Examining multi-functionality for crop yield and ecosystem services in five systems of agroecological intensification

ABSTRACT

Agroecological intensification (AEI) integrates ecological principles and biodiversity management into farming systems with the aims of increasing farm productivity, reducing dependency on external inputs, and sustaining or enhancing ecosystem services. This review develops an analytic framework to characterize the fulfilment of these objectives by documenting the co-occurrence of positive, neutral, and negative outcomes for crop yield and nine regulating ecosystem services. We provide an illustrative examination of the framework, evaluating evidence for yield and ecosystem service outcomes across five AEI systems: conservation agriculture, holistic grazing management, organic agriculture, precision agriculture, and system of rice intensification (SRI). We reviewed 104 studies containing 245 individual comparisons between AEI and contrasting farming systems. In three of the five AEI systems, conservation agriculture, precision agriculture, and SRI, more than half of reviewed comparisons reported ‘win-win’ outcomes, enhancement of both yield and ecosystem services, or ‘win-neutral’ outcomes relative to contrasting farming systems. The review presents substantial evidence that the five AEI systems can contribute to multi-functional agriculture by increasing ecosystem service provision, or reducing negative externalities associated with agriculture, while maintaining or increasing yields. A framework such as the one presented here can help guide decision-makers considering how best to implement multi-functional agriculture so that both crop yield and ecosystem service delivery can be maintained or increased.

KEYWORDS:

• conservation agriculture
• holistic grazing management
• organic
• precision agriculture
• system of rice intensification

Acknowledgements

We thank the participants in the March 2012 workshop ‘Assessing the Scale and Scalability of Agroecological Approaches’ for their ideas and guidance in framing this study. These participants included Lise Andreasen, Lee Gross, Jeremy Haggar, V.A. Nambi, Christine Padoch, Cheryl Palm, Frank Place, Kate Tully, and Jianchu Xu, Ken Giller, Peter Hobbs, Toby Hodgkin, Amy Kaleita, Jules Pretty, Sara J. Scherr, Wieteke Willemen, and one anonymous reviewer provided valuable comments on a prior draft of this paper. This paper is a contribution of the Landscapes for People, Food and Nature Initiative (http://landscapes.ecoagriculture.org).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Supplemental data

Supplemental data for this paper can be accessed http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14735903.2016.1174810

ORCID

Kelly Garbach http://orcid.org/0000-0002-7896-9773

Fabrice A.J. DeClerck http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3631-8745

Laura Driscoll http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9394-8906

Barbara Gemmill-Herren http://orcid.org/0000-0003-4991-640X

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, by the CGIAR Research Program on Water, Land and Ecosystems, and by the authors’ respective host institutions. This paper is a contribution of the Landscapes for People, Food and Nature Initiative (http://landscapes.ecoagriculture.org).