In one of his videos in Youtube, permaculture farmer Richard Perkins said that mankind has 6000 years of agriculture, but has mostly concentrated plant breeding efforts to annual plants. We mostly eat annuals. (Plants that grow and die in one year.)

But, he said, imagine what kind of perennial (plants that live multiple years) food plants we could have, if we invested similar 6000 years of effort to perfecting perennial food plants. Like fruit trees and nut trees and whatever.

The benefits of perennials being, you don't need to plat then anew every year. And because the plants and especially their root systems are not killed off at the end of every summer, the soil is not vulnerable to erosion, because the plant roots stay in the soil and hold it together.