Agroforestry Practices in Ballia District of Eastern Plain Region of Uttar Pradesh, India
Abstract
Agroforestry is an efficient land-use system where trees or shrubs are grown with arable crops, seeking positive interactions in enhancing productivity on the sustainable basis. Agroforestry combines agriculture and forestry technologies to create more integrated, diverse, productive, profitable, healthy and sustainable land-use systems. The study was conducted in selected villages (1%) of Ballia District of Eastern plain region of Uttar Pradesh in India during the year 2018 to record the crop combinations with tree species and their stratified arrangement to identify agroforestry practices. The socio-economic studies based on general village profile, land holding, land use pattern and tree species planting pattern were performed in 1 % villages to collect the data with structured questionnaire and Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) tools. The results demonstrated that a total of six different agroforestry practices, agri-silviculture, silvi-horticulture, agri-horticulture, agri-silvi-horticulture, silvi-pastoral, and homestead existed indifferent villages. Out of different categories, timber, fruits, medicinal, agriculture, flower and other plant species were recorded. It was recorded that out of existing agroforestry practices, scattered near farms and around homestead was found most common (about 37.7 %) followed by agri-silviculture (20.20 %), silvi-horticulture (19.1 %) and agri-horticulture (12.3 %). The pattern of plantation on bunds and blocks was 17.94 % and 16.82 % respectively. The benefits from agroforestry practices in the villages was also assessed and ranked in their order of preferences in respective blocks of district. The different benefits as fruits/vegetables, timber, shade, medicinal, fodder, firewood, protection, and soil erosion were scored from 1 to 8. It was concluded from the results that status of agroforestry in the studied zonal area of the region is in developing stage and needs to be improved by imparting technical knowledge about planting material, methods and sale of end produces of trees to the farmers and tree growers.
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Introduction
Agroforestry has traditionally been a way of life and livelihood in India for centuries. It is a land use system which involves trees with agricultural crop/grass or animals simultaneously. Agroforestry has attracted the interest of scientists and development planners because it provides variety of products for meeting varied requirements of the people, insurance against risks caused by weather aberrations, controlling erosion hazards and ensuring sustainable production of the intercrops (Nair, 2007). Agroforestry systems in India include trees in farms, community forestry and a variety of local forest management and ethno-forestry practices. In UP, agroforestry practices vary according to different agro-climatic zones, land capability and socio-economic status of farmers. The variation is reflected in terms of diversity in agroforestry practices, and comparative advantage prompted a renewed interest to harness the vivid potential (Verma et al. 2017). The survey revealed the wide spectral potential of agroforestry practices in sustenance of agriculture as they provide food, fodder, fruit, vegetables, fuel wood, timber, medicines, fiber etc. from the same piece of land at a time which not only fulfils the demand of people but also elevate their socioeconomic status and standard of life (Pathak et al., 2000).Today, Indian agriculture faces diverse challenges and constraint due to growing demographic pressure, increasing food, feed and fodder needs, natural resource degradation and climate change (Dhyani et al., 2013). Therefore, a management system needs to be devised that is capable of producing food from marginal agricultural land and is also capable of maintaining and improving quality of producing environment (Dobriyal, 2014).
Agroforestry system is one of the best known traditional practices and has an important role in reducing vulnerability, increasing resilience of farming systems and buffering households against climate related risks (CAFRI, 2015), but there are several challenges that reap the benefits of agroforestry in India. There is shortage of superior planting material and improved seed varieties (Verma et al. 2017). In India, just as there is a great diversity in climate similarly there exists a large number of agroforestry systems of various forms and types (Dagar et al., 2014) .The current area under agroforestry in India is estimated as 25.31 million hectares or 8.2 percent of the total reporting geographical area of the country by Dhyani et al. (2013); Dagar et al. (2014) and CAFRI (2015). As the population of India is increasing at avery fast rate; the land-holding size of farmers shrink at avery fast rate and agroforestry is the only way to optimize the farm productivity (National Agroforestry Policy, 2014).It is generally well known that status of agroforestry in districts of Eastern plain region of Uttar Pradesh is in developing stage. From Forest survey of India report (2017), it was recorded that forest cover including tree cover is only 0.74 percent in the district of Ballia. Therefore, a study has been conducted in selected villages (1%) of Ballia district of Eastern plain region of Uttar Pradesh in India during the year 2018 to assess the socio-economic profile of villages for land use pattern, general information about villages, status of tree plantations, crop combinations with tree species and their stratified arrangement to identify agroforestry practices with a view to study existing tree species indifferent agroforestry systems in the villages and their benefits in day-to-day life of rural livelihood. The choice of species in agroforestry models were also recorded on the basis of their preferences in plantations.
Conclusion
The different combinations of agroforestry systems were recorded in the studied areas which were of various benefits for rural livelihood. The systematic pattern in tree planting needs to be improved for the region. The extension and training programmes regarding selection of species, tree planting pattern, nursery raising, quality planting material, maintenance and management of plantations and most importantly, the marketing of trees as end produce. In marketing or sale of trees, transit and felling permit to be issued by forest department is very important. The unawareness of rules and fear of administration discourages farmers for adopting agroforestry widely at large level in this region. It is well known that western part of UP is more flourished than Eastern part for adoption of agroforestrty. It is now urgent need of time to adopt tree plantations in massive way in districts of Eastern Plain zone to achieve our national target of forest policy. Agroforestry is the only way for progress for farmers and rural people, leading to sustainable development, food and nutritional security. Agroforestry adoption with suitable species of economic value will improve country’s forest and tree cover to the 33 percent as desired in national forest policy. The foresters, researches, NGOs and tree growers and traders are needed to coordinate on a common platform for successful implementation of agroforestry programme on massive level. Further, to enhance the efforts of farmers, sale of end products should be strengthened with the involvement of project planners and wood based industries.
