Biodiversity Management in Agricultural Ecosystems

Biodiversity management in agricultural ecosystems seeks to harmonise productive farming with the conservation of species, habitats and ecosystem functions. Agricultural intensification and landscape simplification have driven declines in pollinators, soil biota and natural pest‐control agents, undermining long‐term productivity and resilience. Management strategies range from field-scale interventions, such as floral strips, hedgerows and reduced chemical inputs, to landscape-scale planning that retains or restores semi-natural habitats, hedgerows and riparian buffers. Agroecological approaches—often termed ecological intensification—optimise crop yields by enhancing beneficial biodiversity rather than relying solely on external inputs. Agri-environment schemes and organic farming demonstrate that moderate shifts in field management can boost species richness and functional diversity, though they may entail trade-offs with yield. A balanced mosaic of crop fields, set-asides and protected areas, underpinned by spatial configuration and connectivity, is essential to support pollination, pest regulation, nutrient cycling and soil retention. Globally, tailored combinations of on-field and off-field measures are being implemented to meet food-security goals alongside international biodiversity targets, delivering multiple co-benefits for communities, climate mitigation and ecosystem resilience.

Research from Nature Portfolio

Recent studies have modelled how ambitious land restoration and a minimum of 20 % semi-natural habitat within farmed landscapes can uphold pollination supply, soil stability and landscape heterogeneity without compromising productive land; these models indicate that spatially relocating cropland outside high-priority conservation zones can achieve biodiversity gains without additional carbon loss or productivity decline. Foundational research has also demonstrated that landscape-scale simplification drives functional homogenisation, selectively disadvantaging specialist, small-bodied and seasonally active taxa; maintaining diverse land-cover types at broad scales can buffer against intensive in-field management and sustain functional community composition even in heavily farmed regions.

Biodiversity Management in Agricultural Ecosystems publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in biodiversity management in agricultural ecosystems across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Semi-natural habitat: Remnant or restored areas within agricultural landscapes retaining original vegetation structure and species, such as hedgerows, woodlands and grassland strips.

Landscape heterogeneity: The variety and spatial arrangement of land-cover types that create ecological niches and movement corridors for wildlife.

Ecological intensification: The enhancement of on-farm ecosystem services (pollination, pest control, nutrient cycling) through biodiversity-friendly practices rather than external chemical inputs.

Agri-environment scheme: A policy-driven incentive system that remunerates farmers for implementing biodiversity-enhancing measures on agricultural land.

References

1. Projected landscape-scale repercussions of global action for climate and biodiversity protection. Nature Communications (2023).
2. Landscape simplification filters species traits and drives biotic homogenization. Nature Communications (2015).
3. Mixing on- and off-field measures for biodiversity conservation. Trends in Ecology & Evolution (2024).
4. Securing Nature’s Contributions to People requires at least 20%–25% (semi-)natural habitat in human-modified landscapes. One Earth (2024).
5. Quantifying potential trade-offs and win-wins between arthropod diversity and yield on cropland under agri-environment schemes–A meta-analysis. Journal of Environmental Management (2024).
6. Ecological intensification to mitigate impacts of conventional intensive land use on pollinators and pollination. Ecology Letters (2017).
7. The role of agri‐environment schemes in conservation and environmental management. Conservation Biology (2015).
8. Land‐use intensity and the effects of organic farming on biodiversity: a hierarchical meta‐analysis. Journal of Applied Ecology (2014).