Agriculture in India has historically been a diversified land-use practice, integrating crops, trees, and livestock. This technique, broadly called agroforestry, can enhance farmer livelihoods and the environment and is slowly gaining in popularity after decades of the modus operandus of monocropping inspired by the Green Revolution.
“The Gaja cyclone nearly razed down all coconut trees and made the soils saline; we did not know what to plant after,” said Chitra, a medium-scale farmer in Pudukkottai district of Tamil Nadu, during one of our recent field visits. “We pooled our money and started planting jackfruit and mangoes. It has been six years and we are seeing some good profits.”
This change resulted from India’s pioneering efforts to promote agroforestry. These efforts received an impetus nearly 10 years ago with the establishment of the National Agroforestry Policy (2014) but which also built on significant investments in research over a longer 40-year span. Yet the uptake of agroforestry remains restricted to farmers with medium or large landholdings.
