CAP interventions and farmers' actions to preserve and enhance biodiversity in the agrarian landscape in Lithuania

Abstract

Continued intensification of agriculture led to severe habitat and species diversity in the farmed landscape in Europe. In 2022 EU‘s farmland bird index was 33% below its 2000 value what shows a relative decrease in species abundance in the farmland. In response to growing public concern on environmental issues, the European Commission has introduced agri-environmental measures (AEM) as a financial incentive-based element of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) Pillar 2 for the years 2007-2022 and Eco-schemes as an element of the Pillar 1 for the years 2023-2029. The general purpose of these measures and schemes is to encourage farmers to protect and improve soil, environment, landscape and biodiversity, and to support climate change mitigation. However, several studies have shown that the conditions for disbursing agri-environmental payments were not sufficiently rigorous for generating tangible environmental benefits. For this presentation, we reviewed the history, current use, payments, and efficiency of agri-environmental and Natura 2000 measures, and Eco-schemes under the CAP that encourage Lithuanian farmers to preserve and enhance biodiversity in the agricultural landscape. To achieve these goals, both time and space analyses of the implementation of AEM, eco-schemes and Natura 2000 on agricultural land in Lithuania were used. We found that the public expenditure (EU and national) on AEM and NATURA 2000 accounted for about 1.9% (i.e. nearly 136 million EUR) of total funding for the CAP and national support for Lithuanian agriculture in 2014-2022. The findings of our study and other studies show that farmers are slow to engage in both measures in fertile land areas. In 2022 Lithuanian farmland bird index was 55% below its 2000 value. The majority of this decline occurred since the middle of the last decade (an average of -7% per year in 2014-2022). We conclude that the positive effects on biodiversity of the examined measures were modest. It can be expected that the new environmental measures of the Eco-scheme have the potential to correct these weaknesses of AEM. For 2023-2029 approximately 18% (i.e. over 730 million euros) of the total budget of Lithuania’s CAP Strategic Plan is allocated to fund the direct payments under Eco-schemes (excluding activities on arable land using certified seed) and Natura 2000.