Future Directions of Agroforestry in Europe

Abstract

The main direction of current research on Agroforestry systems in Europe has been summarised in this book. These have included general descriptions of the different areas where there are good examples of how agroforestry practices are currently being implemented or could be implemented from farm to landscape level and, as a land use option, at a local level. The book has four sections, each providing a synthesis of the information for each of the four biogeographic regions. This structure was chosen because temperature and precipitation (quantity and distribution) will determine the opportunities for agroforestry systems in the different regions of Europe. Most of the recommendations from the Orlando Declaration (2004) on agroforestry following the 1st World Congress of Agroforestry and the Declaration published in the Silvopastoralism for Sustainable Land Management Conference (Mosquera-Losada et al. 2005) are valid within the European context. However, there are several aspects that need improvement at a research, education and policy level.

In the research context, this book summarizes production, environmental and social aspects of research on agroforestry systems. Government-funded trials have been carried out over the past 20 years in different countries. Recently, SAFE (Silvoarable Agroforestry for Europe), a European Union (EU) funded project (Dupraz et al. 2005) has given an integrated European dimension to the study of some types of agroforestry systems. Results of research in Europe into agroforestry have been published in the proceedings of numerous European Congresses concerning agroforestry. These have been organized by: (1) INRA (Institute National de la Recherche Agronomique, France) and coordinated by M. Etienne (1996) (2) A major EU-wide silvopastoral network was funded by the EU (AIR CT92-0134 contract) and, a congress was held in Montpellier, France in 1997 (Auclair and Dupraz 1999). (3) the European Grassland Society and Coordinated by V. P apanastasis et al. (1999) (4) organized by the EU in collaboration with FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization) and EFI (European Forest Institute) and coordinated by M.R. Mosquera-Losada, J. McAdam and A. Rigueiro-Rodríguez (2005). At these meetings partners participated from all over Europe and this facilitated the interchange of ideas and research findings from different countries of Europe. United Kingdom, France, Greece and Spain have created agroforestry research networks at country levels. The first of these was the UK Agroforestry Research Forum (now the Farm Woodland Forum), from which grew two multi-site co- ordinated silvopastoral and silvoarable research trials. The results from these have helped to persuade policy makers of the value of such systems at a broad scale in Europe, and the Council Regulation to support rural development by the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) (EC 2005) included a specific direct payment for the establishment of this kind of systems at a European scale.