The challenge of HIV/AIDS: Where does agroforestry fit in? - World ...

Chapter 9: Land and people81• scaling up approaches that could beapplied to many situations over widerscales;• strategies for testing of unfinished technologieswith farmers to fine tune theirapplication;• use and integration of high-level scientificapproaches such as GIS and biotechnology;• building capacity among national researchand development organizations toenable ICRAF to effect exit strategies; and• identification of the Centre’s comparativeadvantage in dynamic research anddevelopment environment.Working group on Mike Swift’schallengesThe working group addressed many of thechallenges presented in the opening sessionon Land and People which was ledby Mike Swift, eminent soil scientist andformer Director of the Tropical Soil Biologyand Fertility Programme. Here is a list of thechallenges followed by the responses of theworking group that were more of a reflectivebrainstorm about the challenges.What are the key determinants of the adaptiveand adoptive advantages of the availabletechnological options? What works,where do they work, when do they work,and for whom do they work?• There is a need to be able to better predictthe performances of different technicaloptions under different conditionsExplore whether the creation of targetzonedomains for various options basedon biophysical and socio-economicconditions is practical and beneficial.• Test options across varying conditions sothat limits of the options are known.• Conduct risk analysis for various options.What are the main questions arising fromthe interactions in the chain that goes fromresource management to system intensificationto market access to policy?• Our analysis of natural resource management(NRM) programmes shouldstart with determining what markets existfor goods and services in an area andthis will drive our research agenda.• Our approaches should take a holisticyet incremental approach (covering markets,policies, institutions and so on).• Based on one aspect of a very complexproblem, try to look at an integratedmodel of the situation and work in amultidisciplinary team.What are the rules governing transitionsacross spatial scales (for example, hownutrient cycling processes or biodiversityfunctionlinkages differ at plot, farm andlandscape scales)?• Be aware of the spatial scale of the workin both biophysical and socioeconomicresearch and be able to better link researchthat takes place at different scales.• Some of the work within the Centredoes deal with issues at various scales– this is very innovative science. Theseinteractions and transitions are complex,which makes ICRAF’s work in thisarea complex compared to research oncrops. However this work has practicalpayoffs and should be continued, despitethe difficulties.What are the trade-offs between the storageof organic matter in the soil and its use todrive nutrient cycling, crop production andother ecosystem services?• Much is known about nitrogen (N) andits role in crop production.• We need to go beyond N and studyother nutrients, issues such as soil acidity,and environmental services, and linkthis with price, policies, farmers’ needsand the resilience of agroecosystems.This is an area that is largely unexplored.How can the functions of the soil biologicalcommunity be optimized with respectto different ecosystem services?• Functional biodiversity (as opposed tospecies richness) is the key issue in relationto various ecosystem services aswell as such issues as soil health, soilmacrofauna, soil microbes, and soilphysical properties.• These components/systems need to bestudied in relation to agroecosystemstability, productivity, and resilience ofsystems.• This type of research should be pursuedvigorously over the next 5 years.