ROTATES Diagnoses of current ecosystem services

Deliverable D6.1 reports the outcomes of Task 6.1, "Diagnosis of baseline ecosystem services", within Work Package 6 of the ROTATES project. The task establishes the reference state of biodiversity, soil health and related ecosystem services across the six ROTATES pilot Living Labs (pLLs) before diversification practices based on minor roots-and-tubers (MRT) crops are introduced. The pLLs cover taro, sweet potato and cassava in Mediterranean, temperate and tropical settings. This "time-zero" baseline is the reference against which later changes will be measured, so that changes caused by the interventions can be told apart from differences that already existed between sites. The baseline combines three complementary sources of evidence. The first is a review of existing literature and historical data on each crop and study area, which identifies the ecosystem services each production system may already support. The second is a structured questionnaire survey of farmers and stakeholders, which records current practices, perceived benefits and the main constraints on cultivation. The third is primary field and laboratory measurement, which characterises soil condition directly. Soil health was assessed with the Biofunctool® framework, which uses low-cost, in-field indicators of three soil functions: nutrient cycling, carbon transformation and structure maintenance. Soil biodiversity was assessed through nematode trophicgroupanalysis and full-length 16S rRNA sequencing of bacterial communities, together with predictions of their functional potential. A common methodology was applied across the pLLs, supported by training activities to promote consistent data collection among partners. The deliverable presents the results by pLL and then synthesises them across sites. The literature review shows that provisioning and cultural services are generally well documented for MRT crops. Regulating and supporting services, however, depend mainly on how the crops are managed, for example through intercropping, rotation, fallows, cover crops and organic amendments. The field data provide a multidimensional picture of the initial biological and functional condition of the soils. The deliverable alsostresses the distinction between biodiversity indicators, soil functions and ecosystem services: biological and functional measurements describe the mechanisms that may underpin services, but they are not services in themselves. The baseline also exposed practical challenges, including differences in sampling design and timing, incomplete indicator sets at some sites, and difficulties in applying new protocols for the first time. These have been documented and will guide improvements in the follow-up campaigns. Because sites differ in climate, soils, crops and experimental design, the baseline is intended to support comparison of each pLL with its own starting point rather than ranking pLLs against each other. The results of D6.1 form the foundation for the subsequent WP6 tasks on biodiversity and soil-health monitoring (D6.2, D6.3) and for integration and modelling (D6.4). Together, these will allow ROTATES to test whether crop diversification with MRT crops produces measurable improvements, from soil biological communities through soil functions to ecosystem-service outcomes.