Agroecological practices support climate change resilience
Agroecology emphasises the use of natural processes and resources to create sustainable and resilient agricultural systems.It is a response to modern intensive agricultural systems that focus on maximising production, sometimes at the expense of ecological and environmental health. A number of common agricultural practices are aligned with agroecology. For example, planting legumes alongside other crops – a centuries-old practice that is still widely used today – can improve soil fertility and water infiltration into the soil.
There is empirical evidence that some agroecological practices contribute to sustainably addressing climate challenges and ensuring food security. These include livestock integration, crop mixing, crop diversification, use of organic manure, and agroforestry.
Yield and economic benefits with fewer inputs and emissions
One of the core tenets of agroecology is to reduce reliance on external inputs, such as synthetic fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides, in favour of practices that support biodiversity and soil health. As synthetic fertilisers are energy-intensive to produce and are typically made using fossil fuels, limiting their use can help reduce greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture. Synthetic fertilisers also contribute to nitrous oxide emissions – a potent greenhouse gas with significant ozone-depleting potential. Research shows tha two thirds of emissions from synthetic fertilisers occur once they have been applied to the field. Shifting cropland systems towards agroforestry systems – whereby trees or shrubs are planted alongside crops or livestock – is a viable solution to addressing the leaky nitrogen cycle.
Research shows that agroecological practices can improve crop yields with fewer inputs compared to conventional farming practices. This is increasingly important as the effects of human-caused climate change, such as reduced rainfall, are anticipated to lower agricultural yields. A review on the economic performance of agroecology in Europe found that agroecological farming generates incomes that exceed those of conventional agriculture, provides more employment per hectare, uses less fossil fuels and enhances biodiversity and landscapes.
A key finding of several of these studies is that the adoption of multiple agroecological practices maximises yield benefits over a single practice, and that these yield benefits tend to increase with time and are more stable year-to-year than in comparable conventional farming systems.
Improved ecosystem services
Human-caused climate change is significantly impacting the provision of ecosystem services, defined as the benefits that humans derive from nature. For example, changes in precipitation can lead to water scarcity, with knock-on effects for food production, or can lead to biodiversity loss. Research shows thatagroecological practices improve ecosystem services such as pollination, pest control, erosion, soil fertility and water management compared to conventional systems, and also enhance biodiversity. While conventional farming practices, such as intensive cultivation and pesticide use, are some of the biggest contributors to pollinator decline globally, agroecological practices increase the abundance and density of beneficial insects, reduce the abundance and density of insect pests, increase pollinator diversity, and reduce weed density and the abundance of parasitic and non-parasitic weeds.
Agroecological practices can also significantly decrease soil erosion – the most important indicator of land degradation – in temperate, tropical and mediterranean-type soils. Adding organic matter to soils, crop rotation, and the use of cover crops can improve carbon sequestration in soils. Analysis suggests that increasing the soil organic carbon pool of degraded croplands using agroecological practices has the potential to increase yields of wheat by 20-40 kg per hectare, maize yields by 10-20 kg per hectare and cowpea yields by 0.5-1 kg per hectare.
The text is an adaptation of a scientific article published on the website "Zero Carbon Analytics".