Towards productive landscapes: Trade-offs in tree-cover and income across a matrix of smallholder agricultural land-use systems

Syed Ajijur Rahman,Terry Sunderland,Mrigesh Kshatriya,James M Roshetko,Tim Pagella,John R Healey

doi:10.1016/j.landusepol.2016.07.003

Abstract

One of the main causes of tropical forest loss is conversion to agriculture, which is constantly increasing as a dominant land cover in the tropics. The loss of forests greatly affects biodiversity and ecosystem services. This paper assesses the economic return from increasing tree cover in agricultural landscapes in two tropical locations, West Java, Indonesia and eastern Bangladesh. Agroforestry systems are compared with subsistence seasonal food-crop-based agricultural systems. Data were collected through rapid rural appraisal, field observation, focus groups and semi-structured interviews of farm households. The inclusion of agroforestry tree crops in seasonal agriculture improved the systems’ overall economic performance (net present value), even when it reduced understorey crop production. However, seasonal agriculture has higher income per unit of land area used for crop cultivation compared with the tree establishment and development phase of agroforestry farms. Thus, there is a trade-off between short-term loss of agricultural income and longer-term economic gain from planting trees in farmland. For resource-poor farmers to implement this change, institutional support is needed to improve their knowledge and skills with this unfamiliar form of land management, sufficient capital for the initial investment, and an increase in the security of land tenure.

Highlights

Throughout the past century, tropical forests have declined mainly due to land conversion (Laurance, 2007; Lambin et al, 2003), and continue to be lost at alarming rates (Davidar et al, 2010)
They do not differ much amongst the farming groups in Indonesia, agroforestry farmers in Bangladesh have double the amount of savings (US$ 481.14) of swidden farmers (US$ 240.69)
Profitability measured by net present value (NPV) over a 30-year time period shows that farmers will achieve a positive economic performance by mixing trees and seasonal crops in agroforestry systems compared with seasonal agriculture in both countries

Summary

Introduction

Throughout the past century, tropical forests have declined mainly due to land conversion (Laurance, 2007; Lambin et al, 2003), and continue to be lost at alarming rates (Davidar et al, 2010). The economic return, especially net present value (NPV), internal rate of return (IRR), benefit-cost ratio (B/C), return-to-land and return-to-labor of agroforestry has been found to be much higher than from seasonal agricultural systems in many locations (Roshetko et al, 2013; Rahman et al, 2008, 2007; Rasul and Thapa, 2006; Alavalapati and Mercer, 2004; Elevitch and Wilkinson, 2000) This is especially so for marginal farmlands where agricultural crop production is no longer biophysically or economically viable (Roshetko et al, 2008), and may become incompatible with the sustainable development concept with its major focus on ‘people-centered’ development (Snelder and Lasco, 2008)

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion