Planting trees on North Holland farmland: “This food forest has to yield something”

For Anna Kuiper from Hensbroek, agroforestry no longer holds any secrets. Two and a half years ago she started the construction of an agricultural food forest in Hensbroek, the first in all of North Holland. ‘And that is not a romantic food grove with a few apple trees,’ she emphasizes on the phone. “I’m a farmer, and this food forest has to yield something.”

For two years, she and the researchers of the sustainable knowledge institute Louis Bolk researched the right proportions, combinations and species. For example, Kuipers’ forest will soon consist of seven layers: including tall trees, low trees, shrubs, herbs and fungi. Coming winter, the edible species will go into the ground. Kuiper chose, among other things, walnuts, hazelnuts, black currants, sumac and bamboo and honey berries.

A food forest is a form of agroforestry. In agroforestry, woody plants, such as trees and shrubs, are combined with arable land or grassland. For example, a farmer can choose to plant a walnut tree between the cauliflowers, or to let the cows graze between the trees.

We don’t see this very often in the Netherlands. Farmers often think that trees are in the way. They give shade to the crops and it becomes a lot more complicated to drive the tractor between the trees.

Nevertheless, various studies show that these trees have many ecological benefits. For example, sheep, cows and goats can seek shade, less wind blows over the crops and the trees provide an enormous increase in biodiversity.

Although the province of Noord-Holland was previously skeptical about this method of agriculture, they will be working on it more actively in the near future. For example, the province is making a plot of 24 hectares of land available to farmers who want to get started with agroforestry. Interested parties can respond until today, and the farmer with the best plan can cultivate the land for twelve years.

Pioneering

Kuiper is the first farmer in North Holland to get so actively involved in agroforestry. On the one hand that is nice, she says, because ‘now I really develop my own vision’, but she has also run into quite a few bureaucratic walls in recent years.

The municipality of Dijk en Waard did not know what to do with it for the first year. Planting trees on farmland? Is that allowed in the vast North Holland landscape? It took officials a year to find out which permits Kuiper needed. In the end it turned out that she was allowed to start without a permit.

In North Holland, agroforestry does not receive as much attention as in other provinces, says Waas Thissen, researcher at the Louis Bolk Institute Institute (a knowledge institute for sustainable agriculture, food and health). “North Holland does have agroforestry on the agenda, but more as part of a broader approach. In other provinces, such as North Brabant and Gelderland, they are already a little further along with agroforestry.”

This is mainly due to what we call the ‘cultural-historical landscape’, says Theo Spek, professor of landscape history in Groningen. “About 80 percent of the land in North Holland consists of peat soil, which has traditionally been open and wide.”

Residents have bonded with this landscape, says Spek. “They grow up with it, are used to the openness and are attached to the vastness. It can then be very drastic to suddenly plant it full,” says the professor.

Moreover, North Holland also has many meadow bird areas, where you are not allowed to plant trees just like that. Rightly so, says Kuiper. “Those birds need meadows, not trees. And that area is unique, so we have to protect it.”

Soil resilience

But trees, says Thissen, do have a very positive effect on the major challenges of our time, such as climate, nitrogen and water quality. Just think of all the insects that come back with it, all the fungi in the soil, the birds and the shade.”

But the big question is: how do you get farmers to do so? Because, explains Thissen, ‘Dutch farmers are very good at producing a lot, and trees don’t seem like a good investment at first glance.’

But, says Thissen, you can also look at it differently. “Trees are an economic investment in the resilience of the soil. Nowadays, that soil must be able to withstand all kinds of changes, such as extreme weather conditions. Trees make that soil stronger and a strong soil also improves the crop. And that in turn is good for the production.”

And what about those North Holland meadow landscapes? Be careful, Spek warns, planting those trees might destroy the historic landscape. But, if you change something, you also add quality. “And a landscape is not a museum.”