The social aspects of robust production systems

In the past decades agriculture has become much more vulnerable to disturbances. From a systems-theory perspective these are interpreted as unwanted fluctuations. Robustness, the capacity of a system to undergo disturbance and still maintain functions and controls, might be a way to control these external disturbances. However, the development of robust systems must fit in both sustainable and socially acceptable agriculture. A uniform definition of robustness is missing. As a consequence societal stakeholders and scientists use varying conceptualizations of robustness. Unclear is in what way societal concepts of robustness are translated into scientific research questions and how scientific results render towards practical approaches on farm level. To justify robustness as a research goal for sustainable and social acceptable agriculture its relation with these concepts, its content and its power to steer to solutions needs to be developed.