There are different ways to define monocultures. We find it rewarding to stress economics rather than biology, and to think of monoculture as a matter of degrees rather than absolutes. For our means and purposes, monocultures are market-oriented organic production regimes whose economic viability hinges on a single commodity. In other words, our focus is not on whether an organic production regime is a monoculture of something else. We look at the extent to which an organic production regime shows the typical features of a monoculture and work from there.

While we are dealing with definitions: organic production regime is our way to designate systems of resource allocation that are based on biological processes. The antonym is mineral production regime, where resource allocation is based on extracting stuff from the ground. We use this term to flag that while agriculture is at the center of our attention, the MaMoGH project also looks at the drift towards monoculture in forestry. So when we speak of organic production, please do not think in terms of alternative agriculture or organic farming.