Economic Share of Agroforestry in Boosting Living Status of Farmers Community: A Case Study of District Faisalabad

Abstract

Agroforestry (AF) is a traditional land management system in Pakistan that has the potential to boost agriculture and cope with wood shortage. Being a forest deficit country Pakistan has to improve the tree cover which is just less than 5%, about which 2.1% is productive and is unable to meet the local needs and to improve the social fabric of the community. Along with deforestation, urbanization, industrialization, and climate change have imposed disastrous effects on the forest resources of the country. Thus, to create awareness among rural masses about the importance of trees on farmlands, a comprehensive survey-based study was designed for two tehsils of District Faisalabad, Pakistan; to investigate the role of Social forestry and the impact of climate change upon it and, to recognize its importance in socioeconomic condition of rural communities. After the data analysis by using (SPSS 8.1 Software), results showed that about 80% of respondents were willing to grow trees on their farmlands if they were provided with technical support. However, 50% of the educated/literate respondents have shown more interest in growing trees on their farmlands. About 90% of the total respondents have shown interest in tree plantation on farmlands and social forestry is helpful in a sense to aid in the socioeconomic condition of rural/farming communities. Moreover, 82% and 61% of respondents from Faisalabad and Chak Jhumra respectively were aware that tree plantations can mitigate climate change. Therefore, social forestry-related projects especially agroforestry need the hour for the mitigation of adverse climate change, uplifting the socioeconomic of farmers, and meeting the local industrial and fuel wood needs.