Trees and markets for agroforestry tree products: targeting poverty reduction and enhanced livelihoods

Agroforestry tree domestication as a farmer-driven, market-led process emerged as an international initiative in the early 1990s, although a few studies pre-date this. A participatory approach now supple - ments the more traditional aspects of tree improvement, and is seen as an important strategy for meet - ing the Millennium Development Goals of eradicating poverty and hunger and promoting social equity. Considerable progress towards the domestication of indigenous fruits and nuts has been achieved in many villages in Cameroon and Nigeria that focuses on ‘ideotypes’, based on an understanding of the tree-to-tree variation in many commercially important traits. Vegetatively propagated cultivars are being developed by farmers for integration into their polycultural farming systems, especially cocoa agro - forests. However, if agroforestry is to be adopted on a scale that has meaningful economic, social and environmental impacts, it is crucial that markets for agroforestry tree products (AFTPs) are expanded. Detailed studies of the commercialization of AFTPs, especially in southern Africa, provide support for the wider acceptance of the role of indigenous tree domestication in the enhancement of livelihoods for poor farmers in the tropics. Consequently, policy guidelines are presented in support of this new approach to sustainable rural development – an alternative to the biotechnology approaches being promoted by some development agencies

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