Measuring stability and degradability of agroforestry systems

Tropical agriculture usually deals with severe limitations on management alternatives, arising from a combination of factors such as low-resource farmers, fragile lands, high pest susceptibility, etc. Under these conditions, agroecosystem properties other than productivity, such as stability, sustai...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Ferreira, Pedro, Kass, Donald Charles Lieber
Format: Book Chapter
Language:Inglés
Published: International Center for Tropical Agriculture 1995
Subjects:
Online Access:https://hdl.handle.net/10568/82008
Description
Summary:Tropical agriculture usually deals with severe limitations on management alternatives, arising from a combination of factors such as low-resource farmers, fragile lands, high pest susceptibility, etc. Under these conditions, agroecosystem properties other than productivity, such as stability, sustainability, degradability, etc. are of crucial importance. Although a conceptual framework has been elaborated on these topics, the problem of evaluating agroecological system properties and comparing systems is still an almost open field. In addition to evaluating system properties, an appraisal of the relative importance of factors which affect those properties should be given.