Environment
Land Sharing and Land Sparing
A conservation framework contrasting two strategies for reconciling agriculture and biodiversity: wildlife-friendly farming across the landscape, or high-yield farming that frees land for nature.
Definition
Land sharing and land sparing are contrasting strategies for balancing food production with biodiversity conservation. Land sharing integrates biodiversity into lower-intensity, wildlife-friendly agricultural landscapes; land sparing concentrates production in high-yield areas so that other land can be left or restored as natural habitat. The dichotomy was formalised by Green, Balmford, Phalan and colleagues in the 2000s–2010s.
References
Definitions, Phalan/Balmford origins, Ghana–India evidence, Perfecto–Vandermeer critique
Overview
What it means
Empirical work in Ghana and India found that most species — especially habitat specialists — decline even under low-intensity farming, which can favour sparing; critics, notably Perfecto and Vandermeer's agroecological "matrix" perspective, argue that diversified farming landscapes sustain biodiversity and livelihoods and that real systems mix both strategies.
The framework has become a standard lens in conservation science, agricultural policy and land-use modelling, while its binary form is increasingly treated as a continuum.
How it is used
The framework structures research and policy debates on agricultural intensification, protected-area planning, agroecology and landscape approaches to sustainability.
Why it matters
How societies resolve this trade-off shapes the future of both food systems and terrestrial biodiversity. **Note:** Candidate 1591 ("Land sharing-sparing continuum") merges here.
Review
Public comments appear only after editor acceptance. Draft comments stay in the review queue.
Reviewers choose the definition or an overview paragraph, leave a comment or replacement, and attach evidence or a source link.
Editors compare reviewer cards side by side. AI may help find agreement, conflicts, unsupported claims and possible source issues.
Only an editor-accepted synthesis changes the public page. Reviewer identities are shown only with consent and an editorial decision to attribute them.
Submitted reviews stay private until an editor decides whether to accept and attribute them.
Contribute to this entry
Help improve this definition
Your contribution is private while it is checked. Nothing changes on this page unless an editor accepts it.
Loading verified endorsements… Endorsements are not votes and never determine publication.
Endorse this definition
Endorse the exact version shown here. This is not a vote, and publication remains an editorial decision.
Review board
Comment on a specific line. Each reviewer stays separate until an editor accepts a merged draft.
Each person comments on the definition or overview in their own draft card, with role, evidence and suggested wording kept together.
AI can compare comments against the current text, flag conflicting claims, surface missing evidence and identify where reviewers agree.
An editor merges compatible suggestions into a draft change, checks sources, records disagreements and decides what can be published.