Sustainable Rural Buildings for Implementing the Agroecology Concept at Territorial and Landscape Level in the Mediterranean Area

Agroecology is a strategy aimed to combine technical, ecological and social principles, to design and manage agro-food systems, while protecting biodi-versity, promoting soil health and optimizing resource management. This approach maximizes relationships among humans, animals, and plants within their natural environment, addressing global food demands, while minimizing the environ-mental footprint of agricultural activities. Fostering agroecology at territorial and landscape level offers a holistic approach to sustainable development, combining technical, social, political, economic, and cultural factors with local realities. In this framework, Agricultural and Biosystem Engineering may play a decisive role, particularly thanks to its contribution to the analysis and exploitation of: -) Natural materials for farm buildings-such as wood, stone, as well as natural fibers (wool, straw, reed, hemp, etc.), and recycled waste biomass, improving mechanical and thermal characteristics of building components and introducing new bio-based materials. -) New technologies for land survey, planning and management-includ-ing digital tools, remote-sensed data, Geographical Information Systems, Internet of Things (IoT), etc., able to optimize crop management, while also reducing chemical inputs and natural resource consumption. This review paper presents the advancement of research and study activities on Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering and their contribution to the imple-mentation of the Agroecology concept, aimed to increase the sustainability of agricultural activities, thanks to the implementation of new specific study courses as well as whole curricula, while opening new prospects of development for the scientific community.