Agroforestry

Agroforestry (or alley cropping) is a strategy used by farmers to combat soil erosion. In this method, several crops are planted together in strips or alleys between trees and shrubs. This design provides shade (reducing water loss from evaporation), ensures retention of soil moisture, and can also produce fruit, fuelwood, or trimmings to be made into mulch.

The World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) made this definition in 1993: "Agroforestry is a collective name for land use systems and practices in which woody perennials are deliberately integrated with crops and/or animals on the same land management unit. The integration can be either in a spatial mixture or in a temporal sequence. There are normally both ecological and economic interactions between woody and non-woody components in agroforestry". It means that trees are intentionally used within agricultural systems. Knowledge, careful selection of species and good management of trees and crops are needed to maximize the production and positive effects of trees and to minimise negative competitive effects on crops.