| agricultural rehabilitation [back to community agroforestry] |
| goals+scope | environmental factors | scenarios | programs | resources |
Crop selection:
Choice of agricultural crops in post-disaster scenario should provide refugees with maximum output of food, economic benefits, fuel, and flexibility. since agricultural soil is deposited with high salinity, sea-floor materials, and various kinds of debris, selected crops needs to tolerate high content of salt and harsh growing environment.
criterion:
+ salt tolerant
+ fast-growing
+ fits in local food culture
+ preferably native to Indonesia or southeast asia regions
+ plant materials preferably available within Indonesia or nearby tropical countries to ease plant adaptation and lessen cost of material transportation
salt tolerant crops (from left to right): sapodilla + water apple + mango + coconut
fast growing (from left to right): sugar cane + banana + papaya + rice
commercial crops (from left to right): oil palm + coffee + cashew nut + durian
Crop rotation:
Crop rotation is growing different crops as to avoid depletion of particular soil nutrients. It also means that succeeding crops are of a different genus, species, subspecies, or variety than the previous crop. Examples would be rice after rice, row crops after small grains, grain crops after legumes, etc. The planned rotation sequence may be for a two- or three-year or longer period. Some of the general purposes of rotations are to improve or maintain soil fertility, reduce erosion, reduce the build-up of pests, spread the workload, reduce risk of weather damage, reduce reliance on agricultural chemicals, and increase net profits.
Increase sustainability and maintain biodiversity in plantations:
In the 1980s and 1990s, large-scale plantation and estate crop programs were promoted and developed in Indonesia because of the strong demand for oil palm and pulp. However, as forest conversion and agricultural intensification have a critical impact on biodiversity, the practice of CAF, Complex Agroforests, is introduced to the agriculture communities. While the monoculture in plantation persists, other non-timber fruits and annuals crops are being introduced to provide income diversification. As a happy incident, biodiversity has increased in plantation where other cash crops are cultivated.
Communal program:
As part of community networking, farmers should combine their resources to invest on basic farming tool, equipment, seeds, seedlings, and irrigation system as a community initially.