Biodiversity can support a greener revolution in Africa

摘要: The Asian green revolution trebled grain yields through agrochemical intensification of monocultures. Associated environmental costs have subsequently emerged. A rapidly changing world necessitates sustainability principles be developed to reinvent these technologies and test them at scale. need is particularly urgent in Africa, where ecosystems are degrading crop stagnated. An unprecedented opportunity reverse this trend unfolding Malawi, a 90% subsidy has ensured access fertilization improved maize seed, with substantive gains productivity for millions farmers. To if economic ecological could improved, we preformed manipulative experimentation diversity countrywide trial (n = 991) adaptive, local scales decade participatory research 146). Spatial temporal treatments compared monoculture legume-diversified that included annual semiperennial (SP) growth habits spatial combinations, including rotation, SP intercrop, intercrop systems. Modest fertilizer doubled yield maize. Biodiversity ecosystem function further: rotation systems half-fertilizer rates produced equivalent quantities grain, on more stable basis (yield variability reduced from 22% 13%) monoculture. Across sites, profitability farmer preference matched: rotations provided twofold superior returns, whereas diversification legumes modest returns. In study, provide evidence can effective scale, shrubby, enhance food security.