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FAQs

1. Many people say that syntropic agriculture is very complicated, and that a person needs to have a PhD in soil science, another one in botany, and another one in agronomy, is this true?

In fact we need to know the plants and understand how the planet works, how natural succession occurs; and to understand this we can start by planting vegetables in 1m2. If you take some time and attend some classes at our university, we guarantee that you will quickly understand how forests work, how natural succession occurs and how you can combine plants.

2. When we plant at high density, i.e. if we integrate many plants per m2, competition between plants increases, is this true?

F4F– Ernst Götsch discovered, through many experiments, that by increasing the number of tree seeds per square meter, the plants developed better. The secret is to manage them at the right time, that is, pruning and thinning. In fact, plants help each other, cooperation even occurs between plants from different botanical families, see the work of Canadian researcher Suzane Simmard here (https://www.ted.com/talks/suzanne_simard_how_trees_talk_to_each_other?subtitle= pt-br&geo=pt-br) and Jena diversity experiment (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3SvG2nBCTM).

3. Syntropic agroforestry is an excellent technology for recovering water sources and restoring forests, but to end hunger in the world we need the green revolution, that is, producing food on a large scale and in monoculture, is this true?

When Norman Borlaug created wheat varieties that responded with high productivity in response to high doses of chemical fertilizers, he had the intention of ending world hunger, but this model proved not to be sustainable in the long term. We don't have two planets Earth to extract oil and minerals from one, and to use them on the other one. We need to think about a form of agriculture which is sustainable in the long-term, i.e. which does not need to destroy the soil, destroy untouchable landscapes and oceans to extract fossil fuels and nutrients for plants. If people reconnect with nature and decide to understand how forests work, it is possible to produce food for 30 billion human beings, it is possible to stop and reverse climate change, transforming agriculture into a carbon sink.

4. Why aren't there many examples of farmers applying syntropic agriculture techniques on their farmlands?

F4F- Syntropic agriculture is a relatively new way of doing agriculture. For example think about how old the plow is. It appeared more than 5,000 years ago, around 4500 BC and was one of the greatest innovations in Prehistory and a landmark of the Agricultural Revolution. Ernst Götsch has been carrying out experiments for just 40 years, and has evolved a lot to do it in the systematic way in practice over the last 20 years. There are many indigenous peoples who work with consortiums of plants and live with forests for thousands of years.The fundamental difference between the native people who have lived in forests for millennia and the syntropic agriculture created by Ernst Götsch is that he sets out to solve the problems of modern agriculture by using ancestral methods of living with nature, while at the same time creating a didactic methodology and interpretation of how forests work, allowing modern humans who were not born in a forest and have had little contact with native forests throughout their lives to practice agriculture that respects ecological processes.

The syntropic farming model is also a model that seeks to give farmers autonomy and independence, moving them away from an economy based on scarcity and towards an economy based on abundance, the economy of emerging consciousness. As society as a whole is immersed in the economy of scarcity, it is very difficult for people to access this 'new' model, which is not publicized or propagated by the media and still anchored in the economy of scarcity. Nevertheless, it's important to note that the number of people practicing syntropic agriculture has increased a lot in recent years, due to the fact that people are looking for alternatives to mitigate the negative effects of climate change.

5. Is it possible to have an economic return in the short term with syntropic agriculture, as it is an agriculture focused on planting trees?

It is possible to have an economic return with syntropic agriculture in the same way that we have a return with conventional agriculture. The fundamental difference is that as time passes, the soil gets better and better, we produce black soil ('terra preta'), and we increasingly need less external inputs, until one reaches the point where you no longer need external inputs, such as chemical or organic fertilizers or any type of pesticides, fungicides, herbicides. The fact that we plant trees in high density for future pruning/pollarding does not mean that we reduce the number of fruit trees, or other food plants, the opposite often happens. When we start with vegetables, we can produce 300% more vegetables in the same time and space, using the same amount of water and fertilizer, where we would conventionally produce only one type of vegetable.

6. Is it possible to carry out syntropic agriculture on a large scale?

We already have examples on a larger scale. For example, there is a family in Martinique that has implemented around 400 hectares of bananas in consortium with many trees. In Brazil (State of Goias) there is a couple planting coffee on more than 30 hectares. In both cases the plants are less attacked by pests and diseases. The most limiting factor for expanding these areas is the lack of machines on the market adapted to work in an environment with trees.

7. How many hectares of syntropic agroforestry can a family of 4 or 5 people manage per year?

This question leads to many types of answers. Firstly, it depends on how far the property's soils are from the abundance state. Do we talk about soils with high natural fertility, but which have been degraded through misuse, or do we work with very old soils which have also been degraded by conventional agriculture? Each type of response will demand greater or lesser skill from farmers in making these soils productive again through processes. The complexity we want to install also influences. Very rich soils may not require high complexity, we can use fewer species to produce enough biomass to activate ecological processes, while poorer soils need a higher complexity. As a rule of thumb, we believe that a family of 4 people can take care of between 3 to 5 hectares with high complexity (high plant diversity, which requires more management) and some more few hectares in case of low complexity.

8. How can we use natural succession in syntropic agriculture?

The first point would be for you to study what natural succession means in forests. We can use natural succession, for example, when we start on very degraded soils, where we cannot establish our cultivated plants, such as corn, oranges, avocados, etc. So we look for plants that grow well with the current level of fertility, we sow these plants in high density, respecting the stratum and life cycle of each one. Each year we manage these plants through pruning and thinning, this management increases the organic matter content of the soil and with this we improve the physical, chemical and biological parameters of the soil. After a time - that can vary from 2 to several Years - we cut down the vegetation that we created and now we can sow more demanding plants. Since by pruning the plants that we sowed at the beginning, we improve the soil, increase its capacity to retain water and the availability of nutrients.

9. What species should I plant to accompany my cultivated plants?

We have to plant the ‘placenta’ (plants with up to 2 years life-cycle) which provide shelter and nutrients to our cultivated plants of a longter life-cycle at the beginning as well as ‘mother trees’ (term created by Ernst Götsch). Mother trees are trees that we plant together with our cultivated plants, so that we protect and care for them in the long-term.

What are mother trees?

Fast-growing, deep-rooted, long-lived trees
Respond well to annual pollarding
Easy to manage

Benefits of having mother trees?

Strong increase in photosynthetic activities throughout the year, also in the dry season
After topping, rejuvenation and induction of new vigorous growth
Carbon sequestration and an improvement in the microclimate
Covered and revitalized soils

Water retention
No need to plow or weed anymore

Consequences?

Stable production of the main crop with high quality
Healthy soils without the need for external inputs and a very high ratio of fungi to bacteria

10. Leafcutter ants often make life difficult for us. What should we do when leaf-cutting ants attack our crops?

Find the anthill and place cement or agricultural lime in the anthill. Accumulate asmuch organic matter as possible on top of and around the anthill. Use plants that work asant repellents, such as Tithonia diversifolia, Canavalia ensiformis, Ricinus comunis. Formore information, see https://www.researchgate.net/publication/340661588_Revision_de_la_biologia_y_metodos_de_control_de_la_hormiga_arriera_Atta_cephalotes_Hymenoptera_Myrmicinae.

11. We are often asked whether and for how long chemical fertilizers are still necessary after switching from a conventional system (which is dependent on external chemical inputs) to a syntropic agroforestry system?

The aim is to give up any chemical inputs after a few years and rely on the organic matter produced by the agroforestry system itself. As a first measure, chemical fertilizers (such as NPK) can be replaced by organic fertilizers (such as animal manure). If the farmer is not willing to stop using NPK immediately, a gradual transitional solution could look like as follows:

Year 2: 70% of the conventional NPK use

Year 3: 50% of the conventional NPK use

Year 4: 25% of the conventional NPK use

Year 5: no more NPK use

Glyphosate and fungicides have to be immediately dispensed with. According to information from SoilFoodWeb, one application of glyphosate destroys 80% of the fungi in the soil!

12. What is meant by pollarding?

Pollarding means the removal of the upper branches of a tree (the crown), which promotes the growth of a dense canopy of foliage and branches. Trees can be maintained like that at a certain height.

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