Agroforestry’s role in an energy transformation for human and planetary health: bioenergy and climate change

When agroforestry was ten years old as formal term, the Brundtland report1 on Sustainable Development reviewed many of the aspects that are still part of the current discussions – but it did not have the ‘global climate change’ issue on its agenda yet. Energy was amply discussed, however, and there the issue of carbon emissions was getting attention. Remarkably soon after that report, in 1992, the Rio conventions put climate change, biodiversity and desertification (land degradation) at the same level of priority and global commitments were made. It has taken the next 25 years to come to grips with implementation modalities and reframe the commitments as the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of 2015, that presented access to energy, human health, climate change and integrity of terrestrial ecosystems at the same level as food, water, jobs and income (Figure 13.3).