María Rosa Mosquera-Losada

• Agroforestry
• Head of Department at University of Santiago de Compostela

Agricultural intensification, as well as the abandonment of traditional agriculture practices, can result in reduced biodiversity and ecosystem services that are difficult to reverse because of the long-time lags characterising the dynamics of socio-ecological systems (Santos et al., 2022b). Societal and ecological mechanisms interact, generating c...

The aim of this study is to evaluate the effects of high grazing pressure for short, intermittent periods (1–2 h per day) on fuel load management in cork oak (Quercus suber L.) forests in the north-eastern region of Portugal. This evaluation aims to understand the effectiveness of targeted grazing as a forest management tool, specifically in reduci...

The mechanisms shaping biodiversity in agroecosystems and particularly in agroforestry are mostly unknown, difficult to understand and predict, and remain largely elusive and challenging. The relation between planned biodiversity, the species chosen by the farmer, and associated biodiversity, the species that are able to adapt and thrive in agrofor...

Ontology matching (OM) plays a key role in enabling data interoperability and knowledge sharing, but it remains challenging due to the need for large training datasets and limited vocabulary processing in machine learning approaches. Recently, methods based on Large Language Model (LLMs) have shown great promise in OM, particularly through the use...

The excessive use of chemical fertilisers can cause soil acidification, depletion of soil quality, and biodiversity loss. Alternatively, biochar can improve crop productivity due to its ability to bind macronutrients and micronutrients and also adsorb various contaminants. However, the properties of the biochar depend among other factors on the mat...

Promoting food security is one of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) proposed by the United Nations General Assembly, with a target date of 2030. Human nutrition based on legume consumption is essential to ensuring food security while reducing greenhouse gas emissions associated with nitrogen fertilizer use. Moreover, preserving legume bio...

Editorial on the Research Topic Can the trees save the crops? Predicting the services provided by traditional and novel agroforests in changing Mediterranean landscapes

Agroforestry (AF) is a sustainable land use practice and system that increases the ecosystem services delivery from agricultural lands compared with treeless systems. Agroforestry can be considered a practice when linked to plot scale (silvoarable, silvopasture, homegarden, woody linear landscape strips, and forest farming), and a system when assoc...

Grasslands play a crucial role in European agriculture and ecology, but are often underutilized due to low-value end-products. The utilisation of late-harvest grass for biochar and heat generation on farm-level is being studied as a potential negative emissions technology. Technical (energy provision and carbon sink), economic (cost vs. benefit), p...

Fire and grazing in forest ecosystems modify the characteristics of plant communities, favoring colonization by sprouting shrub species. These shrubs may offer protection and facilitate greater survival in slow-growing species, which are less tolerant of biotic and abiotic stressors. The objective of this study was to evaluate Nothofagus antarctica...

Biosolids have been long used as a soil amendment to promote nutrient recovery. The readily releasable forms of nutrients present in this biowaste, such as phosphorus (P), along with their over application, can be detrimental to the environment, causing eutrophication. Pyrolysis, the thermal decomposition of organic materials at elevated temperatur...

Wood pastures represent specific ecosystems across Europe with diverse ecological, agricultural, and socioeconomic roles. Land-use changes and the cessation of traditional management in conjunction with socioeconomic changes led to shifts in their spatiotemporal distribution. Despite a recent increase in scientific interest, data on historical patt...

Yield-SAFE is a biophysical model to predict long-term production according to light and water availability in agricultural, forest, and agroforestry systems. The Yield-SAFE model should be calibrated and validated for the highest number of tree species and crops to be used as a management tool that takes into account climate change. This study aim...

The co-creation and sharing of knowledge among different types of actors with complementary expertise is known as the Multi-Actor Approach (MAA). This paper presents how Horizon2020 Thematic-Networks (TNs) deal with the MAA and put forward best practices during the different project phases, based on the results of a desktop study, interviews, surve...

Le feu contrôlé est pratiqué dans certaines régions du sud-ouest de l’Europe pour la restauration des habitats et la prévention des grands incendies de forêt. Malgré son intérêt, il est confronté à des défis environnementaux, socio-économiques et réglementaires. Le projet Interreg SUDOE Open2preserve a mis en œuvre huit expériences sur l’herbivorie...

Le dépeuplement rural, ainsi que l’intensification des systèmes agricoles dans le sud de l’Europe, ont provoqué d’importants changements dans le paysage et dans leurs services écosystémiques associés. La réduction ou l’absence de pâturage se traduit par une expansion rapide des buissons et des processus extensifs de boisement naturel. Cela entraîne...

Silvoarable is a type of agroforestry practice where a woody component is deliberately integrated with an arable crop as part of the understory. Silvoarable practices are generally associated with the delivery of more ecosystem services than monocultures in agricultural lands. Therefore, it is necessary to develop policies to foster silvoarable pra...

The land use sector currently represents ∼25% of the global greenhouse gas emissions, thus this human activity is having a huge impact on climate change. Semi-arid climate areas, which are widely distributed, are particularly influenced by such climate change. In these areas, land use changes have transformed the entire landscape and increased the...

Forest management practices impact the amount of organic matter reaching the soil, but also the soil properties and/or vegetation composition that influence soil microbiome structure and composition. After 15 years of the last application of sewage sludge (SS) alone or in combination with CaCO3 to soils of a silvopastoral system with Pinus radiata...

Silvopastoral systems play an important role in climate change mitigation, considering their effect on soil carbon sequestration. In silvopastoral systems, sewage sludge can be used as fertiliser, which is promoted by the Circular Economy Package of the European Commission. This study evaluates the soil chemical properties (pH, carbon), tree growth...

Prescribed fire is one of the most widely-used management tools to recover encroached rangelands. Fire has been reported to cause changes in the soil physical and chemical properties. However, the legacy effects of former plant species on soil responses to fire remains unknown. The legacy effect of the former extant plant species on soil carbon (C)...

Considering the present ecological crisis, land use-biodiversity relationships have become a major topic in landscape planning, ecosystem management and ecological restoration. In this scope, consistent patterns of outstanding biodiversity have been identified in agroforestry systems within diverse biogeographic regions and types of management. Emp...

Grasslands cover almost half of the total European agricultural area and are the source of a wide range of public goods and services. Yet, their potential to produce innovative bio-based products, such as paper and plastic, remains widely untapped. We employ a multiple case study approach and implement the Business Environment Framework by Adamsege...

The effects of climate change are increasingly noticed worldwide, and crops are likely to be impacted in direct and indirect ways. Thus, it is urgent to adopt pliable strategies to reduce and/or mitigate possible adverse effects to meet the growing demand for sustainable and resilient food production. Monoculture cropping is globally the most commo...

Rural Europe encompasses a variety of landscapes with differing levels of forest, agriculture, and agroforestry that can deliver multiple ecosystem services (ES). Whilst provisioning and regulating ES associated with individual land covers are comparatively well studied, less is known about the associated cultural ES. Only seldom are provisioning,...

Agroforestry is a traditional land use system that may contribute to the solution of environmental problems in agriculture. Agroforestry is the practice of deliberately integrating woody vegetation (trees or shrubs) with crops and/or animal systems to benefit from the resulting ecological and economic interactions. Recent research indicates that a...

Agroforestry is a sustainable land management system recognized worldwide but not implemented in a extensive form in temperate and developed countries. Agroforestry has been promoted in the last decades at global level as it provides more efficient and sustainable farming systems. This review aims at summarizing the main research findings explainin...

n Europe, sewage sludge has to be stabilised before its use as fertiliser in agricultural land. Stabilisation processes can cause differences in the concentration of heavy metals in sewage sludge, such as that of zinc (Zn), one of the heavy metals with the highest proportion in sewage sludge. This study was undertaken to examine during a five-year...

Short-term production in silvopastoral systems is often limited due to inappropriate soil-fertility management. Sewage sludge fertilisation could enhance productivity of silvopastoral systems (including understory and trees). After taking into account heavy metal concentrations, the main aspects related to adequate use of sewage sludge as an organi...

Wildfires have always been an integral part of the ecology of many terrestrial ecosystems, but their frequency is increasing in many parts of the world. Wildfires were once a natural phenomenon, but after humans learned to control fire, it has been used as a management tool to increase soil fertility, to regenerate natural vegetation for grazing an...

Theme: Agroforestry systems and innovations Abstract Innovation is one of the key aspects to favour transition from conventional to more sustainable agricultural practices in developed countries. Europe is leading nowadays the development of a good knowledge infrastructure to move on this transition mainly related with the Thematic Networks. The Ag...

Silvopasture is the deliberate integration of a woody component with grazed pastures as understorey. It is one of the most extended agroforestry practices all over the world. Silvopasture use is key to increase the sustainability of livestock farming systems as silvopasture reduces the use of concentrates since the woody component provides feed for...

The effects of climate change threaten food security by affecting the production and quality of crops that are part of the world's food base, such as wheat. The crop-tree association can act as a tool to mitigate and adapt to climate change, and it is important to analyze the influence of the shade cast by the tree canopy on the yield of important...

Integrating woody perennials and agricultural crops combined is a centuries-old practice, nowadays called agroforestry. Because agroforestry is being promoted by public administrations, it is essential to obtain scientific knowledge about the effect of different factors (e.g. tree shade) on crop characteristics. In this study, the effects of light...

Rural depopulation as well as the intensification of farming systems in southern Europe have led to important changes in landscape and the ecosystem services they provide. Indoors livestock production is translated into a reduction or absence of grazing which ends up with a rapid expansion of bushes and extensive processes of natural forestation. T...

Climate change affects temperate areas by increasing the risk of suffering extreme climatic events and sharping major problematics. Moreover, climate change and its related effects jeopardize water and food supply. Rural areas are key for sustainable development and provide socio-economics advantages, but it also exists a downside on key aspects su...

Wildfires have always been an integral part of the ecology of many terrestrial ecosystems, but their frequency is increasing in many parts of the world. Wildfires were once a natural phenomenon, but after humans learned to control fire, it has been used as a management tool to increase soil fertility, to regenerate natural vegetation for grazing an...

Floristic diversity changes substantially depending on the type of land management. We evaluated the impact of a continuous (CG) and rotational (RG) grazing system on the dynamics of plant diversity and community composition in a heather-gorse understory after a two and six-year pause from horse grazing. Previously grazed sites had higher total and...

Silvopasture is the combination of woody vegetation with forage and animal production on the same land that allows the diversification of agricultural income and productivity. In the silvopastoral systems, the fertilisation with sewage sludge could increase tree growth and pasture production at the same time that the pasture biodiversity is modifie...

Agroforestry (AF) is a climate-smart agriculture (CSA) practice of deliberately integrating woody vegetation (trees or shrubs) with crop and/or animal systems to benefit from the resulting ecological and economic interactions. It is recognized as a proactive “negative emissions technologies” (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate change (IPCC) 1.5SR)...

Mixed pasture establishment is considered as a key point to increase livestock production due to the higher quality it has compared with unmanaged shrubby species. They also provide a set of ecosystem services such as carbon sequestration and higher biodiversity. Moreover, herbaceous pasture establishment effectively contributes to biomass producti...

Sewage sludge use in agriculture is promoted by the European Union since the normative of cleaning waters related to the compulsory use of depuration plants in all cities over 2000 inhabitants was finally implemented in 2005. The University of Santiago de Compostela (USC) has been conducted long-term experiment research about the application of dif...

Agroforestry seeks to balance protection of forest resources, the exploitation of the ecosystem services that trees can contribute to agriculture and the role of agroforestry in diversifying the range of agricultural products and markets. This volume reviews the latest research on the role and implementation of main types of agroforestry, understan...

The Circular Economy Package adopted by the European Commission proposes that when a product reaches the end of its life, it should be used again to create further value. In this context, it is important to valorise and characterize the effect of waste on soil fertility and pasture/crops growth. In this experiment we used two types of bio-waste bas...

Policy is one of the main drivers of agricultural land management in Europe because Community Agricultural Policy spends around the 40% of the EU budget representing €55 billion per year. There are two main pillars in the CAP, the first deals with the direct payments and the second with the rural development. Lack of consistency between Pillars hav...

Adaptation to climate change is becoming more and more relevant in the recent years due to the changing environment that are European Union is facing, but also due to the higher frequency of extreme events than before. Mediterranean countries placed in the South of Europe are the member states that will be more prone to suffer environment changes w...

Agroforestry is a sustainable land use system that has been categorized as a “negative greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions tool” by the IPCC (Global warming of 1.5°C. An IPCC Special Report) at the end of 2018 and can be implemented at the plot, farm and landscape level. Policy makers should develop strategies and direct funding to promote agriculture (...

Chestnut stands are forest and permanent crop lands of high economic importance in the north of Spain for both high timber value and fruit production. Nowadays, the lack of profitability of some chestnut stands linked to the high amount of man power needed to harvest the chestnut fruits in high step mountain areas. A good option to increase profita...

Silvoarable or alley cropping practices are one of the best forms to intensificate cropland systems based on the best optimization of the available resources (light, fertilizers) as the biomass production could be increased by 25% per unite of land. However, to perform silvoarable practices it is key to know which are the best varieties of crops to...

La presente investigación tiene como objetivo la realización de una aproximación a la creación de un modelo matemático para conocer la dinámica de crecimiento del maíz de variedades locales, cultivado en asociación o no a una leguminosa en las condiciones agroecológicas de la provincia de Imbabura. El desarrollo del modelo partió de la siembra de m...

Nowadays, the lack of profitability of some chestnut stands linked to the high amount of man power needed to harvest the chestnut fruits in high step mountain areas. A good option to in- crease profitability of these areas is to rare animals to use fruit as feeds. Most of the mountain chestnut stands are associated to less favored areas where autoc...

Agroforestry is considered a sustainable form of land management that optimizes the use of natural resources (nutrients, radiation, water). Agroforestry was a traditional land use system in Europe before modern times. However, before the sixties land intensification and conso- lidation destroyed millions of trees all over Europe. On the contrary, s...

Agroforestry is one of the most prominent tools to make easy the transition of European agricultural and forestry farms to more sustainable land use systems such as agroforestry. The extent of agroforestry in Europe is 19.5 million of hectares, of which 85% is allocated to silvopastoralism mainly associated to European Southern countries but also p...

Secuestro de carbono en las distintas fracciones del suelo de un sistema silvopastoral establecido con nogales (Juglans regia L.) en Galicia

Es un placer presentaros el libro de actas del VII Workshop de REMEDIA: Red Científica de Mitigación de Emisiones de Gases de Efecto Invernadero con un enfoque en el sector agroforestal. El cambio climático es ya un hecho que despierta muchas inquietudes a nivel social y en España necesitamos un empuje importante para llegar a los niveles de concie...

Agroforestry, relative to conventional agriculture, contributes significantly to carbon sequestration, increases a range of regulating ecosystem services, and enhances biodiversity. Using a transdisciplinary approach, we combined scientific and technical knowledge to evaluate nine environmental pressures in terms of ecosystem services in European f...

Allometric models predicting aboveground woody biomass for open grown valonian oak (Q. ithaburensis subs. macrolepis L.) trees growing in a Mediterranean silvopastoral system were built based on Bayesian and classical statistical techniques. The simple power model M = aDb was used for predicting aboveground woody biomass (M), stem (MS) and branch (...

The study assessed the economic performance of marketable ecosystem services (ES) (biomass production) and non-marketable ecosystem services and dis-services (groundwater, nutrient loss, soil loss, carbon sequestration, pollination deficit) in 11 contrasting European landscapes dominated by agroforestry land use compared to business as usual agricu...

As regiões mediterrânicas ocorrem na transição entre as zonas climáticas temperadas e tropicais, em latitudes que variam sensivelmente entre os 30° e 40° Norte e Sul, na parte oeste dos continentes (Gómez-Sal, 2000). Distribuem-se pela bacia do Mediterrâneo, África do Sul, sudoeste da Austrália, Chile e Califórnia. Na Europa, a região mediterrânica...

Agroforestry is an integrated land use management that combines a woody component with a lower story agricultural production recognized as one of the most important tools to mitigate and adapt to climate change. The objective of this paper is to provide a categorization and extent of agroforestry practices linked to agricultural and forest lands at...

El conocimiento de la calidad nutritiva de la vegetación es esencial para el desarrollo de una gestión eficiente y ecológicamente sostenible de los sistemas silvopastorales. Se compararon 11 parámetros nutricionales: Fibra Ácido Detergente (FAD), lignina, celulosa, sílice, proteína bruta (PB), digestibilidad in vitro (DMO), materia seca (MS), fósfo...

La presencia de vegetación leñosa en el interior y en los márgenes de terrenos agrícolas era relativamente común en España hasta el desarrollo de la mecanización de las tareas agrícolas a partir de mediados del siglo XX. El proceso de simplificación de los ecosistemas en entornos agrícolas y la separación efectiva de zonas forestales y zonas agríco...

La Asociación Agroforestal Española nace oficialmente en 2016, con cuatro finalidades fundamentales: (i) promover la adopción de los sistemas y prácticas agroforestales en España; (ii) trabajar por la aplicación de la PAC de forma adecuada a los sistemas agroforestales; (iii) generar un lugar de encuentro entre investigadores y actores interesados,...

Whilst the benefits of agroforestry are widely recognised in tropical latitudes few studies have assessed how agroforestry is perceived in temperate latitudes. This study evaluates how stakeholders and key actors including farmers, landowners, agricultural advisors, researchers and environmentalists perceive the implementation and expansion of agro...

Agroforestry systems are known to provide ecosystem services which differ in quantity and quality from conventional agricultural practices and could enhance rural landscapes. In this study we compared ecosystem services provision of agroforestry and non-agroforestry landscapes in case study regions from three European biogeographical regions: Medit...

Potential benefits and costs of agroforestry practices have been analysed by experts, but few studies have captured farmers’ perspectives on why agroforestry might be adopted on a European scale. This study provides answers to this question, through an analysis of 183 farmer interviews in 14 case study systems in eight European countries. The study...

Agroforestry understood as the combination of a woody component (forest tree, shrub, fruit tree) with an agricultural use of the understory is not clearly identified as such by the European Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). Despite the protection and promotion of the woody component in different parts of the CAP political text, the identification o...

Agroforestry is considered a sustainable form of land management that optimizes the use of natural resources (nutrients, radiation, water). Agroforestry is defined as the deliberate integration of woody vegetation with agricultural activities in the lower story. It provides a higher biomass production per unit of land, while providing more ecosyste...

Agroforestry is a sustainable land management system that should be more strongly promoted in Europe to ensure adequate ecosystem service provision in the old continent (Decision 529/2013) through the common agricultural policy (CAP). The promotion of the woody component in Europe can be appreciated in different sections of the CAP linked to Pillar...

Desde el año 2006 en el que comenzaron los trabajos de campo relacionados con el Catálogo Galego de Árbores Senlleiras, en el marco de un convenio de colaboración entre la Consellería de Medio Ambiente y la Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, se han visitado, medido y fotografiado más de 1100 ejemplares y formaciones por toda la geografía galleg...

Please see the complete paper, pages 351-354, in the Conference Proceedings. Using biochar from sewage sludge and other feedstocks in European agroforestry: Opportunities and challenges. p 351-354. 4th European Agroforestry Conference - Agroforestry as Sustainable Land Use. Nijmegen, Netherlands. May 2018.

Agroforestry (AF) is the practice of deliberately integrating woody vegetation (trees or shrubs) with crop and/or animal systems to benefit from the resulting ecological and economic interactions. The appropriate application of AF practices is a key avenue to help the European Union to achieve more sustainable methods of food production. However, t...

In 2014, FAO suggested five principles to guide strategic global development to provide ‘a basis for developing national policies, strategies, programs, regulations and incentives that will guide the transition to an agriculture that is highly productive, economically viable, environmentally sound, and which is based on the principles of equity and...

In Europe, the adoption of agroforestry practices by farmers is limited. Therefore, it is important to understand how farmers perceive agroforestry practices to promote their adoption. The aim of this study was to understand the knowledge that farmers have on apple orchard silvopasture in Galicia (NW Spain) through an analysis of farmer qualitative...

In the silvopastoral systems one of the main factors affecting pasture production is tree density. Therefore, it would be very useful to have management tools to estimate long-term pasture production when silvopastoral systems are established. In this context, the Yield-SAFE is a biophysical model to predict long-term pasture production taking into...

Sewage sludge production has been increased in the last years because the wastewater treatment is mandatory in urban areas with more than 2000 inhabitants since 2005. Most adequate disposal of sewage sludge should be agricultural soils to improve their fertility and fulfill bioeconomy and circular economy requirements. However, the higher level of...

Agroforestry is a multifunctional, environmentally-friendly and modern system of land use by which we can reach economic, environmental and social benefits for the society. Bulgaria has achieved good results in the establishment of agroforestry practices, such as: protective forest belts, forest farming (agricultural use of forest areas), silvopast...

Agroforestry within the Pillar I can be established in arable lands, permanent grasslands and permanent crops, but the current Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) prevents from agroforestry practices extension. Some improvements have been carried out within the OMNIBUS regulation, mainly linked to avoid the reduction of loss of payments by the presenc...

Agroforestry definitions and practices are difficult to understand mainly because of both time and spatial scale understanding is needed to fully be aware of the concept. The definition of agroforestry to facilitate the identification by policy makers could be "the deliberate integration of woody vegetation (trees and/or shrubs) as an upper storey...