Farmers differ in their commitment and interest to keep a diverse crop species and varieties.But which kind of farmers are more interested to keep maintaining diversified cropping systems?
Speaking after one decade of experience in northern Italy, small and/or non-professional farmers operating in marginal areas (pre-alpine valleys, small Mediterranean isles etc.) show most interest in growing and often collecting landraces. Conversely, large or medium size farms are often absent, as the industrial agriculture they practice an obstacle to (re)introduce landraces in their cropping systems. Conversely, small and/or non-professional farmers are not familiar with cropping systems; unfortunately they are often aged, so the perspectives about landrace and agrobiodiversity conservation (at least in in Italy) rely on activities carried out by local agricultural agencies. As you may probably know, the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (Rome, 2001) set the scene for these PGR topics at global level.
there are some methods to measure biodiversity on different farm scale. It could be masured as how the farmers in one community use their landscape. Usually measuring biodiversity in farm scale also related to measuring carbon stock, optimize yield potential by different crops, and the sustainability of agroecology in a farm scale.
I'm studying a lot of thing about this topic from my lecture, may you ask her for more detail discussion.
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Kurniatun_Hairiah/publications
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