Why an edible forest garden?

Consider, if you will, the fact that natural world ecosystems sustain every life-supporting function on the planet, including climate regulation, water filtration, soil formation, food, fibers, medicines, and so on.  All that and yet these ecosystems are essentially just combinations of biotic and abiotic components.  They are life, as we know it, which sustains, builds upon, and propagates further life in a cycle of renewal, through an elaborate dance of successional state changes in geologic step with changing environments.  

Basically, these combinations of biotic and abiotic components function in a closed-loop manner (aside from solar energy and cosmic radiation) to recycle the elements that make possible biotic existence in any form.  An ecosystem works because all the applicable abiotic elements are present, and all the biotic components act paradoxically to bind the system together.  Moreover, with ongoing environmental dynamics, biotic disruptions, and mutations, successional ecosystem state changes are ongoing more or less reciprocally.  

Through such ongoing successional ecosystem state changes of varying degrees, Earth's natural ecosystems have evolved over billions of years to include our own existence.  Just how long our life form exists depends on the extent and progress of further biotic and abiotic disruptions, in which, though we don't have a controlling role, we do have a consequential role.  If we consider the question of ecosystem states, in terms of what it is to sustain human existence, then it means preserving and fostering Earth's natural ecosystems, to the extent possible, that allow our habitation—everything else is undeniably secondary.  

Pertinent to higher life forms, like ourselves, the two key measures of ecosystem states are sustainable long term productivity and relative stability.  Productivity builds up over time as the diversity of the biotic community builds to exploit all the ecological niches (in time, space, and kind).  That is, greater biodiversity leads to greater primary productivity through better coverage of habitat heterogeneity by the broader range of species traits in a more diverse community.  The second key measure (i.e. relative stability) is dependent on the overall balance of ecological processes in minimizing ecosystem state shifts to background evolutionary changes, as much as possible.  Ecological processes are the basis for self-maintenance in an ecosystem, and involve both biotic interactions with each other and with abiotic components.  Examples of ecological processes are competition, predation, parasitism, various forms of symbiosis (e.g. mutualism, facilitation), and so on.  The more balanced, on the whole, the dynamic, opposing attributes are, the more stable the system will be.  

It goes without saying that our species plays a major role in ecosystem disruptive practices, and that such are accelerating successional ecosystem state changes to our detriment.  Among the most severe of our practices, and the most exacerbated by our economic paradigm, are our excessive use of fossil fuels, and our conventional agriculture with its extensive monocultures and agrochemicals.  Yet these practices are two of the most easily alleviated with paradigm shifts in how we provision ourselves.  

Conventional agriculture, together with its reliance on fossil fuels, is obviously the very antithesis of the natural ecosystems that sustain our existence.  So, why not a paradigm shift to many more people producing their own basic needs (food, fuel, fiber, fodder, fertilizer, "farmaceuticals", etc.) as much as possible, and doing so in a manner that mimics natural ecosystem structures.  Considering just food, natural, whole, mostly raw, foods would help considerably in restoring our natural health (conventional agriculture, processing, and cooking decrease or destroy many essential nutrients and phytochemicals).  

Whether one has only a small yard, or more arable land, a meaningful step in restoring and fostering our life sustaining natural ecosystems is what is termed an "edible forest garden".  That is, a perennial polyculture of multipurpose plants that are self-renewing, self-fertilizing, and for the most part self-maintaining.  The term "multipurpose plants" means plants that each fulfill one or more ecological considerations, such as nitrogen fixers, dynamic accumulators, food and shelter for beneficial organisms (e.g. birds, insects, microbes), aromatic pest confusers, and so on.  The goal in an edible forest garden is not just provisioning ourselves, but also increasing biodiversity and working at balancing ecological processes.  Forest gardens mimic forest ecosystems—those natural perennial polycultures once found throughout the world's humid climates.  

Just fostering more native plant life, in an effort to promote more biodiversity through more polycultures, would be a meaningful step in the right direction.    Surely there is no more necessary, or rewarding, endeavor than trying to foster the gardens of life that sustain or very existence.