Enabling agroecological transition in Europe: insights from national stakeholder perspectives

Unsustainable food systems contribute to a range of challenges, including environmental degradation, biodiversity loss, climate change impacts, and social inequalities. Agroecology offers a holistic approach to address these challenges. This study aims to (1) examine national stakeholder perceptions of agroecology and policy support mechanisms across 18 European countries and (2) investigate how stakeholders’ understandings of agroecology relate to enablers for agroecological transition. Through interviews with 53 national contacts representing policy, research, and civil society and employing Multi-Level Perspective and a barriers and enablers framework, we find heterogeneous definitions of agroecology and definitional divergences between EU and national levels. At national levels, agroecology is largely unfamiliar and predominantly understood as agricultural practices rather than encompassing its dimensions of science, practice, and movement. Additionally, our results show that individual enablers do not necessarily translate to successful transition, suggesting the need for systemic integration of multiple enablers rather than fragmented approaches. We propose expanding the HLPE agroecology framework to include vertical knowledge integration across all levels and recommend holistic policy interventions focusing on synergies across multiple enablers. These findings contribute to the understanding of scalar integration challenges of European agroecological transition and highlight the importance of aligned definitions and coordinated policy frameworks for achieving food system transformation.