Deconstructing and unpacking scientific controversies in intensification and sustainability: why the tensions in concepts and values? PC Struik 1 , TW Kuyper 2 , L Brussaard 2 and C Leeuwis 3 Assuming ‘ceteris paribus’ in terms of the viability of the planet during the coming half-century or so, the rising needs of a burgeoning, but also increasingly rich and demanding world population will drastically change agriculture. Crop yields and animal productivity will have to increase substantially, with the risk of further depleting the resource base and degrading the environment, making food production both the culprit and the victim. Future food security therefore depends on development of technologies that increase the efficiency of resource use and prevent externalization of costs. The current trend is towards intensification, especially more output per production unit so as to increase input efficiency. Whether that trend is sustainable is a matter of strong debate among scientists and policy-makers alike. The big question is how to produce more food with much fewer resources. Sustainable intensification (i.e., increasing agricultural output while keeping the ecological footprint as small as possible) for some is an oxymoron, unless real progress can be made in ecological intensification, that is, increasing agricultural output by capitalizing on ecological processes in agro-ecosystems. Definitions of intensification and sustainability vary greatly. The way these concepts are being used in different disciplines causes tensions and hides trade-offs instead of making them explicit. Inter-disciplinarity and boundary-crossing in terminology and concepts are needed. Implicitly, the operationalization of intensification and sustainability implies appreciation of and choices for values, an issue that is often overlooked and sometimes even denied in the natural sciences. The multidimensional nature of intensification needs to be linked to the various notions of sustainability, acknowledging a hierarchy of considerations underlying decision-making on trade-offs, thus allowing political and moral arguments to play a proper role in the strategy towards sustainable intensification. We make a plea to create clarity in assumptions, norms and values in that decision-making process. Acknowledging that win-win situations are rare and that (some) choices have to be made on non-scientific grounds makes the debate more transparent and its outcome more acceptable both to the scientific community and society at large. Addresses 1 Centre for Crop Systems Analysis, Plant Sciences, Wageningen University, PO Box 430, 6700 AK Wageningen, The Netherlands 2 Department of Soil Quality, Environmental Sciences, Wageningen University, PO Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen, The Netherlands 3 Knowledge, Technology and Innovation Group, Social Sciences, Wageningen University, PO Box 8130, 6700 EW Wageningen, The Netherlands Corresponding author: Struik, PC (paul.struik@wur.nl) Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2014, 8:80–88 This review comes from a themed issue on Sustainability governance and transformation Edited by Paul C Struik and Thom W Kuyper For a complete overview see the Issue and the Editorial Received 23 July 2014; Accepted 01 October 2014 Available online 30th October 2014 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cosust.2014.10.002 1877-3435/# 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Introduction The majority of the world’s population is affected by poor nutrition. During the period 2011–2013, 0.84 billion people were chronically hungry [1]. Most recent data show that over 2 billion suffer from micronutrient deficiencies [2], while 1.4 billion adults are over-nour- ished [3]. More people are obese than chronically hungry, but those with micronutrient deficiencies equal the sum of those who eat too much or too little. In total, over half of all deaths worldwide are associated with malnutrition. Poor quantity and quality of food production and nutrition have very high societal costs. The societal costs of current ways of using technology for producing food also are substantial. From an agronomic and environmental perspective these include depletion and spillage of resources such as water, degradation of agro-ecosystems and natural ecosystems, decline in eco- system services, loss of biodiversity, emission of green- house gases and toxic waste, post-harvest loss, among others, all contributing to agriculture’s ecological foot- print. Future trends are unclear: although population growth might level off by 2050, in some parts of the world the population will age rapidly inducing large changes in diets, irreversible climate change and sea level rise will affect agriculture in many densely populated countries, degradation of natural resources might accelerate in fragile environments, among others. Although some of the worrying trends will slow down or come to a halt, the Available online at www.sciencedirect.com ScienceDirect Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2014, 8:80–88 www.sciencedirect.com