Agroecology: A new research and development paradigm for world agriculture

In its several conceptions, agroecology has emerged as a scientific approach used to study, diagnose and propose alternative low-input management of agroecosystems. Solving the sustainability problem of agriculture is the primary aim of agroecology. It is maintained here, however, that simply focusing on the technological aspects of the problem, even though promoted technologies are low-input, obscures the fundamental problems that lie behing the technology-induced environmental crisis and rural poverty affecting the agricultural regions of the world. Agroecology can provide the ecological guidelines to point technological development in the right direction, but in the process, technological issues must assume their corresponding role within a strategy of rural development that incorporates social and economic problems.