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Research on intensive agricultural features contributes to the social relations of farming, including the means by which farmers mobilize labor and the possible destination of surplus. Lidar provid...

Irrigation has been a key component of agricultural intensification and transformation in Asia and has the potential to take on the same role in Sub-Saharan Africa. Irrigation has contributed to increased food production, lower food prices, higher rural employment, and overall agricultural and economic growth. At the same time, irrigation—through its large consumptive water use—has accelerated water depletion, degradation, and pollution; moreover, it has benefitted richer farmers more than poorer farmers. This article reviews the contributions and challenges of irrigation and identifies a series of measures to increase the sustainability and equity of irrigation going forward.

Rice is one of the most culturally valued and widely grown crops in the world today, and extensive research over the past decade has clarified much of the narrative of its domestication and early spread across East and South Asia. However, the timing and routes of its dispersal into West Asia and Europe, through which rice eventually became an important ingredient in global cuisines, has remained less clear. In this article, we discuss the piecemeal, but growing, archaeobotanical data for rice in West Asia. We also integrate written sources, linguistic data, and ethnohistoric analogies, in order to better understand the adoption of rice outside its regions of origin. The human-mediated westward spread of rice proceeded gradually, while its social standing and culinary uses repeatedly changing over time and place. Rice was present in West Asia and Europe by the tail end of the first millennium BC, but did not become a significant crop in West Asia until the past few centuries. Complementary historical, linguistic, and archaeobotanical data illustrate two separate and roughly contemporaneous routes of westward dispersal, one along the South Asian coast and the other through Silk Road trade. By better understanding the adoption of this water-demanding crop in the arid regions of West Asia, we explore an important chapter in human adaptation and agricultural decision making. Introduction Domestication - East Asia - South Asia Himalayan Plateau West and Central Asia - Historical Sources - Archaeobotanical Data South Asian Coastal Routes - Historical Sources - Archaeobotanical Data Intensification of Rice Cultivation Culinary Shift Conclusions

Agri-Environmental Schemes (AES) have been proposed to mitigate the impact of agriculture on both taxonomic and functional biodiversity. However, a better knowledge of the mechanisms involved in the loss of agrobiodiversity is needed to implement efficient AES. An unbalanced effort on research towards arable lands compared to permanent crops, and on fauna relative to plants, is patent, which limits the generalization of AES effectiveness. We evaluated the effects of agricultural management and landscape simplification on taxonomic and functional diversity of the ground herb cover of 40 olive groves. We use a recently developed approach based on Hill numbers (rare, common and dominant species based) to analyse taxonomic and functional dissimilarity between farms with contrasting agricultural practices, and its potential attenuation by landscape complexity. We further explore the filtering effect of agricultural intensification on functional traits, and the relationship between functional and species richness across landscapes. We found that taxonomic and functional dissimilarity of herb assemblages between intensively and low-intensively managed fields was mainly due to rare species. Dissimilarity decreased as landscape complexity increased, evidencing that complex landscapes attenuate the impact of agriculture intensification on herb assemblage composition. Agricultural intensification favoured more functionally homogeneous assemblages and disfavoured the herbs pollinated by insects, while it did not seem to affect wind-pollinated species. Overall, functional richness increased exponentially with species richness across landscapes, but the latter was insufficient to drive any clear enhancement in functional richness in simple landscapes. In contrast, high species richness accelerated the enhancement in functional richness in intermediate and complex landscapes. These results highlight the functional filtering that intensive agriculture has generated for decades in homogeneous olive-dominated landscapes. Synthesis and applications. Herb cover is essential to support the fauna of permanent croplands and their sustainable production. Hence, Agri-Environmental Schemes (AES) in these croplands should promote management practices favouring the diversity and functionality of herb assemblages. Such AES should be particularly prioritized in homogeneous landscapes, where ground herb cover composition and function has long been homogenized to a great extent.

The study was conducted to know the landscape modification and agricultural intensification at a terrestrial segment of the Sidhmukh Canal Irrigation Project (SCIP) command area. The study confirms that the inception of the Sidhmukh Canal Project caused a massive land-use pattern change and shifted irrigation systems towards rain-fed farming to canal irrigation. Furthermore, the increased water availability by SCIP has extensively inflated irrigated land area, changed cropping pattern and land productivity. The study noticed a significant positive impact of SCIP on agricultural intensification. The study was accomplished by analysing primary data provided by the Department of Water Resources, Department of Agriculture, and Department of Economics & Statistics, Rajasthan Government.

Made available in DSpace on 2021-06-25T11:10:46Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2021-01-01 Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP) Recent studies have characterized the influence of agroecosystems on biodiversity. However, a set of components associated with the management of these areas is still neglected in landscape-level studies, especially in areas of recent agricultural intensification. The resources and conditions provided by agroecosystems to different species are highly variable in space and time, and failing to account for this variation may lead to misleading conclusions about the biodiversity status in these environments. In this perspective, we provide a conceptual overview to highlight why and which landscape components still need to be better explored to provide an adequate assessment of the agroecosystem effects on biodiversity. We used a Brazilian heterogeneous intensive-farming landscape as an example to outline the components that we believe are important for understanding biodiversity patterns in such landscapes. An in-depth description of agroecosystems can help us create better landscape-level management strategies and to design more effective green-way policies. Laboratório de Genética & Biodiversidade Instituto de Ciências Biológicas Universidade Federal de Goiás Spatial Ecology Lab Institute of Biology Federal University of Bahia Spatial Ecology and Conservation Lab (LEEC) Department of Biodiversity São Paulo State University UNESP, Avenida 24 A, 1515, Bela Vista Programa de Pós-Graduação em Ecologia e Manejo de Recursos Naturais Universidade Federal do Acre Instituto de Estudos Sociombientais - IESA Universidade Federal de Goiás Instituto Federal de Goiás Spatial Ecology and Conservation Lab (LEEC) Department of Biodiversity São Paulo State University UNESP, Avenida 24 A, 1515, Bela Vista

This article describes the intensification process of agriculture and its environmental limits regarding soil fertility in the rural community of Fonsagrada, in the inner region of Galicia in northwestern Spain. It addresses changes in land use, crops, and agricultural productivity between 1750 and 1890, framed within the theory of social metabolism and based on the method of nutrient balances. That technique measures nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium flows across the landscape within a given agro-ecosystem to assess its biophysical functioning and to detect environmental constraints related to management. The intensification of cropland resulted in net losses of potassium in outlying rough grazing land and hay meadows that served as the sources of cropland nutrients. Agricultural intensification was possible due to the close stabling of livestock, which allowed for more manure availability. Doing so, however, deprived pastureland of nutrient recover through manure deposition, which created a metabolic rift in the agro-ecosystem.

Agricultural windbreaks are promoted to reduce the negative ecological impacts of agricultural intensification while providing ecosystem services. To improve understanding of the conditions under w...

This article reviews the present state of insects, describing their taxonomic position, cost, and value as well as the threats to their well-being. Insects are an important source of both ecosystem services and ecosystem disservices. Recent studies have indicated a worrying decline in insect species, especially in flying insects in the northern temperate region, and this has spawned much media attention. Some decline has occurred, it is clear, due to agricultural intensification, urbanization, overuse of pesticides, and global climate change. A decline would seriously affect the ecosystem services that insects provide. However, there is too little data to warrant the belief that all insects are declining everywhere. There is a pressing need for more basic research on insect diversity in the context of a changing world.

The key objective of this study is to examine the livelihood practices and strategies adopted by the Scheduled Tribe (ST) population of the Palasbari Revenue circle, Assam, India. For empirical analysis, 132 households were surveyed from 6 areas dominated by the ST population, namely Kallapara N.C. (Satargaon), Jimirigaon, Rani Khamar, Chouthala, Jupangbari, and Kochpara, which aggregates to 553 sample populations. It was surveyed by stratified random sampling method from January to March 2020. The results show that livelihood diversification, agricultural intensification and temporal migration are three of the major strategies adopted by the population to meet their needs.

Conservation Agriculture (CA) is a Sustainable Agricultural Intensification strategy based on minimum soil disturbance, permanent soil coverage by living or dead biomass, and diversification of crop rotations. We reviewed the literature on benefits, trade-offs, adoption and adaptation of CA in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). While CA can improve soils and sustain crop yields, benefits are inconsistent and there are trade-offs with crop residue use, weeds and insect pests, labour demands and short-term yield penalties. Adoption rates by smallholders in sub-Saharan Africa are generally low. We hypothesize that underlying adoption constraints are 1) the magnitude of transformation of management practices required from farmers moving to CA, 2) the multiple inherent trade-offs associated with CA practices and 3) the incompatibility of CA practices to local conditions. We suggest CA adoption in SSA could be improved by focusing the promotion of CA to environments where it best fits, or by facilitating smallholders’ adaptation of the practices of CA to respond to their conditions and constraints. We, therefore, propose to move from Conservation Agriculture to Conservation Practices by: (A) identifying and overcoming locally important CA trade-offs through adaptations and complementary practices, and (B) finding farm-specific optimal combinations of practices in terms of feasibility and benefits.

Capsule: The Crested Lark Galerida cristata as an example of a species which selects habitats which have undergone agricultural intensification. Aims: To describe habitat preferences of the Crested...

In the next 24 years, the Malawian population is expected to double, a development that will inevitably affect access to land and land holding sizes. As access to land is already limited, securing ...

Agricultural intensification and land-use changes are major factors impacting farmland biodiversity. The Ortolan Bunting Emberiza hortulana is the long-distance trans-Saharan migratory passerine that has undergone the most dramatic decline among all European farmland birds. The factors responsible for this decline may originate from the breeding grounds, migration stopovers and/or overwintering quarters. Very little is known about conditions on the species' wintering grounds, but a recent study has highlighted the utmost importance of the traditionally managed agroecosystems in the Ethiopian Highlands as a key wintering area, apparently harbouring as much as 90% of the world's Ortolan Bunting population. Using radiotracking and line transect surveys, this study aimed to provide fine-grained information about species–habitat relationships in the Ortolan Bunting overwintering quarters. Our results showed the importance, at the landscape scale, of small-scale agriculture, notably of traditionally managed, cereal-dominated fields interspersed with semi-natural structures. At a foraging-site scale, on the other hand, patches of bare ground in combination with large areas of post-harvesting stubble represented key habitat features. Stubbles provide an essential food resource and bare ground promotes ground foraging by enhancing food accessibility. The maintenance of a traditional agricultural economy will be essential to maintain the habitat potential for the Ortolan Buntings overwintering in the Ethiopian Highlands and will be instrumental in preserving its world population from further decline.

The central tenet of European farmland ecology is that agricultural intensification during the 20th century was largely responsible for dramatic declines in species abundances. However, during this time, human rural settlements were also undergoing radical changes through modernization, with undocumented biodiversity impacts in this important wildlife habitat. We performed the first ever large‐scale study to disentangle the impact of these simultaneous processes on farmland bird diversity in 104 Polish villages. We show that modernized villages and their surrounding agricultural fields had 50–60% fewer birds than those in and around comparable older villages. The relative contribution of modernization versus agricultural intensification to predicted bird declines was 88% versus 12% for bird communities in villages and 56% versus 44% in surrounding croplands, with considerable variation among ecological species subgroups. These results challenge our current understanding of agricultural ecosystem ecology and how best to implement conservation measures costing billions of euros annually.

Le nord-ouest du Togo, est caracterise par une forte pression sur les sols, entrainant une regression de parcs agroforestiers et une diminution rendements agricoles. Dans un tel milieu, l’appreciation des producteurs de ces changements ainsi que les methodes qu’ils adoptent pour y faire face restent moins connus. C’est pour cet objectif qu’une enquete socio-economique a ete menee aupres des producteurs pour evaluer leurs perceptions sur la degradation des sols et les changements climatiques afin d’identifier puis retenir les pratiques originales d’adaptation pouvant faire objet de diffusion. L’enquete menee sur un echantillon raisonne de 216 producteurs des deux sexes a montre que : 98,10% des enquetes sont conscients de la degradation de leurs sols tandis que 99,50% ressentent les effets des changements climatiques qui se manifestent en termes de longues secheresses, de retards de pluies, de pluies violentes, abondantes et variable et d’augmentation de temperature. Les causes des changements evoquees par les producteurs sont : les pluies diluviennes (26,85%), les mauvaises pratiques culturales (62,50%), l’intensification agricole (46,76%), le surpâturage (2,78%), l’usage abusif de pesticides (20,37%), l’augmentation de la population (12,96%), la deforestation (21,76%) et les feux de brousse (6,48%). Globalement, les 98,6% des enquetes ont abandonne 63 ha de sol devenus irrecuperables. Les producteurs adoptent des mesures d’adaptation telles que l’apport de fumure organique, les rotations et associations culturales, la construction de bandes enherbees, de cordons pierreux et de diguettes, et le reboisement pour proteger et restaurer leurs champs. Plusieurs especes de plantes desirees par les producteurs pour leur vertu sont en voie de disparition. La perception par les paysans des cas de longue secheresse sont expliques par les variables « âge du paysan », « la pratique de l’elevage », « l’acces aux services de vulgarisation » et « la pratique de l’agriculture ». Il est necessaire de prendre ces variables en compte dans les projets et programmes de luttes contre la secheresse dans le milieu. Les variables « âge du paysan », « mauvaises pratiques culturales », et « deforestation » influencant egalement la perception des paysans de degradation des sols, doivent etre egalement consideres dans les programmes et projets de restauration des sols degrades dans le milieu. Il est important d’etudier les effets The north-west of Togo is characterized by strong pressure on the soil, leading to a decline in agroforestry parks and a reduction in agricultural yields. In such an environment, producers' appreciation of these changes and the methods they adopt to deal with them remain less well known. It is for this purpose that a socioeconomic survey was conducted among producers to assess their perceptions of soil degradation and climate change to identify and then retain original adaptation practices that can be disseminated. The survey carried out on a purposely selected sample of 216 producers from both sexes. The results showed that: 98, 10% of respondents are aware of the degradation of their soils while 99,50% feel the effects of climate change which are manifested as long droughts, delayed rains, heavy rains and temperature rise. The causes of the changes mentioned by the producers are: torrential rains (26,85%), bad cultivation practices (62,50%), agricultural intensification (46,76%), overgrazing (2,78%) , the abusive use of pesticides (20,37%), the increase in population (12,96%), deforestation (21,76%) and bush fires (6,48%). Globally, 98,6% of those surveyed abandoned 63 ha of land that had become irrecoverable. Producers adopt resilience measures such as providing organic manure, crop rotations and associations, the establishment of grass strips and stone bunds, bunds and reforestation to protect and restore their plots. Producers adopt adaptation measures such as adding organic manure, crop rotations and associations, construction of grass strips, stone bunds, bunds, and reforestation to protect and restore their fields. Several species of plants desired by producers for their virtue are endangered. The farmers' perception of cases of long drought are explained by the variables "age of the farmer", "the practice of animal husbandry", "access to extension services" and "the practice of agriculture". It is necessary to take these variables into account in projects and programs to fight against drought in the area. The variables "farmer's age «,» bad cultivation practices” and "deforestation" also influencing farmers' perception of soil degradation, must also be considered in programs and projects for the restoration of degraded soils in the area. It is important to study the effects of these practices on soil restoration and crop yields.

To meet food demand after the failure of irrigation system developments, agricultural intensification is occurring in inland valley agro-ecosystems in sub-Saharan Africa. Agricultural enhancement in inland valleys, which undermines environmental sustainability, was assessed using ‘Driving Force–Pressure–State–Impact–Response’ approach in four agro-ecological zones of Benin. The survey revealed that inland valleys are largely devoid of ligneous species. Crop residues are mainly transferred from inland valley fields to feed cattle, burnt in situ by the farmers themselves or abandoned to wildfires or to pasture—not mulched. Crop diversification is not universal and is limited to rice and vegetables crops. Monocropping of rice, practised by 83.3% of inland valley farmers, requires large chemical fertilizer application despite their impacts on environment including land degradation and water contamination. A major challenge is to determine means of characterizing entire agro-ecosystems of inland valleys in a way that is simple enough to be effectively and efficiently monitored. Inland valley agricultural development projects might include backstopping activities and policies that enable monitoring of chemical inputs and farming practices in inland valleys to reduce negative impacts on the environment and human health.

This study conducts a Cost-benefit analysis of dyke heightening in the Vietnam floodplain to explore some of economic issues associated with three interrelated aspects of the Mekong Develop...

In many different societies around the world, people transitioned from slash-and-burn agriculture to an intensive mode of agricultural production. However, why agriculture was increasingly intensified by early farmers remains less understood. This study investigates the driving forces of agricultural intensification from an environmental perspective. Based on our fieldwork at the Sanyangzhuang site and previous paleoclimatic studies, we reconstruct the depositional processes and climatic changes at Sanyangzhuang and its surrounding area between 5000 yr BP and 2000 yr BP. Data suggest that farmers in the lower reaches of the Yellow River were confronted with increasingly severe Yellow River flooding and drier and colder climate during this time period. The environmental changes increase risks of crop failure and famine, disrupt the equilibrium of the social system and induce a process that brings about initial agricultural intensification. This environmental pressure is aggravated by social/political factors and results in the further development of agricultural intensification.

A large network of exceptionally well-engineered prehistoric canals has been discovered near Safford, Arizona. Within an area of roughly 450 km2, 12 distinct canal systems, comprised of 41 ...

Smallholder-based, sustainable, agricultural intensification is increasingly put forth as a development pathway that is necessary to improve farmer's livelihoods, enhance productivity and engender a surplus that can be used to feed growing urban areas across sub-Saharan Africa. The following article examines trends in yields for Africa's largest staple crop – maize – among smallholder farmers in six regions in Malawi, Tanzania and Zambia, using longitudinal quantitative data collected in 2008, 2013 and 2017 in combination with qualitative data from nine villages. Substantial increases in yields are found only in Zambia, while yields are largely stagnant in Malawi and Tanzania. In the case of Zambia, however, there is a persistent gender-based yield gap. We use the qualitative data to explain this gap and find that gender-based differences in yields need to be understood in relation to local production systems, as well as the varied positionality of women, where the biases facing women who head their own households are different than for women living in male headed households. In policy terms, technologies that can promote intensification are different depending on these factors, even within the local context of particular farming systems.

The amount of High Nature Value farmland (HNVf) is a commonly used environmental indicator for assessing the performance of the Common Agricultural Policy, to support sustainable agriculture and monitor changes in agricultural land use in Europe. HNVf comprises agricultural areas of semi-natural state, low-intensity farming and fine-scale landscape mosaics of different habitat types. For a successful implementation, the identification of HNVf should correctly reflect the variation in biodiversity values between different agricultural landscapes. We examined how well the Finnish HNVf indicator and the sub-indicators constituting it – recalculated for the purposes of this study for five study regions – reflect the variation in bird and butterfly species richness and diversity patterns at different spatial scales. We found that butterfly diversity index was positively associated with the HNVf indicator at the finest scale of 0.5 km × 0.5 km squares. Among the HNVf sub-indicators, extensive cultivation of grasslands was most strongly related to the farmland bird diversity and the density of edge to the butterfly diversity. Thus, the HNVf concept reflects well the distribution of butterflies in the Finnish agricultural landscapes but insufficiently the diversity patterns of farmland birds. Importantly, semi-natural vegetation and long-term pastures – the backbone of the concept – presently occur in small and highly fragmented patches in agricultural landscapes in Finland. The Pan-European concept of HNVf has restricted application to farmland birds of this boreal country and the national HNVf concept may need to be revised.

This article investigates the role of shifting land ownership in landscape change in New Zealand’s Mackenzie Basin. It was hypothesised that ownership patterns influence landscape transformation; and changes in ownership lead to landscape changes. Satellite imagery was used to trace recent landscape changes quantifying a change from brown extensive pastoralism to green irrigated pasture. It was concluded that the change in land ownership following land reform allowed for about half of this agricultural intensification since 2003. Aggregating intensification on new freehold land with that on current pastoral lease changes the story; Crown decisions about disposition or intensification of Crown land account for two-thirds of intensification since 2003. Hence, if current trends in the Mackenzie are to change, the Crown must examine its decision patterns. Change in some form seems likely. The results presented speak to who has the power to make change. The choice and the power reside somewhere in the space between the Commissioner of Crown Lands and the Minister of Land Information.

In seasonal environments, increasing spring temperatures lead many taxa to advance the timing of reproduction. Species that do not may suffer lower fitness. We investigated why black-tailed godwits (Limosa limosa limosa), a ground-breeding agricultural grassland shorebird, have not advanced timing of reproduction during the last three decades in the face of climate change and human-induced habitat degradation. We used data from an 11-year field study to parameterize an Integral Projection Model to predict how spring temperature and habitat quality simultaneously influence the timing of reproduction and population dynamics. We found apparent selection for earlier laying, but not a correlation between the laying dates of parents and their offspring. Nevertheless, in warmer springs, laying dates of adults show a stronger positive correlation with laying date in previous springs than in cooler ones, and this leads us to predict a slight advance in the timing of reproduction if spring temperatures continue to increase. We also show that only in landscapes with low agricultural activity, the population can continue to act as a source. This study shows how climate change and declining habitat quality may enhance extinction risk.

Terraces are highly productive, culturally distinctive socioecological systems. Although they form part of time/place-specific debates, terraces per se have been neglected – fields on slopes or landscape elements. We argue that this is due to mapping and dating problems, and lack of artefacts/ecofacts. However, new techniques can overcome some of these constraints, allowing us to re-engage with theoretical debates around agricultural intensification. Starting from neo-Broserupian propositions, we can engage with the sociopolitical and environmental aspects of terrace emergence, maintenance and abandonment. Non-reductionist avenues include identifying and dating different phases of development within single terrace systems, identifying a full crop-range, and other activities not generally associated with terraces (e.g. metallurgy). The proposition here is that terraces are a multi-facetted investment that includes both intensification and diversification and can occur under a range of social conditions but which constitutes a response to demographic pressure in the face to fluctuating environmental conditions.

Animal populations at northern latitudes may have cyclical dynamics that are degraded by climate change leading to trophic cascade. Hare populations at more southerly latitudes are characterized by dramatic declines in abundance associated with agricultural intensification. We focus on the impact of historical climatic and agricultural change on a mid-latitude population of mountain hares, Lepus timidus hibernicus. Using game bag records from multiple sites throughout Ireland, the hare population index exhibited a distinct regime shift. Contrary to expectations, there was a dynamical structure typical of northern latitude hare populations from 1853 to 1908, during which numbers were stable but cyclic with a periodicity of 8 years. This regime was replaced by dynamics more typical of southern latitude hare populations from 1909 to 1970, in which cycles were lost and numbers declined dramatically. Destabilization of the autumn North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) led to the collapse of similar cycles in the hare population, coincident with the onset of agricultural intensification (a shift from small-to-large farms) in the first half of the 20th century. Similar, but more recent regime shifts have been observed in Arctic ecosystems and attributed to anthropogenic climate change. The present study suggests such shifts may have occurred at lower latitudes more than a century ago during the very early 20th century. It seems likely that similar tipping points in the population collapse of other farmland species may have occurred similarly early but went undocumented. As northern systems are increasingly impacted by climate change and probable expansion of agriculture, the interaction of these processes is likely to disrupt the pulsed flow of resources from cyclic populations impacting ecosystem function.

En áreas de intensificación agropecuaria, los tomadores de decisión son los responsables del uso de las tierras y de la conservación de las franjas de vegetación ribereñas. Estas, proporcionan numerosos servicios ecosistémicos a los seres humanos. A pesar de su importancia, cuando la calidad de los suelos lo permite, son convertidas en áreas de cultivo. El objetivo de este trabajo fue comprender la influencia relativa de distintos factores psicosociales, sobre las intenciones de conservar los ambientes ribereños. Se eligieron 50 explotaciones en la Pampa Austral de Argentina, se entrevistaron a los tomadores de decisión a los que se pidió completaran una encuesta de tipo estructurada. Las respuestas fueron codificadas, analizadas estadísticamente y se obtuvieron 3 modelos de ecuaciones estructurales. El modelo basado en los factores normativos mostró el mayor peso, el segundo mejor modelo, fue el cimentado en factores cognitivos, en tanto que, el fundado en factores emocionales fue el de menor representatividad. Se concluye que si bien los factores normativos fueron los que mejor explicaron las intenciones de conservación, representan cuellos de botella en los que no se puede influir y solo se puede intervenir a través de los factores cognitivos, promoviendo el conocimiento. In areas of agricultural intensification, decision makers are responsible for the land use and the conservation of riparian vegetation strips. These provide many ecosystem services to humans. Despite their importance, they are converted into crop areas when the quality of the soils allows it. The objective of this work was to understand the relative influence of different psycho-social factors on the intentions to conserve the riparian environments. Fifty decision makers of farms of the Southern Pampa of Argentina were interviewed in order to complete a structured survey. The responses were coded and statistically analyzed to determine three models of structural equations were obtained. A model based on normative factors showed the greatest weight. A second model, based on cognitive factors, was most adjusted than one based on emotional factors. It is concluded that although normative factors were the ones that best explained the intentions about the conservation. These factors represent bottlenecks that cannot be influenced and can only be intervened by cognitive factors based on the promotion of the knowledge. EEA Barrow Fil: Giaccio, Gustavo Carlos Marí­a. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA). Chacra Experimental Integrada Barrow; Argentina Fil: Giaccio, Gustavo Carlos Marí­a. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina Fil: Mastrángelo, Matías Enrique. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA). Estación Experimental Agropecuaria Balcarce; Argentina Fil: Mastrángelo, Matías Enrique. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Agrarias; Argentina. Fil: Aparicio, Virginia Carolina. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA). Estación Experimental Agropecuaria Balcarce; Argentina Fil: Costa, Jose Luis. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA). Estación Experimental Agropecuaria Balcarce; Argentina Fil: Laterra, Pedro. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina Fil: Laterra, Pedro. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA). Estación Experimental Agropecuaria Balcarce; Argentina. Fil: Laterra, Pedro. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Agrarias; Argentina.

We provide an analytical contrast of the dynamics of secondary forest regeneration in Nepal and Peru framed by a set of common themes: land access, boundaries, territories, and rights, seemingly more secure in Nepal than Peru; processes of agrarian change and their consequences for forest-agriculture interactions and the role of secondary forest in the landscape, more marked in Peru, where San Martín is experiencing apparent agricultural intensification, than in Nepal; and finally processes of social differentiation that have consequences for different social groups, livelihood construction and their engagement with trees, common to both countries. These themes address the broader issue of the necessary conditions for secondary forest regeneration and the extent to which the rights and livelihood benefits of those actively managing it are secured.

Research Article 1. Fleshy fruit production is becoming more intensive worldwide, but how this affects frugivorous birds is poorly known. In the Mediterranean region, intensive and super-intensive olive orchards are fast expanding, potentially affecting millions of wintering songbirds. Here, we test the idea that intensification may benefit frugivorous birds, at least locally, due to increased fruit availability, while negatively affecting the wider wintering bird community due to intensive management, structural simplification and landscape homogenisation. 2. We estimated olive abundance and surveyed birds in early, mid-and late winter, at traditional, intensive and super-intensive orchards in southern Portugal. We used Hierarchical Modelling of Species Communities to relate species richness, prevalence and abundance to management intensity, winter period, olive availability and landscape context, and evaluated the role of frugivory in modulating observed responses. 3. Olive availability was much higher throughout the winter in more intensive than in traditional orchards, both in trees and on the ground. Frugivorous bird abundance was higher in more intensive orchards, and the most abundant frugivorous species (blackcap, song thrush, robin) were positively affected by olive availability and/or increasing landscape cover by olive orchards, while intensification level had relatively minor effects after accounting for other variables. Non-frugivorous richness and abundance were higher in traditional orchards, and many non-frugivorous species had lower prevalence in more intensive orchards or were negatively affected by landscapes dominated by olive cultivation. 4. Synthesis and applications. While negatively affecting the wider bird community, our results suggest that olive farming intensification can contribute to sustaining large numbers of frugivorous birds in the Mediterranean region. As frugivorous birds are not seen as damaging by olive farmers, there is an opportunity to promote their conservation in intensive and super-intensive orchards, which requires management to increase habitat heterogeneity, and to reduce risks such as mortality associated with mechanical harvest and contamination with pesticide residues. Overall, we recommend that efforts to manage farmland biodiversity should consider the impacts and conservation opportunities of fruit crop intensification info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion

The fast intensification of agriculture affects many systems. In recent decades, traditional vineyards have been rapidly converted to trellis vineyards in Spain (the country with the largest vineyard surface worldwide) in an attempt to reduce harvesting costs and increase vine productivity. The implications of this modernization of vineyards on farmland biodiversity are still largely unknown. We studied 52 vineyards (26 traditional and 26 trellis) from June to September in south-western Spain, aiming to describe the effect of the modernization of goblet-shape traditional vineyards on vine structure and their management, as well as its effect on species' occurrence in vineyard plots. We applied hierarchical occurrence models to assess the occurrence probability of 10 bird species and two mammal species in traditional and trellis vineyard plots. Vineyard modernization involved taller vines (connected by metallic guide wires and poles by rows), greater distance between vine rows, bigger plot sizes, the systematic implementation of irrigation, and an application of fertilizers through the watering system (fertirrigation) in a third of studied vineyards. Other agrochemical treatments seemed to be equally used in both vineyard types. Due to the use of herbicides and frequent tilling, both types of vineyards showed low natural vegetation groundcover. Vineyard modernization had clear effects on fauna biodiversity in vineyard plots, with a higher occurrence in trellis vineyards of some species (rufous-tailed scrub-robin, European goldfinch, red-legged partridge, and house sparrow) and a higher occurrence of other species (European rabbit and European greenfinch) in traditional ones. Thus, vineyard modernization can drive a change in the community of birds and mammals that inhabit them. In addition, vineyard use by some species (particularly ground-dwelling ones) was strongly determined by the presence of arable land adjacent to the vineyard. These species may therefore use vineyards during summer because they provide water and/or better cover than harvested crops. Animals attracted to vineyards for water could be exposed to toxic doses of nitrates that are routinely applied through the watering system in a third of these. To maximize benefits for biodiversity, it would be advisable to manage modernization schemes in order to maintain landscape heterogeneity, with vineyards of both types combined with other agricultural systems, as well as higher proportions of natural vegetation surface cover., F.M. and B.A.'s time for writing this paper was within the AGROPERDIZ project (SBPLY/17/180501/000245), funded by the “Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional” (Feder) and “Junta de Comunidades de Castilla-La Mancha” (JCCM) (recipient: F.M). X.C. was supported by a Ph.D. grant from the Basque Country Government (Grant number PRE_2018_2_0273).

This chapter identifies and discusses the key social and environmental consequences of the modernizing food system outlined in Chap. 4. Based on a series of field interviews by the author (along with evidence from the literature), we see through yerba mate’s careful branding to reveal the true contexts of the vast majority of production. Key issues explored include extreme poverty, child labor, occupational hazards, pollution, and soil erosion.

Land-use changes due to agricultural intensification and climatic factors can affect avian reproduction. We use a top predator of agroecosystems, the American kestrel (Falco sparverius) breeding in nest boxes in Central Argentina as a study subject to identify if these two drivers interact to affect birds breeding. We analyzed their breeding performance across a gradient of agricultural intensification from native forest, traditional farmland to intensive farmland. The surface devoted to soybean was used as a proxy of agriculture intensification; however, it did not affect the breeding performance of American kestrels. Even though the presence of pastures was important to determine the probability of breeding successfully. Climatic variables had strong effects on the species breeding timing, on the number of nestlings raised by breeding pairs and on the probability of those pairs to breed successfully (raising at least one fledgling). Our results highlight the relevance of pastures and grasslands for American kestrel reproduction. These environments are the most affected by land-use change to intensive agriculture, being transformed into fully agricultural lands mostly devoted to soybean production. Therefore, future expansion of intensive agriculture may negatively affect the average reproductive parameters of American Kestrels, at least at a regional scale. Further research will be needed to disentangle the mechanisms by which weather variables affect kestrel breeding parameters. Fil: Orozco Valor, Paula Maiten. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Instituto de Ciencias de la Tierra y Ambientales de La Pampa. Universidad Nacional de La Pampa. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Instituto de Ciencias de la Tierra y Ambientales de La Pampa; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de La Pampa. Facultad de Ciencia Exactas y Naturales. Departamento de Recursos Naturales. Centro para el Estudio y Conservación de Aves Rapaces; Argentina Fil: Grande, Juan Manuel. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Instituto de Ciencias de la Tierra y Ambientales de La Pampa. Universidad Nacional de La Pampa. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Instituto de Ciencias de la Tierra y Ambientales de La Pampa; Argentina

Developing countries frequently find their poverty reduction initiatives to be at odds with promotion of sustainable practices. In India too, agricultural intensification through horticulture cultivation is an important government strategy to raise farm incomes but its mechanisms and implications have not been critically analyzed. Our objective is to characterize this intensification and explore conditions under which its goals may be achieved while ensuring equity in access to ecological services and resilience of the social-ecological system (SES). Our focal SES is the water-constrained farm system of western India that overlays shallow hard-rock aquifers common to the Indian peninsula. We document farm decisions and coping strategies of 121 farmers over two consecutive years: a drought year and a good rainfall year. We find that farmers are driven to high-value horticulture to remain economically viable in the face of increasing social-ecological vulnerability due to factors such as monsoon variability, high groundwater development, and uncertainty in irrigation access. Through systems modeling, we uncover the feedback loops that propagate risk. Risk in access to water, in part due to monsoon dry spells, starts a cycle of expensive investments often requiring large loans to assure access and a simultaneous move to horticulture in response to the elevated cost of water. This mitigates risk for the farmer in the short run but, in the absence of regulation and complete information about the common groundwater pool, leads to competitive investments, driving the regime to greater uncertainty levels for the entire community. This vicious cycle of investment and intensification escalates risk, leading to frequent crop failure, farmer indebtedness, and the tragedy of the commons. Government interventions further catalyze this. We propose alternate leverage points to enhance social comprehension of risk and facilitate collective action so as to negotiate room for human needs while remaining within biophysical boundaries.

In an effort to feed a growing world population, agriculture has rapidly intensified over the last six decades, relying heavily on agrochemicals (fertilizers, insecticides, fungicides, and herbicides) to increase and maintain desired crop yields. Despite environmental concerns in Canada’s agricultural regions, long-term patterns of changing crops and the associated trends in the proportion of cropland treated with agrochemicals are poorly documented. Using the Canadian Census of Agriculture, we compiled historical data over 35 years (eight census periods: 1981–2016) on agrochemical applications, measured as the proportion of cropland treated with pesticides and fertilizers and the associated crop classes, to identify and interpret spatial and temporal trends in Canada’s agricultural practices across 260 census units. Due to differences in agricultural practices, soil, and climatic conditions across the country, the Pacific (British Columbia), Prairie (Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba), Central (Ontario, Quebec), and Atlantic (Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Newfoundland/Labrador, Prince Edward Island) regions were analyzed separately. Most of the agrochemicals in Canada were applied in the Prairie and Central regions, which combined comprise 97% of the total cropland. Fertilizers were the dominant agrochemicals across Canada applied on 48% (Pacific) to 78% (Prairie) of the total cropland area, followed by herbicides, which were applied on 30% (Pacific) to 81% (Prairie) of the total cropland area in 2016. Notably, we observed significant changes between 1996 and 2016 in area treated with fungicides and insecticides, which increased by 412% and 50% in the Prairie region and by 291% and 149% in the Central region, respectively. The proportion and distribution of crops shifted in favor of more oilseeds and soybeans in the most intensive Prairie and Central regions, whereas cereals decreased over the same time period. Our analysis of past and current trends of agrochemicals and cropping patterns within Canada indicates a rapid and systemic increase in chemical use, and policies that promote a shift toward lower chemical reliance through sustainable agricultural practices are urgently needed.

In recent decades, several parts of the world have been facing severe droughts and frequent floods against a background of anthropogenic influences and changes in climatic variables. For ef...

© 2020 by the authors., Arable field margins are valuable habitats providing a wide range of ecosystem services in rural landscapes. Agricultural intensification in recent decades has been a major cause of decline in plant diversity in these habitats. However, the concomitant effects on plant functional diversity are less documented, particularly in Mediterranean areas. In this paper, we analyzed the effect of margin width and surrounding landscape (cover and diversity of land use and field size), used as proxies for management intensity at local and landscape scales, on plant species richness, functional diversity and functional trait values in margins of winter cereal fields in southern Spain. Five functional traits were selected: life form, growth form, seed mass, seed dispersal mode and pollination type. RLQ and fourth-corner analyses were used to link functional traits and landscape variables. A total of 306 plant species were recorded. Species richness and functional diversity were positively related to margin width but showed no response to landscape variables. Functional trait values were affected neither by the local nor landscape variables. Our results suggest that increasing the margin width of conventionally managed cereal fields would enhance both taxonomic and functional diversity of margin plant assemblages, and thus the services they provide to the agro-ecosystem., This work was partly funded by FEDER funds and the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (Projects AGL2012-33736 and AGL2015-64130-R). YP was supported by an FPI (Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness) scholarship.

Worldwide sustainable development is threatened by current agricultural land change trends, particularly by the increasing rural farmland abandonment and agricultural intensification phenomena. In Mediterranean countries, these processes are affecting especially traditional olive groves with enormous socio-economic costs to rural areas, endangering environmental sustainability and biodiversity. Traditional olive groves abandonment and intensification are clearly related to the reduction of olive oil production income, leading to reduced economic viability. Most promising strategies to boost traditional groves competitiveness&mdash, such as olive oil differentiation through adoption of protected denomination of origin labels and development of value-added olive products&mdash, rely on knowledge of the olive varieties and its specific properties that confer their uniqueness and authenticity. Given the lack of information about olive varieties on traditional groves, a feasible and inexpensive method of variety identification is required. We analyzed leaf spectral information of ten Portuguese olive varieties with a powerful data-mining approach in order to verify the ability of satellite&rsquo, s hyperspectral sensors to provide an accurate olive variety identification. Our results show that these olive varieties are distinguishable by leaf reflectance information and suggest that even satellite open-source data could be used to map them. Additional advantages of olive varieties mapping were further discussed.

Agricultural intensification has stimulated the economy in the Guayas River basin in Ecuador, but also affected several ecosystems. The increased use of pesticides poses a serious threat to the freshwater ecosystem, which urgently calls for an improved knowledge about the impact of pesticide practices in this study area. Several studies have shown that models can be appropriate tools to simulate pesticide dynamics in order to obtain this knowledge. This study tested the suitability of the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) to simulate the dynamics of two different pesticides in the data scarce Guayas River basin. First, we set up, calibrated and validated the model using the streamflow data. Subsequently, we set up the model for the simulation of the selected pesticides (i.e., pendimethalin and fenpropimorph). While the hydrology was represented soundly by the model considering the data scare conditions, the simulation of the pesticides should be taken with care due to uncertainties behind essential drivers, e.g., application rates. Among the insights obtained from the pesticide simulations are the identification of critical zones for prioritisation, the dominant areas of pesticide sources and the impact of the different land uses. SWAT has been evaluated to be a suitable tool to investigate the impact of pesticide use under data scarcity in the Guayas River basin. The strengths of SWAT are its semi-distributed structure, availability of extensive online documentation, internal pesticide databases and user support while the limitations are high data requirements, time-intensive model development and challenging streamflow calibration. The results can also be helpful to design future water quality monitoring strategies. However, for future studies, we highly recommend extended monitoring of pesticide concentrations and sediment loads. Moreover, to substantially improve the model performance, the availability of better input data is needed such as higher resolution soil maps, more accurate pesticide application rate and actual land management programs. Provided that key suggestions for further improvement are considered, the model is valuable for applications in river ecosystem management of the Guayas River basin.

Functional agrobiodiversity (FAB) has severely declined during the last decades. Current efforts to reinforce FAB are mainly focused on single-actor, parcel-based measures, whereas multi-actor landscape approaches are supposed to be more effective. In this paper, we propose a social–ecological framework that structures how different land users at both the parcel and landscape level interact with FAB as a natural resource. Furthermore, we introduce 1 m(2) FAB gardens as an interactive multipurpose measurement tool to gather data on ecosystem services in collaboration with land users. The presented action research approach provides new insights on motivations and interests of different land users in FAB and how knowledge exchange can result in a higher motivation to invest in FAB. Using a case study in Flanders, we illustrate the FAB-garden concept and highlight its strengths and necessary considerations to properly complement other research approaches in this social–ecological system. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s13280-020-01382-0) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Conservation agriculture (CA) is recognized as a promising crop management strategy for sustainable agricultural intensification. The objective of this study was to evaluate CA cropping systems for rainfed maize as an alternative to the traditional tillage-based cropping systems (CT) in the context of family farms, using a multi-criteria model that represents the point of view of farmers. Farmers considered several aspects for evaluating the cropping systems, thatwere systematized in the model through five criteria (with sub-criteria): (a) costs; (b) yield; (c) labour; (d) human health and environment; and (e) production risks. CA did not differ from CT for the 'costs' criterion but was superior for the 'yield' and 'labour' criteria. In contrast, CT obtained better ratings for the criteria 'human health and environment' and 'production risks'. Considering all criteria, CA was better appraised than CT. However, a new local policy measure that subsidizes the hiring of mechanized tillage services overturns this outcome, indicating the importance of exogenous factors. Overall, the participatory processes in building the model allowed us to better understand the reasons of adoption or non-adoption of CA by small-scale farmers in the tropics.

1. In agricultural landscapes, arthropods provide essential ecosystem services such as biological pest control and pollination. Intensified crop management practices and homogenization of landscapes have led to declines among such organisms. Semi-natural habitats, associated with high numbers of these organisms, are increasingly lost from agricultural landscapes but diversification by increasing crop diversity has been proposed as a way to reverse observed arthropod declines and thus restore ecosystem services. However, whether or not an increase in the diversity of crop types within a landscape promotes diversity and abundances of pollinating and predaceous arthropods, and how semi-natural habitats might modify this relationship, are not well understood. 2. To test how crop diversity and the proportion of semi-natural habitats within a landscape are related to the diversity and abundance of beneficial arthropod communities , we collected primary data from seven studies focusing on natural enemies (carabids and spiders) and pollinators (bees and hoverflies) from 154 crop fields in Southern Sweden between 2007 and 2017. 3. Crop diversity within a 1-km radius around each field was positively related to the Shannon diversity index of carabid and pollinator communities in landscapes rich in semi-natural habitats. Abundances were mainly affected by the proportion of semi-natural habitats in the landscape, with decreasing carabid and increasing pollinator numbers as the proportion of this habitat type increased. Spiders showed no response to either crop diversity or the proportion of semi-natural habitats.

In the last 50–60 years, agricultural intensification and later urban development have threatened the rare and valuable gully landscape formed on marine clay. We studied landscape changes in eastern Akershus county in south-east Norway, which has one of the world’s largest concentrations of marine gullies. Interpretation of aerial photos showed that about 25% of the gully area has been lost. Only 39.5% of the remaining area is original gullies, and 60.5% of the area has been affected by landscape change. The largest loss of gully area was between 1955 and 1991, mainly through land levelling and transformation to intensively managed agricultural landscape. The most densely populated areas also lost gullies to residential areas and industry. Gullies support high plant and animal diversity, and future management should be based on landscape ecological principles. Gully fragments should also be preserved to maintain connectivity between the many different habitats belonging to the gullies.