Transforming Ifugao Rice Terraces Into Food & Wood Wonders – I Wonder How?

Yes, we Filipinos are very proud of the rice terraces in Banaue, Ifugao. Yet, we Filipinos would be more benefitted if the terraces looked like or greener than the above, from Peru – more crops, more trees, more beauty!
(image of terraced hill above from Worldagroforestry.org)

Over and above Regenerative Agriculture early today, Sunday, 16 January 2022, I had the audacity to reinvent Agroforestry into Regenerative Agroforestry, and then I find, on googling, that the term and concept had been invented years ago. Shame on me! I had to reinvent.

Considering Climate Change, you have to grow food along with wood. We need a new science I now call AgriForestry, distinguishing it from that earlier reNatureconcept, Regenerative Agroforestry; the differences I see are these:

(1)   Agroforestry – small scale, crops and/or animals grown with shrubs, small trees.

(2)   Agriforestry – wide-scale practices, single or cluster of farmers growing crops and/or animals for food, always with relatively wide swaths of trees and shrubs grown not only for the wood but also as wind shields from strong winds. (I invented the term and created the definition today as I write this, Sunday, 16 January 2022.)

AgriForestry: You can simply think of it as combining the growing of food and wood.

The New AgriForestry – “New” to emphasize novelty. No, it is not just the claim of this new concept of mine; it comprises my new formulation for the type of Agriculture cum Forestry that the Philippine Islands, nay the whole wide world, should be pursuing. Because AgriForestry is a singular science that is at the same time an intelligent move to curb climate change. So, today:

I begin to believe my country should now learn about The New AgriForestry, pointing to me a new communication campaign to help transform Philippine Agriculture and Forestry from simply individual economic success to cooperative ecological triumph.

Slogan: “Food Plus Wood Is Good – Cultivating Climate Mood Makes It Best!”

Remember: While farming, wild climate change is always a threat. We must protect farms & fields from strong winds that can collapse our crops and rains that can flood our food – by the wood we grow along with them.

To do Regenerative AgriForestry right, we must first replenish the natural wealth that the soil has lost by our chemical farming – we must return the organic matter the ground had lost because as farmers we did not consider it necessary or important.

Organic farming is a good beginning – but remember, in Regenerative AgriForestry, the replenishment of the organic fertility of the soil should be natural, not man-made. I do it by what I call “Mulching Matilda,” where the rotavator creates a natural organic layer of bits of soil mixed with pieces of live plant materials automatically scattered all over the field. (For details, see my essay, “PH Farmers Want Cost Of Fertilizer Way Down – Much Better, Yield & Net Income Way Up!” 24 Dec 2021, RegINA, Queen Mother Earth.)

How do you like it that you are fighting farmer poverty at the same time fighting climate change?!@517