Making Multicropping Work in the UK: More than an Agronomic Challenge

Despite increasing interest in multicropping to support resilience and biodiversity, adoption in the UK remains limited. AGRIIH brought together researchers, farmers and practitioners to identify the research needed to support the responsible development of multicropping in the UK. August 26, 2026

Multicropping is receiving growing attention as a way of improving agricultural resilience. Increasing crop diversity can support biodiversity, improve soil health, reduce reliance on external inputs and make farming systems more resilient to climate change. Around the world, many examples demonstrate that these benefits are possible.

Yet adoption in the UK remains limited. Why? 

This question brought together researchers, farmers, and practitioners at AGRIIH’s recent workshop, Exploring the Potential of Multicropping in the UK.  

“Multicropping is closer to the nature’s own system; it’s not really an innovation, more peeling away the oddness of the monocropping habits we’ve – relatively recently – gotten ourselves into!” – Dr Elizabeth Sandis, Tenant Farmer, Hogacre Eco Park in Oxford

Rather than asking simply whether multicropping works, the workshop explored a broader question:

What would it take to make multicropping work in the UK? 

Looking beyond the field

Many discussions began with familiar questions around crop combinations, biodiversity and yields. They did not stay there for long.

Participants repeatedly returned to issues beyond the field itself: labour, mechanisation, processing, routes to market, consumer demand, policy and food systems. Again and again, the conversation expanded from how crops grow together to how farming systems, markets and institutions need to evolve alongside them.
The discussions reinforced an important point. Multicropping is not simply an agronomic innovation. It is a systems challenge. 

Asking better questions

One of the most interesting shifts during the workshop was not the emergence of a particular research priority, but a change in how participants framed the challenge. Rather than asking whether multicropping should be promoted, participants increasingly asked:

“What do we still need to understand before we can responsibly recommend multicropping more widely in the UK?” 

That single word — responsibly — became an important organising principle for the afternoon discussions.
It acknowledged both the promise of multicropping and the need for stronger evidence before wider adoption. Discussions therefore moved away from identifying solutions towards identifying the research questions that matter most.

Who we ask matters

One of the wider reflections from the workshop concerned not only the questions research should address, but whose experience informs those questions. Discussions around farm scale repeatedly challenged the assumption that successful innovations must eventually be “scaled up” into larger production systems. Smaller farms may offer different models for experimentation, adaptation and replication.

From discussion to research priorities

The workshop generated research questions spanning ecology, agronomy, economics and food systems. Participants voted for research questions according to both importance and tractability. Some were considered both highly important and tractable within a medium-term research programme, while others highlighted longer-term challenges around transition, governance and food-system transformation.
Four broad research priorities emerged:

• Building a stronger UK evidence base for multicropping – through coordinated experiments, monitoring and long-term assessment of ecological, agronomic and social outcomes.
• Designing crop combinations and systems suited to UK conditions – including crop combinations, breeding, mechanisation and climate resilience.
• Developing viable pathways for adoption – including business models, farmer decision-making, routes to market and practical support during transition.
• Addressing wider food-system challenges – including governance, value chains, food affordability, consumer engagement and the distribution of risk.

These themes are summarised further in the accompanying workshop report, which brings together the key outcomes and emerging research priorities identified during the day.

Looking ahead

AGRIIH was established to bring together different disciplines and perspectives around some of the biggest challenges facing agricultural resilience. Multicropping provides a clear example of why this matters.
The workshop demonstrated that many of the barriers to wider adoption are not agronomic or ecological alone. They sit equally within economics, governance, markets and society. Addressing these challenges will require collaboration across disciplines and between researchers, farmers, businesses and policymakers.
The conversations begun during the workshop will continue as AGRIIH works with partners to refine these research priorities, identify new collaborations and explore future funding opportunities.

Read our workshop summary report: Exploring the potential of Multicropping in the UK