Agroecological roots and routes
S. Bellon, G. Ollivier, A . Wezel
FAO Regional Symposium on Agroecology, Budapest, Hungary, 24-25/11/2026
Introduction
• Acknowledging the legacy of agroecology : a tribute to european « pionners » (XXth century)
• Focus on six pionneering scholars born in Europe, as identified in several papers dealing with the history of AE (Gliessman, 1990 to 2015; Hecht, 1987; Wezel et al., 2009)
• Restriction to an academic dimension, using writtendocuments (papers and books)
• Focus on what their trajectories and proposals were: contents, ideas, (co-) citations, debates, networks
• What can we learn from this? : trends defined, relevance for agroecology today, further pathways…
Outline
• A brief presentation of 6 authors
Azzi, Bensin, Friederichs, Klages, Papadakis, Tischler
• Authors’ specific contributions and differences
• Lessons learnt and orientations for further work
1- A brief presentation of 6 authors
Girolamo Azzi (1885-1969),
In Proc. 1° Congress of Agrarian Ecology, 1955
Wolfgang Tischler(1912-2007)
Juan Papadakis(1903-1997)
Karl Friederichs(1878-1969)
Basil Bensin(1881-1973)
Karl Klages(1898-1967)
1- A brief presentation of 6 authors (ctd)
Based on some seminal papers:
• (Bensin B.M., 1925. Agroecological characteristics description and classification of the local corn varieties chorotypes. Prague).
• Bensin Basil M., 1930. Possibilities for international cooperationin agroecological investigations. Int. Review of Agric. Monthly Bulletin of Agric. Science and Practice (Rome), n° 21, pp. 277–84.
• Bensin B.M., 1938. Agroecology as a basic science of soil conservation. Soil Conservation, vol. 152, pp. 138-41
• Klages Karl. H.W., 1928. Crop ecology and ecological cropgeography in the agronomic curriculum. Journal of the American Society of Agronomy, vol. 10, pp. 336–53
Brief presentation of 6 authors (ctd): books
Three books on Agricultural (Agrarian) Ecology
• Girolamo Azzi (1928 it ; sp ; fr ; en)
• Juan Papadakis (1938 gr; be, ar)
• Wolfgang Tischler (1965)
One book on Ecological
Crop Geography
• Karl Klages (1942; ru, us)
One book on Zoology• Karl Friederichs (1930)
2. Authors specific contributions and differences
(Papadakis, 1938: ecological map of climates)
From G. Azzi, 1928
• Agricultural Ecology : study of the physicalenvironment – climate and soil- as related with the development of cultivated plants and their yield(yield considered from a triple viewpoint: quantitative, qualitative and generative)
• «Meteorological equivalents»/ Soil units & series
• Complex « climate-soil » (as an entity)
• Ecological characteristics (morphology and physiology -> productivity and resistance)
• Factorial combinations (bases for experiments)
From Papadakis, 1938 (and with Azzi)
• Ecology at the center! Study of global phenomenaof life (differing from physiology and biology in labs)
• Autoecology (individuals/ experiments) & synecology(associations/ observations)
• A critique of Azzi’s «Meteorological equivalents»: with attention to biological effects of excess/lack of
• Cultivation methods (plough..) as ecological factor
• Plant breeding programs with an ecological view: limits of « productivity » criterion (-> distinguishvarieties based on their reactions to env. factors)
From Bensin, 1928 (adapted from Léger, 2015)
• Plant breeding of commercial cvs should rely on theircharacters of adaptation to the environment
• Agroecology: study of cultivated plants and theirrelationships with environment based on ecology to grab and understand this adaptive capacity
• Such understanding is the basis of fairer productive systems, due to its accessibility for farmers and enables them access to low-cost solutions to improvetheir production
This ecological approach, contrasting with the prevailingproductivist paradigm, never outperformed in the XXth
Bensin B., 1938. Agroecology as a basic science of soil conservation. Soil Conservation, vol. 152, pp. 138-41
Comparative wordcloud
Based on the titles of authors’ publications, translated into englishColours: terms mostlyused by the authors
Representation with a Factorial Correspondance Analysis(where distances reveal statistical proximities)
3. Lessons learnt and orientations for further work
• History as an asset to understand dynamics in AE? Beyond a « course of time », inertia and strategiesalso counteract.
• Environmental history or agroecological perspective in history (Worster, 1990)? Agroecology contributes to connecting fragmented domains!
• Parallel construction of other disciplines and fieldsalso interfere with AE dynamics (e.g. ecology,agronomy; pioneers in Organics, promoters of Integrated Protection…)
• After a silent ½ century (silent spring) a renewal…
Renaissance and new dynamics
Conclusions
• Relevance of pioneers’ work and proposals (concepts, approaches, academic and learning fields…).Relevance, but relative ignorance… Is this due to the strength of the productionist model? And its renewalwith intensification?
• Common features among these authors: mobility in their trajectories and topics addressed, often at a widerange of scales (plant…); international vision stressingthe intercultural origin of agroecology; contributions to disciplinary evolutions. Differences also appear…
• Opening on ecology, with an integrative vision of the environment (agroecosystems); also questioningmethods (e.g.function of experiments); lower attention given to food, to social sciences and humanities...
Agroecology Europe at work…