Conceptualising fields of action for sustainable intensification A systematic literature review and application to regional case studies

[EN] After two decades of research on sustainable intensification (SI), namely securing food production on less environmental cost, heterogeneous understandings and perspectives prevail in a broad and partly fragmented scientific literature. Structuring and consolidating contributions to provide practice-oriented guidelines are lacking. The objectives of this study are to (1) comprehensively explore the academic SI literature, (2) propose an implementation-oriented conceptual framework, and (3) demonstrate its applicability for region-specific problem settings. In a systematic literature review of 349 papers covering the international literature of 20 years of SI research, we identified SI practices and analysed temporal, spatial and disciplinary trends and foci. Based on key SI practices, a conceptual framework was developed differentiating four fields of action from farm to regional and landscape scale and from land use to structural optimisation. Its applicability to derive region specific SI solutions was successfully tested through stakeholder processes in four European case studies. Disciplinary boundaries and the separation of the temporal and spatial strands in the literature prevent a holistic address of SI. This leads to the dominance of research describing SI practices in isolation, mainly on the farm scale. Coordinated actions on the regional scale and the coupling of multiple practices are comparatively un-derrepresented. Results from the case studies demonstrate that implementation is extremely context-sensitive and thus crucially depends on the situational knowledge of farmers and stakeholders. Although, there is no 'one size fits all' solution, practitioners in all regions identified the need for integrated solutions and common action to implement suitable SI strategies at the regional landscape level and in local ecosystems.This research was financially supported by the European Commission under grant agreement 652615 and conducted in the context of the ERA-Net FACCE SURPLUS project VITAL, with the national funders NWO (Netherlands), BMBF (Germany), INIA (Spain), ANR (France).Weltin, M.; Zasada, I.; Piorr, A.; Debolini, M.; Geniaux, G.; Moreno-Pérez, OM.; Scherer, L.... (2018). Conceptualising fields of action for sustainable intensification A systematic literature review and application to regional case studies. Agriculture Ecosystems & Environment. 257:68-80. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agee.2018.01.023S688025

Analysing behavioural differences of farm households: An example of income diversification strategies based on European farm survey data

Different forms of income diversification represent important strategies of farmers to either cope with the changing economic framework conditions or to valorise given territorial potentialities. Nevertheless, the decision to diversify economic activities on or off the farm will heavily depend on the agricultural business and household characteristics. Our study used a survey of 2154 farms from eleven European regions to identify distinct farm types in order to investigate differences regarding the willingness to diversify in the future. Two scenario situations with continuation (baseline) and without any market intervention (“No CAP”) were tested. A factor and cluster analysis depicted six farm types both previously described and novel. The typology proved validity across all case studies, whereas single types occurred more frequently under specific site conditions. The six farm types showed strong variations in the stated future diversification behaviour. Young farm households with organic production are most likely to diversify activities particularly on-farm, whereas farm types characterised by intensive livestock holding and also already diversified and part-time farm households are least likely to apply this strategy. Results have further shown that under hypothetical conditions of termination of economic support by the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) an increasing share of farmers – throughout all types – would apply income diversification, mainly off-farm diversification, as a survival strategy

Data on the scope of the literature on sustainable intensification 1997–2016: Bibliography, geography and practical approaches

The data presented in this DiB article offers a full overview on the scientific sustainable intensification literature from 1997 to 2016. It consists of articles retrieved from the Scopus and the Web of Science databases that feature “Sustainable Intensification” (SI) as search term in title, abstract or author keywords. Information on bibliography, geographic focus and proposed sustainable intensification practices of each publication is recorded. The suggested sustainable intensification practices were assigned into 26 SI approaches constituting bundles of practices using a qualitative classification approach. The data is related to the research article entitled”Conceptualising fields of action for sustainable intensification. A systematic literature review and application to regional case studies” [1]. The information builds a baseline to assess the developments of the knowledge on SI and especially its practical implementation in depth. The database provides a comprehensive and structured overview of the SI literature and guidance for scholars and practitioners working on the topic. Keywords: Systematic literature review, Classification, Agricultural systems, Food productio

Tethered cord syndrome in KBG syndrome.

Tethered cord syndrome (TCS) is characterized by leg pain and weakness, bladder and bowel dysfunction, orthopedic malformations such as scoliosis, and motor deficits caused by the fixation of the spinal cord to surrounding tissues. TCS is surgically treatable and often found in conjunction with other syndromic conditions. KBG syndrome is caused by variants in the ANKRD11 gene and is characterized by short stature, developmental delay, macrodontia, and a triangular face. The current study explores the prevalence of TCS in pediatric KBG patients and their associated signs and symptoms. Patients with KBG were surveyed for signs and symptoms associated with TCS and asked if they had been diagnosed with the syndrome. We found a high proportion of patients diagnosed with (11%) or being investigated for TCS (24%), emphasizing the need to further characterize the comorbid syndromes. No signs or symptoms clearly emerged as indicative of TCS in KBG patients, but some the prevalence of some signs and symptoms varied by sex. Male KBG patients with diagnosed TCS were more likely to have coordination issues and global delay/brain fog than their female counterparts. Understanding the presentation of TCS in KBG patients is critical for timely diagnosis and treatment

CONCEPTUALISING FIELDS OF ACTION FOR SUSTAINABLE INTENSIFICATION – A SYSTEMATIC LITERATURE AND APPLICATION TO REGIONAL CASE STUDIES

Given the challenges of food security and environmental degradation, sustainable intensification (SI) that combines food production and environmental goals has received growing attention. This study traces the heterogeneous debate in a systematic literature review covering 20 years. To enhance structured, action-oriented understanding, we propose a conceptual framework that anchors the portfolio of SI practices in four fields of action covering farm to landscape level and land-use to organisational optimisation. Applying the framework in four European case studies demonstrates that future research and context-specific implementation must focus on the decision-making rationales of agents, coordinated action and coupling of locally-adapted practices

Deliverable D1.1 Analytical and Scenario Framework

The challenges of an increasing world population accelerating food demand, biodiversity globally under threat, depleting natural resources, and the need to mitigate the effects of climate change, signal that new food for thought is needed for food and non-food biomass production systems. Sustainable intensification (SI) needs to be one element of the solution. It aims at the development of intensive agricultural systems that have minimal detrimental environmental and social effects. The VITAL project explores the transition process of European agriculture towards sustainably intensified production. This first deliverable report synthesising the results of task 1.1 establishes the scientific framing of SI and the analytical approach of the project. We therefore analysed the literature using in-depth as well as systematic approaches and developed a conceptual-scenario framework of sustainable intensification. The aim is to establish an anchoring point to assess the implementation of SI at farm and regional scale and to enable an up-scaling of the results to the European level. The conceptual-scenario framework was validated by a group of regional stakeholders in order to ensure its applicability to practice and to develop a common science-practice understanding. We found that the understanding on what SI is and how it should be achieved varies in the literature and overlap with other concepts of sustainable agriculture, such as ecological intensification or agroecology, is debated. However, in this report we demonstrate that the discussed measures and concepts of sustainable intensification can be clustered alongside two dimensions: from the farm/local to the landscape/regional level and from land-use optimization to structural optimization. Using these two dimensions, we conceptualize four different scenarios of SI which we label sustainable intensification pathways (SIP). SIP I “Agronomic Development” and SIP II “Resource Use Efficiency” address land-use and structural optimization respectively on the farm level. On the regional scale we derive SIP III “Land Use Allocation” and SIP IV “Regional Integration”. The consulted local stakeholders were able to assign local solutions to each SIP. Based on the conceptual-scenario framework, an analytical line is drawn between SI implementation, evaluation and up-scaling defining the process of the project in a common analytical framework