Agroforestry as a Resource for Resilience in the Technological Era: The Case of Ukraine

Sergiusz Pimenow, Olena Pimenowa (), Lubov Moldavan, Piotr Prus () and Katarzyna Sadowska
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Sergiusz Pimenow: School of Business, VIZJA University, Okopowa 59, 01-043 Warszawa, Poland
Olena Pimenowa: School of Business, VIZJA University, Okopowa 59, 01-043 Warszawa, Poland
Lubov Moldavan: Department of Forms and Methods of Management in Agri-Food Complex of SI, Institute of Economics and Forecasting, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, 01011 Kyiv, Ukraine
Piotr Prus: Department of Agronomy and Food Processing, Faculty of Agriculture and Biotechnology, Bydgoszcz University of Science and Technology, Al. Prof. S. Kaliskiego 7, 85-796 Bydgoszcz, Poland
Katarzyna Sadowska: Department of Agronomy and Food Processing, Faculty of Agriculture and Biotechnology, Bydgoszcz University of Science and Technology, Al. Prof. S. Kaliskiego 7, 85-796 Bydgoszcz, Poland

Resources, 2025, vol. 14, issue 10, 1-29

Abstract: Climate change is intensifying droughts, heatwaves, dust storms, and rainfall variability across Eastern Europe, undermining yields and soil stability. In Ukraine, decades of underinvestment and wartime damage have led to widespread degradation of field shelterbelts, while the adoption of agroforestry remains constrained by tenure ambiguity, fragmented responsibilities, and limited access to finance. This study develops a policy-and-technology framework to restore agroforestry at scale under severe fiscal and institutional constraints. We apply a three-stage approach: (i) a national baseline (post-1991 legislation, statistics) to diagnose the biophysical and legal drivers of shelterbelt decline, including wartime damage; (ii) a comparative synthesis of international support models (governance, incentives, finance); and (iii) an assessment of transferability of digital monitoring, reporting, and verification (MRV) tools to Ukraine. We find that eliminating tenure ambiguities, introducing targeted cost sharing, and enabling access to payments for ecosystem services and voluntary carbon markets can unlock financing at scale. A digital MRV stack—Earth observation, UAV/LiDAR, IoT sensors, and AI—can verify tree establishment and survival, quantify biomass and carbon increments, and document eligibility for performance-based incentives while lowering transaction costs relative to field-only surveys. The resulting sequenced policy package provides an actionable pathway for policymakers and donors to finance, monitor, and scale shelterbelt restoration in Ukraine and in similar resource-constrained settings.

Keywords: agroforestry; shelterbelts; Earth observation; UAV/LiDAR; AI; MRV; payments for ecosystem services; carbon finance; sustainable development (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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