Abstract
Agroforestry is an intensive land management system that integrates trees into land already used for crop and animal farming. This provides a diverse range of ecosystem services by bridging the gaps between agriculture, forestry, and animal husbandry. It is an important approach to improve the environmental, economic, and social benefits of complex social–ecological systems in the Asia-Pacific region. This paper aims to examine the research trends in agroforestry and the current state of knowledge, as well as the research gaps in the ecosystem services of agroforestry in this region. A systematic mapping methodology was applied, where analysis units were academic articles related to agroforestry practices in the Asia-Pacific region. The articles published between 1970 and 2018 were collected through the international specialized academic database, SCOPUS. They were coded according to the types of agroforestry practices and ecosystem services. The research result indicates silvorable systems, especially plantation crop combinations, tree management, habitats for species, biological controls, and maintenance of genetic diversity and gene-pools, are the most prominent in the agroforestry research from the Asia-Pacific region. Approximately 60% of all research articles include case studies from India, China, Indonesia, and Australia. Research on agroforestry has changed following the international discourse on climate change and biodiversity. Therefore, this systematic map improves our understanding of the nature, volume, and characteristics of the research on ecosystem services with regard to agroforestry in the Asia-Pacific region. It provides scholars with a springboard for further meta-analysis or research on agroforestry and ecosystem services.
Highlights
Agroforestry is defined as agriculture that incorporates trees [1]
The articles captured were screened based on our included agroforestry practices, ecosystem services, and Asia-Pacific region during ‘screening and eligibility’ stages
The 2206 articles from the SCOPUS database were extracted with the search strings for the agroforestry practices, ecosystem services, and Asia-Pacific countries (Table A1 of Appendix A) [69]
Summary
Agroforestry is defined as agriculture that incorporates trees [1]. Data show that 43% of all agricultural land, globally, is used for agroforestry, which is more than 1 billion hectares [2]. Agroforestry systems in the Asia Pacific region are abundant under various agro-ecological environments, especially in Indonesia, Malaysia, India, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh, as the practices have played important roles there since ancient times [3]. As agroforestry practices in the region have evolved over a long period of time, they utilize many novel and historic strategies to fulfill the basic needs of the smallholder farmers for food, fodder, medical products, fuelwood, and as Forests 2020, 11, 368; doi:10.3390/f11040368 www.mdpi.com/journal/forests
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