The State of the World’s Biodiversity for Food and Agriculture—the first-ever report of its kind—provides an assessment of biodiversity for food and agriculture (BFA) and its management worldwide, drawing on information provided in 91 country reports, 27 reports from international organizations and inputs from over 175 authors and reviewers.
It describes the many contributions that BFA makes to food security and nutrition, livelihoods, the resilience of production systems, the sustainable intensification of food production and the supply of multiple ecosystem services; the major drivers of change affecting BFA; the status and trends of various components of BFA; the state of management of BFA; the state of policies, institutions and capacities that support the sustainable use and conservation of BFA; and needs and challenges in the management of BFA.
Key findings include:
- Biodiversity is essential to food and agriculture
- Biodiversity for food and agriculture is indispensable to food security, sustainable development and the supply of many vital ecosystem services.
- Multiple interacting drivers of change are affecting biodiversity for food and agriculture
- While a range of drivers of change are having major negative impacts on biodiversity for food and agriculture and the ecosystem services it delivers, some provide opportunities to promote more sustainable management.
- Biodiversity for food and agriculture is declining
- Many key components of biodiversity for food and agriculture at genetic, species and ecosystem levels are in decline.
- Knowledge of associated biodiversity, in particular micro-organisms and invertebrates, and of its roles in the supply of ecosystem services needs to be improved.
- Monitoring programmes for biodiversity for food and agriculture remain limited.
- The use of many biodiversity-friendly practices is reported to be increasing
- The sustainable use and conservation of biodiversity for food and agriculture call for approaches in which genetic resources, species and ecosystems are managed in an integrated way in the context of production systems and their surroundings.
- The use of a wide range of management practices and approaches regarded as favourable to the sustainable use and conservation of biodiversity for food and agriculture is reported to be increasing.
- Although efforts to conserve biodiversity for food and agriculture in situ and ex situ are increasing, levels of coverage and protection are often inadequate.
- Enabling frameworks for the sustainable use and conservation of biodiversity for food and agriculture remain insufficient
- Enabling frameworks for the sustainable use and conservation of biodiversity for food and agriculture urgently need to be established or strengthened.
- Research on food and agricultural systems needs to become more multidisciplinary, more participatory and more focused on interactions between different components of biodiversity for food and agriculture.
- Improving the management of biodiversity for food and agriculture and enhancing its contributions to ecosystem services call for better multistakeholder, cross-sectoral and international cooperation.