Levers for the agroecological transition of tropical agriculture

Abstract

To promote greater sustainability in agriculture, development of agroecology is increasingly being invoked. What are the conditions for establishing agroecological production in tropical regions? Based upon case studies in several tropical areas, we provide here some answers to this question. We review the “pillars” (i.e. principles) and the “implementation levers” (i.e., tools) for the development of agroecology. We identify three main pillars: (1) the mobilization and management of ecological processes for the sustainable production and the resilience of agroecosystems; (2) the development of interactions between technical, social, environmental, and institutional components of agroecosystems for a holistic approach to agroecology; and (3) the scaling up of agroecology that takes place with a plurality of actions and pathways at different organization levels rather than an increase in resources and a replication of standardized technical processes. To implement these three pillars, we identify 11 main bio-technical, cognitive, socio-political, and organizational levers. Bio-technical levers include those for (1) mobilizing complementarity between crop species to optimize natural resources use, (2) mobilizing functional biodiversity at the plot scale to optimize natural regulation of pests and diseases, (3) managing biodiversity at landscape and territorial scales, (4) increasing the efficiency of biogeochemical cycles, and (5) renewing targets for genetic improvement. Cognitive, socio-political, and organizational levers include those for (6) political and institutional action at the national and global level, (7) action at the local level to support producers, (8) political and organizational action at the territorial level, (9) the marketing and the development of new agri-chains, (10) the development of new methods for evaluating production systems, and (11) the recognition of the values of gender and generation within families and other organisational levels. This paper provides an overall orientation for the agroecological transition in tropical agriculture and also considers the socio-political context that underlies this transition.

What is enlightened agriculture? A multi-normative approach to the nature and values of food production systems

“…Such emerging technologies are emphasised as robotics, the Internet of Things, blockchain accounting, artificial intelligence and big data analytics-and indeed, data-driven farming has already now been branded "Agriculture 5.0" (Saiz-Rubio and Rovira-Más, 2020). Moving the other way along the spectrum, ecological intensification (Bommarco et al, 2013) and the search for nature-based solutions (Hrabanski and Le Coq, 2022) grade into an agroecology agenda (Gliessman, 1990;Côte et al, 2022), organic farming (Darnhofer et al, 2010), and forms of localised, biodiversity-based farming (Duru et al, 2015).…”

The input reduction principle of agroecology is wrong when it comes to mineral fertilizer use in sub-Saharan Africa

“…Within the scientific literature, there is a debate at the science-policy interface harnessing current knowledge to build views on the possible future of agricultural systems: some authors claim that there is “a growing consensus that sustainable intensification in Africa will be […] fertilizer intensive” (Jayne et al, 2019; Vanlauwe et al, 2014), while others assert, that “reducing the dependency on purchased inputs can reduce food insecurity especially for small-scale food producers” (Wezel et al, 2020) and that “the challenges farmers face can be met with appropriate management […] making the addition of external inputs largely unnecessary” (Gliessman, 2014). Côte et al (2022) propose a reconciling view of agroecology that does not exclude “the use of […] exogenous inputs when yield gap is important,” insisting that “an in-depth agroecological transformation […] should be free of synthetic pesticides and should be parsimonious in the use of synthetic fertilizers.” Donor agencies, notably the European Union and its member countries, increasingly support development projects in SSA that engage with the agroecological transition and transition to green economies (DG DEVCO, 2020), without necessarily being clear on the role that external inputs and mineral fertilizer play.…”

Evaluating Limitations of Agroecological Practices and Stakeholders’ Response: A Case of Uluguru Mountains Landscape in Morogoro Municipality, Tanzania

“…Sustainable agriculture is a subset of agroecology practices that involve the use of organic manure, organic pest and disease control, adoption of agroforestry, crop diversification and natural control measures for soil erosion (AdeOluwa, 2010;Emeana et al, 2018;Constantine et al, 2021). Agroecology neither emphasizes obsolete farming technologies nor disregard recent agricultural knowledge and innovation, but connect traditional and scientific knowledge in a way that food can be produced without jeopardizing the environment and ecological fragile areas (Adidja et al, 2019;Cote et al, 2019).…”

“…International donor agencies and organizations are the sole funders of agroecology projects and research (Cote et al, 2019). The possible rhetorical question is, if agroecology has substantial contributions to food security and environmental conservation, then why is it not supported legitimately by countries?…”