Can investments in manure technology reduce nutrient leakage to the Baltic Sea?

In this study, quantitative models of the agricultural sector and nutrient transport and cycling are used to analyse the impacts in the Baltic Sea of replacing the current Greening measures of the EU's Common Agricultural Policy with a package of investments in manure handling. The investments aim at improving nutrient utilization and reducing nitrogen leaching, based on the assumption that lagging farms and regions can catch up with observed good practice. Our results indicate that such investments could reduce nitrogen surpluses in agriculture by 18% and nitrogen concentrations in the Baltic Sea by 1 to 9% depending on the basin. The Greening measures, in contrast, are found to actually increase nitrogen leaching.

Major challenges of integrating agriculture into climate change mitigation policy frameworks.

Taking the European Union (EU) as a case study, we simulate the application of non-uniform national mitigation targets to achieve a sectoral reduction in agricultural non-carbon dioxide (CO2) greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Scenario results show substantial impacts on EU agricultural production, in particular, the livestock sector. Significant increases in imports and decreases in exports result in rather moderate domestic consumption impacts but induce production increases in non-EU countries that are associated with considerable emission leakage effects. The results underline four major challenges for the general integration of agriculture into national and global climate change mitigation policy frameworks and strategies, as they strengthen requests for (1) a targeted but flexible implementation of mitigation obligations at national and global level and (2) the need for a wider consideration of technological mitigation options. The results also indicate that a globally effective reduction in agricultural emissions requires (3) multilateral commitments for agriculture to limit emission leakage and may have to (4) consider options that tackle the reduction in GHG emissions from the consumption side.

A modelling approach for the assessment of the effects of Common Agricultural Policy measures on farmland biodiversity in the EU27.

In this paper we describe a methodology to model the impacts of policy measures within the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) on farm production, income and prices, and on farmland biodiversity. Two stylised scenarios are used to illustrate how the method works. The effects of CAP measures, such as subsidies and regulations, are calculated and translated into changes in land use and land-use intensity. These factors are then used to model biodiversity with a species-based indicator on a 1 km scale in the EU27. The Common Agricultural Policy Regionalised Impact Modelling System (CAPRI) is used to conduct the economic analysis and Dyna-CLUE (Conversion of Land Use and its Effects) is used to model land use changes. An indicator that expresses the relative species richness was used as the indicator for biodiversity in agricultural areas. The methodology is illustrated with a baseline scenario and two scenarios that include a specific policy. The strength of the methodology is that impacts of economic policy instruments can be linked to changes in agricultural production, prices and incomes, on the one hand, and to biodiversity effects, on the other - with land use and land-use intensity as the connecting drivers. The method provides an overall assessment, but for detailed impact assessment at landscape, farm or field level, additional analysis would be required.