Tropical forest architectural analysis as applied to agroforests in the humid tropics: The example of traditional village-agroforests in West Java

The features of the tropical forest are found in Sundanese village-gardens. They are rich in plant species, a layered structure of the vegetation, existing patchwork and succession of sylvigenetic phases (from pioneer to homeostatic phase). These traditional agroforests reflect the sourrounding forest ecosystem, simplifying the features. The architectural method of tropical forest analysis is applied to Sundanese agroforests, but here each plant is both a structural element of the ecosystem and a producing element of the agricultural landscape. Such structural analysis could represent one aspect of an integral analysis of complex agroforestry systems.