The nexus between intercropping systems, ecosystem services and sustainable agriculture: A review

In the face of aggravating environmental challenges, achieving food security while preserving natural ecosystems, the present-day agriculture demands transformative strategies. Intercropping, an age old yet under-recognized practice, offers a promising direction towards sustainable agriculture by elevating biodiversity, optimizing resource use and delivering critical ecosystem services. Intercropping contributes to climate change mitigation by improving soil health and carbon sequestration, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and long-term soil fertility restoration through nutrient cycling. Intercropping system aligns with agroecology principles, integrating biodiversity and ecosystem services into agricultural systems. Intercropping enhances provisioning, regulating, supporting, and cultural ecosystem services through multiple mechanisms. One of its key advantages is the promotion of biodiversity, which is essential for agroecosystem sustainability. By increasing species richness, intercropping nurtures pollinators, beneficial insects, and microbial communities, ultimately boosting productivity and resilience against environmental stressors. Moreover, intercropping represents an ecologically and economically viable alternative to conventional farming, confronting critical global concerns such as soil degradation, biodiversity loss, and climate change. However, challenges such as choosing compatible crops, planning planting patterns, and coordinating harvest schedules pose huge tasks. Research findings on crop combinations, climate-resilient systems, mechanization tools, and region-specific information can help to overcome these issues. The review article focuses on the alignment of an intercropping system with ecosystem services targeting agricultural sustainability.