For the practice of agroforestry to yield its full potential, it needs to bring health and nutrition to the fore. The figure presents a simple conceptual framework of agroforestry, health, and nutrition linkages that focuses on five pathways between agroforestry and health, dubbed the MINER pathways: M-medicinal plant conservation, domestication, and propagation; I-income earned and inputs saved through improvements in the farm resource base and products for sale; N-nutritious agroforestry foods, including fruits and leaves; E-changes in ecosystem structure and function that affect disease risk and transmission; and R-responses of agroforestry priorities and program design to changes in farmers’ circumstances resulting from health and nutrition problems. The rest of this brief briefly discusses the five MINER pathways.
understanding the links between agriculture and health
International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI)