Abstract
Concerns about the negative impacts of productivist agriculture have led to the emergence of two forms of ecological modernisation of agriculture. The first, efficiency-substitution agriculture, aims to improve input use efficiency and to minimise environmental impacts of modern farming systems. It is currently the dominant modernisation pathway. The second, biodiversity-based agriculture, aims to develop ecosystem services provided by biological diversity. It currently exists only as a niche. Here we review challenges of implementing biodiversity-based agriculture: managing, at the local level, a consistent transition within and among farming systems, supply chains and natural resource management. We discuss the strengths and weaknesses of existing conceptual frameworks developed to analyse farming, social-ecological and socio-technical systems. Then we present an integrative framework tailored for structuring analysis of agriculture from the perspective of developing a territorial biodiversity-based agriculture. In addition, we propose a participatory methodology to design this agroecological transition at the local level. This design methodology was developed to support a multi-stakeholder arena in analysing the current situation, identifying future exogenous changes and designing (1) targeted territorial biodiversity-based agriculture, (2) the pathway of the transition and (3) the required adaptive governance structures and management strategies. We conclude by analysing key challenges of designing such a complex transition, developing multi-actor and multi-domain approaches based on a combination of scientific and experiential knowledge and on building suitable boundary objects (computer-based and conceptual models, indicators, etc.) to assess innovative systems designed by stakeholders.
Highlights
Considering the key challenges of the agroecological transition presented above, we identified three conceptual frameworks that consider the organisational levels and domains in which the necessary changes must occur: (i) the farming system framework, to structure analysis of the organisation and dynamics of farm production systems; (ii) the social-ecological system framework, to analyse natural resource management; and (iii) the sociotechnical system framework, to analyse the dynamics of agricultural innovations
The conceptual framework presented above leads us to consider the development of territorial biodiversity-based agriculture as an innovation process, based on interactions between actors involved in the management of farms, supply chains and natural resources at the local level
Its attractiveness and promise increases as social pressure increases for sustainable management of the environment and agriculture. It is challenging in intensive production areas, such as intensive lowlands, mixed crop-livestock and livestock zones in developed countries and intensive agricultural zones in developing countries where agricultural development has been driven by the green revolution. It requires simultaneous implementation of agronomic innovations that enable the development of diversified farming systems and new modes of coordination between actors in supply chains and for natural resource management
Summary
Challenges of the transition to biodiversity-based agriculture and its design 3. An integrative conceptual framework for analysing agricultural systems at the local level 3.1. Strengths and weaknesses of three existing conceptual frameworks 3.2.1. Farming systems and associated innovation systems 3.2.2. An integrative analytical framework of the local agriculture 3.3. A local polycentric system of actors for promoting biodiversity-based agriculture 4. A methodological framework for designing the agroecological transition of agriculture
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