Leveraging the blue economy to transform marine forest restoration.

The UN Decade of Ecosystem Restoration is a response to the urgent need to substantially accelerate and upscale ecological restoration to secure Earth's sustainable future. Globally, restoration commitments have focused overwhelmingly on terrestrial forests. In contrast, despite a strong value proposition, efforts to restore seaweed forests lag far behind other major ecosystems and continue to be dominated by small-scale, short-term academic experiments. However, seaweed forest restoration can match the scale of damage and threat if moved from academia into the hands of community groups, industry, and restoration practitioners. Connecting two rapidly growing sectors in the Blue Economy-seaweed cultivation and the restoration industry-can transform marine forest restoration into a commercial-scale enterprise that can make a significant contribution to global restoration efforts.

Increasing the cost-effectiveness of nutrient reduction targets using different spatial scales.

In this paper, we investigate the potential gains in cost-effectiveness from changing the spatial scale at which nutrient reduction targets are set for the Baltic Sea, with particular focus on nutrient loadings from agriculture. The costs of achieving loading reductions are compared across five levels of spatial scale, namely the entire Baltic Sea; the marine basin level; the country level; the watershed level; and the grid square level. A novel highly-disaggregated model, which represents decreases in agricultural profits, changes in root zone N concentrations and transport to the Baltic Sea is used. The model includes 14 Baltic Sea marine basins, 14 countries, 117 watersheds and 19,023 10-by-10 km grid squares. The main result which emerges is that there is a large variation in the total cost of the program depending on the spatial scale of targeting: for example, for a 40% reduction in loads, the costs of a Baltic Sea-wide target is nearly three times lower than targets set at the smallest level of spatial scale (grid square). These results have important implications for both domestic and international policy design for achieving water quality improvements where non-point pollution is a key stressor of water quality.

Decision-Support Tools Used in the Baltic Sea Area: Performance and End-User Preferences.

Decision-support tools (DSTs) synthesize complex information to assist environmental managers in the decision-making process. Here, we review DSTs applied in the Baltic Sea area, to investigate how well the ecosystem approach is reflected in them, how different environmental problems are covered, and how well the tools meet the needs of the end users. The DSTs were evaluated based on (i) a set of performance criteria, (ii) information on end user preferences, (iii) how end users had been involved in tool development, and (iv) what experiences developers/hosts had on the use of the tools. We found that DSTs frequently addressed management needs related to eutrophication, biodiversity loss, or contaminant pollution. The majority of the DSTs addressed human activities, their pressures, or environmental status changes, but they seldom provided solutions for a complete ecosystem approach. In general, the DSTs were scientifically documented and transparent, but confidence in the outputs was poorly communicated. End user preferences were, apart from the shortcomings in communicating uncertainty, well accounted for in the DSTs. Although end users were commonly consulted during the DST development phase, they were not usually part of the development team. Answers from developers/hosts indicate that DSTs are not applied to their full potential. Deeper involvement of end users in the development phase could potentially increase the value and impact of DSTs. As a way forward, we propose streamlining the outputs of specific DSTs, so that they can be combined to a holistic insight of the consequences of management actions and serve the ecosystem approach in a better manner.

Farmers' preferences for nutrient and climate-related agri-environmental schemes: A cross-country comparison.

We use data from a survey of 2439 farmers in 5 countries around the Baltic Sea (Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Poland and Sweden) to investigate their preferences for adopting agricultural practices aimed at reducing nutrient leaching and greenhouse gas emissions. The measures considered are set-aside, catch crops and reduced fertilization. Contracts vary with respect to the area enrolled, contract length, possibility of premature termination, availability of professional advice and compensation. We quantitatively describe farmers' preferences in terms of their willingness-to-accept compensation for specific attributes of these contracts, if implemented. The results vary substantially between farm types (farmers' characteristics) and between the 5 countries, and support differentiation of contract obligations and payments to improve the uptake of Agri-Environmental Schemes. The results can be readily used to improve the design of country-specific nutrient reduction policies, in accordance with the next Common Agricultural Policy.

Toward the Baltic Sea Socioeconomic Action Plan.

This paper analyzes the main weaknesses and key avenues for improvement of nutrient policies in the Baltic Sea region. HELCOM's Baltic Sea Action Plan (BSAP), accepted by the Baltic Sea countries in 2007, was based on an innovative ecological modeling of the Baltic Sea environment and addressed the impact of the combination of riverine loading and transfer of nutrients on the ecological status of the sea and its sub-basins. We argue, however, that the assigned country-specific targets of nutrient loading do not reach the same level of sophistication, because they are not based on careful economic and policy analysis. We show an increasing gap between the state-of-the-art policy alternatives and the existing command-and-control-based approaches to the protection of the Baltic Sea environment and outline the most important steps for a Baltic Sea Socioeconomic Action Plan. It is time to raise the socioeconomic design of nutrient policies to the same level of sophistication as the ecological foundations of the BSAP.

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.

Cost-effective abatement of non-point source nitrogen emissions - The effects of uncertainty in retention.

Non-point nitrogen discharges from agriculture are difficult to regulate, because of the diffuse nature of the pollution. Inflexible and uniform regulation policies have been the solution in many parts of the world. A more targeted and flexible regulation, adjusted to the heterogeneity of hydrological conditions and ambient water quality, as well as the heterogeneity in abatement costs between farms, has been challenging to develop and implement. One reason is the difficulties measuring the hydrological conditions on a detailed spatial scale. One of the most important hydrological factors, which co-determines the load reduction, is the retention (attenuation) of nitrogen in the catchment, from the root zone to the coast. It is therefore critical to understand how uncertainty in retention affects policy recommendations. In this paper, we use a spatial costs-minimization catchment model, TargetEconN, applied to the Danish catchment Limfjorden. The model includes retention, effects of measures and abatement costs at a detailed spatial scale. The model identifies optimal spatial allocation of nitrogen abatement measures at different load reduction targets to the fjord. We use the model to evaluate the sensitivity of the results to different forms of uncertainty in retention by running scenarios. For all scenarios, the total costs, the marginal costs and the distribution of measures are compared, and special emphasis is paid to how uncertainty on the retention affects the cost-effective allocation of abatement measures. The results indicate that taking spatial heterogeneity of retention into account is important to obtain cost-effective nitrogen abatement as this reduces the costs by approximately 25 percent. We assess the importance of uncertainty in the retention estimates by comparing baseline results with the results from model runs using 1) the mean retention estimate for all areas, 2) misspecification of the retention estimates by 10-20 percent in low and high retention areas, and 3) random misspecification of the retention across the catchment. The results indicate that this range of misspecification and uncertainty in retention, does not play a major role for the allocation of measures, nor for the total costs. We conclude that considering spatial heterogeneity in retention is important for cost-effectiveness, and that a policy where retention is included in the allocation of measures is relatively robust towards the uncertainty in the measurements of retention. Uncertainty and misspecification can lead to higher costs for individual farmers. However, for the agricultural community as a whole it is much more costly not to take differences in retention into account.

Including aesthetic and recreational values in cost-effectiveness analyses of land use change based nitrogen abatement measures in Denmark.

In recent years there has been an increased focus on including aspects such as greenhouse gas emissions and biodiversity in cost-effectiveness analyses of nitrogen (N) abatement measures. Side-effects such as aesthetic and recreational benefits generated by the land use changes implied by some N abatement measures, such as afforestation and constructed wetlands, are included in ecosystem service approaches, but seldom explicitly in cost-effectiveness analyses. While several studies have estimated these values for e.g. forests and wetlands, per se, few have studied how these effects are valued by the general population when generated through the implementation of land use changes driven by measures aimed at reducing the loss of nitrogen from agriculture. The land use changes implied by the N abatement measures have different characteristics to that of the evaluations of forests for recreation or larger wetlands created or maintained for biodiversity, mainly because the area affected varies considerably in size and shape. In this paper, we estimate the welfare economic impacts of some of the potential side-effects, such as recreational and aesthetic effects, of three N abatement measures related to agricultural land use change: afforestation, constructed wetlands or energy crops. We incorporate the value of these side-effects in a standard cost-effectiveness analysis and discuss the policy implications. This allows us to evaluate to what extent the inclusion of these side-effects change the ranking of the measures and the cost levels used. We thereby provide a more holistic approach to the cost-effectiveness analysis of land use change based N abatement measures, and discuss the challenges relating to the spatial aspects that arise when accounting for the value of the analyzed side-effects. The analysis shows that public access to the area largely determine whether the selected measures are perceived as positive or negative. The impact of the analyzed side-effects on the cost-effectiveness analysis critically depends on the size of the affected population, as the value of the side-effects are measured per household.

The Baltic Sea as a time machine for the future coastal ocean.

Coastal global oceans are expected to undergo drastic changes driven by climate change and increasing anthropogenic pressures in coming decades. Predicting specific future conditions and assessing the best management strategies to maintain ecosystem integrity and sustainable resource use are difficult, because of multiple interacting pressures, uncertain projections, and a lack of test cases for management. We argue that the Baltic Sea can serve as a time machine to study consequences and mitigation of future coastal perturbations, due to its unique combination of an early history of multistressor disturbance and ecosystem deterioration and early implementation of cross-border environmental management to address these problems. The Baltic Sea also stands out in providing a strong scientific foundation and accessibility to long-term data series that provide a unique opportunity to assess the efficacy of management actions to address the breakdown of ecosystem functions. Trend reversals such as the return of top predators, recovering fish stocks, and reduced input of nutrient and harmful substances could be achieved only by implementing an international, cooperative governance structure transcending its complex multistate policy setting, with integrated management of watershed and sea. The Baltic Sea also demonstrates how rapidly progressing global pressures, particularly warming of Baltic waters and the surrounding catchment area, can offset the efficacy of current management approaches. This situation calls for management that is (i) conservative to provide a buffer against regionally unmanageable global perturbations, (ii) adaptive to react to new management challenges, and, ultimately, (iii) multisectorial and integrative to address conflicts associated with economic trade-offs.

Valuing the commons: An international study on the recreational benefits of the Baltic Sea.

The Baltic Sea provides benefits to all of the nine nations along its coastline, with some 85 million people living within the catchment area. Achieving improvements in water quality requires international cooperation. The likelihood of effective cooperation is known to depend on the distribution across countries of the benefits and costs of actions needed to improve water quality. In this paper, we estimate the benefits associated with recreational use of the Baltic Sea in current environmental conditions using a travel cost approach, based on data from a large, standardized survey of households in each of the 9 Baltic Sea states. Both the probability of engaging in recreation (participation) and the number of visits people make are modeled. A large variation in the number of trips and the extent of participation is found, along with large differences in current annual economic benefits from Baltic Sea recreation. The total annual recreation benefits are close to 15 billion EUR. Under a water quality improvement scenario, the proportional increases in benefits range from 7 to 18% of the current annual benefits across countries. Depending on how the costs of actions are distributed, this could imply difficulties in achieving more international cooperation to achieve such improvements.

Mussels as a tool for mitigation of nutrients in the marine environment.

Long-line mussel farming has been proposed as a mitigation tool for removal of excess nutrients in eutrophic coastal waters. A full-scale mussel farm optimized for cost efficient nutrient removal was established in the eutrophic Skive Fjord, Denmark where biological and economic parameters related to nutrient removal was monitored throughout a full production cycle (1 yr). The results showed that it was possible to obtain a high area specific biomass of 60 t WW ha(-1) eqvivalent to a nitrogen and phosphorus removal of 0.6-0.9 and 0.03-0.04 t ha(-1)yr, respectively. The analysis of the costs related to establishment, maintenance and harvest revealed that mussel production optimized for mitigation can be carried out at a lower cost compared to mussel production for (human) consumption. The costs for nutrient removal was 14.8 € kg(-1)N making mitigation mussel production a cost-efficient measure compared to the most expensive land-based measures.

Reduction of Baltic Sea nutrient inputs and allocation of abatement costs within the Baltic Sea catchment.

The Baltic Sea Action Plan (BSAP) requires tools to simulate effects and costs of various nutrient abatement strategies. Hierarchically connected databases and models of the entire catchment have been created to allow decision makers to view scenarios via the decision support system NEST. Increased intensity in agriculture in transient countries would result in increased nutrient loads to the Baltic Sea, particularly from Poland, the Baltic States, and Russia. Nutrient retentions are high, which means that the nutrient reduction goals of 135 000 tons N and 15 000 tons P, as formulated in the BSAP from 2007, correspond to a reduction in nutrient loadings to watersheds by 675 000 tons N and 158 000 tons P. A cost-minimization model was used to allocate nutrient reductions to measures and countries where the costs for reducing loads are low. The minimum annual cost to meet BSAP basin targets is estimated to 4.7 billion Euro.

Environmental sub models for a macroeconomic model: agricultural contribution to climate change and acidification in Denmark.

Integrated modelling of the interaction between environmental pressure and economic development is a useful tool to evaluate environmental consequences of policy initiatives. However, the usefulness of such models is often restricted by the fact that these models only include a limited set of environmental impacts, which are often energy-related emissions. In order to evaluate the development in the overall environmental pressure correctly, these model systems must be extended. In this article an integrated macroeconomic model system of the Danish economy with environmental modules of energy related emissions is extended to include the agricultural contribution to climate change and acidification. Next to the energy sector, the agricultural sector is the most important contributor to these environmental themes and subsequently the extended model complex calculates more than 99% of the contribution to both climate change and acidification. Environmental sub-models are developed for agriculture-related emissions of CH(4), N(2)O and NH(3). Agricultural emission sources related to the production specific activity variables are mapped and emission dependent parameters are identified in order to calculate emission coefficients. The emission coefficients are linked to the economic activity variables of the Danish agricultural production. The model system is demonstrated by projections of agriculture-related emissions in Denmark under two alternative sets of assumptions: a baseline projection of the general economic development and a policy scenario for changes in the husbandry sector within the agricultural sector.

Valuation of biodiversity effects from reduced pesticide use.

This study deals with the effects on biodiversity of pesticide-free buffer zones along field margins. Using choice modeling, the majority of respondents to a survey on pesticide use in the environment are willing to accept an increase in the price of bread if the survival of partridge chicks and the number of wild plants increase. The study identifies the need for further empirical work with respect to methodological validation, price estimation, and the use of survey results in policy analysis. In particular, the environmental effects of pesticide use are complex and, therefore, present difficult challenges when presenting information to lay people. Forty-one percent of respondents changed their responses regarding willingness to pay more for bread when references to pesticide use were introduced in the questionnaire. This indicates that scenarios depicting changes in pesticide use can be difficult to present to lay people in an economically rational and well-defined context. Thus, in the study of valuation related to changes in pesticide use, much attention should be devoted to the design and definition of the context. Furthermore, the effects of providing different background information, e.g., with or without the mention of pesticides, should be tested.