IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v12y2020i9p3853-d355541.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Sustainable Agriculture and Its Implementation Gap—Overcoming Obstacles to Implementation

Author

Listed:
  • Norman Siebrecht

    (TUM School of Life Sciences, Technical University Munich, Freising 85354, Germany)

Abstract

There are numerous studies and publications about sustainable agriculture. Many papers argue that sustainable agriculture is necessary, and analyze how this goal could be achieved. At the same time, studies question the sustainability of agriculture. Several obstacles, including theoretical, methodological, personal, and practical issues, hinder or slow down implementation, resulting in the so-called implementation gap. This study addresses potential obstacles that limit the implementation of sustainable agriculture in practice. To overcome the obstacles and to improve implementation, different solutions and actions are required. This study aims to illustrate ways of minimizing or removing obstacles and how to overcome the implementation gap. Unfortunately, the diversity of obstacles and their complexity mean there are no quick and easy solutions. A broader approach that addresses different dimensions and stakeholders is required. Areas of action include institutionalization, assessment and system development, education and capacity building, and social and political support. To realize the suggestions and recommendations and to improve implementation, transdisciplinary work and cooperation between many actors are required.

Suggested Citation

  • Norman Siebrecht, 2020. "Sustainable Agriculture and Its Implementation Gap—Overcoming Obstacles to Implementation," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(9), pages 1-27, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:12:y:2020:i:9:p:3853-:d:355541
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/9/3853/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/9/3853/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bezlepkina, Irina & Reidsma, Pytrik & Sieber, Stefan & Helming, Katharina, 2011. "Integrated assessment of sustainability of agricultural systems and land use: Methods, tools and applications," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 104(2), pages 105-109, February.
    2. Lynn V. Dicks & Richard D. Bardgett & Jenny Bell & Tim G. Benton & Angela Booth & Jan Bouwman & Chris Brown & Ann Bruce & Paul J. Burgess & Simon J. Butler & Ian Crute & Frances Dixon & Caroline Drumm, 2013. "What Do We Need to Know to Enhance the Environmental Sustainability of Agricultural Production? A Prioritisation of Knowledge Needs for the UK Food System," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 5(7), pages 1-21, July.
    3. Swinton, Scott M. & Lupi, Frank & Robertson, G. Philip & Hamilton, Stephen K., 2007. "Ecosystem services and agriculture: Cultivating agricultural ecosystems for diverse benefits," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(2), pages 245-252, December.
    4. Hugo Herrera, 2017. "Resilience for Whom? The Problem Structuring Process of the Resilience Analysis," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(7), pages 1-17, July.
    5. Zhanguo Zhu & Feng Chu & Alexandre Dolgui & Chengbin Chu & Wei Zhou & Selwyn Piramuthu, 2018. "Recent advances and opportunities in sustainable food supply chain: a model-oriented review," International Journal of Production Research, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 56(17), pages 5700-5722, September.
    6. Christian Schader & Lukas Baumgart & Jan Landert & Adrian Muller & Brian Ssebunya & Johan Blockeel & Rainer Weisshaidinger & Richard Petrasek & Dóra Mészáros & Susanne Padel & Catherine Gerrard & Laur, 2016. "Using the Sustainability Monitoring and Assessment Routine (SMART) for the Systematic Analysis of Trade-Offs and Synergies between Sustainability Dimensions and Themes at Farm Level," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(3), pages 1-20, March.
    7. Ness, Barry & Urbel-Piirsalu, Evelin & Anderberg, Stefan & Olsson, Lennart, 2007. "Categorising tools for sustainability assessment," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(3), pages 498-508, January.
    8. Ivonne Acosta-Alba & Hayo M. G. Van der Werf, 2011. "The Use of Reference Values in Indicator-Based Methods for the Environmental Assessment of Agricultural Systems," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 3(2), pages 1-19, February.
    9. Hansen, J. W., 1996. "Is agricultural sustainability a useful concept?," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 50(2), pages 117-143.
    10. Evelien M. de Olde & Henrik Moller & Fleur Marchand & Richard W. McDowell & Catriona J. MacLeod & Marion Sautier & Stephan Halloy & Andrew Barber & Jayson Benge & Christian Bockstaller & Eddie A. M. B, 2017. "When experts disagree: the need to rethink indicator selection for assessing sustainability of agriculture," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 19(4), pages 1327-1342, August.
    11. Le Gal, P.-Y. & Dugué, P. & Faure, G. & Novak, S., 2011. "How does research address the design of innovative agricultural production systems at the farm level? A review," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 104(9), pages 714-728.
    12. Julie Ingram, 2008. "Agronomist–farmer knowledge encounters: an analysis of knowledge exchange in the context of best management practices in England," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 25(3), pages 405-418, September.
    13. David Tilman & Kenneth G. Cassman & Pamela A. Matson & Rosamond Naylor & Stephen Polasky, 2002. "Agricultural sustainability and intensive production practices," Nature, Nature, vol. 418(6898), pages 671-677, August.
    14. Schrettle, Stefan & Hinz, Andreas & Scherrer -Rathje, Maike & Friedli, Thomas, 2014. "Turning sustainability into action: Explaining firms' sustainability efforts and their impact on firm performance," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 147(PA), pages 73-84.
    15. Irina Santiago-Brown & Andrew Metcalfe & Cate Jerram & Cassandra Collins, 2015. "Sustainability Assessment in Wine-Grape Growing in the New World: Economic, Environmental, and Social Indicators for Agricultural Businesses," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(7), pages 1-27, June.
    16. Ika Darnhofer, 2014. "Resilience and why it matters for farm management," European Review of Agricultural Economics, Oxford University Press and the European Agricultural and Applied Economics Publications Foundation, vol. 41(3), pages 461-484.
    17. Roland Olbrich & Martin F. Quaas & Stefan Baumgärtner, 2014. "Personal Norms of Sustainability and Farm Management Behavior," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 6(8), pages 1-28, August.
    18. Petraq Papajorgji & François Pinet & A. Miralles & E. Jallas & P.M. Pardalos, 2010. "Modeling: A Central Activity for Flexible Information Systems Development in Agriculture and Environment," International Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Information Systems (IJAEIS), IGI Global, vol. 1(1), pages 1-25, January.
    19. Adam M. Komarek, 2018. "Conservation agriculture in western China increases productivity and profits without decreasing resilience," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 10(5), pages 1251-1262, October.
    20. Sarah Velten & Julia Leventon & Nicolas Jager & Jens Newig, 2015. "What Is Sustainable Agriculture? A Systematic Review," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(6), pages 1-33, June.
    21. Hani, Fritz & Braga, Francesco S. & Stampfli, Andreas & Keller, Thomas & Fischer, Matthew & Porsche, Hans, 2003. "RISE, a Tool for Holistic Sustainability Assessment at the Farm Level," International Food and Agribusiness Management Review, International Food and Agribusiness Management Association, vol. 6(4), pages 1-13.
    22. Kropff, M. J. & Bouma, J. & Jones, J. W., 2001. "Systems approaches for the design of sustainable agro-ecosystems," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 70(2-3), pages 369-393.
    23. Carof, M. & Colomb, B. & Aveline, A., 2013. "A guide for choosing the most appropriate method for multi-criteria assessment of agricultural systems according to decision-makers’ expectations," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 51-62.
    24. Paracchini, Maria Luisa & Bulgheroni, Claudia & Borreani, Giorgio & Tabacco, Ernesto & Banterle, Alessandro & Bertoni, Danilo & Rossi, Graziano & Parolo, Gilberto & Origgi, Roberto & De Paola, Claudio, 2015. "A diagnostic system to assess sustainability at a farm level: The SOSTARE model," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 133(C), pages 35-53.
    25. Wolfert, Sjaak & Ge, Lan & Verdouw, Cor & Bogaardt, Marc-Jeroen, 2017. "Big Data in Smart Farming – A review," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 153(C), pages 69-80.
    26. Fountas, S. & Wulfsohn, D. & Blackmore, B.S. & Jacobsen, H.L. & Pedersen, S.M., 2006. "A model of decision-making and information flows for information-intensive agriculture," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 192-210, February.
    27. Cristiana Peano & Nadia Tecco & Egidio Dansero & Vincenzo Girgenti & Francesco Sottile, 2015. "Evaluating the Sustainability in Complex Agri-Food Systems: The SAEMETH Framework," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(6), pages 1-21, May.
    28. Gómez-Limón, José A. & Sanchez-Fernandez, Gabriela, 2010. "Empirical evaluation of agricultural sustainability using composite indicators," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(5), pages 1062-1075, March.
    29. Peterson, Caitlin A. & Eviner, Valerie T. & Gaudin, Amélie C.M., 2018. "Ways forward for resilience research in agroecosystems," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 162(C), pages 19-27.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Clémence Vannier & Thomas A. Cochrane & Peyman Zawar-Reza & Larry Bellamy, 2022. "Development of a Systems Model for Assessing Pathways to Resilient, Sustainable, and Profitable Agriculture in New Zealand," Land, MDPI, vol. 11(12), pages 1-32, December.
    2. Shirzad, Hossein & Barati, Ali Akbar & Ehteshammajd, Shaghayegh & Goli, Imaneh & Siamian, Narges & Moghaddam, Saghi Movahhed & Pour, Mahdad & Tan, Rong & Janečková, Kristina & Sklenička, Petr & Azadi,, 2022. "Agricultural land tenure system in Iran: An overview," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 123(C).
    3. Moisés Barbosa Junior & Eliane Pinheiro & Carla Cristiane Sokulski & Diego Alexis Ramos Huarachi & Antonio Carlos de Francisco, 2022. "How to Identify Barriers to the Adoption of Sustainable Agriculture? A Study Based on a Multi-Criteria Model," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(20), pages 1-18, October.
    4. Sara Marcelino & Samia Hamdane & Pedro D. Gaspar & Arminda Paço, 2023. "Sustainable Agricultural Practices for the Production of Medicinal and Aromatic Plants: Evidence and Recommendations," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(19), pages 1-22, September.
    5. Mardani Najafabadi, Mostafa & Magazzino, Cosimo & Valente, Donatella & Mirzaei, Abbas & Petrosillo, Irene, 2023. "A new interval meta-goal programming for sustainable planning of agricultural water-land use nexus," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 484(C).
    6. Jun Fan & Xingming Fan & Attachai Jintrawet & Horst Weyerhaeuser, 2021. "Sustainability Interventions on Agro-Ecosystems: An Experience from Yunnan Province, China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(10), pages 1-15, May.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ionuț-Alexandru Spânu & Alexandru Ozunu & Dacinia Crina Petrescu & Ruxandra Malina Petrescu-Mag, 2022. "A Comparative View of Agri-Environmental Indicators and Stakeholders’ Assessment of Their Quality," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 12(4), pages 1-23, March.
    2. Jun Fan & Xingming Fan & Attachai Jintrawet & Horst Weyerhaeuser, 2021. "Sustainability Interventions on Agro-Ecosystems: An Experience from Yunnan Province, China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(10), pages 1-15, May.
    3. Paula Trivino-Tarradas & Manuel R. Gomez-Ariza & Gottlieb Basch & Emilio J. Gonzalez-Sanchez, 2019. "Sustainability Assessment of Annual and Permanent Crops: The Inspia Model," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(3), pages 1-21, January.
    4. Maria G. Lampridi & Claus G. Sørensen & Dionysis Bochtis, 2019. "Agricultural Sustainability: A Review of Concepts and Methods," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(18), pages 1-27, September.
    5. Paula Triviño-Tarradas & Pilar Carranza-Cañadas & Francisco-Javier Mesas-Carrascosa & Emilio J. Gonzalez-Sanchez, 2020. "Evaluation of Agricultural Sustainability on a Mixed Vineyard and Olive-Grove Farm in Southern Spain through the INSPIA Model," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(3), pages 1-22, February.
    6. Trigo, Ana & Marta-Costa, Ana & Fragoso, Rui, 2023. "Improving sustainability assessment: A context-oriented classification analysis for the wine industry," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).
    7. Hubeau, Marianne & Marchand, Fleur & Coteur, Ine & Mondelaers, Koen & Debruyne, Lies & Van Huylenbroeck, Guido, 2017. "A new agri-food systems sustainability approach to identify shared transformation pathways towards sustainability," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 52-63.
    8. Yahui Lv & Chao Zhang & Jiani Ma & Wenju Yun & Lulu Gao & Pengshan Li, 2019. "Sustainability Assessment of Smallholder Farmland Systems: Healthy Farmland System Assessment Framework," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(17), pages 1-19, August.
    9. Paolo Cupo & Rinalda Alberta Di Cerbo, 2016. "The determinants of ranking in sustainable efficiency of Italian farms," RIVISTA DI STUDI SULLA SOSTENIBILITA', FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2016(2), pages 141-159.
    10. Samir Mili & Javier Martínez-Vega, 2019. "Accounting for Regional Heterogeneity of Agricultural Sustainability in Spain," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(2), pages 1-20, January.
    11. Lairez, Juliette & Lopez-Ridaura, Santiago & Jourdain, Damien & Falconnier, Gatien N. & Lienhard, Pascal & Striffler, Bruno & Syfongxay, Chanthaly & Affholder, François, 2020. "Context matters: Agronomic field monitoring and participatory research to identify criteria of farming system sustainability in South-East Asia," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 182(C).
    12. Mercedes Beltrán-Esteve & Andrés J. Picazo-Tadeo & Ernest Reig-Martínez, 2012. "What makes a citrus farmer go organic? Empirical evidence from Spanish citrus farming," Working Papers 1205, Department of Applied Economics II, Universidad de Valencia.
    13. Luong Van Pham & Carl Smith, 2014. "Drivers of agricultural sustainability in developing countries: a review," Environment Systems and Decisions, Springer, vol. 34(2), pages 326-341, June.
    14. Anna Gaviglio & Mattia Bertocchi & Maria Elena Marescotti & Eugenio Demartini & Alberto Pirani, 2016. "The social pillar of sustainability: a quantitative approach at the farm level," Agricultural and Food Economics, Springer;Italian Society of Agricultural Economics (SIDEA), vol. 4(1), pages 1-19, December.
    15. Daniele, Bertolozzi-Caredio & Barbara, Soriano & Isabel, Bardaji & Alberto, Garrido, 2022. "Analysis of perceived robustness, adaptability and transformability of Spanish extensive livestock farms under alternative challenging scenarios," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 202(C).
    16. Chopin, Pierre & Blazy, Jean-Marc & Guindé, Loïc & Wery, Jacques & Doré, Thierry, 2017. "A framework for designing multi-functional agricultural landscapes: Application to Guadeloupe Island," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 157(C), pages 316-329.
    17. A. Suresh & P. Krishnan & Girish K. Jha & A. Amarender Reddy, 2022. "Agricultural Sustainability and Its Trends in India: A Macro-Level Index-Based Empirical Evaluation," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(5), pages 1-23, February.
    18. Salembier, Chloé & Segrestin, Blanche & Berthet, Elsa & Weil, Benoît & Meynard, Jean-Marc, 2018. "Genealogy of design reasoning in agronomy: Lessons for supporting the design of agricultural systems," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 164(C), pages 277-290.
    19. Galdeano-Gómez, E. & Aznar-Sánchez, J.A. & Pérez-Mesa, J.C. & Piedra-Muñoz, L., 2017. "Exploring Synergies Among Agricultural Sustainability Dimensions: An Empirical Study on Farming System in Almería (Southeast Spain)," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 140(C), pages 99-109.
    20. Siavash Fallah-Alipour & Hossein Mehrabi Boshrabadi & Mohammad Reza Zare Mehrjerdi & Dariush Hayati, 2018. "A Framework for Empirical Assessment of Agricultural Sustainability: The Case of Iran," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(12), pages 1-26, December.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:12:y:2020:i:9:p:3853-:d:355541. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.