With the Convention on Biological Diversity conference (COP15), United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26), and United Nations Food Systems Summit, 2021 is a pivotal year for transitioning towards sustainable food systems. Diversified farming systems are key to more sustainable food production. Here we present a global dataset documenting outcomes of diversified farming practices for biodiversity and yields compiled following best standards for systematic review of primary studies and specifically designed for use in meta-analysis. The dataset includes 4076 comparisons of biodiversity outcomes and 1214 of yield in diversified farming systems compared to one of two reference systems. It contains evidence from 48 countries of effects on species from 33 taxonomic orders (spanning insects, plants, birds, mammals, eukaryotes, annelids, fungi, and bacteria) of diversified farming systems producing annual or perennial crops across 12 commodity groups. The dataset presented provides a resource for researchers and practitioners to easily access information on where diversified farming systems effectively contribute to biodiversity and food production outcomes.

Intercropping is proposed as a promising strategy to meet future food demand while reducing agriculture’s environmental impact by re-diversifying agricultural fields. Strip cropping, a form of intercropping, has a potential to simultaneously deliver multiple ecosystem services including productivity, while facilitating management as strip width can be adjusted to the working width of available machines. While the yield performance of strip cropping systems is influenced by the interaction between neighboring crops, to date, empirical studies on the performance of various crop combinations in strip cropping systems are limited. Here we used three-year data (2020–2022) from a 64-ha organic strip cropping system in the Netherlands to (1) evaluate the effects of crop neighbors and strip cropping on yield and (2) explore if optimizing the allocation of crop neighbors in alternative strip cropping configurations can improve yield and revenue performances. We analyzed the edge effect and strip cropping effect on yield of six crops grown in strips, each neighboring a total of five crops. The yield data was then used to evaluate the performance of the current and alternative strip configurations in terms of LER and relative revenue. Results showed that except for the positive effect observed on potato when neighboring celeriac or broccoli, edge effects lacked statistical significance. Strip cropping effect varied per crop: positive for faba bean and parsnip, neutral for celeriac and potato, and negative for oat and onion. Analysis across crops showed an overall significant positive strip cropping effect on yield. These findings highlighted the value of analysis at the cropping system level in developing designs aimed at unlocking the potential of strip cropping. The positive but variable strip cropping effects observed in the current experimental design and the two alternative configurations suggests prioritizing an overall increased crop diversity over optimizing their spatial arrangement. While we demonstrated increased productivity with strip cropping, further research is needed to expand the database on optimal crop combinations, extending the evaluation beyond yield and revenue performances to facilitate broader adoption of strip cropping in the Netherlands and Western Europe.

The expansion and intensification of agriculture have led to global declines in biodiversity. This paper presents a systematic review protocol to clarify under what management and landscape contexts diversified farming practices are effective at improving outcomes for terrestrial biodiversity, and potential trade-offs or synergies with agricultural yields. The systematic review will be developed following the Reporting Standards for Systematic Evidence Syntheses (ROSES). The review will include articles that compare levels of diversity (e.g., abundance, richness, Shannon’s diversity index) of any terrestrial taxon (e.g., arthropods, mammals) in diversified farming systems to levels in simplified farming systems and/or natural habitats, prioritising articles that also report agricultural yields. We will search for relevant peer-reviewed primary studies in two global repositories: Scopus and Web of Science, and among primary studies included in previous meta-analyses that are retrieved from the search. Full-texts of identified articles will be screened using a clear inclusion/exclusion eligibility criteria. All included articles will be assessed to determine their internal validity. A narrative synthesis will be performed to summarize, describe and present the results, and where the articles provide sufficient and appropriate data, we will conduct a quantitative meta-analysis.