water and other farm conditions.
This is only one story of how tree-based agriculture (also called agroforestry) is helping farmers make the most of their farm lands and at the same give a big boost to the biodiversity of the land. Globally, agroforestry is being seen as one of the major sustainable solutions towards many challenges facing farmers and the entire planet ecosystem.
Tree-based Agriculture aka Agroforestry, a Major Tool to Enhance Biodiversity
The European Union under the Green Deal, has adopted a roadmap for a sustainable economy, striving to be the first climate-neutral continent. Agroforestry represents one of the most important tools to meet this challenge. (source).
What makes agroforestry a singularly effective solution for the biodiversity challenge is that it significantly boosts farmer income. Improved biodiversity is in fact only one of the side impacts!
Farmers can choose to plant trees along with their existing crops or they can move to complete tree plantations on their land. Either case, the trees provide an income through direct produce like fruits, leaves, nuts or timber. Supplemental creepers, vines or shrubs may be grown along with the trees to enhance the income further. For example, pepper vines grown on coconut trees increased farm profits by 4,00,000 INR for a farmer in southern India.
When done right, the trees are also ecological powerhouses on the farm. A few benefits include carbon and water sequestration in soil, air purification, and continuous organic matter replenishment for the soil. These help improve the air, water and soil quality on the farm. Inevitably this will lead to better crop production and business continuity for the farmer.
Further, it provides soft benefits like a cooler, shaded region for workers and animals. Given the many benefits, adopting tree-based agriculture is a no brainer for the farmer. Governments around the world are waking up to this and creating policies and grant packages towards the same for their farmer community.
As per a paper submitted by Gregory Ruark, Director U.S.D.A. National Agroforestry Center,
Although 60 percent of U.S. farms are smaller than 70 hectares, more than half of farm receipts are attributed to the six percent of farms with gross sales over $250,000. Over the past 20 years 300,000 small farms have been lost in the U.S.
When the USDA National Commission on Small Farms Report was issued in January 1998, it listed several recommendations on agroforestry and concluded “…USDA extension, conservation, and forestry services should make greater efforts to promote and support agroforestry as part of an economic and ecological strategy for a healthy agriculture.”
In September 2022, USDA invested $60 million towards advancing agroforestry in America as part of their Partnership for Climate-Smart Commodities program. (source)
Hopefully, all these efforts take root and with the increasing number of trees sustaining better agriculture practices – we may see better biodiversity on our planet!
