Benefits associated with traditional livestock systems in family sheep farms in the Chiloé Province, Chile

The inclusion of trees in pastures have emerged in recent years due to the benefits they generate towards livestock ecosystems. In the province of Chiloé, Chile, family farmers still maintain different designs that integrate the tree component and grasslands. The objective of this papper is to identify designs that integrate forestry components in livestock in the Chiloé Province, Los Lagos Region, Chile, to know the functionality attributed to them by family sheep farmers, and to verify if the participation of farmers in agroecological networks influences their perception of the benefits of silvopastoral systems (SSP). The present work identified 5 types of traditional SSP, and 8 benefits were associated with them by sheep farmers. The forest patch system is the most widespread in farms. Sheep farms under agroecological management have had greater adoption of forest patch SSP in relation to those that are not agroecological. Shade is the benefit most cited by ranchers and native species predominate in their designs.