The challenge: To secure adequate food that is healthy, safe and of high quality for all, in an environmentally sustainable manner.
Today’s food systems are failing on both the consumption and production sides:
The solution: Mainstream agrobiodiversity in sustainable food systems
It is a consistent long-term tool to measure and manage agrobiodiversity across four dimensions: nutrition, production, seed systems and conservation.
It will help decision-makers – governments, investors, companies, farmers and consumers – ensure that food systems are more diverse and sustainable.
Up to now there has been no consistent way for governments, private sector and other decision-makers to assess and track agrobiodiversity in sustainable food systems, track change, or measure the influence it has on other issues and sectors.
Such knowledge gaps also extend to measuring how agrobiodiversity is delivering progress to meet multiple interconnected global targets including the Sustainable Development Goals and the Convention on Biological Diversity.
Agrobiodiversity is a critical component of a sustainable food system.
Without agrobiodiversity a food system cannot be sustainable
To manage agrobiodiversity, we need to measure it
Agricultural biodiversity (agrobiodiversity) “includes the variety and variability of animals, plants and micro-organisms that are used directly or indirectly for food and agriculture, including crops, livestock, forestry and fisheries.” (FAO, 2005)
Allison Smith, Initiative Manager, Effective Genetic Resources Conservation and Use
This booklet presents a summary of the key messages and content from the forthcoming publication: Mainstreaming Agrobiodiversity in Sustainable Food Systems: Scientific Foundations for an Agrobiodiversity Index (2017).
The Agrobiodiversity Index is funded by the European Commission
