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The use of agri-environmental measures to address environmental pressures in Germany: Spatial mismatches and options for improvement

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  • Früh-Müller, Andrea
  • Bach, Martin
  • Breuer, Lutz
  • Hotes, Stefan
  • Koellner, Thomas
  • Krippes, Christian
  • Wolters, Volkmar

Abstract

The European Union has introduced agri-environmental measures (AEM) as one key policy tool to counteract the adverse impact of modern agriculture on the environment. Payments for AEM currently account for about 7% (i.e. nearly 20 billion EUR) of total EU funding for the Common Agricultural Policy programming period 2014-2020. It has been argued that the conditions for disbursing these payments are not rigorous enough to generate environmental benefits. A lack of spatial targeting as well as insufficient consideration of synergies and trade-offs among policy objectives has also been criticized. Here we present the first nationwide analysis on the spatial distribution of agri-environmental payments and their correlation to selected environmental pressure and land-use indicators in Germany. We focused on the AEM payments of the financial year 2014. The results revealed spatial mismatches between the distribution of AEM payments and some indicators for environmental pressures. Uptake of AEM tended to be low in regions with high ammonium deposition or high shares of utilized agricultural area on organic soils. In contrast, AEM uptake was high in regions with a high risk of soil erosion and habitat fragmentation. Moreover, agri-environmental payments varied significantly in relation to land-use attributes across Germany. More farmers received AEM payments in regions with high shares of grassland and Natura 2000 protected areas than did those in regions characterized by intensive agriculture (high numbers of livestock, high area of utilized agricultural area per farm and high natural yield potential). In general, there was a tendency towards spatial separation between highly specialized, productive agricultural areas exposed to comparatively severe environmental pressures and regions with small-scale, low-input farming exposed to lower environmental pressures that maintained a more balanced supply of regulating and cultural ecosystem services. We conclude that AEM need to be more attractive to land managers, especially in productive agricultural regions, in order to increase their effectiveness for environmental impact reduction.

Suggested Citation

  • Früh-Müller, Andrea & Bach, Martin & Breuer, Lutz & Hotes, Stefan & Koellner, Thomas & Krippes, Christian & Wolters, Volkmar, 2019. "The use of agri-environmental measures to address environmental pressures in Germany: Spatial mismatches and options for improvement," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 347-362.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:lauspo:v:84:y:2019:i:c:p:347-362
    DOI: 10.1016/j.landusepol.2018.10.049
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