Less than one year away from the next United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development scheduled for June 2012 in
Rio (Rio+20), the international community is mobilizing to ensure that tomorrow’s major challenges are on the agenda. Among
these subjects, the issue of global food security and new challenges governing current and future agricultural models is on
the agenda. Industrial farming models have reached their limits, and it is high time to invest seriously in more ecologically,
economically and socially sustainable models. “Agroecology”—a concept that will be defined and clarified in this brief—has
now frequently been recognized as a forward-looking solution to overcoming the challenge of feeding nine billion mouths in
2050 without sacrificing the planet’s natural resources. But how is this possible?