West Timor integrated timber-forage-livestock agroforestry (scoping study)

• Department of Primary Industries, Fisheries and Mines, Australia
• Assessment Institute for Agricultural Technology (NTT), Indonesia
• Forest Research and Development Agency, Indonesia

In eastern Indonesia 80% of the population lives below the poverty line, subsisting on cropping, livestock and forestry activities. Agroforestry, with the potential to improve dry-season fodder availability and to provide tree-based incomes during drought, offers smallholders a significant opportunity to increase their incomes. This could be further improved by integration of high-value timber species along with more productive forage trees and grasses. This scoping study reviewed previous agroforestry, forage and livestock projects in eastern Indonesia. It then identified strategies for developing more acceptable systems, proposed methods for their implementation, and provided an assessment and analysis of the constraints to adoption of research results.

The research team undertook a literature review and also made a visit to West Timor. They drew up the following recommendations for further research:
Conduct a socioeconomic survey to define the most suitable Timber-Forage-Livestock Agroforestry (TFLA) combinations for particular types of farmers. This survey should establish farmer typologies and identify the key decision drivers for each category of farmer. This approach will improve efficiency and target scaling-up efforts. This survey should also identify the communities' social capital and identify its role in partnerships/collaborations.
Conduct an impartial evaluation of major TFLA systems, including morphological information of the species within those systems.
Establish and conduct trials on candidate agroforestry species appropriate to farmers' needs and capable of yielding a commercial product.
Conduct Rapid Market Appraisals (RMAs) to provide an overview of market strengths and weaknesses and identify potential opportunities.
Conduct participatory mapping activities to define boundaries based on the acceptable land tenure system. This activity should include all the stakeholders, government, non-government and farmer communities.
Conduct a management audit of the farming sphere to determine the lines of authority and the strengths and weaknesses of the relationships. The audit will establish who and where the power brokers are, identify outstanding challenges arising from the current decentralisation process in government departments. The audit should also establish intraorganisational strengths and weakness that pertain to the TFLA process.
Combine the findings of the RMAs, socio-economic analysis and evaluation of the major systems to formulate a training needs analysis. The analysis should furnish the project with information on farmers' needs as well as government needs so that appropriate training and awareness can be instigated.

The team also noted that strengthening Indonesian-Australian partnerships would lead to an improved capacity to develop and implement targeted research and extension programs. Researchers would develop a better understanding of how smallholder groups and agribusinesses are run. Focus group discussions, workshops and publications of research findings would enhance public recognition and professional standing of researchers and the institutions involved. These activities would assist the Indonesian collaborating organisations and their staff in developing project design, management, and facilitation skills.