Biodiversity of fruits and vegetables in Iran

Understanding agricultural biodiversity is the first step in determining the effects of intensive and monocropping systems and use of high yield cultivars on sustainability of agricultural systems. For this purpose biodiversity of fruits and vegetables in Iran was studied. Results indicated that many fruits and vegetables are cultivated in country, and therefore the number of cultivated species or species richness is considerable. Shannon index indicated that diversity of these crops is not proportional to species richness, which caused from unevenness distribution of cultivated land between crops, and possibly, high monoculture with regard to climatic conditions. Shannon index for fruits and vegetables in different provinces was rather high. However, due to lack of data on number of varieties cultivated, biodiversity at variety level which is an important index was not calculated.