A research agenda for scaling up agroecology in European countries

Abstract

A profound transformation of agricultural production methods has become unavoidable due to the increase in the world’s population, and environmental and climatic challenges. Agroecology is now recognized as a challenging model for agricultural systems, promoting their diversification and adaptation to environmental and socio-economic contexts, with consequences for the entire agri-food system and the development of rural and urban areas. Through a prospective exercise performed at a large interdisciplinary institute, INRAE, a research agenda for agroecology was built that filled a gap through its ambition and interdisciplinarity. It concerned six topics. For genetics, there is a need to study genetic aspects of complex systems (e.g., mixtures of genotypes) and to develop breeding methods for them. For landscapes, challenges lie in effects of heterogeneity at multiple scales, in multifunctionality and in the design of agroecological landscapes. Agricultural equipment and digital technologies show high potential for monitoring dynamics of agroecosystems. For modeling, challenges include approaches to complexity, consideration of spatial and temporal dimensions and representation of the cascade from cropping practices to ecosystem services. The agroecological transition of farms calls for modeling and observational approaches as well as for creating new design methods. Integration of agroecology into food systems raises the issues of product specificity, consumer behavior and organization of markets, standards and public policies. In addition, transversal priorities were identified: (i) generating sets of biological data, through research and participatory mechanisms, that are appropriate for designing agroecological systems and (ii) collecting and using coherent sets of data to enable assessment of vulnerability, resilience and risk in order to evaluate the performance of agroecological systems and to contribute to scaling up. The main lessons learned from this collective exercise can be useful for the entire scientific community engaged in research into agroecology.

Bibliometric Analysis of the State of Research on Agroecology Adoption and Methods Used for Its Assessment

“…Plot scale, farm scale, and territorial scale, such as the country or region, can be distinguished as the three main scales [2,8,19]. To date, the farm transition has not received much attention as a research topic [68,69]. Transition is generally studied at the scale of the territory or landscape, as shown in the keyword analysis section.…”

“…Therefore, in order to plan the technical and financial resources required to achieve the desired results in a timely manner and use a method that is appropriate, modeling work will need to take into account the correlation between time and space. In different regions of the world, it is still difficult to model the process of adopting agroecology on a large scale [68,69]. There is some work that needs to be completed in advance to accomplish such analyses.…”

Reflections on research agendas in agroecology: In search of a practical guide

“…In contrast to the reductionist approach that effectively seeks to solve problems after they emerge, agroecological research should ask, "When a system is working well, what are the characteristics that drive it to do so?" These are the systems that could serve as examples for the scaling out of agroecology (Gascuel-Odoux et al, 2022), yet to do so requires a knowledge of precisely why they are working. Expansion of those successful examples needs to be grounded in concrete knowledge if we are to adapt them to new circumstances and environments.…”

How can GIS support the evaluation and design of biodiverse agroecosystems and landscapes? Applying the Main Agroecological Structure to European agroecosystems

“…The paradigm shift toward an increasingly sustainable food production system in Europe also demands the development of methodologies and tools to monitor, assess, and evaluate the complex aspects needed by the stakeholders to make better and more informed decisions at any level (Gascuel-Odoux et al, 2022).…”

“…Earlier approaches primarily monitored food production and economic performances. However, there has been an evolution in assessment techniques to address the multifaceted nature of sustainability concepts and agroecological frameworks (Sajadian et al, 2017;Gascuel-Odoux et al, 2022).…”