SEMINARIOS BOTÁNICA ECONÓMICA 2018

1) Diamond J (2002) Evolution, consequences and future of plant and animal domestication.
Nature 418: 700-707.

Domestication interests us as the most momentous change in Holocene human history. Why did it operate on
so few wild species, in so few geographic areas? Why did people adopt it at all, why did they adopt it when
they did, and how did it spread? The answers to these questions determined the remaking of the modern
world, as farmers spread at the expense of hunter–gatherers and of other farmers.

2) Fernández-Marín et al. (2014) Side-effects of domestication: cultivated legume seeds contain

similar tocopherols and fatty acids but less carotenoids than their wild counterparts. BMC
Plant Biology 14:1599.

Background: Lipophilic antioxidants play dual key roles in edible seeds (i) as preservatives of cell integrity
and seed viability by preventing the oxidation of fats, and (ii) as essential nutrients for human and animal life
stock. It has been well documented that plant domestication and post-domestication evolution frequently
resulted in increased seed size and palatability, and reduced seed dormancy. Nevertheless, and surprisingly, it
is poorly understood how agricultural selection and cultivation affected the physiological fitness and the
nutritional quality of seeds. Fabaceae have the greatest number of crop species of all plant families, and most
of them are cultivated for their highly nutritious edible seeds. Here, we evaluate whether evolution of plants
under cultivation has altered the integrated system formed by membranes (fatty acids) and lipophilic
antioxidants (carotenoids and tocopherols), in the ten most economicallyimportant grain legumes and their
closest wild relatives, i.e.: Arachis (peanut), Cicer (chickpea), Glycine (soybean), Lathyrus(vetch), Lens
(lentil), Lupinus (lupin), Phaseolus (bean), Pisum (pea), Vicia (faba bean) and Vigna (cowpea). Results:
Unexpectedly, we found that following domestication, the contents of carotenoids, including lutein and
zeaxanthin, decreased in all ten species (total carotenoid content decreased 48% in average). Furthermore, the
composition of carotenoids changed, whereby some carotenoids were lost in most of the crops. An undirected
change in the contents of tocopherols and fatty acids was found, with contents increasing in some species and
decreasing in others, independently of the changes in carotenoids. In some species, polyunsaturated fatty acids
(linolenic acid especially), α-tocopherol and γ-tocopherol decreased following domestication. Conclusions:
The changes in carotenoids, tocopherols and fatty acids are likely side-effects of the selection for other
desired traits such as the loss of seed dormancy and dispersal mechanisms, and selection for seed storability
and taste. This work may serve as baseline to broaden our knowledge on the integrated changes on crop
fitness and nutritional quality following domestication.

3) C. LEVIS et al. (2017) Persistent effects of pre-Columbian plant domestication on Amazonian

forest composition.

The extent to which pre-Columbian societies altered Amazonian landscapes is hotly debated. We performed a
basin-wide analysis of pre-Columbian impacts on Amazonian forests by
overlaying known archaeological sites in Amazonia with the distributions and abundances of
85 woody species domesticated by pre-Columbian peoples. Domesticated species are five
times more likely than nondomesticated species to be hyperdominant. Across the basin,
the relative abundance and richness of domesticated species increase in forests on and around
archaeological sites. In southwestern and eastern Amazonia, distance to archaeological sites
strongly influences the relative abundance and richness of domesticated species. Our analyses
indicate that modern tree communities in Amazonia are structured to an important extent by
a long history of plant domestication by Amazonian peoples.
 4) TILMAN D (1999) Global environmental impacts of agricultural expansion: The need for
sustainable and efficient practices Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA Vol. 96, pp. 5995–600.

ABSTRACT The recent intensification of agriculture, and the prospects of future intensification, will have
major detrimental impacts on the nonagricultural terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems of the world. The
doubling of agricultural food production during the past 35 years was associated with a
6.87-fold increase in nitrogen fertilization, a 3.48-fold increase in phosphorus fertilization, a 1.68-fold
increase in the amount of irrigated cropland, and a 1.1-fold increase in land in cultivation. Based on a simple
linear extension of past trends, the anticipated next doubling of global food production would be associated
with approximately 3-fold increases in nitrogen and phosphorus fertilization rates, a doubling of the irrigated
land area, and an 18% increase in cropland. These projected changes would have dramatic impacts on the
diversity, composition, and functioning of the remaining natural ecosystems of the world, and on their ability
to provide society with a
variety of essential ecosystem services. The largest impacts would be on freshwater and marine ecosystems,
which would be greatly eutrophied by high rates of nitrogen and phosphorus
release from agricultural fields. Aquatic nutrient eutrophication can lead to loss of biodiversity, outbreaks of
nuisance species, shifts in the structure of food chains, and impairment of fisheries. Because of aerial
redistribution of various forms of nitrogen, agricultural intensification also
would eutrophy many natural terrestrial ecosystems and contribute to atmospheric accumulation of
greenhouse gases. These detrimental environmental impacts of agriculture can be minimized only if there is
much more efficient use and recycling of nitrogen and phosphorus in agroecosystems.

5) RUDEL TK et al (2009). Agricultural intensification and changes in cultivated areas, 1970–

2005. PNAS vol. 106 _ no. 49 _ 20675–20680.
www.pnas.org_cgi_doi_10.1073_pnas.0812540106

Does the intensification of agriculture reduce cultivated areas and, in so doing, spare some lands by
concentrating production on other lands? Such sparing is important for many reasons, among them the
enhanced abilities of released lands to sequester carbon and provide other environmental services. Difficulties
measuring the extent of spared land make it impossible to investigate fully the hypothesized causal chain from
agricultural intensification to declines in cultivated areas and then to increases in spared land. We analyze the
historical circumstances in which rising yields have been accompanied by declines in cultivated areas, thereby
leading to land-sparing. We use
national-level United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization data on trends in cropland from 1970–
2005, with particular emphasis on the 1990–2005 period, for 10 major crop types. Cropland has increased
more slowly than population during this period, but paired increases in yields and declines in cropland
occurred infrequently, both globally and nationally. Agricultural intensification was not generally
accompanied by decline or stasis in cropland area at a national scale during this time period, except in
countries with grain imports and conservation set-aside programs. Future projections of cropland
abandonment and ensuing environmental services cannot be assumed without explicit policy intervention.
6) Winqvist C et al (2011). Mixed effects of organic farming and landscape complexity on farmland
biodiversity and biological control potential across Europe. Journal of Applied Ecology, 48, 570–579.

Summary
1. Organic farming in Europe has been shown to enhance biodiversity locally, but potential interactions with
the surrounding landscape and the potential effects on ecosystem services are less well known.
2. In cereal fields on 153 farms in five European regions, we examined how the species richness and
abundance of wild plants, ground beetles and breeding birds, and the biological control potential of the area,
were affected by organic and conventional farming, and how these effects were modified by landscape
complexity (percentage of arable crops within 1000 mof the study plots). Information on biodiversity was
gathered from vegetation plots, pitfall traps and by bird territory mapping. The biological control potential
was measured as the percentage of glued, live aphids removed from plastic labels exposed in cereal fields for
24 h.
3. Predation on aphids was highest in organic fields in complex landscapes, and declined with
increasing landscape homogeneity. The biological control potential in conventional fields was not
affected by landscape complexity, and in homogenous landscapes it was higher in conventional
fields than in organic fields, as indicated by an interaction between farming practice and landscape
complexity.
4. A simplification of the landscape, from 20% to 100% arable land, reduced plant species richness
by about 16% and cover by 14% in organic fields, and 33% and 5Æ5% in conventional fields. For
birds, landscape simplification reduced species richness and abundance by 34%and 32%in organic
fields and by 45Æ5% and 39%in conventional fields. Ground beetles were more abundant in simple
landscapes, but were unaffected by farming practice.
5. Synthesis and applications. This Europe-wide study shows that organic farming enhanced the
biodiversity of plants and birds in all landscapes, but only improved the potential for biological control in
heterogeneous landscapes. These mixed results stress the importance of taking both local management and
regional landscape complexity into consideration when developing future
agri-environment schemes, and suggest that local-regional interactions may affect other ecosystem
services and functions. This study also shows that it is not enough to design and monitor agri-environment
schemes on the basis of biodiversity, but that ecosystem services should be considered too.

7) Tuomisto H.L. et al. (2012) Does organic farming reduce environmental impacts? A meta-analysis of
European research. Journal of Environmental Management 112, 309-320.

Organic farming practices have been promoted as, inter alia, reducing the environmental impacts of
agriculture. This meta-analysis systematically analyses published studies that compare environmental impacts
of organic and conventional farming in Europe. The results show that organic farming practices generally
have positive impacts on the environment per unit of area, but not necessarily per product unit. Organic farms
tend to have higher soil organic matter content and lower nutrient losses (nitrogen leaching, nitrous oxide
emissions and ammonia emissions) per unit of field area. However, ammonia emissions, nitrogen leaching
and nitrous oxide emissions per product unit were higher from organic systems. Organic systems had lower
energy requirements, but higher land use, eutrophication potential and acidification potential per product unit.
The variation within the results across different studies was wide due to differences in the systems compared
and research methods used. The only impacts that were found to differ significantly between the systems were
soil organic matter content, nitrogen leaching, nitrous oxide emissions per unit of field area, energy use and
land use. Most of the studies that compared biodiversity in organic and conventional farming demonstrated
lower environmental impacts from organic farming. The key challenges in conventional farming are to
improve soil quality (by versatile crop rotations and additions of organic material), recycle nutrients and
enhance and protect biodiversity. In
organic farming, the main challenges are to improve the nutrient management and increase yields. In order to
reduce the environmental impacts of farming in Europe, research efforts and policies should be targeted to
developing farming systems that produce high yields with low negative environmental impacts drawing on
techniques from both organic and conventional systems.

8) Seufert V et al (2012) Comparing the yields of organic and conventional agriculture. Nature
nature11069.3d 5/4/12 17:34:22
Numerous reports have emphasized the need for major changes in the global food system: agriculture must meet the
twin challenge of feeding a growing population, with rising demand for meat and high-calorie diets, while
simultaneously minimizing its global environmental impacts. Organic farming—a system aimed at producing food
with minimal harm to ecosystems, animals or humans—is often proposed as a solution. However, critics argue that
organic agriculture may have lower yields and would therefore need more land to produce the same amount of food
as conventional farms, resulting in more widespread deforestation and biodiversity loss, and thus undermining the
environmental benefits of
organic practices5. Here we use a comprehensive meta-analysis to examine the relative yield performance of
organic and conventional farming systems globally. Our analysis of available data
shows that, overall, organic yields are typically lower than conventional yields. But these yield differences are
highly contextual, depending on system and site characteristics, and range from 5% lower organic yields (rain-fed
legumes and perennials on weak acidic to weak-alkaline soils), 13% lower yields (when best organic practices are
used), to 34% lower yields (when the conventional and organic systems are most comparable). Under certain
conditions— that is, with good management practices, particular crop types and growing conditions—organic
systems can thus nearly match conventional yields, whereas under others it at present cannot. To establish organic
agriculture as an important tool in sustainable
food production, the factors limiting organic yields need to be more fully understood, alongside assessments of the
many social, environmental and economic benefits of organic farming systems.
9) Phalan, B., Balmford, A., Green, R.E., Scharlemann, J.P.W. (2011). Minimising the harm to
biodiversity of producing more food globally. Food Policy 36:S62-S71.

Should farming and conservation policies aim broadly to separate land for nature and land for production
(land sparing) or integrate production and conservation on the same land (wildlife-friendly farming)?
Most studies that try to address this question suffer from flaws in sampling design, inappropriate metrics,
and/or failure to measure biodiversity baselines. We discuss how these failings can be addressed, and
what existing information tells us about the key debates on this topic. The evidence available suggests
that trade-offs between biodiversity and yield are prevalent. While there are some wildlife-friendly farming
systems that support high species richness, a large proportion of wild species cannot survive in even
the most benign farming systems. To conserve those species, protection of wild lands will remain essential.
Sustainable intensification could help to facilitate sparing of such lands, provided that as much attention is given to
protecting habitats as to raising yields. We discuss the general circumstances under which yield increases can
facilitate land sparing, recognising that policies and social safeguards will need to be context-specific. In some
situations, bringing degraded lands into production could help reduce pressure on wild lands, but much more
information is needed on the biodiversity implications of using degraded lands. We conclude that restricting human
requirements for land globally will be important in limiting the impacts on biodiversity of increasing food
production. To achieve this, society will need to integrate explicit conservation objectives into local, regional and
international policies affecting the food system.

10) Perfecto, I., Vandermeer, J. (2012). Separación o integración para la conservación de biodiversidad:
la ideología detrás del debate "land-sharing" frente a "land-sparing". Ecosistemas 21(1-2):180-191.

La mayoría de los bosques en el neotrópico están fragmentados. Frecuentemente los fragmentos de bosques se
encuentran en una matriz agrícola que consiste en diferentes tipos de agroecosistemas. En este artículo discutimos
la falacia del argumento "land-sparing" que promueve la intensificación de la agricultura como mecanismo de
protección de bosques y por ende de la biodiversidad. También discutimos el contenido ideológico del debate de
separación (land sparing) frente a integración (land sharing). Posteriormente argumentamos que es en la matriz
agrícola donde se deben enfocar los esfuerzos de conservación de biodiversidad. Nuestro argumento usa evidencia
empírica y la teoría de metapoblaciones para proponer que la mejor estrategia para evitar la pérdida de
biodiversidad en paisajes fragmentados es desarrollar sistemas agrícolas diversos y ecológicos que promuevan la
migración de organismos entre fragmentos de bosques. La calidad de la matriz con respecto a los procesos
metapoblacionales incrementa con la diversificación de los agroecosistems, la incorporación de árboles y otros
elementos que aumentan la diversidad estructural de los agroecosistemas y la eliminación de agroquímicos tóxicos.
Las iniciativas agroecológicas del movimiento Campesino a Campesino y de movimientos sociales de pequeños
agricultores como la Vía Campesina representan los mejores aliados de la conservación de los bosques y la
biodiversidad en el neotrópico.