Introducing AGFORWARD – a Project to advance Agroforestry in Europe
Introducing AGFORWARD – a Project to advance Agroforestry in Europe
wca2014-2299 Paul J. Burgess 1,*Anil R. Graves 1Monique Bestman 2Valerio Bondesan 3Christian Dupraz 4 5Dirk Freese 6Adrien Guichaoua 7Tibor Hartel 8John Hermansen 9Felix Herzog 10Fabien Liagre 11Marcus Lindner 12Jim McAdam 13Gerardo Moreno 14Rosa Mosquera Losada 15Joao Palma 16Anastasia Pantera 17Piero Paris 18Tobias Plieninger 19Laszlo Rakosy 20Adolfo Rosati 21Fergus Sinclair 22Jo Smith 23Andrea Vityi 24Jeroen Watté 25 1Department of Environmental Science and Technology, Cranfield University, Cranfield, United Kingdom, 2Louis Bolk Institut, Driebergen Rijsenburg, Netherlands, 3Veneto Agricoltura, Legnaro, Italy, 4European Agroforestry Federation, Montpellier, 5INRA, Paris, France, 6BTU Cottbus, Cottbus, Germany, 7ACTA, Paris, France, 8Universitatea Babes Bolyai, Cluj Napoca, Romania, 9Aarhus Universitet, Arrhus, Denmark, 10Federal Department of Economic Affairs - Agroscope FDEA-ART, Bern, Switzerland, 11AGROOF, Anduze, France, 12European Forest Institute, Joensuu, Finland, 13Agrifood and Biosciences Institute, Belfast, United Kingdom, 14Universidad de Extremadura, Badajoz, 15Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, Santiago de Compostela, Spain, 16Instituto Superior de Agronomia, Lisbon, Portugal, 17TEI Sterea Elladas, Lamia, Greece, 18Consiglio Nazionale Delle Ricerche (CNR), Roma, Italy, 19Universoty of Copenhagen (UCPH), Copenhagen, Denmark, 20Universitatea Babes Bolyai, Cluj-Napoca, Romania, 21Consiglio per la Ricerca e la Sperimentazione in Agricoltura (CRA), Rome, Italy, 22ICRAF, Nairobi, Kenya, 23Organic Research Centre, Hamstead Marshall, Newbury, United Kingdom, 24NymE KKK Nonprofit Kft, Sopron, Hungary, 25Wervel vzw, Elsene, BelgiumAGFORWARD is a major four-year research project funded by the European Commission starting in January 2014. The goal of the project is to promote AGroFORestry that Will Advance Rural Development in Europe. This exciting initiative will involve over 20 European partners and two international institutions and about 960 person-months of paid input. It builds on the work of European research projects like SAFE, promotional work by ACTA and AGROOF in France, the establishment of the European Agroforestry Federation, and a recognised role for agroforestry in rural development programmes and the new EU strategy for forestry.
This paper will describe the development, the objectives and the broad methodology of the research project which comprises four main components. An initial component is focused on understanding the context and extent of agroforestry in Europe. A large participatory component will work with about 400 stakeholders to identify, develop and field-test innovations to improve the benefits and viability of agroforestry in specific agricultural sectors. There is an evaluation and modelling component that will examine the opportunities for uptake at field-, farm- and landscape scales, building on previous modelling research. The fourth component will promote the wider adoption of appropriate agroforestry systems in Europe through a range of policy development and dissemination activities.