Futures Forum: Corporate welfare in the Westcountry
... and there are 'subsidies':
“The perverse farm subsidy regime”
New research suggests that offering financial incentives for the farming industry to mitigate its impacts on the environment (e.g. by reducing fertiliser use and 'sparing' land for conservation) actually has a positive effect in critical areas such as greenhouse gas reduction and increased biodiversity. But less than 1% of subsidies goes towards mitigating the toll farming takes on the natural world. The researchers are calling for moves to rebalance the amount of government money spent on farming subsidies with more funds spent on reducing the damage farming does to the environment.
This paper is taken from a summary of a research report by Andrew Tanentzap and colleagues at Cambridge University which was published on Farming Online at: http://www.farming.co.uk/news/article/11656
The full report is open access at: http://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.1002242
www.arthurrankcentre.org.uk/images/2257_Perverse_farm_subsidies.pdf
RuSource
Cambridge scientists warn of 'perverse' subsidy regime
Thursday 10 September 2015
Cambridge researchers have said that targeted agri-environment measures have observable positive effects, whereas ‘perverse subsidies’ make matters worse.
New research suggests that offering financial incentives for the farming industry to mitigate its impacts on the environment (e.g. by reducing fertiliser use and 'sparing' land for conservation) actually has a positive effect in critical areas such as greenhouse gas reduction and increased biodiversity.
It has been a point of contention whether such 'cash for conservation' initiatives are actually successful. For the first time, Cambridge researchers aggregated investment in environmental incentives across the country, and, by comparing the funding schemes to broad trends in environmental outcomes, found that paying the agriculture industry to help the environment seems to be working.
Farming News - Cambridge scientists warn of 'perverse' subsidy regime
Resolving Conflicts between Agriculture and the Natural Environment
Agriculture dominates the planet. Yet it has many environmental costs that are unsustainable, especially as global food demand rises. Here, we evaluate ways in which different parts of the world are succeeding in their attempts to resolve conflict between agriculture and wild nature. We envision that coordinated global action in conserving land most sensitive to agricultural activities and policies that internalise the environmental costs of agriculture are needed to deliver a more sustainable future.
Abandoning the Agricultural Sector to Market Forces
New Zealand radically altered its agricultural policy in 1984 to embrace minimal government intervention. It now relies exclusively on regulation to minimise the environmental impacts of agriculture while providing among the least support to domestic producers out of all developed countries (ca. 0.5% of the value of production;S1 Text). Consequently, the natural environment has been left vulnerable to the pressures of market forces, which are rapidly accelerating production and land conversion with increasing demand for dairy products in particular. The rate of conversion of indigenous grassland to exotic pasture in the South Island has increased by 67% from the period between 1990–2001 to 2001–2008 [52], and New Zealand leads the world in livestock emissions per capita, exceeding the global total across developed countries by more than 13-fold [53].
The nonprescriptive Resource Management Act (RMA) is the primary national legislation intended to oversee natural and physical resources, with land regulation devolved to elected district councils. Although the RMA tasks councils with “maintaining” biodiversity in balance with resource development, they generally expedite the latter. Fewer than 5% of agricultural sector consents requiring biodiversity or ecosystem services maintenance were recently found to comply with conditions [54]. Limited resources are often blamed for poor enforcement, but political interference also occurs [55]. Other regulations, such as the Wildlife Act and Native Plant Protection Act, are rarely invoked, and the latter does not apply to landowners [55].
New Zealand also has a dedicated judicial system to contest decisions made under the RMA. While this system has delivered several notable “wins” for the environment (e.g., [56]), many local actions escape scrutiny. In practice, biodiversity protection by rural landowners occurs mainly on small, voluntary, set-asides of residual unproductive land (known as covenants) and through patchy predator-trapping and stock fencing activities, supported by limited local and national funds. It appears that the laissez-faire approach to the agricultural sector does little to safeguard the environment.
PLOS Biology: Resolving Conflicts between Agriculture and the Natural Environment
See also:
Futures Forum: Norman Borlaug and the “Green Revolution”: a centenary
Futures Forum: Peak oil, peak soil, peak water... peak everything
Futures Forum: Food sovereignty in the UK
.
.
.
It has been a point of contention whether such 'cash for conservation' initiatives are actually successful. For the first time, Cambridge researchers aggregated investment in environmental incentives across the country, and, by comparing the funding schemes to broad trends in environmental outcomes, found that paying the agriculture industry to help the environment seems to be working.
Farming News - Cambridge scientists warn of 'perverse' subsidy regime
Resolving Conflicts between Agriculture and the Natural Environment
Agriculture dominates the planet. Yet it has many environmental costs that are unsustainable, especially as global food demand rises. Here, we evaluate ways in which different parts of the world are succeeding in their attempts to resolve conflict between agriculture and wild nature. We envision that coordinated global action in conserving land most sensitive to agricultural activities and policies that internalise the environmental costs of agriculture are needed to deliver a more sustainable future.
Abandoning the Agricultural Sector to Market Forces
New Zealand radically altered its agricultural policy in 1984 to embrace minimal government intervention. It now relies exclusively on regulation to minimise the environmental impacts of agriculture while providing among the least support to domestic producers out of all developed countries (ca. 0.5% of the value of production;S1 Text). Consequently, the natural environment has been left vulnerable to the pressures of market forces, which are rapidly accelerating production and land conversion with increasing demand for dairy products in particular. The rate of conversion of indigenous grassland to exotic pasture in the South Island has increased by 67% from the period between 1990–2001 to 2001–2008 [52], and New Zealand leads the world in livestock emissions per capita, exceeding the global total across developed countries by more than 13-fold [53].
The nonprescriptive Resource Management Act (RMA) is the primary national legislation intended to oversee natural and physical resources, with land regulation devolved to elected district councils. Although the RMA tasks councils with “maintaining” biodiversity in balance with resource development, they generally expedite the latter. Fewer than 5% of agricultural sector consents requiring biodiversity or ecosystem services maintenance were recently found to comply with conditions [54]. Limited resources are often blamed for poor enforcement, but political interference also occurs [55]. Other regulations, such as the Wildlife Act and Native Plant Protection Act, are rarely invoked, and the latter does not apply to landowners [55].
New Zealand also has a dedicated judicial system to contest decisions made under the RMA. While this system has delivered several notable “wins” for the environment (e.g., [56]), many local actions escape scrutiny. In practice, biodiversity protection by rural landowners occurs mainly on small, voluntary, set-asides of residual unproductive land (known as covenants) and through patchy predator-trapping and stock fencing activities, supported by limited local and national funds. It appears that the laissez-faire approach to the agricultural sector does little to safeguard the environment.
PLOS Biology: Resolving Conflicts between Agriculture and the Natural Environment
See also:
Futures Forum: Norman Borlaug and the “Green Revolution”: a centenary
Futures Forum: Peak oil, peak soil, peak water... peak everything
Futures Forum: Food sovereignty in the UK
.
.
.
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