AN ECONOMIC ASSESSMENT OF THE SUSTAINABILITY OF TRADITIONAL AGROFORESTRY SYSTEMS: THE CASE OF KANDYAN FOREST GARDENS

Abstract

A feature of the Sri Lanka Forestry Sector Master Plan 1995 is the promotion conservation-oriented methods or forest management. In this context agroforestry systems such as Kandyan forest gardens (KFGs) are important,since they are not only productive and relieve pressure on the natural forests,but also conserve a rich collection of biodiversity. Although national policy seeks to promote agroforestry in order to achieve nationally desirable objectives, the successful adoption or this policy depends on the degree of congruence between different national objectives, the multiple objectives of farmers, and changing socio-economic conditions. The objective of this study was to make an economic assessment of KFGs, from the point of view of the individual farmers who operate under changing and varied economic objectives.Data were collected by a field survey. using a structured questionnaire. Tabular analytical techniques were then used to describe important features of KFGs.The major technique used to find out how the structure of home gardens changes with changing economic objectives was linear programming analysis by the MOTAD model. The results of the study indicate that even under the condition that a farmer 's main objective is to maximize the net present value (NPV), home gardens can still be an important source of timber, because of their large component of multipurpose trees, which include species such as jak and coconut. The binding constraint of the model is land; sensitivity analysis showed that with an increase in the land area of KFGs, both the number of species and the income increase.