ALBERT

Description: Sputtering argon ion source used for analysis of solids provides more stable operation than a spark source and allows electrometric recording of the mass spectrum

Description: Diverse agricultural land uses are a typical feature of multifunctional landscapes. The uncertain change in the drivers of global land use, such as climate, market and policy technology and demography, challenges the long-term management of agricultural diversification. As these global drivers also affect smaller scales, it is important to capture the traits of regionally specific farm activities to facilitate adaptation to change. By downscaling European shared socioeconomic pathways (SSPs) for agricultural and food systems, combined with representative concentration pathways (RCP) to regionally specific, alternative socioeconomic and climate scenarios, the present study explores the major impacts of the drivers of global land use on regional agriculture by simulating farm-level decisions and identifies the socio-ecological implications for promoting diverse agricultural landscapes in 2050. A hilly orchard region in northern Switzerland was chosen as a case study to represent the multifunctional nature of Swiss agriculture. Results show that the different regionalised pathways lead to contrasting impacts on orchard meadows, production levels and biodiversity. Increased financial support for ecological measures, adequate farm labour supplies for more labour-intensive farming and consumer preferences that favour local farm produce can offset the negative impacts of climate change and commodity prices and contribute to agricultural diversification and farmland biodiversity. However, these conditions also caused a significant decline in farm production levels. This study suggests that considering a broader set of land use drivers beyond direct payments, while acknowledging potential trade-offs and diverse impacts across different farm types, is required to effectively manage and sustain diversified agricultural landscapes in the long run.

Description: Many studies have explored farmers’ perspectives on biodiversity and ecosystem services, but fewer qualitative and cross-country comparisons exist. We develop a socio-ecological system to analyse agricultural landscape services, biodiversity, and drivers that have affected these services in recent decades. Via a systematic stakeholder mapping and 49 semi-structured interviews, we identify stakeholder perceptions of this system. We compare the perceptions across four regional case studies (Austria, Estonia, Germany, Switzerland), and two stakeholder groups (land managers and administrators). The case studies share certain commonalities in perceptions (e.g., provisioning and regulating services discussed in all of them) but also show differences (e.g., changes in biodiversity and landscape services more often perceived in the Swiss and German cases, but less in the Austrian and Estonian case studies). Across all case studies, typical land use change can be attributed to multiple drivers of various strengths, with climate change being the most often perceived driver directly affecting landscape services, followed by policies and market-based drivers, which affect services and biodiversity indirectly via land use. Compared to the administrators (e.g., decision-makers, scientists), the managers (e.g., farmers, NGOs) discuss more often the drivers, like various biodiversity and landscape service categories, as well as climate change, markets, and technologies. However, the administrators focus more on cultural services, policies as drivers, and consider more often links between drivers and landscape services and/or biodiversity. Hence, both of the groups’ (administrators and managers) perceptions partly complement each other. Since policy making should be based on the best knowledge of different stakeholder groups, active knowledge exchange between managers and administrators should be supported and outcome considered in decision making. The resulting regional differences in stakeholder perceptions of the drivers and their respective impact on agricultural landscapes suggest that future agricultural policies need regional targeting and the consideration of landscape-specific characteristics.