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- Albizua, Amaia, et al.
(författare)
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Crop rotations including ley and manure can promote ecosystem services in conventional farming systems
- 2015
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Ingår i: Applied Soil Ecology. - : Elsevier BV. - 0929-1393. ; 95, s. 54-61
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Agricultural intensification has contributed substantially to the increase in food production, but has come at the expense of soil degradation and environmental problems. Management of soil based ecosystem services need to be considered in agricultural management since intensive management implies not only costs to the farmer but also to society. In this study we used data from four long-term (55 years) agricultural experiments in southern Sweden to assess the effects of two arable farming systems on a range of indicators of soil ecosystem services. One farming system used only annual commodity crops (ACC system) while the other integrated one year of ley (ley system) into the crop rotation. Nitrogen (N) fertiliser was applied annually in both farming systems at two rates (0 and 150 kg N ha(-1)). The ley farming system had an addition of farmyard manure (FYM) once every fourth year. Soil organic carbon, total N, phosphorous, potassium, pH and water holding capacity were used as indicators of regulating services; bacterial and fungal biomass were used as indicators of supporting services; grain yield and protein content were used as indicators of provisioning services. We analysed each of the indicators separately, to identify effects of the farming systems, using linear mixed effects models. In addition, we used principal components analysis to bundle the individual indicators together to create latent variables representing categories of ecosystem services. Yields of wheat were greatest in the plots that received N fertiliser, irrespective of farming system, while mycorrhizal fungal biomass was greatest in the ley system with no inorganic N fertiliser. The rest of the indicators were similar in both farming systems although the lowest values of all ecosystem service indicators were found in the ACC system with no N fertiliser. When bundling the indicators, no trade-offs were found between regulating, supporting and provisioning services. Regulating and supporting services were positively correlated, as were regulating and provisioning services. The ley system with N fertiliser had significantly greater values of regulating and provisioning services relative to the other treatments. The results indicate that different farming systems can have large effects on ecosystem service flows, and that integrating leys into arable rotations can enhance the delivery of soil ecosystem services. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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| 2. |
- Albizua, Amaia, et al.
(författare)
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Social networks influence farming practices and agrarian sustainability
- 2021
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Ingår i: PLOS ONE. - : PUBLIC LIBRARY SCIENCE. - 1932-6203. ; 16:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The social-ecological effects of agricultural intensification are complex. We explore farmers perceptions about the impacts of their land management and the impact of social information flows on their management through a case study in a farming community in Navarra, Spain, that is undergoing agricultural intensification due to adoption of large scale irrigation. We found that modern technology adopters are aware that their management practices often have negative social-ecological implications; by contrast, more traditional farmers tend to recognize their positive impacts on non-material benefits such as those linked with traditions and traditional knowledge, and climate regulation. We found that farmers awareness about nature contributions to people co-production and their land management decisions determine, in part, the structure of the social networks among the farming community. Since modern farmers are at the core of the social network, they are better able to control the information flow within the community. This has important implications, such as the fact that the traditional farmers, who are more aware of their impacts on the environment, rely on information controlled by more intensive modern farmers, potentially jeopardizing sustainable practices in this region. We suggest that this might be counteracted by helping traditional farmers obtain information tailored to their practices from outside the social network.
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| 3. |
- Brown, Calum, et al.
(författare)
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Simplistic understandings of farmer motivations could undermine the environmental potential of the common agricultural policy
- 2021
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Ingår i: Land Use Policy. - : Elsevier BV. - 0264-8377. ; 101
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The European Union Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) has failed to achieve its aim of preserving European farmland biodiversity, despite massive investment in subsidies to incentivise environmentally-beneficial farming practices. This failure calls into question the design of the subsidy schemes, which are intended to either function as a safety net and make farming profitable or compensate farmers for costs and loss of income while undertaking environmental management. In this study, we assess whether the design of environmental payments in the CAP reflects current knowledge about farmers’ decision-making as found in the research literature. We do so on the basis of a comprehensive literature review on farmers’ uptake of agri-environmental management practices over the past 10 years and interviews specifically focused on Ecological Focus Areas with policy-makers, advisors and farmers in seven European countries. We find that economic and structural factors are the most commonly-identified determinants of farmers’ adoption of environmental management practices in the literature and in interviews. However, the literature suggests that these are complemented by – and partially dependent on – a broad range of social, attitudinal and other contextual factors that are not recognised in interview responses or, potentially, in policy design. The relatively simplistic conceptualisation of farmer behaviour that underlies some aspects of policy design may hamper the effectiveness of environmental payments in the CAP by over-emphasising economic considerations, potentially corroding farmer attitudes to policy and environmental objectives. We conclude that an urgent redesign of agricultural subsidies is needed to better align them with the economic, social and environmental factors affecting farmer decision-making in a complex production climate, and therefore to maximise potential environmental benefits.
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| 4. |
- Brown, Calum, et al.
(författare)
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Understanding farmer uptake of measures that support biodiversity and ecosystem services in the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) : An EKLIPSE Expert Working Group report
- 2019
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Rapport (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Recent scientific research highlights the urgent need to protect Europe’s remaining – and rapidly declining– biological diversity. The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is one of the major tools with which policymakers in the European Union (EU) can achieve this aim. However, so far, the CAP has proved largely ineffective – or even detrimental – to this goal. With relatively localised exceptions, the Policy’s notable success in ensuring supplies of food and fiber by supporting Europe’s farmers has been at the expense of environmental objectives. This report presents the findings of an Expert Working Group (EWG) convened to explore the ways in which the Common Agricultural Policy could be made more effective in protecting biodiversity and delivering associated ecosystem services, particularly through the implementation of effective biodiversity measures by Europe’s farmers. The EWG was established with a focus on Ecological Focus Areas (EFAs), a policy instrument introduced tothe CAP in the period 2014 - 2020, who broadened this remit to also consider evidence from other measures. In the first of three main strands of research (Step A), we synthesised the findings of recent reviews that investigate the most beneficial measures for biodiversity on farmland. In the second (Step B), we reviewed the factors affecting the design and selection of these measures at European, national and farm scales. In the third (Step C), we used our findings to develop recommendations for improving the impacts of the CAP on biodiversity and associated ecosystem services. The bulk of our work focused on Step B, in particular a new assessment of factors affecting farmer’s uptake of relevant measures, and a series of interviews with farmers’ representatives to further develop our insights and findings.
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