This review of the agroecology debate in South Africa is part of the research project ''Transitions to Agroecological Food Systems: a case for policy support (TAFS)'' launched in 2020.

Its main objective is to provide policymakers and stakeholders with convincing arguments about the importance and adapted ways of promoting agroecological transitions in order to address current and coming sustainability challenges. Specific initiatives and current policies related to agroecological transitions at the national level are identified with different stakeholders. Several questions are addressed such as:

• What are the visions and narratives of agroecological transitions and related food systems?
• How sustainability challenges and agroecological transitions are framed.
• What are the social forces promoting and opposing agroecological transitions?
• What kind of public action supporting agroecological transitions has already been implemented?

Diverse ecological production techniques and their integration at farm and landscape levels are explored. Recognizing agroecology as a movement, this report also proposes the integration of participatory methods of dialogue, research, experimentation, and learning as defining features of agroecological practice. In terms of recent historical context, a number of initiatives on agroecology have unfolded, underpinned by a base of diverse practitioners who are connected in networks of variable coherence and scale. These networks have come closer to each other in response to deepening social and ecological crises, especially after the emergence of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.