Download report here

• It’s a great paradox that the sector that relies the most on biodiversity, agriculture, is also the greatest threat to the world’s most fragile ecosystems. The question isn’t how to just minimize the impact of farming on biodiversity, but how to put biodiversity at the heart of all agricultural policies and investments.
• Keeping natural areas intact is essential. These landscapes provide the green water storage, moisture recycling, and climate regulation that agriculture relies on.
• Landscapes with a minimum share of 20 to 25 percent of natural habitat deliver better ecosystem services – the benefits nature provides to people, such as clean water, pollination, fertile soil, and climate regulation.
• Below 10 percent, some of these services disappear completely. Today, between 18-33 percent of agricultural land lacks the natural habitats needed to support pollination, pest control and other ecosystem services.
• Advancing a more sustainable agriculture requires greater public funding for local research, and innovative financing to help farmers adopt sustainable practices to protect biodiversity. Importantly, repurposing agricultural policies and subsidies can incentivize farmers to prioritize the environment.
• The report discusses the following solutions to support biodiversity for agriculture:
  • Conservation and restoration of natural areas, promoting biodiversity on the farm, and creating corridors between natural habitats and farmed areas
  • Using spatial data to guide conservation and restoration efforts.
  • Including biodiversity in long-term research and extension programs
  • Financing sustainable farming intensification, restoration and conservation through better subsidies and scaling up payments for environmental services
  • Monitoring biodiversity that supports agriculture across landscapes.

“Credit: World Bank Group. All rights reserved”