In this adverse scenario, new farming initiatives and renewed practices are urgently required to promote a sustainable agriculture model. At a global scale, this environmental deterioration results in biodiversity loss and the decline of ecosystem services, placing the maintenance of human well-being at risk. urbanization, job opportunities or aging populations). It has been extensively documented that impacts on biodiversity and natural resources are attributed to agricultural intensification (e.g., pesticides, fertilizers, tillage) and farmland abandonment (i.e. Īttaining sustainable global food systems implies, as a first step, understanding the trade-offs between food security (e.g., produce enough and healthy food) and environmental impacts (e.g., biodiversity loss, resource stresses). Despite the importance of addressing this global issue, it is receiving little urgency, and few quantitative targets are being developed by the global research and policy community. In this sense, many authors note that to meet the world’s future food security and sustainability needs, food production must grow substantially while, at the same time, agriculture’s environmental footprint must shrink dramatically. Current predictions for the future of agriculture point out that to meet surging demand, global food production must double by 2050. These demands are generating some of the most serious challenges faced by humanity, and are concurrently degrading land, water resources, biodiversity, and climate on a global scale. Human population growth and food consumption and waste are placing unprecedented demands on agricultural systems and increasing pressure on natural resources. Global Sustainability Challenges of Agricultural Systems Notwithstanding plural values, challenges and solutions identified by consensus point to a nascent acknowledgement of the strategic necessity to locate agricultural economic activity within social and environmental spheres.This paper demonstrates the need to establish transdisciplinary multi-actor work-schemes to continue collaboration and research for the transition to an agro-ecological model as a means to remain competitive and to create value.ġ. We conclude that the multi-actor transdisciplinary approach successfully facilitated the creation of a culture of shared responsibility among public, private, academic, and civil society actors. The multi-actor, transdisciplinary process implemented collectively, and supported by scientific literature, identified six fundamental challenges to transitioning to an agricultural model that aims to ameliorate risks and avoid a systemic collapse, whilst balancing a concern for profitability with sustainability: (1) Governance based on a culture of shared responsibility for sustainability, (2) Sustainable and efficient use of water, (3) Biodiversity conservation, (4) Implementing a circular economy plan, (5) Technology and knowledge transfer, and (6) Image and identity. Here, we present the outcomes of multi-actor, transdisciplinary research to review and provide collective insights for solutions-oriented research on the sustainability of Almeria’s agricultural sector. The system currently finds itself in a crisis of diminishing economic benefits and increasing environmental and social dilemmas. Almería family farming, predominantly cooperative, greenhouse intensive production, commenced after the 1960s and has resulted in very significant social and economic benefits for the region, while also having important negative environmental and biodiversity impacts, as well as creating new social challenges. In order to illustrate the wicked social, economic and environmental challenges and processes to find transformative solutions, we focus on the largest concentration of greenhouses in the world located in the semi-arid coastal plain of South-east Spain. Globally, current food consumption and trade are placing unprecedented demand on agricultural systems and increasing pressure on natural resources, requiring tradeoffs between food security and environmental impacts especially given the tension between market-driven agriculture and agro-ecological goals.
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