Knowledge Gaps in Climate-Smart, Regenerative, and Agroecological Transitions Across Crop, Livestock, Economic, and Natural-Resource Systems (2020-2026)

Abstract

Global agriculture faces simultaneous pressure to raise productivity, adapt to a changing climate, and restore degraded natural resources, giving rise to three overlapping paradigms-climate-smart agriculture, regenerative agriculture, and agroecology-that share the ambition of reconciling yield with resilience. Despite a rapidly expanding literature, empirical evidence remains fragmented across crop, livestock, socioeconomic, and natural-resource subsystems, limiting the capacity of researchers, extension services, and policymakers to design coherent transition pathways. This narrative review synthesizes knowledge gaps identified in the 2020-2026 peer-reviewed literature across four interconnected domains: (a) crop and livestock production together with precision and digital agriculture; (b) soil, water, and climate-smart management; (c) biodiversity, ecosystem services, and landscape-scale processes; and (d) agricultural economics, adoption behavior, and policy. Methods. A structured, non-systematic literature search was conducted using Crossref-verified bibliographic records, academic web search, and citation tracking, prioritizing systematic reviews, scoping reviews, meta-analyses, and empirical studies published between 2020 and 2026 in agriculture, ecology, and sustainability journals. Thirty-six verified, on-topic references were retained after screening for topical relevance and excluding sources outside the scope of agricultural-systems research; the search and screening process is summarized in a PRISMA-informed flowchart. Across all four domains, the reviewed literature converges on five recurring gaps: (a) persistent overemphasis on plot- and farm-level yield outcomes relative to ecosystem services and social welfare; (b) weak integration of evidence across spatial scales, regions, and socioeconomic contexts, with pronounced geographic bias toward high-income settings and a limited subset of Global South case studies; (c) adoption barriers rooted in finance, extension access, land tenure, and gendered constraints that intervention research addresses inconsistently; (d) immature digital and precision-agriculture decision-support tools, particularly low-cost sensing and trusted data-sharing infrastructure for smallholders; and (e) underdeveloped frameworks for evaluating agroecological and climate-smart transitions at landscape and policy scales. Advancing climate-smart, regenerative, and agroecological transitions requires cross-system, multi-scale research architectures that integrate biophysical, economic, and social outcomes, alongside investment in interoperable digital infrastructure and long-term impact evaluation designed for heterogeneous smallholder and commercial contexts alike.