Resource management perspective for forage production and agroforestry system development in eastern Himalayan region: A review

Advances in forage research in eastern Himalayan zone show that forage-resource development can play a vital role in improving the traditional ago-pastoral economy. Forage-based feeding systems have shown high production and economic efficiencies in ruminants. Besides, new possibilities have emerged to substitute a part of the total concentrate requirements of non-ruminant livestock by succulent forage crops. Tailoring of a number of forage plant species in the hill land-use systems will also provide continuous vegetative cover on the hill slopes to protect land resources and conserve the abundant native forage-plant species. An unbalanced and unsustainable form of a short-cycle shifting cultivation (jhuming) and limited opportunity to expand the arable lands and their mechanization on the hill slopes necessitate a greater intervention through agroforestry in this region. To optimize integrated land-use capacity, many traditional agroforestry practices are existing in this region; besides, farmers own innovative approach to agroforestry systems and a number of agroforestry systems developed and perfected by research. All these systems have shown a way to improve jhum-fallow through agroforestry and contour hedge intercropping. There is a need to encourage product diversification in a unit of land through agroforestry to increase the land capacity to produce full potential and linking them to assured marketing channels by identifying demands and outlets for outputs.