Role of agroforestry in climate change mitigation

Abstract

Agroforestry is an ecologically sustainable land use system that maintains increase total yield by combining food crops (annuals) with tree crops (perennials) and/or livestock on the same unit of land. A large hectare is available in the form of boundaries, bunds, wastelands where this system can be adopted. Farmers retain tree of acacia nilotica, acacia catechu, Dalbergia sissoo, Mangifera indica, Zizyphus mauritiana and Gmelina arborea etc in farm land. It plays a crucial role in climate change mitigation especially due to its tree component. Trees accumulate CO2 (which is the most predominant GHG) in their biomass. Agroforestry not only helps in climate change mitigation but also climate change adaptation. It is an established fact that despite our present effort at climate changes mitigation (GHG reduction), there is a more pressing need to cope with the impact of climate change (adaptation). People should be aware about the scope and benefits of Agroforestry and they should participate in implementation and development of Agroforestry in India. Therefore, agroforestry system is economically and ecologically sound practices with enhancement of overall farm productivity, soil enrichment through litter fall, maintaining environmental services such as climate change mitigation (carbon sequestration), phytoremediation, watershed protection and biodiversity conservation.