Talk:Biodiversity in agriculture

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I disagree with the following statement: More generally, it is the application of agroecology.

A very diligent group of Agroecology students just spent a lot of time and effort editing and adding to the Agroecology wikipedia page to dispel this very misconception. The principles of Agroecology are not applied with the sole goal of environmental sustainability. Please read the definitions on the Agroecology wikipedia page and revise your entry.

Cool. If you're the one who made the correction, thanks. That agroecology page was kind of weak before, but, at a glance, it looks a lot stronger. I'll take a better look later. Btw, one thing I've noticed that was a problem for me was organizing the themes or topics in the agroeco. res. article, if you have any suggestions I'll be glad to give it another shot. Unpoetaster (talk) 07:12, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Page move

Please discuss this. You can't just re-write an article and then rename it because it's now about something different. That's not the way this works. Guettarda (talk) 15:41, 29 October 2019 (UTC)

With respect to this edit summary: Example text the claim you're making here is incorrect. Monocultures do tend to contribute to habitat fragmentation to a much greater extent than polycultures. The article may not be very good, but you shouldn't delete content simply because you aren't familiar with the topic. Guettarda (talk) 15:45, 29 October 2019 (UTC)

Respectfully, the terminology "agroecological restoration" is not used in any of the sources as far as I can see. The words "ecological restoration" occur in the first reference, but not as a term.

Guettarda, I read up on the topic of agroecology, it is Wikipedia which is not following the sources. See the three sources (including a dictionary) in the definition. It simply means the ecology of agricultural systems. All this stuff about organic agriculture and whatnot people added (in 2008!) might be something one would study as an agroecologist, but so is any agricultural system.

In the specific edit you refer to: Sure, monoculture causes habitat fragmentation. So would building an industrial park or a polyculture farm. You are simply wrong if you believe chopping down a rainforest to build a farm will impact the rainforest any less significantly if you put two crops at a time on your parcel or two next to each other. Sorry I'm being abrasive, but I actually think I'm more "familiar with the topic" than whomever wrote this.

The reason I renamed it is because none of the sources are about "agroecological restoration", which looks like invented terminology, but are about (increasing) biodiversity in ecological systems. The word "restoration", for example, implies we are trying to restore an ecological system. This seems presumptuous. If we returned to dumping carcasses all over the place, we would have more kites (the bird) just like back in the old days, but also more disease, just like in the old days. What we are really talking about is supporting more insects and bird species in farmland.

Sure, polyculture increases biodiversity in a field, instead of just one species of aphid, you get two, and their predators, parasites, etc. But to claim it is restoring natural habitat as implied in the text, and to accrue that to agroecology, is simply stretching things beyond the sources and misreading the definition. Leo Breman (talk) 16:49, 29 October 2019 (UTC)

PS: I read your old work on South American palms. Good stuff. I did a bunch myself. Leo Breman (talk) 17:05, 29 October 2019 (UTC)

And, regarding the specific part you are referring to, I see I had previously condensed the offending paragraph to this sentence: "Monoculture, the practice of producing a single crop on a given piece of land, including crop rotation, produces optimum yields, but has implications for the biodiversity of farms." In my view, this sentence is neutral and factually correct. Do you not find this statement in agreement with what you said above? Leo Breman (talk) 17:30, 29 October 2019 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: ERTH 4303 Resources of the Earth

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 13 January 2023 and 15 April 2023. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Juwanm (article contribs). Peer reviewers: Tnmanning, Ari. gg02.

— Assignment last updated by ChloejWard (talk) 03:40, 15 April 2023 (UTC)