UK AGRICULTURAL BIODIVERSITY COMPENDIUM

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WHAT IS AGRICULTURAL BIODIVERSITY?

Agricultural biodiversity encompasses the variety and variability of animals, plants and micro-organisms which are necessary to sustain key functions of the agro-ecosystem, its structure and processes for, and in support of, food production.

Agricultural biodiversity is the selected and enhanced sub-set of biodiversity resulting from human interaction with other species in (agro)ecosystems. It is an outcome of the innovation, knowledge, skills and practices of, or has co-evolved with, countless generations of women and men who are smallholder and peasant farmers, gardeners, livestock keepers, pastoralists, artisanal fishers, forest dwellers, Indigenous Peoples, and other small-scale food providers, who produce food for most people in the world from their more ecological forms of production and harvesting. It can be described at genetic, species and ecosystem levels - variation in agricultural biodiversity is apparent at local, community and landscape / watershed / coastal-marine levels. It is also described spatially, within and between production systems, and temporally.

Agricultural biodiversity includes the variety and variability of:

•  Crop varieties, fodder and tree species, livestock breeds, diverse aquatic and marine species and non- domesticated ('wild') species used by people. (These ‘target' species may also be manifest as ‘populations', rather than distinct ‘varieties')

•  Non-harvested ‘associated' species and populations within ecosystems that support production and provide essential ecosystem functions e.g. soil micro-organisms, pollinators, plant and animal pest predators, crop wild relatives, aquatic organisms.

•  Ecosystems (including agricultural, pastoral, forest and aquatic/marine ecosystems) at all scales.

NOTE:

Ecological food provision depends on and develops agricultural biodiversity above and below ground, in farms and gardens, in grazing lands and in productive waters.

On-farm / on the range / in pond conservation in situ is essential for sustaining and developing agricultural biodiversity

The organisations of small-scale food providers are increasingly and consistently clear about the need to sustain agricultural biodiversity in the framework of food sovereignty, the policy proposal of social movements for a healthy, equitable and sustainable food system.

There are important links between campaigns to secure food supplies, provide adequate nutrition, adapt to and mitigate against climate change, and the numerous advocacy processes and actions to address the causes of loss of agricultural biodiversity – policy, legal, commercial, technological.

( FAO, 1999 and other sources)

Other descriptions include:

Agricultural biodiversity of all food species is a vital sub-set of general biodiversity, highly threatened by globalisation of food markets and tastes, intellectual property systems and the spread of unsustainable industrial food production, but it provides the basis of the food security and livelihood security of billions of people and the development of all food production, including for industrial agriculture and for the biotechnology (Life) industries. It is the first link in the food chain, developed and safeguarded by farmers, herders and fishers throughout the world.

Although the term "agricultural biodiversity" is relatively new - it has come into wide use in recent years as evidenced by bibliographic references - the concept itself is quite old. It is the result of the careful selection and inventive developments of farmers, herders and fishers over millennia. Agricultural biodiversity is a vital sub-set of biodiversity. It is a creation of humankind whose food and livelihood security depend on the sustained management of those diverse biological resources that are important for food and agriculture. Agricultural biodiversity, also known as agrobiodiversity or the genetic resources for food and agriculture, includes:

• Harvested crop varieties, livestock breeds, fish species and non- domesticated ('wild') resources within field, forest, rangeland and in aquatic ecosystems;

• Non-harvested species within production ecosystems that support food provision, including soil micro-biota, pollinators and so on; and

• Non-harvested species in the wider environment that support food production ecosystems (agricultural, pastoral, forest and aquatic ecosystems).

• breakdown of organic matter and recycling of nutrients to maintain soil fertility and sustain plant and consequently animal growth;
• breakdown of pollutants and maintenance of a clean and healthy atmosphere;
• moderation of climatic effects such as maintaining rainfall patterns and modulation of the water cycle and the absorption of solar energy by the land and its subsequent release;
• maintenance and stability of productive vegetative, fish and animal populations and the limitation of invasion by harmful or less useful species;
• protection and conservation of soil and water resources, for example through a vegetative cover and appropriate management practices, and the consequent maintenance of the integrity of landscapes and habitats;
• sequestration of CO2 by plants.

(FAO, 1999)

• i. Sustainable production of food and other agricultural products emphasising both strengthening sustainability in production systems at all levels of intensity and improving the conservation, sustainable use and enhancement of the diversity of all genetic resources for food and agriculture, especially plant and animal genetic resources, in all types of production systems.
• ii. Biological or life support to production emphasising conservation, sustainable use and enhancement of the biological resources that support sustainable production systems, particularly soil biota, pollinators and predators.
• iii. Ecological and social services provided by agro-ecosystems such as landscape and wildlife protection, soil protection and health (fertility, structure and function), water cycle and water quality, air quality, CO2 sequestration, etc.

A DEFINITION OF AGRICULTURAL BIODIVERSITY

The variety and variability of animals, plants and micro-organisms used directly or indirectly for food and agriculture (including, in the FAO definition, crops, livestock, forestry and fisheries). It comprises the diversity of genetic resources (varieties, breeds, etc.) and species used for food, fodder, fibre, fuel and pharmaceuticals. It also includes the diversity of non-harvested species that support production (e.g. soil micro-organisms, predators, pollinators and so on) and those in the wider environment that support agro-ecosystems (agricultural, pastoral, forest and aquatic), as well as the diversity of the agro-ecosystems themselves.

It has also been defined as:

Agricultural biodiversity encompasses the variety and variability of animals, plants and micro-organisms which are necessary to sustain key functions of the agro-ecosystem, its structure and processes for, and in support of, food production and food security. (FAO, 1999)

WHAT IS HAPPENING TO AGRICULTURAL BIODIVERSITY?

These locally diverse food production systems are under threat and, with them, the accompanying local knowledge, culture and skills of the food producers. With this decline, agricultural biodiversity is disappearing and the scale of loss is extensive and with the disappearance of harvested species, varieties and breeds goes a wide range of unharvested species.

• More than 90 per cent of crop varieties have disappeared from farmers' fields;

• Half of the breeds of many domestic animals have been lost.

• In fisheries, all the world's 17 main fishing grounds are now being fished at or above their sustainable limits, with many fish populations effectively becoming extinct.

The genetic erosion of agricultural biodiversity is also exacerbated by the loss of forest cover, coastal wetlands and other 'wild' uncultivated areas, and the destruction of the aquatic environment. This leads to losses of 'wild' relatives, important for the development of biodiversity, and losses of 'wild' foods essential for food provision, particularly in times of crisis.

WHAT ARE THE UNDERLYING CAUSES OF THE LOSSES OF AGRICULTURAL BIODIVERSITY?

There are many causes of this decline, which has been accelerating throughout the 20th century in parallel with the demands of an increasing population and greater competition for natural resources. The principal underlying causes include:

• The rapid expansion of industrial and Green Revolution agriculture, intensive livestock production, industrial fisheries and aquaculture (some production systems using genetically modified varieties and breeds) that cultivate relatively few crop varieties in monocultures, rear a limited number of domestic animal breeds, or fish for, or cultivate, few aquatic species.

• Globalisation of the food system and marketing, and the extension of industrial patenting and other intellectual property systems to living organisms, which have led to the widespread cultivation and rearing of fewer varieties and breeds for a more uniform, less diverse but more competitive global market.

As a consequence there has been:

• Marginalisation of small-scale, diverse food production systems that conserve farmers' varieties of crops and breeds of domestic animals, which form the genetic pool for food and agriculture in the future.

• Reduced integration of livestock in arable production, which reduces the diversity of uses for which livestock are needed.

• Reduced use of 'nurture' fisheries techniques, that conserve and develop aquatic biodiversity.