Suchergebnisse

1. Landscape planning and ecosystem services: the sum is more than the parts -- 2. Objectives and structure of the book -- 3. Theories and methodology for ecosystem services assessment in landscape planning -- 4. The basis of evaluation: legal, economic and social factors -- 5. Data sources for assessments -- 6. Using GIS in landscape planning -- 7. Ecosystem services under pressure -- 8. European Union policies and standards as drivers for ecosystem service provision and impairment -- 9. Assessing pressures in landscape planning -- 10. Production capacity and actual provision of food, materials and energy -- 11. Cooper, Hiscock: Catchment water resources -- 12. Renewable energy production capacities and goods -- 13.Regional climate regulation capacities -- 14. Greenhouse gas storage and sequestration function -- 15. Landscape aesthetic capacities as a cultural ecosystem service -- 16. The natural support system of ecosystems -- 17. Identification and evaluation of habitat development potentials -- 18. Habitat capacity -- 19. Evaluation of multifunctionality and aggregated benefits -- 20. Economic valuation of services -- 21. Developing landscape planning objectives and measures -- 22. Measures for protecting soil-related ecosystem services -- 23. Mitigation measures for water pollution and flooding -- 24. Measures for landscape aesthetics and recreational quality -- 25. Measures for biodiversity -- 26. Methods for increasing spatial and cost effectiveness of measures through multifunctionality -- 27. Leitbilder and scenarios in landscape planning -- 28. Techniques for participatory approaches -- 29. Design in landscape planning solutions -- 30. Perspectives from outside the EU: Influence of legal and planning frameworks on landscape planning -- 31. Synthesis and prospects for landscape planning

For decades, a continuous loss of species diversity in the agricultural landscape has been observed. Today, not only are conservationists and governments engaged in halting the decline of farmland species diversity, but so too are actors of food production and retail. They are aware of the crucial role that farmers play in preserving and promoting species diversity. Food companies would therefore like to record and document the contribution their supplier farmers make to the conservation of biodiversity by managing their land and to show which measures can further promote biodiversity on the farms. Existing valuation approaches and advisory systems that have been applied in practice are either very complicated and time consuming or they are adjusted to assess individual farms by advisory services. The resulting case-specific evaluation is based on the assessment and experience of the consultant and is therefore not necessarily comparable across different farms. There is, therefore, no scientifically sound evaluation system that can simply, comprehensibly and justifiably map the current value and changes in habitats and species richness on farms. In order to ensure the necessary practical relevance and the widest possible dissemination of the results, the research project "Firmen fördern Vielfalt" (companies foster biodiversity) has been implemented. In this project, a system was developed that uses easy-to-grasp key indicators to model species richness on farms. By using a modelling approach, habitat and species richness assessments could be automated and therefore repeated over time. Thus, the evaluation of habitat types is improved in such way that changes in response to modified management practices can be shown. This makes the biodiversity performance of farms measurable and comparable. The working paper explains the methodology and shows main results of the project. The research was carried out by the Institute of Environmental Planning at the Leibniz University Hannover, in cooperation with the Association of Organic Food Processors (AöL), the Chamber of Agriculture Lower-Saxony and the Advisory Service for Bioland Farmers. The food companies Bionade, Hipp, Märkisches Landbrot and Neumarkter Lammsbräu supported the project.

AbstractWater provision and distribution are subject to conflicts between users worldwide, with agriculture as a major driver of discords. Water sensitive ecosystems and their services are often impaired by man-made water shortage. Nevertheless, they are not sufficiently included in sustainability or risk assessments and neglected when it comes to distribution of available water resources. The herein presented contribution to the Sustainable Development Goals Clean Water and Sanitation (SDG 6) and Life on Land (SDG 15) is the Ecological Sustainability Assessment of Water distribution (ESAW-tool). The ESAW-tool introduces a watershed sustainability assessment that evaluates the sustainability of the water supply-demand ratio on basin level, where domestic water use and the water requirements of ecosystems are considered as most important water users. An ecological risk assessment estimates potential impacts of agricultural depletion of renewable water resources on (ground)water-dependent ecosystems. The ESAW-tool works in standard GIS applications and is applicable in basins worldwide with a set of broadly available input data. The ESAW-tool is tested in the Danube river basin through combination of high-resolution hydro-agroecological model data (hydrological land surface process model PROMET and groundwater model OpenGeoSys) and further freely available data (water use, biodiversity and wetlands maps). Based on the results, measures for more sustainable water management can be deduced, such as increase of rainfed agriculture near vulnerable ecosystems or change of certain crops. The tool can support decision making of authorities from local to national level as well as private enterprises who want to improve the sustainability of their supply chains.

Mit dem vorliegenden Grundsatzpapier zeigt die Senatskommission für Agrarökosystemforschung Perspektiven für die Grundlagenforschung zur nachhaltigen Erhöhung der Kulturpflanzenproduktion auf.Agrarsysteme stehen im Spannungsfeld zwischen steigendem Bedarf an landwirtschaftlichen Produkten, der Verknappung der Ressourcen, dem Verlust der Biodiversität und dem Klimawandel. Die für das Jahr 2050 prognostizierte notwendige Ertragssteigerung zur Sicherstellung des Bedarfs an Nahrungsmitteln kann, ohne die Belastbarkeitsgrenzen ökologischer Systeme zu überschreiten, nur durch wissenschaftlichen Fortschritt bewältigt werden (Abb. 1), der eine nachhaltige und ressourcen­effiziente Steigerung der Agrarproduktion ermöglicht (FAO, 2011; Dobermann und Nelson, 2013). Die nachhaltige Intensivierung stellt die Agrarwissenschaften vor neue Aufgaben, die weit über ihre klassischen Grenzen hinausgehen.Die Senatskommission plädiert daher für eine Erweiterung der agrarwissenschaftlichen Perspektive. Die meist auf einzelne Feldfrüchte bezogene Bewertung der Rela­tion zwischen Input und Ertrag muss ergänzt werden um die Optionen, die sich aus der räumlichen und zeitlichen Diversifikation der Produktionssysteme unter Einbeziehung der standörtlichen Eigenschaften, des Landschaftskontextes sowie des Klimawandels ergeben. Um Ökosystemleistungen einzubeziehen, müssen Produktionsstrategien entwickelt werden, die sich auf ganze Landschaften und Regionen richten und auch entsprechende sozio­öko­no­mische und agrarpolitische Rahmenbedingungen berücksichtigen.Vor diesem Hintergrund schlägt die Senatskommission drei interdisziplinäre Forschungsschwerpunkte zur ressourceneffizienten Erhöhung der Flächenproduktivität vor:(1) Ausnutzung des Potentials von Kulturpflanzen zur umweltschonenden Ertragssteigerung im Kontext öko­systemarer Bedingungen.(2) Nachhaltige Steigerung der Pflanzenproduktion im Landschaftskontext.(3) Ökonomische, gesellschaftliche und politische Dimensionen der Ertragssteigerung von Kulturpflanzen. DOI:10.5073/JfK.2014.07.01, https://doi.org/10.5073/JfK.2014.07.01 ; With its policy paper the Senate Commission on Agro-ecosystem Research of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) summarizes potential benefits of basic research for the sustainable intensification of crop production. Agro-ecosystems critically contribute to fulfilling the need for increasing food and fiber production, diminishing resource depletion as well as counteracting biodiversity loss and climate change. Yield demands that are needed to ensure the food supply predicted for the year 2050 can only be achieved by scientific progress that allows the intensive yet environmentally friendly production of plant biomass (Figure 1), (FAO, 2011; Dobermann und Nelson, 2013; Ray et al., 2013). Sustainable intensification requires a scientific realignment that allows for broadening the scope of agricultural research. The productivity of farming systems should be evaluated with regard to their efficiency (input-output relation). In addition, the spatial and temporal variability of these systems must be considered by addressing local conditions, the landscape context and climate change. With respect to ecosystem services, new production strategies must be developed that take all aspects of landscape and regional complexity as well as socio-economic conditions and agricultural policy into account.Against this background, the Senate Commission on Agro-ecosystem Research proposes three priority areas of interdisciplinary research on resource efficient intensification of crop production:(1) Exploiting the biological potential of the individual crop plants for an environmentally friendly intensification in an ecosystem approach(2) Exploring sustainable intensification of crop production within a landscape context(3) Taking full account of the economic, social and political dimensions of sustainable intensification of crop production DOI:10.5073/JfK.2014.07.01, https://doi.org/10.5073/JfK.2014.07.01

Mit dem vorliegenden Grundsatzpapier zeigt die Senatskommission für Agrarökosystemforschung Perspektiven für die Grundlagenforschung zur nachhaltigen Erhöhung der Kulturpflanzenproduktion auf. Agrarsysteme stehen im Spannungsfeld zwischen steigendem Bedarf an landwirtschaftlichen Produkten, der Verknappung der Ressourcen, dem Verlust der Biodiversität und dem Klimawandel. Die für das Jahr 2050 prognostizierte notwendige Ertragssteigerung zur Sicherstellung des Bedarfs an Nahrungsmitteln kann, ohne die Belastbarkeitsgrenzen ökologischer Systeme zu überschreiten,nur durch wissenschaftlichen Fortschritt bewältigt werden (Abb. 1), der eine nachhaltige und ressourcen­effiziente Steigerung der Agrarproduktion ermöglicht (FAO,2011;Dobermann und Nelson,2013). Die nachhaltige Intensivierung stellt die Agrarwissenschaften vor neue Aufgaben, die weit über ihre klassischen Grenzen hinausgehen. Die Senatskommission plädiert daher für eine Erweiterung der agrarwissenschaftlichen Perspektive. Die meist auf einzelne Feldfrüchte bezogene Bewertung der Rela­tion zwischen Input und Ertrag muss ergänzt werden um die Optionen, die sich aus der räumlichen und zeitlichen Diversifikation der Produktionssysteme unter Einbeziehung der standörtlichen Eigenschaften, des Landschaftskontextes sowie des Klimawandels ergeben. Um Ökosystemleistungen einzubeziehen, müssen Produktionsstrategien entwickelt werden, die sich auf ganze Landschaften und Regionen richten und auch entsprechende sozio­öko­no­mische und agrarpolitische Rahmenbedingungen berücksichtigen. Vor diesem Hintergrund schlägt die Senatskommission drei interdisziplinäre Forschungsschwerpunkte zur ressourceneffizienten Erhöhung der Flächenproduktivität vor: (1) Ausnutzung des Potentials von Kulturpflanzen zur umweltschonenden Ertragssteigerung im Kontext öko­systemarer Bedingungen. (2) Nachhaltige Steigerung der Pflanzenproduktion im Landschaftskontext. (3) Ökonomische, gesellschaftliche und politische Dimensionen der Ertragssteigerung von Kulturpflanzen. ; With its policy paper the Senate Commission on Agro-ecosystemResearch of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft(DFG) summarizes potential benefits of basic researchfor the sustainable intensification of crop production. Agro-ecosystems critically contribute to fulfilling the need forincreasing food and fiber production, diminishing resourcedepletion as well as counteracting biodiversity loss and climate change. Yield demands that are needed to ensure the food supply predicted for the year 2050 can only be achieved by scientific progress that allows the intensive yet environmentally friendly production of plant biomass (Figure ), (FAO,2011;DobermannundNelson,2013;Rayet al.,2013). Sustainable intensification requires a scientific realignment that allows for broadening the scope of agricultural research. The productivity of farming systems should be evaluated with regard to their efficiency (input-output relation). In addition, the spatial and temporal variability of these systems must be considered by addressing local conditions, the landscape context and climate change. With respect to ecosystem services, new production strategies must be developed that take all aspects of landscape and regional complexity as well as socio-economic conditions and agricultural policy into account. Against this background, the Senate Commission onAgro-ecosystem Research proposes three priority areas of interdisciplinary research on resource efficient intensification of crop production: (1) Exploiting the biological potential of the individualcrop plants for an environmentally friendly intensificationin an ecosystem approach (2) Exploring sustainable intensification of crop production within a landscape context (3) Taking full account of the economic, social and politicaldimensions of sustainable intensification of crop production

A major strength of the ecosystem services (ESS) concept is that it allows a succinct description of how human well-being depends on nature, showing that the neglect of such dependencies has negative consequences on human well-being and the economy. As ESS refer to human needs and interests, values are to be considered when dealing with the concept in practice. As a result we argue that in using the concept there is a need to be clear about what different dimensions of value are involved, and be aware of ethical issues that might be associated with the concept. A systematic analysis of the ethical implications associated to the ESS concept is still lacking. We address this deficiency by scrutinising value dimensions associated with the concept, and use this to explore the associated ethical implications. We then highlight how improved transparency in the use of the ESS concept can contribute to using its strengths without succumbing to possible drawbacks arising from ethical problems. These problems concern the dangers that some uses of the concept have in obscuring certain types of value, and in masking unevenness in the distribution of costs and benefits that can arise in the management of ESS.