Évaluer les bénéfices de la protection d’une zone humide : application aux sites du Conservatoire du littoral du Bassin d’Arcachon

Cet article présente une évaluation des bénéfices économiques de la politique d’acquisition foncière du Conservatoire du Littoral sur le Bassin d’Arcachon. Elle repose sur l’estimation et la comparaison de la valeur des services écosystémiques rendus par la zone d’étude à l’horizon 2050 en fonction de deux scénarios projectifs : i) un scénario de protection forte correspondant à la mise en oeuvre totale de la stratégie d’acquisition à long terme du Conservatoire et ii) un scénario d’affaiblissement de la protection dans lequel cette stratégie d’acquisition n’est pas mise en oeuvre. La méthodologie utilisée consacre l’utilisation de la télédétection et l’analyse des données cartographiques obtenues à modéliser les variations probables, sur 35 ans, de la valeur des services écosystémiques sous l’effet conjoint des pressions exercées sur les écosystèmes d’une part et des mesures de protection du Conservatoire du Littoral et de ses partenaires d’autre part. Les résultats montrent que les bénéfices de cette acquisition foncière sont de l’ordre de 73,4 millions d’euros sur la période 2015-2050, soit 2,1 millions d’euros par an. Ils offrent un plaidoyer rationnel en faveur de la protection des espaces naturels du Bassin d’Arcachon et permettent de motiver des choix de gestion futurs sur la zone. Même affaiblie par un manque de données locales et l’utilisation d’hypothèses critiquables inhérentes à la conduite des évaluations de services écosystémiques, cette approche offre des perspectives intéressantes pour co-construire avec les acteurs du territoire et sur la base d’arguments cartographiques et socioéconomiques une gestion durable et intégrée du Bassin d’Arcachon fondée sur le maintien des fonctions écologiques et des écosystèmes.This article presents the results of an economic valuation of the benefits of the Conservatoire du Littoral’s land acquisition strategy in the Arcachon Bay (France). The developed approach is built on the classical methods of economic valuation of ecosystems and compares impacts of two prospective scenarios regarding ecosystem services provision toward 2050: i) a “strong protection” scenario relating to the full implementation of the long-term acquisition strategy of the Conservatoire du Littoral; and ii) a “weakening protection” scenario where this strategy is not implemented. Both scenarios integrate the ability of ecosystems to adapt in modeling variation of ecosystem services provision impacted by two major factors: first, threats to ecosystem for which it is possible to apply models built from past trends; then, management measures related to the Conservatoire’s acquisition and management strategy that may generate ruptures. The ecosystem valuation heavily relies on mapping tools to spatialize habitats, ecological and hydrological connectivities and consequently ecosystem services flows. The comparison of ecosystem services values calculated for each of the two scenarios estimates the benefits of Conservatoire du Littoral’s protection within the Arcahon Bay around 73.4 million euros over the period 2015-2050, with an average 2.1 million euros per year. This method provides sound insights as an advocacy tool to promote ecosystem conservation. The comparison of prospective scenarios of biodiversity, method still undervalued by policy makers, allows to develop relevant economic results to guide decision. These results enable to assess potential benefits of future choice and not to justify the past ones. Surely, this method suffers from a lack of data and the assertion of several hypotheses, but it is a powerful tool to design and promote a sustainable management of ecosystems, based on the maintenance of ecological functioning and the provision of ecosystem services and as part of a broader land planning and management approach that uses mapping and socioeconomic modelling

Évaluer les bénéfices de la protection d’une zone humide : application aux sites du Conservatoire du littoral du Bassin d’Arcachon

Cet article présente une évaluation des bénéfices économiques de la politique d’acquisition foncière du Conservatoire du Littoral sur le Bassin d’Arcachon. Elle repose sur l’estimation et la comparaison de la valeur des services écosystémiques rendus par la zone d’étude à l’horizon 2050 en fonction de deux scénarios projectifs : i) un scénario de protection forte correspondant à la mise en œuvre totale de la stratégie d’acquisition à long terme du Conservatoire et ii) un scénario d’affaiblissement de la protection dans lequel cette stratégie d’acquisition n’est pas mise en œuvre. La méthodologie utilisée consacre l’utilisation de la télédétection et l’analyse des données cartographiques obtenues à modéliser les variations probables, sur 35 ans, de la valeur des services écosystémiques sous l’effet conjoint des pressions exercées sur les écosystèmes d’une part et des mesures de protection du Conservatoire du Littoral et de ses partenaires d’autre part. Les résultats montrent que les bénéfices de cette acquisition foncière sont de l’ordre de 73,4 millions d’euros sur la période 2015-2050, soit 2,1 millions d’euros par an. Ils offrent un plaidoyer rationnel en faveur de la protection des espaces naturels du Bassin d’Arcachon et permettent de motiver des choix de gestion futurs sur la zone. Même affaiblie par un manque de données locales et l’utilisation d’hypothèses critiquables inhérentes à la conduite des évaluations de services écosystémiques, cette approche offre des perspectives intéressantes pour co-construire avec les acteurs du territoire et sur la base d’arguments cartographiques et socioéconomiques une gestion durable et intégrée du Bassin d’Arcachon fondée sur le maintien des fonctions écologiques et des écosystèmes.This article presents the results of an economic valuation of the benefits of the Conservatoire du Littoral’s land acquisition strategy in the Arcachon Bay (France). The developed approach is built on the classical methods of economic valuation of ecosystems and compares impacts of two prospective scenarios regarding ecosystem services provision toward 2050: i) a “strong protection” scenario relating to the full implementation of the long-term acquisition strategy of the Conservatoire du Littoral; and ii) a “weakening protection” scenario where this strategy is not implemented. Both scenarios integrate the ability of ecosystems to adapt in modeling variation of ecosystem services provision impacted by two major factors: first, threats to ecosystem for which it is possible to apply models built from past trends; then, management measures related to the Conservatoire’s acquisition and management strategy that may generate ruptures. The ecosystem valuation heavily relies on mapping tools to spatialize habitats, ecological and hydrological connectivities and consequently ecosystem services flows. The comparison of ecosystem services values calculated for each of the two scenarios estimates the benefits of Conservatoire du Littoral’s protection within the Arcahon Bay around 73.4 million euros over the period 2015-2050, with an average 2.1 million euros per year. This method provides sound insights as an advocacy tool to promote ecosystem conservation. The comparison of prospective scenarios of biodiversity, method still undervalued by policy makers, allows to develop relevant economic results to guide decision. These results enable to assess potential benefits of future choice and not to justify the past ones. Surely, this method suffers from a lack of data and the assertion of several hypotheses, but it is a powerful tool to design and promote a sustainable management of ecosystems, based on the maintenance of ecological functioning and the provision of ecosystem services and as part of a broader land planning and management approach that uses mapping and socioeconomic modelling

A Review of Farm Level Inidcators of Sustainability with a Focus on CAP and FADN

The agricultural sector has a strong role to play in achieving the goal of 'Sustainable growth: promoting a more resource efficient, greener and more competitive economy' listed in the Europe 2020 strategy. From a policy perspective, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is likely to be a driver of sustainability as it has progressively introduced more environmental and social concerns within the various CAP reforms. In this context, we provide here a review of sustainable indicators for agriculture. Not only do we review the international literature, but we also provide a synthesis of several national initiatives of farm sustainability assessment in the nine partner countries of the FLINT project: Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, the Netherlands, Poland, and Spain. Although no consensus has yet been reached in terms of the operational meaning of sustainability, we consider here that sustainable development aims at preserving or enlarging our capital stock which includes the economic capital, the social capital and the natural capital. The review particularly focuses on indicators at the farm level. The farm level is a relevant scale at which to assess sustainability, as farm management decisions may directly impact farm sustainability. Further, the farm level approach increases the spatial accuracy, which is highlighted as a main challenge in other quantification approaches. Finally, the farm is the legal unit for legislation purposes and the economic unit that receives payments for externalities within the CAP framework and as such is the level at which most policies are directed.European Commission - Seventh Framework Programme (FP7

A review of farm level indicators of sustainability with a focus on CAP and FADN

In this report, recommendations are made for the FLINT project in view of selecting indicators that can facilitate policy analysis, in terms of indicator design, involvement of stakeholders and in particular, convincing farmers and authorities of the benefits of data collection and the dissemination of results

A review of farm level indicators of sustainability with a focus on CAP and FADN

In this report, recommendations are made for the FLINT project in view of selecting indicators that can facilitate policy analysis, in terms of indicator design, involvement of stakeholders and in particular, convincing farmers and authorities of the benefits of data collection and the dissemination of results

A review of farm level indicators of sustainability with a focus on CAP and FADN

In this report, recommendations are made for the FLINT project in view of selecting indicators that can facilitate policy analysis, in terms of indicator design, involvement of stakeholders and in particular, convincing farmers and authorities of the benefits of data collection and the dissemination of results

Measurement of sustainability in agriculture: a review of indicators

In recent decades, the concept of sustainability has become increasingly prominent in agricultural policy debates. This has led more and more stakeholders to pay attention to the questions of monitoring and evaluation of agricultural practices, and raised the question of appropriate indicators to assess sustainability aspects of given practices. We provide here a review of indicators of sustainability for agriculture. We describe sustainability indicators used in the literature following the typology based on the three sustainability pillars: environmental, economic and social. The literature review shows that the environmental pillar has undergone an ‘indicator explosion’, due to the multitude of themes covered and the attention given by society to this dimension of sustainability. By contrast, economic indicators target a relatively small number of themes. Social indicators typically cover two main themes: sustainability relating to the farming community and sustainability relating to society as a whole. The measurement of these social indicators is challenging as they are often qualitative and may therefore be considered subjective. Careful attention should be given to the choice of indicators, since the data measured will infl uence the calculation of that indicator and therefore the outcome of the analysis. It should fi rst be decided whether individual or composite indicators are preferable, and whether single indicators or a set of indicators should be used. Also, sustainability assessments should be validated, credible and reproducible. Several selection criteria are provided in the literature, such as representativeness, transferability, adaptability and measurability at an acceptable cost