Indigenous agroforestry strategies meeting farmers' needs

Seven characteristics of indigenous agroforestry strategies are discussed: they incorporate native trees and communities; they rely on natural succession; they use natural environmental variation; they incorporate numerous crop and native species; they are flexible; they spread risks by retaining diversity; and they work to ensure independent survival using backup resources available to the community. Specific examples from the sequential agroforestry and forest grove systems of Mexican Huastec and Peruvian Bora farmers show the ways in which indigenous strategies are used.