Uniformity makes food systems vulnerable, and diversification strategies aim to address this. Dimensions of diversity in agriculture include field diversity, field design, nature–agriculture interfaces, and incremental agriculture. Recently, harnessing field design for climate resilience has attracted increasing attention. Examples include agroforestry – integrating trees into agriculture – and intercropping multiple crops in the same field. In Mediterranean drylands, commercial forestry is limited, so agroforestry mainly involves intercropping fruit trees with field crops. Our research focuses on how such field design supports sustainable intensification by enhancing agroecosystem functioning and resilience. We examine how tree-crop interactions modify microclimates, supporting climate mitigation and greater self-reliance on ecosystem services.
We study field design through several systems: (1) isolating shading effects on crops using artificial structures; (2) implementing alley cropping in mature orchards (e.g., olive-clover and citrus-cereal systems); (3) establishing new alley cropping systems for long-term agroecological studies; (4) assessing sheep grazing to terminate cover crops in pomegranate orchards; and (5) testing fast-growing tree crops as riparian buffers to manage flooding while adding agricultural value.
Preliminary results show that shading affects herbaceous crop performance, alley cropping diversifies production, sheep grazing integrates multiple functions effectively, vegetation supports soil biota and its ecosystem services, and willows may enhance riparian resilience. Together, these findings highlight the potential of tailored agroforestry approaches for Mediterranean drylands, aiming to support productivity, sustainability, and climate resilience.
