Farming with Nature: The Science and Practice of Ecoagriculture

By Sara J. Scherr and Jeffrey A. McNeely

A growing body of evidence shows that agricultural landscapes can be managed not only to produce crops but also to support biodiversity and promote ecosystem health. Innovative farmers and scientists, as well as indigenous land managers, are developing diverse types of “ecoagriculture” landscapes to generate cobenefits for production, biodiversity, and local people.

Farming with Nature offers a synthesis of the state of knowledge of key topics in ecoagriculture. The book is a unique collaboration among renowned agricultural and ecological scientists, leading field conservationists, and farm and community leaders to synthesize knowledge and experience across sectors. The book examines:

• the knowledge base for ecoagriculture as well as barriers, gaps, and opportunities for developing improved ecoagriculture systems
• what we have learned about managing landscapes to achieve multiple objectives at a landscape scale
• existing incentives for farmers, other land managers, and investors to develop and invest in ecoagriculture systems
• pathways to develop, implement, manage, and scale up successful ecoagriculture

Insights are drawn from around the world, in tropical, Mediterranean, and temperate environments, from farming systems that range from highly commercialized to semi-subsistence. Farming with Nature is an important new work that can serve as a foundation document for planners, farm organizations, researchers, project developers, and policy makers to develop strategies for promoting and sustaining ecoagriculture landscapes. Replete with valuable best practice guidelines, it is a critical resource for both practitioners and researchers in
the field.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Island Press
• Release date: Sep 26, 2012
• ISBN: 9781597267571

Book preview

McNeely.

Preface

We first coined the term ecoagriculture back in 2001, to refer to landscapes that achieve the joint objectives of sustainable agricultural production, biodi versity and ecosystem conservation, and rural livelihoods (McNeely and Scherr 2001). At that time, we had little premonition about how the concept was going to develop. Our more complete discussion on the topic was published by Island Press (McNeely and Scherr 2003) and generated considerable interest, even controversy in some quarters. But more important, it led to significant follow-up activities, including the International Ecoagriculture Conference and Practitioners’ Fair held in Nairobi in September 2004.

That meeting brought together over 200 of the world’s leading innovators in ecoagriculture, including community leaders, farmers, conservationists, policymakers, researchers, technical advisers, and land-use planners. Our intention was to assess the state of ecoagriculture knowledge and practice and to develop a strategy to promote and support ecoagriculture development around the world. A conference proceedings report was published (Nairobi Declaration 2004), along with the Nairobi Declaration.

One outcome of the Nairobi Conference was a renewed and strengthened confidence that ecoagriculture was sufficiently mature to justify the establishment of an institutional structure to promote it further. A new nongovernmental organization known as Ecoagriculture Partners was legally incorporated in 2005 and is now engaged in activities in various parts of the world to support ecoagriculture innovators (www.ecoagriculture.org). But it was also clear that the concept of ecoagriculture needed further development, which led to the preparation of this book.

We asked many of the participants in the Nairobi conference to do additional work on their contributions, commissioned additional papers where we felt that ecoagriculture-related issues had not yet received appropriate attention, and drew on other ecoagriculture-related analyses and experiences to compile the work that you will find on the following pages.

In publishing this book, we hope to establish a baseline as of 2006 about the current science and practice of ecoagriculture, while recognizing that in a time of dynamic social, economic, ecological, and political change, the concepts will inevitably evolve. We anticipate that ecoagriculture innovators will adopt the concept of adaptive management put forward by Hans Herren and his colleagues in this book, learning lessons in a structured way and applying those lessons to new challenges.

Sara J. Scherr

Jeffrey A. McNeely

May 2007

References

McNeely, J.A. and S. Scherr. 2001. Common Ground, Common Future: How Ecoagriculture Can Help Feed the World and Save Wild Biodiversity. A Joint Publication with IUCN and Future Harvest. IUCN, Washington, DC.

McNeely, J.A. and S. Scherr. 2003. Ecoagriculture: Strategies to Feed the World and Save Wild Biodiversity. Island Press, Washington, DC.

Nairobi Declaration on Ecoagriculture. 2004. International Ecoagriculture Conference, Nairobi, Kenya. September 27–ctober 10, 2004. http://www.ecoagriculturepartners.org/whatis/nairobideclaration.htm.

Chapter 1

The Challenge for Ecoagriculture

Sara J. Scherr and Jeffrey A. McNeely

Agriculture dominates land and water use like no other human enterprise, with landscapes providing critical products for human sustenance. Yet because of their predominance, agricultural landscapes must also support wild species biodiversity and ecosystem services (MA 2005). Moreover global demand for associated agricultural products is projected to rise at least 50% over the next two decades (UN Millennium Project 2005). These conflicting trends are prompting farmers and policymakers alike to identify innovative ways of reconciling agricultural production and production-dependent rural livelihoods with healthy ecosystems (Acharya 2006; Breckwoldt 1983; Jackson and Jackson 2002; McNeely and Scherr 2003). Unfortunately, the dominant national and global institutions for policy, business, conservation, agriculture, and research have been shaped largely by mental models that assume, and even require, segregated approaches.

During the 21st century, a continuing and growing demand for agricultural and wild products and ecosystem services will require farmers, agricultural planners, and conservationists to reconsider the relationship between production agriculture and conservation of biodiversity.

This chapter introduces a new paradigm, ecoagriculture, defined as integrated conservation–agriculture landscapes where biodiversity conservation is an explicit objective of agriculture and rural development, and the latter are explicitly considered in shaping conservation strategies. The rationale for scaled-up action to promote ecoagriculture landscapes, and the defining characteristics of this new approach, are developed further in this book.

The Current Ecological Footprint of Agriculture

Nearly a third of the world’s landmass has agricultural crops or planted pastures as a dominant land use (accounting for at least 30% of total area), which has a profound ecological effect on the whole landscape. Another quarter of land is under extensive livestock grazing, and approximately 1 to 5% of food is produced in natural forests (Wood et al. 2000). The human footprint analysis of Sanderson et al. (2002) estimated that 80 to 90% of lands habitable by humans are affected by some form of productive activity. More than 1.1 billion people—most directly dependent on agriculture—live within the world’s 25 biodiversity hotspots, areas described by ecologists as the most threatened species-rich regions on Earth (Cincotta and Engelman 2000; Myers et al. 2002).

Both extensive lower-yield and intensive higher-yield agricultural systems have profound ecological effects. Millions of hectares of forests and natural vegetation have been cleared for agricultural use and for harvesting timber and wood fuels. Half the world’s wetlands have already been converted for production (MA 2005). Overuse and mismanagement of pesticides poison water and soil, while nitrogen and phosphorus inputs and livestock wastes have become major pollutants of surface water, aquifers, and coastal wetlands and outlets. Between 1890 and 1990, the total amount of biologically available nitrogen created by human activities increased ninefold, and human activity now produces more nitrogen than all natural processes combined (MA 2005). Agrochemical nutrient pollution from the US farm belt is the principal cause of the biological dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico 1500 km (932 miles) away (Rabalais et al. 2002), and similar impacts are felt in the Baltic Sea and along the coasts of China and India.Water supplies and quality for major urban centers and industries are threatened by poor soil and vegetation management in agricultural systems in their watersheds.

Some introduced agricultural crops, livestock, trees, and fish have become invasive species, spreading beyond their planned range and displacing native species (Matthews and Brand 2004; Mooney et al. 2005). Additionally, there are concerns about genetically modified crop varieties potentially becoming invasive species or hybridizing with wild relatives and leading to a loss of biodiversity (Omamo and von Grebmer 2005; NRC 2002; Oksman-Caldentey and Barz 2002). On a broad scale, agriculture fragments the landscape, breaking formerly contiguous wild species populations into smaller units more vulnerable to extirpation. Farmers have generally sought to eliminate wild species from their lands, seeking to reduce the negative effects of pests, predators, and weeds. However, these practices often harm beneficial wild species like pollinators (Buchmann and Nabhan 1996), insect-eating birds, and other species that prey on agricultural pests.

The threats posed by agriculture have been a key motivator for conservationists to develop protected areas where agricultural activity is officially excluded or seriously limited. Nonetheless, the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA) Hassan et al. 2005 calculated that more than 45% of 100,000 protected areas had more than 30% of their land area under crops. In light of political and economic realities, many recently designated protected areas in several African countries explicitly permit biodiversity-friendly agriculture, usually in areas considered category V or VI in the World Conservation Union (IUCN) system (IUCN 1994).

As populations and economies grow around the world, meeting increased demand for both agricultural products and ecosystem services will require that many agricultural landscapes be managed through ecoagriculture approaches.

Meeting Increased Demand for Agricultural Products in Ecologically Sensitive Areas

Human population is expected to grow from a little over 6 billion today to over 8 billion by 2030, an increase of about a third, with another 2 to 4 billion added in the subsequent 50 years (Cohen 2003). Food demand is expected to grow even faster as a result of growing urbanization and rising incomes (OECD-FAO 2005), and assuming hunger is reduced among the over 800 million people currently undernourished (UN Millennium Project 2005). More land will surely be required to grow crops, even more so if biofuels become a greater contributor to energy needs. In Africa alone, land in cereal production is expected to increase from 102.9 million ha in 1997 to 135.3 million ha in 2025 (Rosegrant et al. 2005). Global consumption of livestock products is predicted to rise from 303 million metric tons (t) in 1993 to 654 million t in 2020 (Delgado et al. 1999).

Tilman (2001) predicts that feeding a population of 9 billion using current methods would mean converting another 1 billion ha of natural habitat to agriculture, primarily in the developing world, together with a doubling or tripling of nitrogen and phosphorous inputs, a twofold increase in water consumption, and a threefold increase in pesticide use. A serious limiting factor will be water, because 70% of the freshwater used by people is already devoted to agriculture (Rosegrant et al. 2002). Scenarios prepared by the MA thus suggest that agricultural production in the future will likely have to focus more explicitly on ecologically sensitive management systems (Carpenter et al. 2005).

There are four major reasons why meeting increased demand for agricultural products will often require ecoagriculture systems (Scherr and McNeely 2007).

Most of the Increased Food Production Will Be Grown Domestically and in More Marginal or Fragile Lands

An estimated 90% of food products consumed within most countries will be produced by those same countries. Total agricultural exports increased sharply between 1961 and 2000, but exports still accounted for only about 10% of production (McCalla 2000). A reduction in developed world subsidies and growing demand from China and India could further spur export agriculture in the developing world (Runge et al. 2003). The general pattern of increased trade with most production for domestic markets seems unlikely to change over the next few decades, even though continuing globalization of agriculture will influence product mix and prices. Changes will depend not only on productivity and quality but also on shifts in relative costs for international shipping and internal overland transport. In addition the distances that need to be covered between major population centers and ports and agricultural regions populations fluctuate, and new centers emerge. Interior populations in large countries will continue to be fed mainly by local and national producers.

The declining rate of growth in agricultural yields in places like the Punjab in India, the US Midwest, and the Mekong Delta indicate that most new production may not come from the areas of highest current grain productivity, and some areas are already experiencing declining yields or productivity of inputs (Rosegrant et al. 2002).Although yields in these places may increase through greater input use, plant breeding, biotechnology, and improved irrigation efficiency (Runge et al. 2003), economic and environmental costs are likely to be high.

Lower-productivity lands (drylands, hillsides, rainforests) now account for more than two-thirds of total agricultural land in developing countries (Nelson et al. 1997). Because current yields are relatively low, technologies that already exist can double or even triple current yields, provided adequate investments, market developments, and attention are given to good ecosystem husbandry (UN Millennium Project 2005). Extensive grain monocultures are not likely to be environmentally sustainable in such areas, calling for more diversified land-use approaches.Though the bulk of new production will come mainly from existing croplands, the most promising areas with significant new land for agriculture are in places like the forest and savanna zones of Brazil and Mozambique. These places are also the main remaining large reservoirs of natural habitat in the world.These habitats would be seriously damaged by simplified, high-external-input production systems, but an ecoagriculture approach could both provide a means to increase food production and retain the natural value of the landscape.

Wild Products Will Continue to Be Important for Local Food Supply and Livelihoods

People in low-income developing countries and subregions will continue to rely on harvesting wild species.Wild greens, spices, and flavorings enhance local diets, and many tree fruits and root crops serve to assuage preharvest hunger or provide famine foods when the economy or crops fail. Frogs, rodents, snails, edible insects, and other small creatures have long been an important part of the rural diet in virtually all parts of the world (Paoletti 2005). Bushmeat is the principal source of animal protein in humid West Africa and other forest regions, and efforts to replace these with domestic livestock have been disappointing. Fisheries are the main animal protein source of the poor worldwide. In Africa and many parts of Asia, more than 80% of medicines still come from wild sources. Gathered wood remains the main fuel for hundreds of millions of people, while forests and savannas provide critical fodder, soil nutrients, fencing, and other inputs for farming (McNeely and Scheer 2003). Achieving security in food and livelihood will therefore require the conservation of the ecosystems providing these wild foods and other products.

Agricultural Systems Will Need to Diversify to Adapt to Climate Change

Strategic planning for agricultural development increasingly focuses on adaptation of systems to climate change, anticipating rising temperatures and more extreme weather events. The US Department of Agriculture and the International Rice Research Institute have both concluded that with each 1°C increase in temperature during the growing season, the yields of rice, wheat, and maize drop by 10% (Brown 2004; Tan and Shibasaki 2003). Cash crops such as coffee and tea, requiring cooler environments, will also be affected, forcing farmers of these crops to move higher up the hills, clearing new lands as they climb, meaning that montane forests important for biodiversity are likely to come under increasing threat. Effective responses to climate change will require use of alternative seed varieties, modified management of soils and water, and new strategies for pest management as species of wild pests, their natural predators, and their life cycles change in response to climates. Increasing landscape-and farm-scale diversity is likely to be an important response for risk reduction (Diversitas 2002).

Agricultural Sustainability Will Require Investment in Ecosystem Management

The ability to meet food needs and economic demand for agricultural products will be constrained by widespread natural resource degradation that is already either reducing supply or increasing costs of production. Up to 50% of the globe’s agricultural land and 60% of ecosystem services are now affected to some degree by land or water degradation, with agricultural land use the chief cause (MA 2005; Pretty et al. 2006). Half the world’s rivers are seriously depleted and polluted, and 60% of the world’s 227 largest rivers have been fragmented by dams, many built to supply irrigation water. Up to 20% of irrigated land suffers from secondary salinization and waterlogging, induced by the buildup of salts in irrigation water (Wood et al. 2000).The food system will also have to confront the collapse in harvests of wild game and wild fisheries in many regions around the world due to overexploitation and habitat loss or pollution (Hassan et al. 2005). Considerable investments will be required to rehabilitate degraded resources and ecosystems upon which food supplies, particularly those of the rural poor, depend (UN Millennium Project 2005).

Meeting Increased Demand for Ecosystem Services

Many consider conservation of wild biodiversity (genes, species, and ecosystems) to be an ethical imperative. Conservation also supports ecological processes and functions that sustain and improve human well-being, known collectively as ecosystem services (Daily 1997). Ecosystem services can be divided into four categories: (1) provisioning services, providing food, timber, medicines, and other useful products; (2) regulating services, such as flood control and climate stabilization; (3) supporting services, such as pollination, soil formation, and water purification; and (4) cultural services, including aesthetic, spiritual, or recreational assets that provide both intangible and tangible benefits such as ecotourism attractions (Kremen and Ostfeld 2005). Provisioning has historically been seen as the highest-priority service provided by agricultural landscapes. But it is now recognized that even the bread baskets and rice bowls of the world also provide other ecosystem services, such as water supply and quality, or pest and disease control, that are critically important (Wood and Scherr 2000).

Agricultural Landscapes Provide Critical Habitat

The conservation community is moving toward an ecosystem approach to conserving biodiversity, in light of the dependence of protected areas on a supportive matrix of land and water use, and creation of biological corridors (CBD 2000). The international community has set a goal of having at least 10% of every habitat type under effective protection by 2015 (The Nature Conservancy 2004).This strategy, if successful, will protect many species and ecological communities. But some estimates suggest that more than half of all species exist principally outside protected areas, mostly in agricultural landscapes (Blann 2006). For example, conservation of wetlands within agricultural landscapes is critical for wild bird populations (Heimlich et al. 1998). Protecting such species requires initiatives by and with farmers. The concept of agriculture as ecological sacrifice areas is no longer valid in many regions because agricultural lands both perform services and provide essential habitat to many species. Thus the Convention of Biological Diversity agreed in 2002 to aim for 30% of agricultural lands worldwide to be managed to protect wild flora by 2010 (CBD 2002).

Agricultural Landscapes Provide Critical Watershed Functions

Many of the world’s most important watersheds are densely populated and farmed, and most others are landscape mosaics where crop, livestock, and forest production influence hydrological systems (Wood et al. 2000). In such regions, agriculture can be managed for critical watershed functions, such as maintaining water quality, regulating water flow, recharging underground aquifers, mitigating flood risks, moderating sediment flows, and sustaining freshwater species and ecosystems. This has led to the concept of green water—an understanding that terrestrial land, soil, and vegetation management have critical roles in the hydrological cycle (Penning de Vries et al. 2003). Effective management of green water means using water-conserving crop mixtures, managing soil and water (including irrigation), maintaining soils to facilitate rainfall infiltration, creating vegetation barriers to slow movement of water down slopes, ensuring year-round soil vegetative cover, and maintaining natural vegetation in riparian areas, wetlands, and other strategic areas of the watershed. Well-managed agricultural landscapes can also provide protection against extreme natural events. With increased water scarcity and more frequent extreme weather events predicted in coming decades, the capacity of agricultural systems to sustain watershed functions is likely to be a priority consideration in agricultural investment and management.

Agricultural Landscapes Maintain Green Space, Recreational Opportunities, Healthy Habitats, and Aesthetic Beauty in Human Settlements

With accelerating urbanization worldwide, the loss of natural habitats and natural features has become a central concern for planners and residents as well as for farmers operating in periurban areas. Agriculture can protect green spaces for aesthetic and recreational values and can help to finance the maintenance of green space for wildlife habitat and ecosystem services. Overall positive outcomes for human habitat and aesthetics require adequate management of crop and livestock wastes, air pollution (smoke, dust, odors), and polluting runoff.

Ecoagriculture: Integrating Production and Conservation at a Landscape Scale

The challenges described in this chapter are unlikely to be met by the solutions advocated most widely today: industrial agriculture, the Green Revolution, sustainable agriculture and natural resource management (with its important but limited focus on sustaining the resources underpinning production), or even agroecology or ecotechnology approaches Swaminathan (1994) (with their focus on the farmer’s field), although all of these have major elements to contribute. Approaches to biodiversity conservation also need to move beyond the wild biodiversity focus of strictly protected areas and the modest goals of integrated conservation and development projects. Rather, many regions need ecoagriculture—a fully integrated approach to agriculture, conservation, and rural livelihoods, within a landscape or ecosystem context.

Ecoagriculture explicitly recognizes the economic and ecological relationships and mutual interdependence among agriculture, biodiversity, and ecosystem services (Fig. 1.1). Effective ecoagriculture systems rely on maximizing ecological, economic and social synergies among them, and minimizing the conflicts.

The term landscape itself is functionally defined, depending upon the spatial units needed or managed by the group of stakeholders working together to achieve biodiversity, production, and livelihood goals. Ecoagriculture landscapes are land-use mosaics consisting of the following:

Natural areas (high-quality habitat niches to ensure ecosystem services that cannot be provided in areas under production), which are also managed to benefit agricultural livelihoods, either through positive synergies with productionor through providing other livelihood benefits such as firewood or clean water

e9781597267571_i0003.jpg

Figure 1.1. Links between the goals of ecoagriculture and ecosystem services (Buck et al. 2006)

Agricultural production areas (productive, profitable, and meeting food security, market, and livelihood needs), which are also configured and managed to provide a matrix with benign or positive ecological qualities for wild biodiversity and ecosystem services

Institutional mechanisms to coordinate initiatives to achieve production, conservation, and livelihood objectives at landscape, farm, and community scales, by exploiting synergies and managing trade-offs among them

The concept of ecoagriculture recognizes that agriculture-dependent rural communities are important (and often the principal) stewards of biodiversity and ecosystem services. Although protected natural areas are essential in ecoagriculture landscapes to ensure critical habitat for vulnerable species, maintain water sources, and provide cultural resources, these resources may often be owned or managed by local communities and farmers.

Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services in Ecoagriculture Landscapes

Conservation of biodiversity in ecoagriculture landscapes embraces all three elements of agricultural biodiversity defined by the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD): genetic diversity of domesticated crops, animals, fish, and trees; diversity of wild species on which agricultural production depends (such as wild pollinators, soil microorganisms, and predators of agricultural pests); and diversity of wild species and ecological communities that use agricultural landscapes as their habitat (CBD 2002).

Although wild biodiversity and ecosystem services are closely linked, they are not synonymous. A landscape with a high degree of wild biodiversity is likely to provide many ecosystem services. However, ecosystem services can also be provided by nonnative species, or by combinations of native and nonnative species in heavily managed settings such as permanent farms. Even where wild biodiversity has been significantly reduced to make way for food and fiber production, high levels of ecosystem services can still be provided through land management practices. On the other hand, managing an ecoagriculture landscape for ecosystem services does not automatically ensure that wild biodiversity will be protected adequately. Thus wild biodiversity and ecosystem services both require explicit consideration in ecoagriculture systems.

Ecoagriculture Approaches

Broadly, ecoagriculture landscapes rely on six basic strategies of resource management, three focused on the agricultural parts of the landscape and three on natural areas. In production areas, farmers can achieve intensification without simplification by increasing agricultural outputs and reducing costs in ways that enhance the habitat quality and ecosystem services. Successful techniques include:

Minimizing agricultural wastes and pollution

Managing resources in ways that conserve water, soils, and wild flora and fauna

Using crop, grass, and tree combinations to mimic the ecological structure and function of natural habitats

Farmers or other conservation managers protect and expand natural areas in ways that also provide benefits for adjacent farmers and communities by:

Minimizing or reversing conversion of natural areas

Protecting and expanding larger patches of high-quality natural habitat

Developing effective ecological networks and corridors (McNeely and Scherr 2003)

The relative area and spatial configuration of agricultural and natural components (as well as physical infrastructure and human settlements) are key landscape design issues (Forman 1995). The conservation of wild species sensitive to habitat disturbance, including some of those most endangered or rare globally, requires large, well-connected patches of natural habitat. But many wild species, including some that are threatened and endangered, can coexist in compatibly managed agricultural landscapes, even in high-yielding systems. Ecosystem services can also be considered under a wide range of land uses, under good management.

The outcomes of planning and negotiations among multiple stakeholders in any particular landscape will take diverse forms depending on the context of local cultures and philosophies of land management. Identifying and managing potential synergies and trade offs at different scales will be essential, and calls for new approaches to knowledge-sharing organization and research. Examples of ecoagriculture landscapes with documented joint benefits for agricultural production, biodiversity conservation, and rural livelihoods include the following.

KALINGA PROVINCE, PHILIPPINES

For centuries, the Kalinga indigenous peoples of the Philippines have supported themselves and conserved mountain biodiversity through integrated landscape management. Communities manage watersheds to ensure a continual supply of water to communal irrigation systems, and in recent years over 150 ha of integrated rice terraces (including fish and vegetable production) have been rehabilitated.They manage indigenous forests for sustainable harvest of wild animals for protein, leading to an 81% rate of intact forest in Kalinga Province (Gillis and Southey 2005).

TRANSBOUNDARY COMANAGEMENT IN COSTA RICA AND PANAMA

The Grandoca-Manzanillo National Wildlife Refuge on Costa Rica’s Caribbean coast connects with Panama’s San Pondsak National Wildlife Refuge. This 10,000 ha refuge is comanaged by local communities, nongovernmental organizations, and government agencies. Small farm agroecosystems are integral to regional biodiversity conservation. Over 300 farmers hold secure land titles in the refuge’s buffer zone. A regional small farmers’ cooperative (Smallholder Association of Talamanca) supports over 1500 small farmers, making it Central America’s largest-volume organic producer and exporter, generating 15 to 60% increases in small-farmer revenue. Conservation-based carbon offset schemes are being developed to provide additional revenue for stewardship-focused farming.

COMMUNITY DRYLAND RESTORATION IN RAJASTHAN, INDIA

For most of the past century, drought and environmental degradation severely impaired the livelihood security of local communities within Rajasthan’s Avari Basin. Twenty years ago, the Tarun Bharat Sangh, a voluntary organization based in Jaipur, India, initiated a community-led watershed restoration program. The program reinstated johads, a traditional indigenous technology for water harvesting. Johads are simple concave mud barriers, built across small, uphill river tributaries to collect water. As the water drains through the catchment area, johads encourage groundwater recharge and improve hillside forest growth while providing water for irrigation, wildlife, livestock, and domestic use. More than 5000 johads now serve over 1000 villages in the region and are coordinated by village councils. Landscape changes include restoration of the Avari River, which had not flowed since the 1940s, and the return of native bird populations (Narain et al. 2005).

Where Ecoagriculture Approaches Are Needed

Ecoagriculture approaches can be relevant to all agricultural landscapes, in light of their focus on improving landscape performance vis-à-vis three goals (agricultural production, biodiversity conservation, and livelihoods). Synergies may be most apparent, and trade-offs least difficult, in areas with less productive agricultural lands (where the opportunity costs of protecting or restoring habitats are lower), and in heterogeneous areas where farms are already interspersed with hills, forests, and abandoned farms (Jackson and Jackson 2002). Nonetheless, the need to reconcile increased agricultural productivity and livelihoods with effective conservation of biodiversity and ecosystem services is widely found in both high- and low-income countries. Ecoagriculture approaches offer opportunities for integrated action, at a lower overall cost, to achieve Millennium Development Goals for poverty, hunger, water and sanitation, and environmental sustainability (Rhodes and Scherr 2005). Ecoagriculture also provides a strategy for implementing national commitments to multilateral environmental conventions, including the CBD, the Framework Convention on Climate Change, Ramsar, and the Convention to Combat Desertification.

But it is important to consider where integrated versus segregated land use is likely to be advantageous, and the scale at which integration is desirable (Balmford et al. 2001; Green et al. 2005). For example, if most biodiversity is likely to be lost in the transition from pristine to extensive systems or if key species are very sensitive to fragmentation, then segregated systems might be indicated at a coarser grain. But if the transition from extensive to intensive agriculture will result in greater biodiversity loss, then low-intensity agriculture finely interspersed with natural areas may be most desirable.

Real costs are associated with the cross-sectoral planning and coordination and technical innovations needed to achieve impacts at a landscape scale. These must be considered in prioritizing private, public, and civic ecoagriculture investments. There are four top priorities:

Agricultural landscapes located in or around critical habitat areas for wild species of local, national, or international importance

Degraded agricultural landscapes where restored ecosystem services will be essential to achieve both agricultural and biological diversity

Agricultural landscapes that must also function to provide critical ecosystem services

Periurban agricultural systems, where careful management is required to protect ecological, wildlife, and human health

Geographic scale and location of such priority areas for ecoagriculture development strategies (as distinct from agriculture-led or conservation-led development) have not been assessed. Undertaking such analyses is a critical step to guide policy action.There will be diverse entry points for ecoagriculture sometimes led by farmers and investment keepers, sometimes by conservationists, and sometimes by rural development leaders or even consumers.

Book Objectives and Structure

Farmers, conservationists, researchers, leaders in rural development, entrepreneurs, and policymakers in many parts of the world have begun to develop and promote ecoagriculture. But adoption of ecoagriculture is essential on a much larger scale to achieve the Millennium Development Goals on hunger, poverty, and environmental sustainability in developing countries, and to sustain ecosystems in strong rural economies in industrialized countries. This book assesses the current state of ecoagriculture systems and practices and begins developing a strategy to promote and support ecoagriculture development throughout the world.

The audience for this book includes the full spectrum of stakeholder groups who are, and must be, engaged to organize and manage the various elements of an ecoagriculture landscape:

Land use planners, producer and conservation organizations, and resource managers responsible for conservation and production outcomes at a landscape scale

Scientists and other innovators who study how agroecosystems work and who generate improvements in agricultural production and conservation management

Agricultural and community enterprises, the food industry, other market players, and policymakers responsible for shaping the financial and livelihood incentives for land and resource management

Grassroots practitioners responsible for production and for conservation management at farm and community scales

Structure of This Book

The book is divided into three sections.

Agricultural Production. This section presents current knowledge about agricultural production systems that have benign or positive impacts on biodiversity and ecosystem services. Chapters address annual crops, perennial crops, and livestock, as well as associated species, such as wild pollinators and soil microorganisms, and how diversity of domesticated species interacts with overall biodiversity. The section identifies barriers, gaps, and opportunities for increasing sustainable agricultural production in ways compatible with biodiversity conservation.

Biodiversity and Ecosystem Management. This section presents what has been learned about managing landscapes to achieve biodiversity and ecosystem objectives within mixed production–conservation mosaics. Chapters examine ecosystem design principles for terrestrial and freshwater biodiversity conservation, watershed management, and describe new developments in adaptive management, research, and monitoring at the landscape scale.

Institutional Foundations for Ecoagriculture. This section focuses on community-to policy-level action across ecosystems and farming systems to develop, implement, manage, and scale up successful ecoagriculture approaches. Chapters examine the central role of rural community leadership in developing ecoagriculture landscapes and overcoming barriers. Institutional approaches that effectively support communities and engage key stakeholders in planning and implementation are described, as are research approaches to support ecoagriculture development. Chapters also discuss new market-based approaches to increasing the financial viability of ecoagriculture, and policy actions needed to benefit livelihoods and ecosystems at a meaningful scale.

The ecoagriculture innovators whose work is reviewed and synthesized in this book come from strikingly diverse backgrounds, cultures, professions, and ecosystems. Their perspectives and philosophies are the result of many years of experience and consideration. But ecoagriculture is an emerging challenge that is still in the early years of its development; its implementation is an evolving and dynamic process. The pathways to ecoagriculture that are described may not only differ but may sometimes conflict. Nonetheless, the process of systematically sharing experiences and findings in a spirit of mutual respect will, it is hoped, broaden readers’ understanding of the values, assumptions, and empirical evidence underlying the diversity of views and approaches. Solutions will be site specific; what works well in one setting may fail in another, emphasizing again the need for diversity.

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Part I

Agricultural Production in Ecoagriculture Landscapes

Overview

Conventional wisdom assumes that increasing agricultural production and productivity necessarily reduces biodiversity and ecosystem services. But state-of-the-art reviews of both science and field practice, synthesized in the next six chapters of this book, challenge that assumption. New and traditional approaches to annual and perennial crop and livestock production have been documented to sustain or increase production, reduce production costs or risks, or otherwise benefit producers, while at the same time having benign or positive impacts on wild species and ecosystems.The chapters in this section assess these diverse approaches, and identify major gaps in knowledge and action that must be addressed for agricultural systems to contribute to biodiversity conservation, as well as agricultural supply and rural