Agroforestry is an upcoming and popular agricultural land management system particularly making commodity cultivation such as cocoa more sustainable. This farming system combines growing diverse trees or shrubs with crops in a mutually beneficial way. These mixed-use plots can help to improve soil and plant health, promote biodiversity, and can even address climate change by both storing carbon in the new trees and cooling down the local climate through shade and transpiration.
However, implementing agroforestry systems is a lot of work and the crops that can benefit from agroforestry are mostly grown by small-scale farmers with limited resources.
The farmers interviewed, surveyed and addressed in Focus Group Discussions were all taking part in the Beyond Beans’ (BB) agroforestry programme. That is, farmers receive farm coaching as well as free diversification tree seedlings to plant next to their cocoa trees. Vanessa furthermore explored the farmers’ valuation of the concept connected to the benefits and challenges they are experiencing after implementing it. The results were obtained during a six-week field visit to sometimes very rural villages and farm inspections allowing for deeper insights into the actual implementation of agroforestry.
The study found that farmers participating in the BB programme display strong interest in adopting agroforestry practices, but that this interest is mostly motivated by economic incentives.
An example of such an incentive is the by BB introduced Payment for Ecosystem Services scheme. As part of this, that farmers receive a small pay-out when trees are maintained well over the years. Furthermore, the participating farmers seem to follow an almost blind trust in the company as they believe BB would not implement the system with them if it was not working. This trust also heavily influences the farmers’ valuation of the agroforestry concept: Their understanding of the various aspects of agroforestry, such as optimal seedling amounts or planting patterns, is limited. Indeed, most farmers of the farmers surveyed could not give even a vague definition of ‘agroforestry’.
Regardless, farmers are very enthusiastic about the concept. In addition to their trust in BB, this enthusiasm is driven by the potential benefits they expect to receive, particularly timber harvests from the newly planted diversification trees – once again, this is an economic incentive – and one which requires several years of maturation to realise.
Agroforestry Realities
Farmers also experience more immediate benefits, however. For example, most farmers experience better cocoa yields and, therefore, increased sales resulting in higher income. Although environmental benefits were initially the least motivational for farmers to begin implementing agroforestry systems, most of the immediate benefits of agroforestry can be attributed to environmental gains. This is especially true of diversification trees which protect the young cocoa plants from heavy rains or too much heat; issues only exacerbated by climate change. The systems which have been implemented by participating farmers are still young, so the full range of benefits (such as increased biodiversity or reduced reliance on chemicals preventing plant diseases) is expected to show once systems mature.
Until then, farmers have a lot of work ahead of them, which is connected to significant challenges. Farmers face a combination of deeply rooted issues in the cocoa sector that result in household-level problems. Cocoa is a rather unprofitable crop, due to, amongst other causes, high price volatility. Not only does this mean income insecurity for farmers, but it also makes the sector unattractive for young people, who are leaving the villages in favour of cities – and taking their labour with them.
These structural issues translate to personal problems for farmers, as implementing agroforestry is a labour-intensive process: more trees mean more work! The farmers who participated in this study were in their 50s on average and lacked sufficient labour for all the physical work on the farm. This is why many farmers resort to a high use of pesticides and fertilisers. This is only when pesticides and fertilisers are available and affordable, of course, because these inputs are also scarce. Nevertheless, the overuse of pesticides and fertilisers again results in less healthy cocoa and soils, or can lead to contaminated water in farms. Still, even where labourers are available, farmers lack the money to pay them as they for example have to use a significant part of their income to pay their children’s school fees. Overall, this shows that farmers largely face a huge lack of funds for reinvestments and a vicious cycle of challenges connected not only to agroforestry, but even more to farming in the cocoa sector itself.
From Challenge to Opportunity
How can BB now help the farmers to successfully implement agroforestry systems? These systems could result in many useful benefits for farmers and they environment but currently presents more of a challenge than an opportunity to the farmers. As farmers show limited understanding of the concept, simply providing financial support will not suffice. Overall, I argue, it would be beneficial to channel the power of the collective:
- I suggested that the coaching sessions should not only held individually, but that also more group sessions are established. This will allow for greater opportunities to share knowledge amongst target groups. If farmers understand better what they are doing and the importance of it, they might make better choices for them, increasing their benefits.
- To address the financial challenges of investing in agroforestry systems, farmers can form by village saving groups (facilitated by BB) to procure for agricultural inputs such as tools, or PPE. As part of these groups, farmers pay a little money into the ‘pot’ which can then be loaned out to members when needed.
- Forming worker groups in each village would ease the burden of hard physical labour on individual farmers.
Not only would these measures strengthen farmer communities, they would also give farmers more authority over their own farms. BB staff, who are currently at maximum capacity in providing coaching sessions, would therefore also be relieved.
In addition to these new initiatives, the BB programme can be optimised:
- Partnering with experts can lead to more insights in how to realistically address farming issues such as how to best apply organic farming methods instead of excessive chemical use to fight diseases.
- Improving monitoring mechanisms by switching to more advanced IT systems, in addition to conducting more regular farm assessments would allow BB to provide more tailored advice to farmers struggling from specific issues.
Overall, my research project provides insights into farmers’ perspectives, challenges, and expectations regarding agroforestry. It highlights the need for collective support and education to maximise the potential benefits of agroforestry systems. Understanding the socio-economic and environmental factors that influence farmers’ choices to adopt agroforestry helps contribute to the development of effective strategies and policies for promoting sustainable agricultural practices. In turn, these can be used as a strategy against climate change: a serious issue not only for those farming our food, but for all of us.
For more information, you can read the entirety of Vanessa’s thesis here!
All photographs are from Vanessa’s travels to Ghana!