Abstract

Farm forestry, or the cultivation of trees in close association with agricultural crops, is a major component of the social forestry programme being implemented in India. The paper discusses the situation in Kerala, based on the findings of a recently concluded project which aimed to identify the main social and economic factors influencing homestead tree cropping. It was found that, in spite of their known ecological stability, home gardens are on the decline, mainly due to social and economic pressures. They are being replaced by commercial farming, which, in the long run, is neither ecologically stable, nor socially and economically desirable. Disappearance of the home gardens would not only imply the loss of an ecologically stable and genetically rich system, but would also amount to the loss of the valuable cultural heritage associated with it. It is recommended that social forestry should try to preserve and improve the home garden system by protecting it from the