Food Security and Agroforestry from the Perspective of the SDGs: A Case Study of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea

Abstract

HIGHLIGHTS Agroforestry has emerged as a potential solution to chronic food shortages and forest devastation in North Korea. Agroforestry is positively associated with the security of food, nutrition, environment, and energy. SDGs 1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 8, 11, 12, 13, and 15 can be achieved directly through agroforestry. International aid projects dominate agroforestry project in North Korea. The promotion of agroforestry programmes for food security (SDG2) and land restoration (SDG15) are linked to the achievement of other SDGs. SUMMARY This study analyses the contribution of agroforestry to the achievement of SDGs based on the performance of agroforestry and North Korea's Voluntary National Review (VNR). Since the early 2000s, North Korea has promoted agroforestry and worked with the Swiss Agency for Development Cooperation (SDC), the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF), and the FAO to expand agroforestry projects. Agroforestry has contributed to the achievement of food security and land restoration in SDG2 and SDG15. The achievement of SDGs from individual agroforestry pilot projects since the early 2000s allows the assessment of agroforestry's contribution to SDGs. North Korea is likely to restore degraded forests by sustainable forest management (SDG15), which emphasises the need for new land cultivation in the VNR to strengthen food security (SDG2). Because agroforestry practices can simultaneously enhance food, nutrition, environmental, and energy security, agroforestry can further contribute to the achievement of other SDGs by discovering models that reflect local characteristics and inducing residents to participate through a strict evaluation of their effectiveness and the use of ‘sloping land’ management accompanied by the development of cultivation technologies suitable for mixed management with various trees and crops.