Sustainable intensification has been defined as a form of production wherein “yields are increased without adverse environmental impact and without the cultivation of more land”.
Increased input of organic manure (compost/animal dung), drip irrigation, crop rotation with seasons, N-fixing legume crops added, agroforestry with trees interspersed with crops, collect local varieties of a crop and grow all of them. Like the way agriculture has been done for centuries uptil the 1960s when the chemical inputs became popular, except that, as Masanobu Kukuoka pointed ouit oin his book "One Straw Revolution", each geographical area and plot of land has its unique combination of abiotic and biotic factors, and hence requires keen observation adn experimentation by the farmer to see what combination of crops, watering regime and pest control works best.
Increased input of organic manure (compost/animal dung), drip irrigation, crop rotation with seasons, N-fixing legume crops added, agroforestry with trees interspersed with crops, collect local varieties of a crop and grow all of them. Like the way agriculture has been done for centuries uptil the 1960s when the chemical inputs became popular, except that, as Masanobu Kukuoka pointed ouit oin his book "One Straw Revolution", each geographical area and plot of land has its unique combination of abiotic and biotic factors, and hence requires keen observation adn experimentation by the farmer to see what combination of crops, watering regime and pest control works best.
Based on your definition "yields are increased without adverse . . .", it seems increasing the crop yield per ha is the best way to improve sustainable intensification of agriculture. It means we should try to use cultivators with higher yield. But in reality it is not possible to increase the yields of crops. In modern agricultural systems, we can not consider the production system from one aspect. In analysis of an agricultural system three E should be considered simultaneously,"Energy, Environment and Economy".
If the environmental issues are meant to be considered as the most important factor; under some conditions; we should decrease the application of agricultural inputs and their negative environmental impacts. The Less application of inputs, the fewer production of crops. Therefore more land should be devoted for cultivation.
While considering an increase in food production, there should also be a large emphasis on decreasing waste. Almost 40% of all food growin annually worldwide is wasted, from wasteful harvesting to poor storage to food thrown away in supermarkets and people's homes. There are constraints in most places in increasing land area under food, as that takes land away from forests and wetlands, unless there is a large investment in wasteland regeneration.
Dear Benyamin Khoshnevisan
Growing (or maintaining) production, whilst minimizing inputs, and enhancing ecosystem services, also is one of the definition for sustainable Intensification. In sustainable intensification we use all appropriate best management practices to gain the best possible agricultural outputs from efficient factor productivity.
Thank You
Mohammad Kazemi
Dear Amartya Saha
I completely agree with you.
The profitability and sustainability of production systems derive from efficiency in both the use and conservation of available resources, applied in appropriately-combined crop-soil-water-nutrient-pest-ecosystem management practices.
Mohammad Kazemi
An insightful debate on the topic can be found in the following material:
Sustainable Intensification in Agriculture: Premises and Policies Science 5 July 2013: 33-34.
The answer would be quite different in different places and contexts (bio-phyiscal, socio-economic, institutional).
An interesting read from an African perspective:
Juma, C., Tabo. R., Wilson, K. and Conway, G. 2013. Innovation for Sustainable Intensification in Africa, The Montpellier Panel, Agriculture for Impact, London.
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