Sustainable and resource efficient intensivation of crop production – Perspectives of agro-ecosystem researchPolicy paper of the DFG Senate Commission on Agroecosystem Research

Authors

  • Volkmar Wolters Institut für Tierökologie, Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen
  • Johannes Isselstein Department für Nutzpflanzenwissenschaften, Georg-August-Universität Göttingen
  • Hartmut Stützel Institut für Biologische Produktionssysteme, Leibniz Universität Hannover
  • Frank Ordon Institut für Resistenzforschung und Stresstoleranz, Julius Kühn-Institut Quedlinburg
  • Christina von Haaren Institut für Umweltplanung, Leibniz Universität Hannover
  • Eva Schlecht Section Animal Husbandry in the Tropics and Subtropics, Universität Kassel und Georg-August-Universität Göttingen
  • Justus Wesseler Lehrstuhl für Agrar- und Ernährungswissenschaft, Technische Universität München
  • Regina Birner Institut für Agrar- u. Sozialökonomie in den Tropen und Subtropen, Universität Stuttgart-Hohenheim
  • Margit von Lützow Lehrstuhl für Bodenkunde, Technische Universität München
  • Nicolas Brüggemann Institut für Bio- und Geowissenschaften Agrosphäre (IBG-3), Forschungszentrum Jülich
  • Bernd Diekkrüger Geographisches Institut, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn
  • Andreas Fangmeier Institut für Landschafts- und Pflanzenökologie, Universität Stuttgart-Hohenheim
  • Heinz Flessa Institut für Agrarklimaschutz, Johann Heinrich von Thünen-Institut, Braunschweig
  • Henning Kage Institut für Pflanzenbau und Pflanzenzüchtung, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel
  • Martin Kaupenjohann Institut für Ökologie, Technische Universität Berlin
  • Ingrid Kögel-Knabner Lehrstuhl für Bodenkunde, Technische Universität München, Freising-Weihenstephan
  • Reinhard Mosandl Lehrstuhl für Waldbau, Technische Universität München, Freising-Weihenstephan
  • Ralf Seppelt Department Landschaftsökologie, Helmholtz-Zentrum für Umweltforschung, Leipzig

Keywords:

Sustainable intensification, landscape, ecosystem services, resource efficiency

Abstract

With its policy paper the Senate Commission on Agro-ecosystem Research of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) summarizes potential benefits of basic research for the sustainable intensification of crop production. Agro-ecosystems critically contribute to fulfilling the need for increasing food and fiber production, diminishing resource depletion as well as counteracting biodiversity loss and climate change. Yield demands that are needed to ensure the food supply predicted for the year 2050 can only be achieved by scientific progress that allows the intensive yet environmentally friendly production of plant biomass (Figure 1), (FAO, 2011; Dobermann und Nelson, 2013; Ray et al., 2013). Sustainable intensification requires a scientific realignment that allows for broadening the scope of agricultural research. The productivity of farming systems should be evaluated with regard to their efficiency (input-output relation). In addition, the spatial and temporal variability of these systems must be considered by addressing local conditions, the landscape context and climate change. With respect to ecosystem services, new production strategies must be developed that take all aspects of landscape and regional complexity as well as socio-economic conditions and agricultural policy into account.

Against this background, the Senate Commission on Agro-ecosystem Research proposes three priority areas of interdisciplinary research on resource efficient intensification of crop production:

(1) Exploiting the biological potential of the individual crop plants for an environmentally friendly intensification in an ecosystem approach

(2) Exploring sustainable intensification of crop production within a landscape context

(3) Taking full account of the economic, social and political dimensions of sustainable intensification of crop production

DOI: 10.5073/JfK.2014.07.01, https://doi.org/10.5073/JfK.2014.07.01

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Published

2014-07-01

Issue

Vol. 66 No. 7 (2014)

Section

Review

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