Strategies for the attraction and conservation of natural pollinators in agroecosystems: a systematic review

Abstract

The objective of this work is to find the most prevalent elements that have positive effects on pollinator density and diversity in crop fields, as reported in the literature, through a systematic review. The search equations yielded 659 papers, from which 138 were filtered and finally 55 were selected by publication date, journal, Scimago Journal Rank, Scimago Quartiles, subject area, keywords, and relevance. These papers were subjected to an in-depth qualitative analysis and tabulated using VantagePoint 10.0, finding 30 terms that were considered relevant due to their recurrence in all papers. From these 30 terms, the 10 most mentioned practices were extracted and grouped into four broad categories: proximity to natural habitats (98), grassland management (82), floral resources (80) and organic farming (65). All the above agricultural management practices were found to have the potential to increase pollinator numbers and diversity in different contexts. From the results, further research is recommended to try to attract the attention of specific groups of pollinators, as it was also identified that each species has very specific requirements, and a configuration intended just for one species could cause other groups to leave the area.