Sustainable intensification of agriculture through agroforestry. Central aim of our project is to evaluate whether and under which site conditions agroforestry in Germany can be a land use alternative that is ecologically, economically and socially more sustainable than conventional agriculture.
Mushroom workshop, Finland
1st Spanish RAIN meeting
AFINET people planting trees near Brussels
Photo by Joana Amaral Paulo
Organic dairy farmer Tim Downes, hosting an AFINET meeting
UK. Photo by Jo Smith, ORC
AFINET partners planting trees
Asse, Belgium
1st Finnish RAIN meeting
Valaha-tanya, multifunctional agroforestry organic farm
Hungary. Photo Andrea Vityi
Iberian pig feeding on holm oak acorns
Portugal. by João Palma
Agroforestry with willow used as medicinal fodder
Shropshire, UK. Photo by Jo Smith, ORC
Silvoarable agroforestry experiment with poplar and barley
Bedfordshire in 2002, UK, by Paul Burgess.
Other Projects and Initiatives
AGFORWARD was a four-year project, developed by 23 organisations at the forefront of agroforestry research, practice and promotion in Europe, with the goal of promoting appropriate agroforestry practices that advance sustainable rural development. The project objectives were: i) increase our understanding of existing, and new extensive and intensive agroforestry systems in Europe; ii) identify, develop and demonstrate innovations to improve the ecosystem service benefits and viability of agroforestry systems in Europe using participatory research, iii) develop better adapted designs and practices for the different soil and climatic conditions of Europe, and iv) promote the wide adoption of sustainable agroforestry systems.
The objective of the Agrof-MM project is to train European agricultural stakeholders in agroforestry practices. The project will give them the opportunity to familiarise themselves with agroforestry, and to improve their knowledge of it, in order to work towards the development of agroforestry in the Mediterranean and mountain regions of Europe. The Agrof-MM project both reinforces and completes the European AgroFE project, which ended in December 2015. It thus widens the geographical scope and improves the level of training of the AgroFE project, as well as addressing new stakeholders.
Silvoarable agroforestry comprises widely-spaced trees intercropped with arable crops. This project builds on recent findings that indicate that modern silvoarable production systems are very efficient in terms of resource use, and could introduce an innovative agricultural production system that will be both environment-friendly and economically profitable. Growing high quality trees in association with arable crops in European fields may improve the sustainability of farming systems, diversify farmers incomes, provide new products to the wood industry, and create novel landscapes of high value. In support of the European Common Agricultural Policy, the SAFE project aimed at providing models and databases for assessing the profitability of silvoarable systems, and to suggest unified European policy guidelines for implementing agroforestry.