Effects of agricultural diversity in locally based food systems on resilience and security

Background/Question/Methods

Often considered unrelated, biological/agricultural diversity and food security are connected through resilience to both anthropogenic and natural perturbations.  A relationship between resilience to disturbance and biodiversity has been described in a number of biological systems, both natural and highly managed.  Diversity in food production can be similarly described, a) ecosystem diversity, captured by the diversity of production between farms, and b) on farm species and genetic diversity, as reflected in the diversity of crops and cultivars which can be selected for site/regional suitability or other traits.  

Results/Conclusions

A network of locally based food producers provides an opportunity for high diversity between farms across the agricultural landscape as well as high crop and genetic diversity on each farm.  Diversity across the agricultural landscape provides an opportunity for implementation of biosecurity measures such as quarantine to control the spread of infectious agents between farms, as demonstrated with the recent epidemic of Porcine Transmissible Diarrhea.  Techniques such as permaculture and Biointensive farming  provide positive facilitative interactions between species further enhancing resilience.  Soils managed for Biointensive production showed 3X the CO₂ production and 5X the carbon content of similar soils not managed for production.  This suggests higher microbial activity and carbon sequestration potential with this method of food production.   Crop yield on the Elon University Farm was increased between 18% - 400% with Biointensive techniques, using high crop diversity (usually 3 crops in coproduction) in production beds.  Human community resilience and increased food security can also be achieved through a distributed, locally based network of producers, aggregation centers, distributors, processors and marketing outlets, with risk distributed between the rural and urban sectors.  A regionally based farm/food network formed by a partnership of local governments, NGO's and academic institutions can provide the infrastructure to support a resilient local network.  We use a regional food model in central North Carolina to demonstrate the potential for increased resilience and food security through the biological/agricultural diversity which can be achieved through regionally focused food production and distribution.