Tree Growing on Farms in Northeast Luzon (The Philippines): Smallholders’ Motivations and Other Determinants for Adopting Agroforestry Systems - Smallholder Tree Growing for Rural Development and Environmental Services - page 88

Adoption studies have been performed to find out what factors explain tree
growing patterns in areas under study. Then, the question evolves whether we can
distinguish general patterns of tree integration that have worldwide applicability,
and if not, if we can understand what causes these relationships to differ. As these
studies concern different agroforestry or tree-based systems, the differences in rela-
tions found may be contributable to this. In most studies the age of the household
head was found to be positively related to agroforestry adoption (e.g. Mercer 2004).
In this study, the expected positive relation is explained by reasoning that older-
aged farmers grow trees as a pension provision and value trees for their limited
labor requirements (compared to seasonal crops). Moreover, the trees or fruits are
often harvested by buyers, implying the elderly are still able to make independent
transactions even if their physical condition may not allow them to engage in too
straining activities. Older farmers are also less cash-oriented since their lifestyle
does not require large amounts of cash, for example, to pay their children's educa-
tion. In stead, “leaving something behind for one's children” is rather an important
motive for establishing a timber plantation, assisting offspring in meeting their
future wood needs.
Yet, there are exceptions in the literature with studies showing a different rela-
tionship between age and tree growing. For example, Thangata and Alavalapati
(2003) report that younger households in Malawi more often adopt mixed inter-
cropping of Gliricidia sepium with maize because of greater willingness to take
risks and thus be more open to venture into the unknown.
As in other studies, extension was found to relate positively to tree growing in
farm fields (Mercer 2004). Although the tree projects in the area were not utterly
successful (very low survival rates of seedlings dispersed), the free distribution of
seedlings and the information and technology dissemination campaigns have
increased the adoption rates. Similarly, households with greater land endowments
more often grow trees. This also corresponds to findings in the literature where
greater endowments imply more willingness by households to engage in new, and
therefore insecure, farming activities. Moreover, households in this study are only
willing to devote land to long-term crops after having set aside sufficient land for
growing short-term commercial crops to fulfill immediate cash needs. Large
farms allow households to produce both seasonal and tree crops for diversifica-
tion, subsistence use and market sale. Surprisingly tree growing is positively
related with households having no or limited capital available, given the estab-
lishment of a tree plantation usually requires high investment. The latter is par-
ticularly true for fruit trees, however, farmers regularly refer to freely distributed
fruit-tree seedlings within the framework of various promotional programs as
source of planting material. Moreover, they mention low investment needs for
timber plantations.
In this study, the time spent on non-farm labor is positively related to tree
growing. Tree production is generally perceived as less labor intensive, and thus
combining better with non-farming activities, compared to seasonal crop produc-
tion. In most literature, the total household labor is positively related to tree adop-
tion (Pattanayak et al. 2003). However, in a study on urban wage labor in Pakistan,