Academic paper

Are bees attracted by flower richness? Implications for ecosystem service-based policy J. Liira, I. Jürjendal - Ecological Indicators 154 (2023)

Does participation in agri-environmental schemes increase eco-efficiency? Lajos Baráth, Zoltán Bakucs, Zsófia Benedek, Imre Fertő, Zsuzsanna Nagy, Enikő Vígh, Edith Debrenti, József Fogarasi

A conceptual framework for measuring transaction costs in agri-environmental schemes: an application to the Dutch collective scheme Melody Splinter and Liesbeth K. Dries (2023)

Making bird numbers count: Would Dutch farmers accept a result-based meadow bird conservation scheme? Insa Thiermann, Brechtje Silvius, Melody Splinter, Liesbeth Dries Ecological Economics 214 (2023)

The paper addresses the increasing issues of pollution, intensive farming and declining biodiversity and it aims to acknowledge their relationship with agri-environmental measures and the potential that they pose for climate mitigation.

Degradation of groundwater quality and contamination of drinking resources is one of the most widespread and harmful impacts of over-fertilisation in agriculture. As part of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), agri- environment schemes (AES) have as main objective the protection and management of the farm environment, including groundwater quality. In this article a spatial econometric model is applied to evaluate the impact of AES on groundwater nitrate concentrations. Bavaria, a federal state of Germany, is used as a case study, due to the findings of high nitrate concentrations in the groundwater. A significantly negative effect is found between AES expenditures focusing on grassland management and nitrogen concentrations, while AES focusing on crop management, organic farming and preservation of cultural landscape did not show a significant effect. The assessment of other factors such as cereals and forage showed a statistically positive effect on nitrate concentrations. However, loam soil texture, rainfall, and residential area were found to negatively affect nitrate concentrations.

This paper employs the Institutional Analysis and Development framework across six ecosystem delivery measures in the European Union to develop a configurational explanation of (un)successful outcomes. By undertaking comparative institutional analysis, we systematically examine the effect of variation across rule types and generate insights on how different institutional configurations result in varying degrees of successful implementation of ecosystem delivery measures.

Eco-schemes are conceptually similar to the agri-environmental and climate schemes (AECS) of CAP Pillar 2 and participation is voluntary. A key difference is that farmers are legally entitled to eco-scheme payments, whereas a granting procedure is used to allocate AECS payments. Unlike the previous greening measures that were defined at EU level, Member States are free to choose eco-scheme measures as long as they respect the legal requirements in Article 31 of the Strategic Plan Regulation.

This study explores whether a ‘smart market’ cap-and-trade scheme between non-point sources can offer meaningful, robust and policy amenable, advantages over alternative approaches for nitrogen management in a realistic setting: 6504 individual farms in Limfjorden catchment, Denmark.