Alternatives to Slash-and-Burn 341various types of shifting cultivation, agroforestry, logging, cattle ranching and
commercial tree plantations. There is much confusion in the literature regarding
the use of the terms shifting cultivation and slash-and-burn agriculture; the follow-
ing sections distinguish between the different land-use pathways that follow the
clearing of tropical forests.
Shifting cultivation or slash-and-burn agriculture?
Shifting cultivation is probably the oldest farming system (Nye and Greenland,
1960) and is remarkably similar throughout the humid tropics. Farmers slash and
burn a hectare or so of primary or tall secondary forest, grow food crops in poly-
culture for 1–3 years, and abandon the land to secondary forest fallow regrowth for
20–40 years, then repeat the cycle. This traditional shifting cultivation with short
cropping periods and long secondary forest fallow periods is now rare, practised
primarily by indigenous communities disconnected from the national economy. It
is socially and environmentally sustainable (Thrupp et al, 1997), albeit at low levels
of agricultural productivity and human population densities of less than 30 people
per square kilometre (Boserup, 1965). Shifting cultivation is known by a variety of
terms, referring mostly to cleared fields: swidden (Old English), rai (Sweden), milpa,
conuco, roza (Latin America), shamba, chitemene (Africa), jhum (India), kaingin (Phil-
ippines), ladang (Indonesia and Malaysia) and many others. Fallows are commonly
called bush fallow and jachere in Africa; barbecho, capoeira and purma in Latin Amer-
ica; and belukar and other terms in Indonesia. The concept of fallows in the tropics
differs from that used in the temperate zone, where the term fallow normally means
leaving the soil bare (Sanchez, 1999). The vegetative fallow phase restores carbon and
nutrient stocks in the biomass, improves soil physical properties and suppresses
weeds (Nye and Greenland, 1960; Sanchez, 1976; Szott and Palm, 1986).
When human population pressures exceed a critical density that varies with
agroecological zones and inherent soil fertility, traditional shifting cultivation is
replaced by a variety of other agricultural practices that still involve clearing by
slash-and-burn methods. We suggest that the loosely used terminology be speci-
fied as follows: shifting cultivation refers to the traditional long-fallow rotational
system, and slash-and-burn agriculture refers to other farming systems character-
ized by slash-and-burn clearing, short-term fallows or no fallows at all. These sys-
tems include the shortened fallow–food crop systems and the establishment of
tree-based systems such as complex agroforests, simple agroforests or monoculture
tree crop plantations such as oil palm (Elaeis guineensis Jacquin), coffee (Coffea
spp.), rubber (Hevea brasiliensis [Willd. ex A. Juss.] Muell.-Arg.) or pulp and tim-
ber species. Slash-and-burn is also the means of establishing pastures that are found
throughout the humid forest zone of Latin America. These slash-and-burn systems
differ from shifting agriculture in that the crops are interplanted with pastures or
tree seedlings, or in some cases the cropping period is omitted. Many of the sys-
tems are still rotational to some degree, with occasional slash-and-burn clearing
when the productivity of the system declines.