Ecological Intensification for Sustainable Development

The extent and quantity of natural resources (NRs) are going to degrade day by day due to overexploitation, misuse, unscientific management and some other anthropogenic deleterious activity in addition to climate change. NRs are nature’s properties that not only sustain life but also maintain ecosystem structure and its services to humankinds. Resources like agriculture, forest, animals, soils and water are global treasure and their extent of utilization must be in optimum, i.e. without overlooking the environment. Agriculture, forestry, animals are integrated unit and linked with each other that deliver various multifarious tangible and intangible products which can be modified by varying level of resources like soil, water and other environmental factors that affect the performance of agriculture and forestry at global level. Today, due to huge application of fertilizers in farm, intensive agricultural practices, illicit felling, deforestation, intensive grazing are affecting the soil health, water purity and its availability that leads to depletion of other NRs which are directly and indirectly linked with food and nutrition security, human and animal health, soil and environmental security. Therefore, the terms ecological intensification (EI) and sustainable intensification (SI) have proven to be a good strategy and play a significant role in conserving and managing these resources without affecting our environment health. FAO has defined the term EI and according to them, EI requires a knowledge intensive process that intensifies the ecosystem services (ES) of NRs by enhancing biodiversity which resulted in higher tree–crop–soil productivity through less use of synthetic inputs. This helps in maintaining food, health and climate security at global scale. However, intensification in agriculture and forestry must be promoted in lieu of maintaining food and nutritional security (FNS) of burgeoning 9.8 billion population along with minimizing global hunger and health issues of people. Therefore, EI in agricultural and forestry not only make sustainable production but also promote other ES, enhance other resource use efficiency (RUE), promote efficient nutrient cycling, maintain soil fertility along with ecological sustainability. However, there is lack of farmer’s knowledge regarding EI and SI in agriculture and forestry, effective policies should be framed at government level in relation to knowledge communication among peoples. Lack of scientific oriented research and development (R&D), etc. becomes constraints behind adoption, promotion and application of a better EI in these NRs without affecting our environment. In this context, this chapter gives a framework and outlines the concept and prospects of EI, its utility in various NRs (agriculture and forestry, etc.), its role in ES, RUE, climate change mitigation along with discussions on ongoing trends of hurdles and constraint behind its adoption, related R&D and future roadmap for better applicability of EI in NRs for better environment with sustainable production systems at global scale.