Perfecto & Vandermeer 2008, Biodiversity Conservation in Tropical Agroecosystems: A New Conservation Paradigm

The paper is a literature review on biodiversity in tropical agricultural landscapes concluding that many tropical agricultural systems have high levels of biodiversity and provide a high-quality matrix for movement of forest organisms among patches of natural vegetation. The authors argue that the conservation paradigm that focuses on setting aside pristine forests while ignoring the agricultural landscape is a failed strategy in light of ecological principles, particularly the patch dynamics involved in metacommunities.

PerfVandNYAcad.pdf — PDF document, 291Kb