Proposed actions
Agroforestry curricula must recognize the interdisciplinary nature of this
field and assure that students, regardless of their level, learn basic principles
and how to apply them in real-world situations. The level of research
specialization, of course, will depend on the degree program, but at least two
core courses are required to support any curriculum in agroforestry. First
must be a technical course which deals with the science and management of
agroforestry systems. This needs to be followed by a practicum where
methods and approaches to interdisciplinary team problem-solving are
reviewed and practiced. Such a course would be greatly strengthened if
methods were actually applied to real field problems using teams composed
of students from various disciplines. These core courses must be
supplemented with a breadth of specialty courses (e.g., ecology, soils, statistics,
sociology, etc.). The extent to which a student concentrates on one
specific discipline area to support an agroforestry focus will vary with degree
programs and student interests. Whether such a curriculum becomes a
major or minor area of study will vary among countries. In all cases,
however, an agroforestry curriculum needs to be flexible enough to attract
and accommodate students from a variety of disciplines associated with the
science and practice of agroforestry.
Educational activities involving teaching and researching agroforestry
will need to remain decentralized. This will assure that such programs meet
the specific needs of particular countries while fully utilizing the capabilities
and resources of a variety of institutions and centers. The need to network
and cooperate among and between academic institutions and research
centers is very important as no one location can expect to amass all the
resources needed to establish and maintain a comprehensive teaching/
research program as well as the diverse, long term field sites needed to
support it.
It is generally felt that the land grant university model developed in the
United States, which links teaching, research, and extension, would be a
good infrastructure within which to develop an agroforestry education
program. Care needs to be exercised to assure that such a program remains
committed to addressing real-world needs, which means promoting on-farm
and in-country research and training activities. In order to support an