

Policy brief: “Biodiversity promotes healthy agricultural systems and benefits human health”
The diversity of functions that insects provide is crucial to sustain agricultural production. Diversity supports wild bee health. Soil microbial diversity can protect crops from disease and insect pests.
Biodiversity loss in agricultural landscapes is a critical threat to food security, ecosystem stability, and human health. Agriculture intensification severely reduces critical ecosystem services, including pest control, pollination, and soil fertility, which leads to cascading effects on crop productivity and nutritional quality.
In 2018, Biodiversa+ launched the BiodivHealth call to support research at the intersection of biodiversity and health. This brief presents findings from FUNPROD, NutriB2, VOODOO and SuppressSoil on the role of species and functional diversity in the health of agricultural systems, specifically the role of diversity in providing the unique nutritional requirements for wild bee health, reducing the risk of pathogen spillover to wild bees, and the importance of soil microbial diversity to protect crops from disease and insect pests. The brief emphasizes the urgency of protecting and enhancing biodiversity within agricultural systems to secure food production and support the health of ecosystems and people.
Functional diversity
Functional diversity – the variety of roles and traits that species perform within agricultural systems, such as predation on pests, pollination, and nutrient cycling – supports crucial regulatory ecosystem services that ensure safe, nutritious food and contribute to human physical and mental health. Intensive agriculture threatens this diversity, while organic farming enhances it by promoting landscape heterogeneity and connectivity between farms and semi-natural habitats, supporting beneficial species like wild bees and ground beetles.
- Keep strong incentives for farmers to preserve and restore semi-natural habitats such as meadows, flower strips, hedgerows, and forest patches to enhance landscape heterogeneity. National authorities can consider this recommendation in the implementation of the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) 2023-27, especially in the eco-schemes that direct payments for voluntary climate-and environment-friendly farming practices.
Bees
Wild bee species have variable and sometimes narrow nutritional needs, requiring a wide range of floral resources with specific nutritional values. Over 30% of bee species also require plant resins for disease protection. Changes in land use, such as agricultural intensification, reduce both the diversity and nutritional quality of floral resources and disrupt plant-pollinator networks. This leads to reduced pollination services and increased pathogen transmission among bees. Semi-natural habitats, such as meadows and hedgerows, are essential for supporting diverse bee communities.
- Ensure the implementation of pesticide use reduction and promote organic farming practices like crop rotation, cover cropping, and reduced tillage. Results presented demonstrate that these practices enhance the functional diversity of beneficial insects and improve the health and survival of pollinators. Lower chemical use may also support soil microbial diversity, essential to protect crops from fungal and insect pests. This recommendation is aligned with the goal of the EU Farm to Fork strategy to reduce pesticide use by 50% by 2030 and Integrated Pest Management (IPM). Expanding legislation on Plant Protection Products (PPPs) under Regulation 1107/2009 to include wild pollinators, in addition to honeybees, could further benefit beneficial species.
- Protect and plant native wildflowers with high nutritional value to support the diverse nutritional needs of wild bees and reduce disease transmission risks. Incentives under the CAP’s eco-schemes and reduced administrative hurdles can support these efforts.
- Improve biosecurity measures in beekeeping by controlling of ectoparasitic mites (Varroa destructor), a prominent vector of several bee viruses 28, monitoring and controlling pathogen levels in honeybees, and reducing density of managed apiaries to reduce disease spillover to wild bee populations. These actions can be supported under the EU Nature Restoration Law, as part of the EU Pollinators Initiative, or under the EU Pollinator Monitoring Scheme (EU PoMS).
Soils
Soils with high microbial diversity promote crop health by suppressing pathogens and protecting against insect pests.
- Encourage organic manure amendments and promote other farming practices such as crop rotation and reduced tillage to support soil health and enhance soil microbial diversity, protecting crops from considerable losses by Fusarium fungi and pest insects. Align these practices as part of the EU Soil Strategy for 2030 and the proposed directive on Soil Monitoring and Resilience (Soil Monitoring Law), which promotes sustainable soil management and restoration of degraded soils.