Based on new research results and practical findings, this new, revised edition of a classic text re-emphasizes the importance of agroecology as the discipline that provides the basic ecological principles of how to study, design and manage agroecosystems. By separating myth from reality, Miguel Altieri extracts the key principles of sustainable agriculture and expounds on management systems that "really work." Providing case studies of sustainable rural development in developing countries, he goes beyond a mere description of practices to include data that reveal the socioeconomic and...