Agroecological Farming Systems in China 209matters. The Yin and Yang theory (negative and positive forces interacting with each
other and ecological relationships) and the Wuxing theory (five elements within a
system and the interrelated movements between them) have been widely used in
agriculture to reflect the relationship between different components.
In ancient China, the people have long used the terms of Xiang Cheng and
Xiang Ke to express the positive and negative relationships between different com-
ponents when they co-exist. Two or more of these can integrate to exert Xi ang
Cheng for their mutual benefits, and to use Xiang Ke for living control. All these
basic philosophical concepts have profound influence on the practice and formula-
tion of IFS (Wang, 1996).
The beginnings of IFS in ancient China
In the course of China’s long history of agriculture, a wealth of knowledge and
theories have accumulated (Institute of the History of Natural Sciences, 1985;
Guo et al, 1986; Tang, 1986; Liang, 1989). Archaeological evidence has revealed
that the ancestors of the Chinese people inhabited forests where they sheltered
from external hazards and lived on edible parts of wild plants and animals. In the
New Stone Age (6000–8000 BC), the Chinese initiated fire farming in which forests
were burned and seeds were directly sown in soil covered with the ash. Tillage farm-
ing arose later on the burned land and the ash was mixed with soil before planting.
Grains or other crops were grown without external fertilizer. After several years the
crop yield decreased remarkably, and cultivation would shift to another forest and
the same practices were repeated. Such slash-and-burn cultivation is the oldest and
most primitive form of ecoagriculture and was widely practised over a period of
6000–7000 years until the Xia Dynasty (2000–1600 BC) when there was a gradual
shift to settled farming, except in some remote mountainous areas in south-western
China and among some minorities such as the Du Long, Nu, Xi Wa and Yao.
Slash-and-burn was also widely used in silviculture, for reforestation and affor-
estation with Chinese fir (Cunninghamia laceolata) in southern China, for thou-
sands of years. Farmers remove all ground cover, including small trees and shrubs
in summer, burn them in autumn, level the ground to mix in the ashes in winter
and then either plant seedlings or cuttings of fir trees with other crops in spring, or
grow crops for one or two years before tree planting. In newly established fir stands,
intercropping is also practised until crown closure. Such measures, used in the
process of establishment of fir forests, are similar to the Taungya system developed
for management of teak (Tectona grandis) stands in Myanmar in the mid-1800s.
Interplanting of trees and crops, now known as agroforestry, originated in the
Shang-West Zhou Dynasties (1600–800 BC), as the forested land of the plains was
converted into cultivated land, and farmers planted trees in or around the crop
fields. Some grew fruit trees, vegetables or bred domestic animals (Gui Mowen,
1990), whereas in the mountainous areas with fewer people and more forests,
peasants cultivated cash crops in the forests or interplanted food crops during
reforestation and afforestation. Since then, various forms of agroforestry–animal