Organic farmers’ reality to manage functional agrobiodiversity in European organic apple orchards

According to its principles and standards, organic farming particularly rely on natural processes and functional agro-biodiversity (FAB) to benefit from essential ecosystem services. However, these processes are mostly complex, hardly visible and site-specific, thereby making it difficult to assess and manage on-farm. A European survey has been carried out among organic farmers and emphasizes the variability among countries with a diversity of techniques targeting different functional groups according to farming contexts and farmers’ expectations. The different criteria used by farmers to evaluate FABtechniques efficiency and implementation potential clearly illustrate the difficulty to assess the agroecosystem as a whole

Organic farmers’ reality to manage functional agrobiodiversity in European organic apple orchards.

According to its principles and standards, organic farming particularly rely on natural processes and functional agro-biodiversity (FAB) to benefit from essential ecosystem services. However, these processes are mostly complex, hardly visible and site-specific, thereby making it difficult to assess and manage on-farm. A European survey has been carried out among organic farmers and emphasizes the variability among countries with a diversity of techniques targeting different functional groups according to farming contexts and farmers’ expectations. The different criteria used by farmers to evaluate FAB techniques efficiency and implementation potential clearly illustrate the difficulty to assess the agroecosystem as a whole

The Little Prince and economics as a 'social science'

«Grown-ups love numbers. When you tell about a new friend, they never ask you about the important things. They never say: ‘What does his voice sound like? What are his favourite games? Does he collect butterflies?’ They ask you: ‘How old is he? How many brothers and sisters does he have? What does he weigh? How much does his father earn? Only then do they feel they know him. If you say to grown-ups: ‘I saw a beautiful pink brick house with geraniums on the window sills and doves on the roof,’..

Organic farmers’ reality to manage functional agrobio diversity in European organic apple orchards: Results of an European survey

According to its principles and standards, organic farming particularly rely on natural processes and functional agro-biodiversity (FAB) to benefit from essential ecosystem services. However, these processes are mostly complex, hardly visible and site-specific, thereby making it difficult to assess and manage on-farm. A European survey has been carried out among organic farmers and emphasizes the variability among countries with a diversity of techniques targeting different functional groups according to farming contexts and farmers’ expectations. The different criteria used by farmers to evaluate FAB-techniques efficiency and implementation potential clearly illustrate the difficulty to assess the agroecosystem as a whole