Agroforestry integrates woody perennials with arable crops, livestock, or fodder in the same piece of land, promoting the more efficient utilization of resources as compared to monocropping via the structural and functional diversification of components. This integration of trees provides various soil-related ecological services such as fertility enhancements and improvements in soil physical, biological, and chemical properties, along with food, wood, and fodder. By providing a particular habitat, refugia for epigenic organisms, microclimate heterogeneity, buffering action, soil moisture, and humidity, agroforestry can enhance biodiversity more than monocropping. Various studies confirmed the internal restoration potential of agroforestry. Agroforestry reduces runoff, intercepts rainfall, and binds soil particles together, helping in erosion control. This trade-off between various non-cash ecological services and crop production is not a serious constraint in the integration of trees on the farmland and also provides other important co-benefits for practitioners. Tree-based systems increase livelihoods, yields, and resilience in agriculture, thereby ensuring nutrition and food security. Agroforestry can be a cost-effective and climate-smart farming practice, which will help to cope with the climate-related extremities of dryland areas cultivated by smallholders through diversifying food, improving and protecting soil, and reducing wind erosion. This review highlighted the role of agroforestry in soil improvements, microclimate amelioration, and improvements in productivity through agroforestry, particularly in semi-arid and degraded areas under careful consideration of management practices.

No abstract

A combined preparation of SO2 and recovery of solid products was investigated as a hazard-free method to use coke as a reducer to treat electrolytic manganese residue (EMR) at high temperature. In this study, the response surface prediction and thermodynamic analysis of the high-temperature calcination of EMR were evaluated. In addition, the effects of mole ratio of EMR to coke and temperature on the gas–solid phase and the feasibility of calcined solid products as cement raw materials were also studied. The results showed that the release of sulfur from EMR mainly depends on the mole ratio of EMR to coke and temperature. The best condition for preparing SO2 was EMR calcined for 60 min at 1000 °C and the molar ratio of C:CaSO4 = 0.78:1. At this time, the volume fraction of SO2 reached 7.6%, which meets the requirements for preparing sulfuric acid with SO2. Under this condition, the sulfur in desulfurization manganese residue (DMR) was reduced to 0.38%, and DMR was used as cement raw material to prepare cement. The cement prepared by adding 10% DMR meets the national standard GB175. The method realized the recovery of sulfur in EMR and calcined solid products and promoted the resource utilization of EMR.