Assessing Scotland's Progress on the Environmental Agenda

For good reasons the environment has a high political profile in Scotland. This report is concerned with three important components of the environmental agenda and the way in which they are being taken forward by the responsible authorities in Scotland. The delivery of environmental outcomes on agricultural land by means of a range of current policies, including agri-environment schemes, cross-compliance conditions on direct payments to farmers and implementation of the EU Water Framework Directive.The selection and management of a new network of Marine Protected Areas.Policy measures designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to mitigate climate change.Each of these topics is addressed individually in three separate chapters, aiming to identify some of the leading questions and the policy responses that have been adopted. The progress that is being made in meeting the objectives and aspirations set out in legislation and other key policy documents is then considered. Some of the objectives under review are determined entirely by the Government and by more local authorities in Scotland. Others arise primarily from obligations under EU legislation

The state of farming on Dartmoor 2002: final report on research to inform the "Moor Futures" initiative

Dartmoor National Park Authorit

The state of farming on Dartmoor 2002

Dartmoor National Park Authorit

Towards a step change for enhanced delivery of environmental and social benefits from EU farming and forestry.

More environmentally sensitive management of farmland and forestry is needed in Europe in response to increasing public demand and to meet the requirements of EU legislation for example on biodiversity. However, the provision of environmental and social public goods from farmland and forestry is not increasing at the required pace. A step change in approach is required: the opportunity could be provided by the current debate on adopting a more performance focussed model of the Common Agricultural Policy. Current policy mechanisms, including regulation and a range of incentives to individual farmers, meet part of the need but are not sufficient. Detailed analysis of 34 cases across the EU has convinced us that a new approach based on greater engagement with a wider range of key actors through collective actions could have greater ambition. It could aim for greater scale, longevity and coherence of action across a territory or along a supply chain. Building trust and establishing the right form of governance for highly diverse networks and types of cooperation is vital. Commercial actors in the supply chain could play a larger role. Links between flexible and extended forms of policy support, including for new initiatives, multi‐stakeholder partnerships and projects and for facilitators, will be needed

A Social-Ecological Systems approach to enhance sustainable farming and forestry in the EU

The two concepts of public goods and ecosystem services are often used to describe the same welfare benefits potentially generated by agriculture and forestry, but they originate from different perspectives and each offer only partial analysis of these relationships. A more holistic approach – Social‐Ecological Systems (SES) – has been adapted and applied in new research to understand more fully how the relationships can best be characterised, and beneficial change promoted, through policy reforms and practical action. An important and novel part of the description of a SES, as developed under the PEGASUS project, is the assessment of its ‘valorisation cascade’. Through the mapping and consideration of assets, actors, interactions, drivers and the nature of the valorisation cascade in 34 diverse case studies, the project highlighted the importance of multi‐actor approaches and social processes to foster beneficial change. These include collective action, co‐learning and trust between actors, promoting experimentation and innovation, developing public and/or consumer awareness and identifying new valorisation options, including via commercial supply chains and enhanced community involvement

The Political Economy of the 2014-2020 Common Agricultural Policy: An Imperfect Storm. CEPS Paperback, 17 August 2015

After five years of debates, consultations and negotiations, the European institutions reached an agreement in 2013 on the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) for the 2014-2020 period. The outcome has major implications for the EU’s budget and farmers’ incomes but also for Europe’s environment, its contribution to global climate change and to food security in the EU and in the world. It was decided to spend more than €400 billion during the rest of the decade on the CAP.The official claims are that the new CAP will take better account of society's expectations and lead to far-reaching changes by making subsidies fairer and ‘greener’ and making the CAP more efficient. It is also asserted that the CAP will play a key part in achieving the overall objective of promoting smart, sustainable and inclusive growth. However, there is significant scepticism about these claims and disappointment with the outcome of the decision-making, the first in which the European Parliament was involved under the co-decision procedure. In contrast to earlier reforms where more substantive changes were made to the CAP, the factors that induced the policy discussions in 2008-13 and those that influenced the decision-making did not reinforce each other. On the contrary, they sometimes counteracted one another, yielding an ‘imperfect storm’ as it were, resulting in more status quo and fewer changes. This book discusses the outcome of the decision-making and the factors that influenced the policy choices and decisions. It brings together contributions from leading academics from various disciplines and policy-makers, and key participants in the process from the European Commission and the European Parliament

Review of Rural Development Instruments: DG Agri project 2006-G4-10. Final Report

The aim of the study was to review the policy instruments under the framework of the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD), 2007-13, by: • reviewing intervention rationales and instruments and their use against the objectives, priorities and key actions in the EU Strategic Guidelines; • assessing whether and how RD rationales and instruments should be adapted to deliver these more effectively. The study involved 8 tasks, grouped into 3 themes of analysis: 1) the targeting of EU-27 rural development expenditure, 2000-13, including the development of databases of EU-27 rural area characteristics and ‘indicators of need’ for RD; 2) consideration of the adequacy of the current EAFRD framework, based upon an evaluation of instruments’ cost-effectiveness; the a priori development of a typology of RD interventions and catalogue of instruments; an analysis of delivery mechanisms; and assessment of instruments in ‘fiches’; 3) conclusions and recommendations. In the event, progress in finalising national and/or regional RDPs 2007-13 was delayed,over the study period. Thus, the approach was modified to incorporate more qualitative analysis and the expenditure analysis was made using incomplete figures (July 2007), so 4% of total EAFRD planned expenditure was missing

Land as an Environmental Resource

Report Prepared for DG Environment, Contract No ENV.B.1/ETU/2011/0029, Institute for European Environmental Policy, London. Land is a multifunctional resource and the amount available to be used for different purposes is relatively fixed. This study focuses on the rural land resource and its essential role in delivering all ecosystem services, including food, timber, biomass for energy, clean water, healthy soils, carbon sequestration, cultural landscapes and recreational space, underpinned by biodiversity. Some of these ecosystem services, such as crops, livestock and timber do not have to be produced within the EU to be enjoyed by EU consumers as they can be traded. Others, notably environmental services such as clean water are location specific and have to be produced within the EU, for European citizens to benefit from them. Consequently, while the main concern of this study is land use in the EU, it must be recognised that a larger area of the world, including land in many other countries, is deployed to meet the needs of European citizens. This ‘footprint' overseas needs to take account of exports too, but includes land growing food, livestock feed, fibre, wood, bioenergy feedstocks and other commodities, as well as less quantifiable, but important, services provided by forests and other ecosystems. With large scale trade in commodities in and out of the EU, there is a dynamic interplay between land uses, which need to be taken into account. EU land use cannot be considered in isolation. To meet the multiple demands being placed upon rural land in a way that is sustainable and promotes the efficient use of natural resources, policy decisions have to be made about the appropriate use of the available resource in any given location and situation. These can guide, influence and, in some cases, regulate the decision of land owners and managers. The need for a coherent approach to land use and its integration into key policy areas is therefore paramount. The purpose of the study is to consider the range of demands facing different types of rural land use and related ecosystem services in the EU to 2050 and, in light of these, to examine the various ways in which these demands could be met