4TH World Congress on agroforestry

20-24 May 2019. Montpellier, France. 4TH WORLD CONGRESS ON AGROFORESTRY

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This international event was organized in Europe for the first time, by CIRAD and INRA, in partnership with World Agroforestry, Agropolis International and Montpellier University of Excellence.

The 4th World Agroforestry Congress bridged the gap between agroforestry science and its practical implementation worldwide. Over 1,200 attendees from all over the world presentied new research and sharing ideas for implementation of this agricultural technique that is good for food security, biodiversity, the climate, and more.

One topic gaining extra attention at this Congress was the involvement of the private sector in boosting agroforestry’s implementation worldwide, because it can be quite profitable to do so while also supporting people and planet. 

Agroforestry combines trees alongside shrubs, crops and livestock in systems that produce food, support biodiversity, build soil horizons and water tables, and sequester carbon from the atmosphere.

1,200 plus attendees streamed into workshops and swirled among some 600+ posters hanging in the halls which outline new agroforestry research, underpinning the notion of agroforestry seeming a rather academic topic, yet this group is exploring many angles to advance this climate- and biodiversity-positive agricultural practice.

“There are journalists here from 30+ media outlets from many countries here, and French TV produced four stories about it last week. Also, we had 1,850 people attending the public event on Sunday we organized with the French Association for Agroforestry. These facts are proof that the Congress is bridging the gap between science, society and policy, which is the event’s goal.” Emmanuel Torquebiau, Congress organizer and senior scientist CIRAD 

Because agroforestry is seen as a solution for this issue while boosting food security levels and biodiversity in the agricultural landscape due to its incorporation of useful trees and shrubs with annual crops, Mongabay has been producing a series highlighting its global implementation for the last year.

Extract of the programme:
Plenary session 2: Agroforestry and climate change

• Cheikh Mbow, Executive Director of START-International → Download abstract
• Seydou Kaboré, Manager of the Guié Agroforestry farm, Burkina Faso → Download abstract in French ; → Download abstract in English
• Margaret Muchanga, Farmer, Kenya
• Chad Frischmann, Vice President and; Research Director, Drawdown
• Sarah Magida Toumi, Tunisian Entrepreneur, Desertification and Tree planting
  Video witness @3:35:00
  "Acacias for All" is the name of a Tunesian Social Enterprise started by Sarah and Khalil Toumi in 2012. Its aim is to encourage farmers to plant Acacias (lat: Acacia Senegal) against desertifacation of their land and in order to give them a new source of income: the arabic gum harvested from the trees.
  
  "70 % of the European consumers want to make ethical food purchases"
  "We need communicators and the media to be intrested in what we do about agro forestry and allow all the agro-forestry projects to develop. If you don't know that those projects exist they can not develop. And we remain in a vicious cirle"
  
  "Today we have already planned 500,000 trees (acacia, muringa, Citrus sinensis {=orange tree - ear de fleur d'oranger/orange flower water)" 

Plenary Session 3: Agroforestry, Food security and Nutrition

• H.E Dr.Eyasu Abraha Alle, State Minister of Agriculture and Natural Resource of Ethiopia
• Saul Morris, Director of Programme Services, Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) → Download abstract
• Andrew Campbell, Chief Executive Officer, Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research → Download abstract
• Catherine Muthuri, World Agroforestry
• Kami Melvani, Charles Darwin University
• Rowan Reid, Farmer, Author of “Heartwood: the art and science of growing trees for profit” → Download abstract
• Gary S. May, Chancellor, University of California Davis
• Patrick Caron, Chairperson, High Level Panel of Experts of the UN Committee on world Food Security, Vice President, University of Montpellier

Plenary Session 6: A road map for agroforestry

• Roger Leakey, International Tree Foundation, UK → Download abstract
  
  "We need to challenge donors, development agencies and agribusiness and emphasize that the so-called "Inevitable Trade-offs" are not acceptable in modern agriculture and that agro-forestry can deliver sustainanle intensification without those Trade-offs"
  
  "Trade-Ons instead of Trade-offs"
  
  "One type of research we need most is impact assessment"

• John Munsell, Past-President, Association for Temperate Agroforestry → Download abstract
• Patrick Worms, EURAF → Download abstract

• Stephen Briggs, Farmer and Consultant, AbacusAgri, UK → Download abstract

"We don't need more research but more agro-forestors"
"Research needs to catch up on innovation on the ground by farmers"

"Reading is not believing but seeing is believing"

"Research needs to be presented in a pallatable form where  farmers can see it, touch it, belief it".

• Gilles Delaunay, Farmer, France
• Emmanuel Petel and José Ruiz Espi, European Commission, DG Agriculture and Rural Development → Download abstract
• Tony Rinaudo, Laureate of the Right Livelihood Award (video presented by Dennis Garrity)
• Fergus Sinclair, World Agroforestry / School of Natural Sciences, Bangor University, Wales, UK → Download abstract
  
  "We are currently embedding research in development practices"