Rethinking Agriculture for New Opportunities 405South Asia, most words for agriculture derive from the Sanskrit word for plough,
krsi, so that agriculture in that region is characterized as ‘plough work’.) Such a
conceptualization, however tacit, makes the raising of livestock, fish, trees and
other activities less central to the agricultural enterprise, except where cattle or
oxen are necessary for ploughing, or where monocrop tree plantations substitute
for fields. The full range and richness of the agricultural enterprise has not been
well captured in the word that we use to refer to it.
Etymologically, it is not clear where livestock, fish, insects, microbes and trees
fit in. Few sustainable farming systems exist that do not include several of these
groups in addition to plants. But most often, those who work on other flora or on
fauna have been accorded marginal status within agricultural ministries, or been
assigned to separate ministries, leaving crop and soil specialists in charge of the
agricultural sector.
Fishery departments are invariably marginal if located within an agricultural
ministry, even though aquaculture integrated within farming systems has great
potential. Indeed, until ‘agroforestry’ was discovered (King, 1968; Bene et al, 1977)
and the International Centre for Research in Agroforestry (ICRAF) was estab-
lished, there was little concern with trees as part of agriculture, except in large-scale
plantations where tree crops were commercially profitable. Otherwise, trees got
respect and attention only if looked after by a separate ministry that was more
concerned with forests or plantations than with farms.
Although agroforestry may sound like a kind of forest management, it is a com-
prehensive land-use management strategy that includes a range of woody perenni-
als (particularly trees but also shrubs) in spatial and temporal associations with
non-woody perennials, grasses and annual crops, together with a variety of ani-
mals, including cattle, sheep, goats, pigs, chickens, guinea pigs, fish and even bees
(Lundgren and Raintree, 1982). While some agroforestry practices are extensive –
for example, most agrosilvopastoral systems – these practices generally contribute
to intensified production that is agroecologically sound and maintains soil fertility
(Fernandes and Matos, 1995). Fortunately, the integration of perennial plants into
otherwise annual farming systems is increasingly recognized as a mainstream
opportunity to increase per-hectare output in future decades.
A bias in favour of fields means that horticulture gets somewhat marginalized
in most institutions dealing with agriculture, including universities. Gardens and
orchards, being smaller, have lower status than fields, even if they produce several
times more value per unit of land when intensively managed. Horticulture is deval-
ued in part also because its produce is mostly perishable and hard to denominate.
Heads of cabbage and baskets of apples are hard to compare with bags of rice or
tons of wheat, their nutritional value notwithstanding. Historically, governments
have gained more wealth and security from grains because these could be stored (or
seized) more easily than fruits and vegetables.
Farming systems of most rural households around the world depend crucially
upon livestock and poultry, large and/or small, together with home gardens and
orchards and often with fish ponds and hedgerows. Efforts to improve single