THE ROLE OF BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION IN THE TRANSITION TO RURAL SUSTAINABILITY pptx

internships, as well as Advanced Research Workshops ARW or Forums on science policyissues, with an emphasis on identifying the needs of Partner countries.In the application to the NATO S

THE ROLE OF BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION IN THE

TRANSITION TO RURAL SUSTAINABILITY

NATO Science Series

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of countries of the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council The types of scientific meeting generallysupported are "Advanced Study Institutes" and "Advanced Research Workshops", although othertypes of meeting are supported from time to time The NATO Science Series collects together theresults of these meetings The meetings are co-organized by scientists from NATO countries andscientists from NATO's Partner countries - countries of the CIS and Central and Eastern Europe

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The Role of Biodiversity Conservation in the Transition

to Rural Sustainability

Edited by Stephen S Light

Conservation Science and Policy Consultant

/OS

P r e s s

Amsterdam • Berlin • Oxford • Tokyo • Washington, DC

Published in cooperation with NATO Scientific Affairs Division

The Role of Biodiversity Conservation in the Transition to Rural Sustainability

5-9 November 2002

Krakow, Poland

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I would like to thank Kristen Blann and Marin Byrne, staff from the Institute forAgriculture and Trade Policy, for their indispensable help in finalizing this work Thankyou also to Ricki McMillan, Rafal Serafin and Barbara Kazior for maintaining the financialaccounting and administration that accompanied the funding of this project The NATOScience Program, the Trust for Mutual Understanding and the Polish EnvironmentalPartnership underwrote expenses related to convening the Advanced Research Workshop inKrakow and the production of the book Bridget O'Meara, a doctoral intern, helped writethe Epilogue.

The Polish Environmental Protection Foundation, especially Barbara Kazior andRafal Serafin, organized the logistics and the travel arrangements for the Krakowworkshop, from coordinating flight schedules to the ARW program Zbigniew BochniarzDirector of the Center for Nations in Transition, Hubert H Humphrey Institute of PublicAffairs, University of Minnesota deserves special thanks for his support andencouragement

Much credit goes to Rafal Serafin for hosting the NATO ARW, especially while Iwas incapacitated Special thanks to the surgical team at the Surgeon's Hospital in Krakowwho saved my life I was truly blessed

Many more thanks go to the large team of international authors — researchers whofor the most part were working together for the first time The workshop participants andauthors worked cohesively and inspired a network that continues to function

Fikret Berkes, Tim Webb, K Michael Bessey, Niels Roling were among those whohelped fashion our thinking in the early stages of the project Special thanks to the steeringcommittee of Rafal Serafin, Zbigniew Bochniarz, Tim O'Riordon, and Jan Sendzimir OurNATO advisors, Ragnild Solhberg and Evan Vlachos, provided considerable direction andencouragement

Special thanks for all the editorial support from Anne Marie de Rover, Jolijn vanEunen and Carry Koolbergen, of IOS Press and Susan Williamson, of the NATO ScienceProgramme

Steve Light

St Paul, Minnesota USA

August 2003

Acknowledgements

The Search for a Mutual and Interdependent Relationship

between Humans and Nature

"Dominion should be self-perpetuating not self-destructive In short

"The reaction of land to occupancy determines the nature and duration

of civilization We inherit the earth, but within the limits of thesocial and the plants succession we also rebuild the earth - withoutplan, without knowledge of its properties, and with out understanding

of the increasingly rough-hewn and powerful tools which science hasplaced at our disposal."

— Aldo Leopold

(in Meine, Curt 1988 Aldo Leopold.

Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, pp 302.)

Dr Ragnhild Sohlberg

Vice President, Corporate Center, Norsk Hydro ASA, Oslo, Norway

Member of the Science Technology Policy and Organization (STPO) Advisory Panel,

NATO Science Program Scientific Secretary, The European Research Advisory Board (EURAB)l

As a member of the Advisory Panel of NATO's Science Program, "Science andTechnology Policy and Organization (STPO)," the major sponsor of this ARW, and due to

my professional and personal interest in the topic, I had the pleasure of participating in theAdvanced Research Workshop (ARW) in Krakow 5-9 November 2002 The NATOScience Program attempts to have Panel representation at all major events

My interest in and understanding of the importance of biodiversity conservation arevery much the result of six years (1995 - 2001) as a member and Chair of the Governing

Board of the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT).

During these years I frequently visited and travelled extensively through India and Sahara Africa and learnt to appreciate the importance of conservation of genetic resourcesand of rural sustainability

Sub-Since I am also actively involved with the EU Commission, Directorate General forResearch (RTD), I found it particularly interesting that this ARW addressed challenges forthe Central and Eastern European countries (CEE) as the EU enlargement becomes areality, and attempted to identify possible ways to deal with these challenges, as well asopportunities that the CEE experience offers for redesigning biodiversity research,management and policies in Western Europe and North America

The NATO Science Program2 was founded in 1958 with the establishment of theNATO Science Committee, following the recommendations of a Committee on Non-Military Cooperation in NATO The report of that Committee of "Three Wise Men" (theForeign Ministers from Canada, Italy and Norway) asserted that progress in the fields ofscience and technology can be decisive in determining the security of nations and theirposition in world affairs The Science Committee immediately recognized that the training

of young scientists and engineers was of paramount importance, and introduced a group ofsupport mechanisms that in essence remain today

Since the early 1990s the NATO Science Program has served a wider scientificcommunity, as also scientists from the 27 Partner countries of the Euro-Atlantic PartnershipCouncil (EAPC)3 have become eligible for support 1999 was a landmark year, in that, withthe exception of a small number of Fellowships, the Science Program was transformed sothat support is now devoted to collaboration between Partner-country and NATO-countryscientists or to contributing towards research support in Partner countries The ResearchInfrastructure Sub-program on Science and Technology Policy and Organization (STOP),supports Advanced Training Courses (ATC) in science policy, graduate scholarships and

EURAB is a high level expert group providing strategic advice to the EU Commisioner for RTD (ref: http//europa.eu.int/comm/research/eurab/index_en.html.)

2 See: http://www.nato.int/science/e/overview.htm

3 In 1958 NATO had 15 member countries By 1999 NATO had 19 member countries plus the 27 Partner countries.

internships, as well as Advanced Research Workshops (ARW) or Forums on science policyissues, with an emphasis on identifying the needs of Partner countries.

In the application to the NATO Science Program for support for this ARW, it said:

"Science management in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) is not well linked to policy and planning for sustainable development [and that] new approaches for linking science, policy and management are needed " The Workshop succeeded in an initial

identification of approaches, theories and methods that will be beneficial to CEE in thisregard and provided valuable lessons to the representatives from North America andWestern Europe Two things should be kept in mind, however:

1 The background paper and the many case studies presented in the Workshop indicatethat the Western European nations and the US have not been all that successful when itcomes to biodiversity and rural sustainability

2 What may be successful at one time or in one place, may be a failure or inappropriate atanother time or in another place This is true even when it comes to identifying andimplementing policies and practices that aim to achieve long term goals likebiodiversity conservation and rural sustainability The degree to which policies andpractices are successful or not depends on the specific context or local, national orregional framework conditions at a given time

Therefore, while we can and should learn and get ideas from the successful or even

the unsuccessful practices of others, even the most successful practices cannot be adopted outright but must be adapted to the local circumstances.

Finally, I would like to thank the dedicated people who took the initiative for thisWorkshop and organized it In particular I would like to thank the Co-Directors, ProfessorRafal Serafin and Dr Stephen S Light, the staff, and the active and enthusiastic presenters,facilitators and participants - each and everyone contributed to the success of the Workshopand will help ensure that this will not become an isolated "happening"

Acknowledgements vPreface vii

Ragnhild Sohlberg

The Role of Biodiversity Conservation in Rural Sustainability: An Introduction 1

Steve Light, Rafal Serafin, Timothy O 'Riordan, Zbigniew Bochniarz, Jan Sendzimir and Kristen Blann

Section 1 The Importance of Dealing with Biodiversity in New Ways

A New Agricultural Policy for the United States 29

Dennis Keeney and Loni Kemp

Integration of Biodiversity in the Common Agricultural Policy Reform: Implications forResearch 48

Krister Andersson and Marco A Janssen

Building Institutional Capacity for Biodiversity and Rural Sustainability 79

Zbigniew Bochniarz and Richard S Bolan

Promoting Sustainable Development at a Regional Level as an Economic Driver 95

Keith Buchanan

Toward Rural Sustainability in British Columbia: The Role of Biodiversity Conservationand Other Factors 101

J.C Day, Thomas I Gunton, Tanis M Frame, Karin H Albert andK.S Calbick

State of Biodiversity in Some Rural Areas of the Ukraine and Abilities of its

The Social-Psychological Dimension of Biodiversity Conservation 147

Kristen Blann, Tim Webb, Dennis Keeney and Steve Light

The Rhoen Region: A Model for Sustainable Development at the Former Border betweenEast and West Germany 199

Wolfgang Fremuth

The Role of Rural Communities in Biodiversity Conservation and the Transition toSustainability: Practical Experiences from the Pacific Northwest United States 212

J Martin Goebel, Caitlin Fox and Krystyna U Wolniakowski

Some Thoughts on Rural Sustainability in Canada — and Elsewhere 232

Gordon Nelson

An Interdisciplinary Approach for Integrating Landscape Management in the CommonAgricultural Policy: Application to the Municipality of Mertola, Southern Alentejo,

Portugal 254

Rosdrio Oliveira and Teresa Pinto-Correia

The Tisza River Basin: Slow Change Leads to Sudden Crisis 261

Jan Sendzimir, Peter Balogh, Anna Vdri and Tamds Lantos

Conservation and Restoration of the Danube River Floodplains as a Basis for Rural

Sustainable Development 291

Philip Weller

Belarusian Polesye — A Regional Model for Transition to Sustainable Development 302

Valentin Yatsukhno, Elena Davydik and Maxim Vergeichik

Section 4 Where Do We Go Next?

Summary of Conclusions and Recommendations 315

Steve Light and Kristen Blann

An Epilogue: Reflections on Peasantry, Power and Security 326

Steve Light, Bridget O'Meara and Kristen Blann

Appendix A: ARW Participants 338Author Index 342

The Role of Biodiversity Conservation in the Transition to Rural Sustainability

1:6 Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, USA

2 Polish Environmental Partnership Foundation, Poland

3 School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, UK

4 Center for Nations in Transition, University of Minnesota, USA

5 Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy and Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, USA

1 Goals and Purpose

"Man has always lost his way, but now he is in jeopardy of

losing his address."

GK ChestertonDespite well-documented economic recovery in North America and Europe over the pasthalf century, insufficient progress has been made in ensuring biodiversity resources areprotected and the future of rural Sustainability (simultaneously achieving social, economicand environmental objectives) is secure Financial capital, enterprise and governmentpolicy have failed to address rural development; in fact many of current policies tend toperpetuate if not exacerbate the problems Ideology and orthodoxy must be put to the test,science, policy, and management must be sufficiently linked to examine projected benefitswith outcomes and assure that development enhances, rather than undermines, ruralbiodiversity and Sustainability

As 10 Central and East European accession countries (ACs) join the EuropeanUnion (EU) in 2004', there is an urgent need to identify appropriate institutional and policymeasures to prevent further losses in biodiversity - degradation of natural capital that isvital for securing Sustainability of not just rural areas, but of the economies of Europe andNorth America The 10 ACs (Czech Republic, Cyprus, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania,Malta, Poland, Slovak Republic and Slovenia) represent much richer and diversified naturalcapital that that of the EU This capital could enhance environmentally sensitivedevelopment not just in the ACs, but also across Europe as a whole The difference between

AC and EU in natural capital is symbolized by a comparison of the size of the white storkpopulation in Poland and Germany, which is roughly 10:1 (40,000 vs 4,000) The twocountries are comparable in terms of territory, which is similar (312,000 sq km vs 357,000

sq km) and other geographical and natural features

Will the EU enlargement process engender a path of economic development andecological degradation similar to the disappointing performance of former East Germanysince reintegration? Are there alternative responses that could prevent negative patterns ofdevelopment being repeated in the accession countries (ACs)? Is it possible that these

Bulgaria and Romania hope to join the European Union by 2007.

2 S Light et al /Introduction

former war torn and repressed republics of Central and Eastern Europe could in theirtransition to democracy offer an alternative model for rural development not just in Europebut elsewhere, worldwide? What lessons can be drawn from emerging theory and practice

in collaboration, adaptive management, institutional analysis, and sustainability appraisalregarding improved integration of scientific research, policy, and management in pursuit ofthese goals? These are the vital questions for financial institutions, policy making,practitioner, and academic communities not only concerned with the ACs, but also for thoseconcerned with protecting global biodiversity through making development programmingtake full account of sustainability priorities

New efforts from the ground up must be mounted to redesign policy andorganization arrangements for biodiversity conservation; provisions that do not attempt tolock up boutiques of biodiversity by creating massive NGOs, or government agencies but

by fostering social and individual enterprise in rural working landscapes of North Americaand Europe In this context, the NATO Advanced Research Workshop (ARW) in Krakowserved to review promising opportunities for promoting and integrating scientific researchand monitoring with such efforts More specifically:

• THEORY AND METHODS The ARW reviewed recent developments in theory,methods and techniques of collaborative adaptive management, institutional analysisand sustainability appraisal and their possible application to linking or integratingresearch, policy and management related to the linkages between biodiversityconservation and rural development in the transition to rural sustainability

• CASE STUDIES Assembling well-documented and long-standing case studies fromthe ACs, EU, NATO and NATO-partner countries in Europe and North Americadescribed specific biodiversity management situations, where a systematic attempt hasbeen made to research, policy and organizational arrangements as they contributed torural sustainability In analyzing the individual case studies, special interest was paid

to in understanding the contribution of biodiversity conservation to rural developmentand vice-versa, and learning from the experiences — both successes and failures - ofother approaches in order to generate proposals for how and by whom to accelerate thetransition to rural sustainability

Over 30 papers were prepared for NATO ARW covering four themes:

1 Recent developments in theory and practice of integrating science, policy,leadership and institutional arrangements management for biodiversityconservation, and the role of conservation in the transition to rural sustainability;

2 The challenges for biodiversity conservation in rural areas in Europe and NorthAmerica as EU enlargement comes to be a reality;

3 Comparing and contrasting case study applications in biodiversity conservationfrom NATO and NATO partner countries; and

4 Identifying new opportunities for integrated approaches to rural sustainabilityand biodiversity conservation within in rural areas in the context of an enlargedEuropean Union and reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and theforthcoming trade round negotiations under the World Trade Organization(WTO)

This chapter provided the integrating framework within which to discuss the ideas,tools and infrastructure of the papers presented by those participating in the NATO ARW inKrakow, Poland Ideas gained in planning and preparing for the Workshop as well as thosedrawn from experience with Adaptive Management, Institutional Analysis andSustainability Appraisal are presented

Unprecedented EU enlargement will reconfigure the politics of not just theEuropean continent, but also transatlantic and north-south relationships Just what theimplications of this geopolitical reconfiguration will be for agriculture, biodiversity and

5 Light et al / Introduction 3

rural areas is unclear, but one thing is certain: 'business-as-usual' will be insufficient toassure real progress towards sustainability in both Europe and North America What thenshould be done to move beyond 'business-as-usual' and replace failed ideology andunsustainable institutional arrangements and policies with those that will enhance the twingoals of biodiversity conservation and rural development? Can the nations representingmost of the world's largest economies rise to the occasion and move beyond the currentpatchwork of policy prescriptions to develop new ideas and a more coherent framework forreconciling objectives and resolving these issues?

European Union (EU) enlargement offers a historic and last best opportunity forlinking biodiversity conservation to rural development as a basis for setting a new agendafor research, policy and action in the North Such an agenda will be aimed at achieving realprogress on sustainability The intent in organizing the NATO ARW was to bring together

a range of disciplinary perspectives with a wide array of experiences in research, policy andinstitutional management to formulate recommendations for research and practice ruralsustainability

2 Biodiversity Under Threat

North America and Europe are continuing to experience significant declines in biodiversityand natural capital Increasing pressures from agriculture and forestry and other land-usechanges now threaten half of vertebrate species [1,2] Available habitat is shrinking belowlevels needed to sustain certain species

In the EU, more than two-thirds of existing habitat types are considered endangered,and a high proportion of species are at risk of extinction Sixty-four endemic plants havealready disappeared and 38 percent of bird species are at high risk [3] Threats to Europeanbiodiversity derive from the intensification and industrialization of agriculture; continuedfragmentation of habitats; the extension of the urban peripheries of big cities until theyform metropoles; and the expansion of tourist facilities in mountain regions or oncoastlines Some 200 habitat types listed of Community Importance are threatened byagricultural intensification Twenty-six such habitats are also threatened by loss or neglect

of agricultural practices that once maintained their conservation stakes The problem ofwildlife habitat is especially acute in Western Europe, where the ongoing development ofroads, high-speed railway lines, and other infrastructure is a major threat [4] Europeansettlement is expected to increase by 5.9 percent by 2010, along with transport arteries

In Central and Eastern Europe the picture of biodiversity conservation is quitedifferent CEE contains a diversity of viable natural environments that support higher forestcover than in the European Union countries Forested land varies from 50% of total area inSlovenia to about 30% in Poland and Romania (Hungary is an exception with about 20% offorested land), providing extensive wildlife habitat for large mammals, such as brown bearand wolf, European bison, and elk Under communist rule, much of the developmentpressure was focused in and around industrial-urban regions, while the lack of ruralinfrastructure such as rail and motor transit fragmented less landscape and habitat

That is not to say that CEE has been immune to adverse ecological impacts.Following World War II the forced collectivization of farms destroyed the natural socialfabric of family farming, and degraded social and human capital accumulated overcenturies associated with that way of farming, some dating back to the 1200s whenCistercian monks brought agricultural and horticultural innovations to CEE

During the 1960s and 1970s political and ideological pressure to develop potentindustrial farming introduced intensive use of pesticides, herbicides, and nutrients thatresulted in environmental degradation Large-scale state-run agricultural development,

4 S Light et al / Introduction

particularly in Eastern Europe, drained hundreds of thousands of hectares of wetlands forproduction Fortunately for wildlife, since the beginning of the transition in June 1989 theseunsustainable policies have stopped Due to loss of Soviet subsidies, farm inputs (fertilizersand biocides) have declined dramatically While overall production has declined, waterquality and habitat have improved in the past decade

3 Rural Sustainability

A key sustainability challenge to existing and future EU member states lies in establishingbenchmarks and baseline criteria for biodiversity and rural stability and vitality needed toevaluate outcomes under the enlarged EU CAP reforms are needed, even more far-reaching than the "green" payment plan agreed to, and should be oriented primarily topromoting rural vitality (economic, social and environmental), rural sustainability, andensuring livelihoods to be compatible with the maintenance of biodiversity and ecologicalservices, processes, and functions, e.g natural capital in the form of soil, water,biodiversity, and ecosystem health Biophysical constraints help structure efficienteconomic activities that might otherwise erode the life-support systems and functions ofnatural systems upon which current and future generations will depend

Respecting biophysical constraints does not mean avoiding all possible negativeenvironmental effects Emerging understanding of the diverse resource managementsystems humans have developed in local context increasingly demonstrates that humaneconomic activity and ecological health need not always be seen as a zero sum tradeoff.Many communities and cultures throughout human history have developed systems that arerooted in living with and profiting from understanding ecological dynamics [5]

Rural sustainability builds local social capacity that encourages communities andcitizens to explore a range of healthy and viable livelihood possibilities Citizens needopportunities to develop skills and personal confidence to develop market-based livelihoodsand evolve workable partnerships that more efficiently use resources and waste Renewableenergy systems, local food production, woodlot management, recycling and eco-tourism allfit into these categories, as do energy conservation for subsistence households, redesigningpublic buildings for energy efficiency, and creating opportunities for linking crafts andartwork to biodiversity conservation Sustainable rural communities offer fresh approachesfor science to develop technologies that work with and profit from ecosystem-basedservices

4 The Changing Transatlantic Context

EU enlargement offers a historic opportunity for linking biodiversity conservation to ruralsustainable development as a basis for setting a new agenda for research, policy andpractical action aimed at moving beyond the ideology of "market fundamentalism" toachieve real progress on poverty alleviation and job generation EU enlargement willreconfigure the politics of not just the European continent, but also transatlantic and north-south relationships Just what will be the impacts and implications on biodiversity, ruraldevelopment, forestry and agriculture of this new geopolitical reconfiguration is unclear.One thing is certain, however, rural development programs based on subsidies foragricultural production of the kind delivered through the existing CAP in the EuropeanUnion and the Farm Bill in the USA will be insufficient to assure real progress towardssafeguarding biodiversity and rural stability and security

S Light et al /Introduction 5

The current farm support system in the EU is both costly and ineffective, soaking upannually approximately 1.3% of the GNP of all OECD countries or approximately twicePoland's GNP According to the OECD [6], the current system based on agriculturalsubsidies distorts market signals and so production and trade create surpluses, high foodprices, environmental damage and harm to third world farmers Total support to agricultureamounted to US$ 311 billion, while support to agricultural producers accounted for 31% oftotal farm receipts in the OECD area in 2001 The EU was responsible for US$ 93 billionand the U.S for US$ 49 billion

Following a half-century of centrally planned economies with Soviet oversight anddirection from government ministries, science management in Central and East Europe(CEE) is a fundamentally crude industrial agriculture model based on U.S productionapproaches Science has been slow to respond despite participation of all the leading CEEcountries in the European Research Area and the European Union's 5th ResearchFramework Programme EU research focused explicitly on environment and resourcemanagement has made little progress in bringing CEE research in line with the Europeanpublic policy agendas Thus opportunity has lagged in improving environmental andresource management in anticipation of EU enlargement and the growing influence ofglobal markets arising from World Trade Organization (WTO) negotiations

By the end of 2003 EU enlargement membership negotiations for the ten ACs will

be complete An official report of the European Commission released on October 9th, 2002adjudged the accession countries to be ready for EU membership in 2004 This historicevent is taking place as the EU is seeking to reform its CAP by 2006 and relate this topolicy commitments to implementing sustainable development across the Enlarged Europe.Preparations are also under way for another round of trade liberalization under the WTO.The three ongoing processes of EU Enlargement, CAP reform and WTO tradeliberalization are interrelated with one another, generating new opportunities, synergies andalso new threats to biodiversity and sustainability of rural development In this context, thefuture of agriculture and rural economies has become a key issue in the reconfiguration ofeconomic and political interrelationships between CEE, West Europe and North America,and thus in accelerating or slowing the globalization movement or improving sustainability

of rural areas

4.1 European Union

In the European Union, rural areas account for 80% of the geographical area andapproximately 25% of the population Agriculture accounts for over 40% of the total landarea with the EU and forestry accounts for a further 36% Despite representing only 2.3%

of EU gross domestic product and 5.3% of employment, agriculture dominates land use andthe appearance of the countryside Since its establishment in 1962, the EU's CommonAgricultural Policy (CAP) has promoted intensification, specialization and concentration ofagricultural production Despite noble goals and objectives, CAP has performed unevenly,resulting in disproportionate economic, social, and environmental outcomes It hascontributed to inequalities in income distribution and the provisioning of social services.Negative environmental impacts of agricultural intensification on biodiversity havestemmed from increased use of pesticides and fertilizers, physical alteration of aquaticsystems, degradation of soil and water resources, the persistence of some chemicals in theenvironment and their accumulation in wildlife tissues, introduction of exotics, and thetransformation of species rich to species poor agroecosystems In addition, the introduction

of genetically engineered crops and the loss of cultural landscapes have generated socialconflict while exposing people and nature to new risks

6 S Light et al /Introduction

The CAP was initially conceived as a set of rules and mechanisms to regulate theproduction, trade and processing of agricultural products in the EU The concept of'multifunctionality' of agriculture was introduced in proposed reforms of the CAP (Agenda2000) to try to capture the range of services provided by agriculture: producing food,providing fibers and energy sources, preserving biodiversity and landscape resources,providing food security, intercepting precipitation and mediating water quality, andcontributing to the economic vitality of rural areas The central plank of proposed reforms

is an overall reduction of the CAP in the EU budget, coupled with a move to reducingemphasis on direct payments to agricultural producers (the so-called Pillar 1 of the CAP) infavor of financial support for rural infrastructure and development (the so-called Pillar 2 ofthe CAP), including provisions for integration of more environmental and structuralconsiderations

Among the EU's policies, the CAP is important if for no other reason that itaccounts for almost 50% of EU budget, but also because of the vast number of people andgeographical territory affected, and not least, its political importance in that it represents theclearest example of sovereignty transferred from national to EU level As CAP reforms aredebated, the CEE accession countries are negotiating how they can implement the CAP toimprove their agricultural systems and revitalize rural areas "The scope of ruraldevelopment must be extended to meet new needs and opportunities, particularly in thefields of employment and sustainable development" [7]

In a recent mid term review of the CAP, the European Commission [8] concludedthat new measures should target intervention as a safety net for needy farms, improvedenvironmental quality, biodiversity, animal welfare, food quality and food safety; cross-compliance performance indicators, rather than to food production alone; stabilization ofagricultural income; and rural sustainability more generally

At the heart of proposed CAP reforms is a necessary investment to significantlyimprove rural technical infrastructure linking communities with delivery of basic socialservices These services, particularly roads, telecommunication, sanitation, education, andhealth care are vital to improved human capital, and to expanding access to businessopportunities and establishing linkage with local and regional markets Without suchinvestment, rural communities will not be able to develop new jobs, compete successfully

in their markets, reduce unemployment (currently ranking 15-30% of the working agepopulation), and reduce chronic suffering from poverty and social pathology (such asalcoholism) From this perspective, the proposed CAP reform toward moving funds fromthe Pillar 1 to the Pillar 2 (support for sustainable rural development) will be a welcomeinvestment in building rural sustainability in the AC It would prevent the development ofunsustainable dependence on direct subsidies to commodity production in AC

Unfortunately, accession negotiations are not well linked to the EU's declaredsustainable development objectives as expressed in the 6th EU Environmental ActionProgramme 2001-2010 [9] Similarly, accession negotiations are not linked to efforts by theEuropean Commission to reorient rural development programs "to meet new needs andopportunities, particularly in the fields of employment and sustainable development" [7].This is because negotiations are concerned primarily with the transposition of existing EU

law (the acquis communautaire) into the legal systems of the accession countries In

relation to the CAP, the focus is on the here and now and not on how the CAP may look inthe future after implementation of the proposed reforms This approach taken by EU mightlead to establishing a costly infrastructure for the traditional CAP that might disappear after

2006 This will mean not only a waste of effort and resources for both EU and ACs, butalso a missed opportunity for both to test out new measures proposed in the mid termreview of the CAP [8]

S Light el al /Introduction 1

Rural areas in the ten accession countries (including eight CEE countries plus Maltaand Cyprus) show considerable variation in land use, rural population and agriculturalproduction Taken together, agricultural land makes up 55.9% (EU: 40%), with a muchhigher rural population (40% in AGIO as compared to 5% in EU15) and higher proportionemployed in agriculture (22.5% in AGIO as compared to 5% in EU15) The highestproportion of agricultural employment is in Poland (26.7%), Romania (37.3%), Bulgaria(24.3%) and Lithuania (24%) and the lowest in Slovakia (5.8%), Czech Republic (5%) andSlovenia (6%) Agricultural production as a percentage of GDP is also higher in theaccession countries (6.8% in AGIO as compared to EU 1.7%) The AC 10 will also bringthe richness of their forested land and inland waters to contribute to natural capital andbiodiversity of the expanded EU

Considerable areas of traditionally farmed land still survive, especially in Romaniaand Poland For example, in Poland's Wielkopolska Region, there is evidence of a longtradition of landscape management going back to the 1820s, which has helped to reducesoil erosion and nutrient emissions to watercourses while at the same time enriching thebiodiversity of the area The land is treated as having multiple uses, providing employmentfor rural people and contributing to the national economy How such systems will beaffected by European Union membership and further liberalization of world trade isunclear

In terms of the international context, it is worth noting that the expanded EU willhave even a greater role in agricultural trade than it has today as the world's largestimporter of agricultural products, and the second largest exporter But despite calls frommany developing countries to set agriculture and food supply on a truly sustainable path atthe World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) held in Johannesburg inSeptember, 2002, essentially no progress was made on accelerating the phase-out ofEuropean and U.S agricultural production subsidies

4.2 North America

In the United States and Canada, the multifunctional character of agriculture and itsrelationship to communities and nature have been all but lost Since WWII U.S agriculturehas been sacrificed to industrial development Labor and capital were moved to the cities

to support the industrial development of the post-war economy

Today, the U.S economy is still the strongest in the world, but its agriculture hasnever been so vulnerable In 2001, over $38 billion (U.S.) in emergency payments weredistributed to the farm sector For decades, the farm sector has been racked with lowprices, increasing costs of inputs and operations, and mounting debt that makes it tooexpensive for new farmers to enter farming and increasingly difficult for current farmers toturn a real profit

Environmentally, agriculture has been a major source of resource degradationthroughout North America Farm inputs (pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizer) pollutesurface and groundwater sources, creating increasingly threatened freshwater ecosystems.Modern farms have eliminated fencerows, drained wetlands, and straightened streams tomaximize productive acreage, eliminating wildlife habitat Farm systems have grownincreasingly large, less diversified, and more intensive with the years Production ofchickens, hogs and milking herds have moved to factory scale production with farmersunder contract to operate production systems that are dictated by industry Air and waterpollution from such operations are an increasing cause of concern Coastal euthrophicationand hypoxia, caused largely by nitrogen and phosphorus runoff from industrial agriculture,have contributed to the ecological collapse of the Chesapeake Bay and now threaten the

8 S Light et at /Introduction

$26B fish and shellfish industry at the mouth of the Mississippi River The Red RiverValley of the North, once the largest staging area for waterfowl in North America and athriving center of grain production, has lost 99% of its wetlands, is battling persistent cropdisease problems with increasing inputs, and continues to lose farms

While a century ago almost everyone lived on a farm, today less than two percent ofthe U.S population farms for a living Rural communities, indeed whole regions of theGreat Plains, are losing population and productivity, while cities are sprawling acrossmillions of acres of the productive agricultural lands and remaining natural habitats Thesetrends, combined with growing political and economic power of agribusiness, have resulted

in more concentrated land ownership and eroded the influence of independent producersand rural citizens, who have the most intimate knowledge of natural and agroecosystems, indetermining federal rural and agricultural policy

Despite the abovementioned problems, the U.S remains a major player in the worldmarket and will continue in the short-term to rely on the intensive "industrial" model ofagriculture Organic farming is increasing rapidly (20-30% annually) but still accounts forless than two percent of the market in most areas and less than one percent of farmedacreage The 2002 U.S Farm Bill was one of the largest in history, and despite including anunprecedented amount of conservation spending and initiatives, the bulk of spending is stillprimarily oriented towards commodity production price supports Consequently, U.S.agricultural exports will continue to have a major impact on the competitiveness of both the

EU and the ACs Furthermore, the U.S has a strong hand in guiding and setting agendas ofthe WTO For this reason, the U.S will remain a major factor affecting sustainability ofrural areas under an enlarged EU In turn, EU enlargement will transform transatlanticeconomic relations and so affect also the prospects for moving towards rural sustainability

in North America

4.3 The Johannesburg Summit

The World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) held in Johannesburg, SouthAfrica in September 2002 affirmed that biodiversity has a role to play not only in economicwealth creation, but also in widening economic opportunity and participation, investing inhuman capital, enhancing social cohesion, promoting environmental sustainability andsecurity, especially in rural areas The argument that addressing biodiversity more directly

in the rural community revitalization agenda promotes positive multiplier effects foreconomy, security and environment was first made a decade ago at the Earth Summit in Rio

de Janeiro and is now common currency In short, biodiversity conservation has become asmuch a question of economics and governance, as of biology and ecosystem science, asdebates over the need to maintain life support functions and the transition to sustainabilityhave gained currency [10]

Yet reports presented to the Johannesburg Summit drew attention to the fact that forbiodiversity conservation, the decade since Rio can be characterized by a chronic inability

to stem species loss Moreover, insufficient progress has been made to take full advantage

of resources and advances in understanding of ecological systems, as well as the systems ofrules, customs and institutions that govern human social and economic organization andinteractions with the environment

The Johannesburg summit failed to establish a clear target for the return ofdegraded biodiversity But it did acknowledge the importance of incorporatingsustainable development into social communal well being, sensitivity to indigenous andlocal knowledge, accountable forms of public-private partnerships and an ecosystembased approach to biodiversity management This latter feature enables a more

S Light et al / Introduction

adventurous approach to biodiversity evaluation along the lines advocated by Balmford

etal[\\}.

5 Recent Developments in Systems Theory and Methods

Continued declines in biodiversity in the face of enormous scientific, institutional andeconomic resources allocated to conservation in the countries of West Europe and NorthAmerica suggest that current approaches have serious limitations [12-14] Conventionalapproaches to biodiversity conservation based on national parks and protected areas areincreasingly recognized as limited in their capability of delivering nature conservation inthe context of changes occurring across the landscape

Despite growing political and public support for biodiversity conservation, efforts tomanage biodiversity have only partly benefited from the considerable scientific advances inunderstanding ecosystem behavior Many now argue that improving managementeffectiveness will require linking these advances to better understanding of institutionalarrangements and their dynamics, as well as to more flexible, inclusive and participatoryapproaches to management that can be sustained over the long term

Approaches to assessing and managing biodiversity that explicitly address theinteractions between ecological function, human activities and institutions have not beengranted adequate attention among policy makers and practitioners even as economicpressures on natural resources have grown and in turn given rise to security concerns [15].Despite the increasing lip service paid to the need to integrate economic, social, andenvironmental objectives, a thin track record of success suggests that most initiatives andpolicies are failing to do so in practice

In Central European countries, where biodiversity resources are still comparativelyhigh and institutional and economic reforms are under way, it is not clear how to organizeresearch and management arrangements so as to preserve biodiversity resources whileadopting market economics and international trading systems [16]

The need to improve biodiversity conservation has stimulated an interest inunderstanding the behavior of ecological, economic and social systems in terms of thelinkages between them, specifically in relation to the structure and dynamics of institutions,and processes by which scientific and experiential knowledge of ecological function can becombined to deal with complex environmental management situations [17] Insights gained

in studying resource crises have helped build new theories of systems organization anddynamics (catastrophe, chaos, complexity, resilience) that seek to describe the limits of ourcapacity to understand complex adaptive systems of nature and society [18-20]

A key theoretical and practical challenge remains our inadequate means tounderstand and manage interactions between ecological function, human activities andinstitutions Critical components of this challenge include failures to understandinteractions within and between scales (global to local), human capacity to influence theseinteractions, multiple stable domains, and the inevitability of always having to operate withlimited information and high uncertainty as to the future [20-22]

What lessons can be drawn from Western experience with linking biodiversityconservation to rural development so as to design more effective research and managementarrangements not just for Central Europe, but for an enlarged EU? What opportunities doesCentral European experience offer for redesigning biodiversity and rural sustainabilityresearch and management arrangements in Western Europe and North America?

10 S Light et al / Introduction

5.1 The Failures of Conventional Approaches: The Search for Explanations

Decades of experience have demonstrated convincingly that short-term optimization ofsingle objectives leads inevitably to fixes that backfire, eventually creating more problemsthan it solves One explanation put forward for the failure of conventional resourcemanagement approaches has been the centralized direction from state ministries andscientific bureaucracies Narrow production targets (timber, crop production, maximumsustained yield) have rigorously pursued by controlling or magnifying ecologicalvariability, while preserving the political and economic status quo for the beneficiaries ofsuch management policies come to dominate decision-making In the process, ecosystemshave been driven further into less productive (and potentially irreversibly degraded) states,and biological and cultural diversity continue to erode and decline, lowering their capacity

to act as buffers to system collapse or as reservoirs that stimulate system renewal [23].The failure to integrate ecological and social objectives into economic solutions hascome increasingly under question Ecological restoration will not be possible or sustainableunless social and economic opportunities are fostered in conjunction with biodiversitygoals Unfortunately, policy continues to compartmentalize issues If multiple objectivesare addressed, their treatment is considered as mitigation, or compensation, rather than asequivalent Why has it proven so difficult to integrate social, economic, and biodiversityobjectives?

The prevailing development paradigm shared by western scientific and socialcommunities is rooted in a set of powerful and interwoven doctrines:

• Reductionism Simple, cause and effect relationships govern reality and are more

or less independent in their operation

• Empiricism Science could reveal universal truths and solutions

• Positivism Nature is infinitely malleable.

These doctrines have, in turn, shaped institutions and worldviews that havepowerful self-protective force Resource management has remained preoccupied withstability and control Institutional cultures and scientific practices have their historical roots

in engineering Organizational structures and government bureaucracies have relied on down, command and control, and compartmentalized approaches to management that arenot very sensitive to feedback and often unable to recognize dynamics Science has tended

top-to promulgate technological fixes as solutions top-to social ills Prevailing economic theoryand policy have assumed full and symmetric knowledge, rational utility maximizingbehavior, absence of externalities, and other conditions that rarely apply in the real world.Clearly, the world around us has grown more complex, interdependent andinterconnected than the current set of ideas, tools, and infrastructure are capable ofhandling Problems of species extinction, exotic species, and climate change are at thesame time local and half a world away; they cannot be solved in isolation of one another.When performance declines in existing concepts, values, techniques, and practices,confusion arises What was orderly and stable and predictable becomes with disorder,commotion, and uncertainty as new ways of functioning and thinking are mixed with whatused to work in the past As in a large flood or massive forest fire, much changes - buteventually a river regains its channel, the forest plants new seeds, and some sense of orderand direction to life emerges This does not occur without pain of giving up the old andembracing the new This is how society and nature have flexed and responded in the past -new order is created from the accumulated knowledge from useful variations on the past

As a result:

S Light et al / Introduction 11

• Large stable government bureaucracies that have long advocated "one size fits allsolutions" are discovering they lack the flexibility needed to develop tailored solutionsthat are locally appropriate and responsive to rapid change

• Traditional economic analyses used to judge the efficiency of resource allocationdecisions are struggling to find criteria for judging the efficacy of projects that includesocial and ecological benefits as well; relatively young environmental economics andeven less established ecological economics are not yet fully recognized and accepted bythe political, academic, and corporate establishments

• Management that has relied on economies of scale to advance efficiency andproductivity are finding that there are other considerations that impose limits toefficiencies of scale - diversity and complexity costs should not be denied its place

• Science that was well suited to tracking and analyzing the severity of specific indicators(e.g water quality) is incapable of sorting through the competing explanations for whycorrective actions are not providing the results predicted

• Citizens that often turned to government to solve problems are now realizing they need

to take their future in their own hands

The major lessons emerging from across scientific and social science disciplinesthus relate to the primacy of uncertainty, interdependence, and complexity There are noexperts No one is in complete control, authority must move beyond authoritative answers

to find workable solutions Everyone must assume responsibility for the whole What hasbeen politically, economically and socially "impossible" may become practicable Thereare no established procedures

Uncertainty and surprise are inevitable when studying or managing systems thatconstantly change and co-evolve in non-linear ways, especially when such dynamismmakes facts uncertain and values in dispute [24] Human intervention, whether at themacro-scales of climate change or the meso-scales of managing ecosystems, oftencompounds that uncertainty This is especially so where resource collapse results fromshort-sighted management goals that sacrifice deeper probes of system behavior for quickgains in efficiency and profit [18] Clearly, in conditions of limited information and highuncertainty, management interventions as well as ecosystems and society must be studiedand managed in parallel; we must learn even as we manage our interventions and responses

to environmental changes [25,26] In this regard, O'Riordan [27] has stressed the scope forecosystem advocacy on the basis that biodiversity and its link to ecosystem properties havecultural, intellectual, aesthetic and spiritual values that are important to society

Making real progress towards sustainability requires adaptive work, involvingchanges in values, beliefs or behavior, learning to reconcile conflicts in values andunderstanding Navigating the transition to sustainability means coping with persistentperiods of disequilibria It will be tempting to return to the current repertoire tools forproblem solving, but people will increasingly turn to learning new ways Asking the rightquestions may be far more productive than sorting though conventional solutions

5.2 Adaptive Management

Adaptive Management is an approach that applies scientific method to complexbiodiversity conservation situations with the objective of designing robust policies fordealing with uncertainty and surprise inherent in such contexts Developed and appliedsince the 1970s, adaptive assessment employs systems analytic concepts and tools such asmodeling exercises to assist professional and lay stakeholders working together throughfacilitated workshops to develop shared understandings as a basis for guiding managementinterventions in complex environmental management situations Applications of analysis,

12 S Light etal./ Introduction

policy and practice are linked and broadened to more effectively engage extant uncertainty.Adaptive Management develops a range of policy prescriptions that address not one singlesolution but a diversity of responses that can emerge as nature and society co-evolve [28].Second, adaptive management treats policy implementation as propositions or experimentssubject to periodic evaluation and policy reformation

Adaptive Management is rooted in systems ecology [19,29-31] and was developed

in the 1970s at the University of British Columbia, Canada and International Institute forApplied Systems Analysis in Austria It has been subsequently applied in a wide range ofenvironmental management situations in every continent ranging from local (village) tolarge (regional fisheries, forestry) scales Early applications of adaptive management weredesigned as an alternative to the static, one-shot environmental impact assessment processthat evolved in U.S after passage of the National Environmental Policy Act in 1969.Adaptive Management strove to improve the prevailing rational management paradigm byallowing managers, scientists and policy makers, making management-relevant sciencemore responsive to policy concerns

Adaptive Management has provided a process-driven alternative to the scriptedpublic meetings and sterile, voluminous appendices of scientific data that were attached toresource policy options Science and policy were more flexibly integrated, butresponsibility, while broader than before, remained largely with scientists and managementprofessionals The wider public and stakeholders have generally been involved in only alimited way - as sources of information and knowledge or as a factor to be considered indesigning management interventions This has changed somewhat over time, and the circle

of responsibility has broadened as the experience and knowledge of local stakeholders hascome to be recognized as an essential ingredient in understanding the dynamics of complexenvironmental management situations, as in the case of managing the Florida Everglades,Pacific Salmon fisheries, forestry in Eastern Canada [19], and river basins in theMississippi, Colorado and Kissimmee [31]

Although Adaptive Management has been widely embraced as a concept, manylarge-scale adaptive management efforts have experienced only limited success.Considerable agreement has emerged that the obstacles to successful implementation ofAdaptive Management have been primarily institutional This problem has beenacknowledged and debated since the inception of Adaptive Management Although theliterature on Adaptive Management has, overall, remained relatively weak in the area ofmanaging institutional change, learning, and designing architecture for adaptive processes,

a recent article documents the evolution of practice and redesign of institutions toaccommodate adaptive management [32]

5.3 Institutional Assessment

Efforts to conserve biodiversity largely in terms of biological inventory, assessment andmonitoring are likely to do little more than document the disappearance of species and thedestruction of habitats in more detail The need is to understand the history of humaneffects on the distribution of species, habitats and ecosystems Moreover, if conservationefforts are to succeed in maintaining and restoring biological diversity and productivity inthreatened areas, assessment and monitoring must address the different ways in whichpeople value, use, manage and affect biodiversity of an area [33] This broader perspective

on biodiversity conservation has led to efforts to understand the dynamics of managementand institutions is complex environmental management situations and a recognition thatconservation efforts must elicit the long-term support and participation of those usingbiodiversity [34-37]

S Light et al / Introduction 13

A range of approaches to assessing institutional and management arrangementshave been developed and applied with the aim of providing a comprehensive or holisticimage of biophysical and cultural settings in complex biodiversity conservation situations.Institutional Analysis and Development (IAD) was developed to more rigorously link thestudy of the social space of human interaction (action arena) with changes in theenvironment [38-40] More specifically, IAD has been designed to provide a researchframework to study "how rules, physical and material conditions, and community attributesshape action arenas and incentives faced by individuals" [33] Application of IAD hasspurred analysis and development of diverse social theories as well as served as a language

to link empirical analysis (laboratory and field) with formal models of resourceappropriation by humans [41] Such applications have markedly revised views of thepotential of local resource-users to conserve biodiversity in the absence of externalmonitoring and control by government authorities [42] Thus, IAD has already introduced anew degree of rigor in social-ecological studies by demonstrating that "Tragedy of theCommons" type declines in biodiversity are not inevitable given sufficient understanding ofhow local users can monitor and manage their own resources

Other approaches, such as the ABC approach developed at the University ofWaterloo, seek to provide not only a basis for understanding human and environmentinteractions and for monitoring and assessing outcomes as a proposed undertakingproceeds, but also a basis for managing or avoiding altogether many land-use controversiesand resource conflicts Here the emphasis is to engage systematically with the broadercontext of local experience found in all those most directly involved in an environmentalmanagement situation This means thinking about interconnections between factorsrecognized as important or relevant by all stakeholders in a particular place or situation.The goal is to sustain collaboration with those with a stake in the situation to build a picturethat goes beyond the tangible to address the intangibles that often matter to people most -

to the ideas, beliefs and ways of life that people value and use to understand and adjust tochange in their surroundings and circumstances The ABC has been applied in many parksand protected area situations in Canada, including the Yukon, Grand River watershed,Great Lakes, with some efforts to apply the approach also in Poland, especially inmanagement of the Hel Peninsula on the Baltic Sea coast [36,43]

Approaches which emphasize the institutional or human dimensions of biodiversityconservation are sometimes referred to as "civics" approaches as they probe for solutionsmade durable by broad and long-lasting cooperation that arises when stakeholdersrecognize their participation in formulating, implementing and monitoring of ideas andpossible policies The motivation is to prepare citizens for involvement in the decision-making process to employ science as an equal contributor of insight and experience of localpeople The civics approach involves a wide range of people and groups in understandingand taking responsibility for their impact on the dynamic interaction between ecosystems,human activities and institutions The emphasis on institutions is important because, all toooften, institutional arrangements are treated largely as remote and independent concerns ofdifferent professional or disciplinary interests, such as biology, political sciences orsociology Sometimes, they left for no-one because they fall between disciplinary fields orareas of perceived responsibility [35,44-47]

5.4 Sustainability Appraisal

Sustainability and sustainable development are used often synonymously, but they refer toquite different things Sustainable development is an idea, a process, and a hypothesis, not areadily quantifiable capacity; it describes the journey we believe we must take to arrive at

14 S Light et al / Introduction

the destination, which is sustainability Sustainability aims at human livelihood systemsthat are viable socially, economically efficient, and that do not erode the life-supportcapacity of ecological systems It is worthy to underline that the ecological life-supportsystems are not established by human desires, but by biophysical processes that provideecological services essential for life-support The process is driven by political, social andeconomic forces, as well as by ecological forces

Recognition that ongoing and proposed policies, programs and institutions need to

be assessed and redesigned to ensure progress towards sustainability has prompted theemergence of Sustainability Appraisal [48,49] This is a process of connecting andrevealing the implications of the various institutions and policies in terms of progresstowards sustainability rather than a method for analyzing and deciding It is an unfoldingexamination of a new form of shared governance - sustainability governance, which focuses

on who is gaining and losing from all specific measures associated with any proposal, howtheir behavior is being adapted to accord with the entitlements of nature, and what measures

of liability compensation or cross-subsidization, or corporate social responsibility should beput into effect to ensure that the mix of interested stakeholders is at least better off as aresult [49]

Sustainability appraisal techniques seek to identify operational criteria andindicators, which can be linked to incentives and monitoring systems The EuropeanEnvironmental Agency is seeking to move in this direction by linking monitoring andreporting systems directly to assessing progress of EU countries and the EU as a whole inmeeting EU sustainability objectives In the UK, a Commission on SustainableDevelopment has been set up by the national government to assess and monitor thesustainability implications of government policies

Sustainability appraisal involves the integration of ecological, social, and economicand governance indicators and processes into a single conceptual framework Take as anexample a landscape stewardship scheme Suppose that its aim is to enhance ruralsustainability be enable farmers to work collaboratively across their boundaries to thetotality of the landscape Such a scheme would involve the following aspects for asustainability appraisal:

i The maintenance of soil health by erosion controls, contour management, croprotations for fixing nitrogen and stabilizing soil organic fractions, watermanagement in both surface runoff and leaching, and the assurance of soil vianutrient management as a whole,

ii Enhancing biodiversity through buffering all steams against nutrient rich runoff,providing fields and hedge margins for insect and plant diversity, maintaining wildplant reservoirs, establishing linear pathways for beetles and insects, and ecosystemedges for birds All this can be done through linked farm management practicesacross ecosystems,

iii Creating a fund for supporting maintenance labor via a pesticide fertilizer levy on acarbon levy Carbon sequestration could be linked to soil stabilization andwoodcuts Establishing charcoal and other woodland services for small woodlands

to create rural employment localizing food production via chains of economiclinkages to shops, farmer's markets and restaurants,

iv Establishing biomass for renewable fuel, and flood absorption sewers for soaking up

floods

Sustainability appraisal seeks to create robust ecosystems by generating social trust

in schemes and thus outputs, and doing so to create meaningful livelihoods especially forthe locally disadvantaged If all of this is undertaken via inclusive forms of citizenparticipation, then the offerings of governance also become part of the appraisal In this

S Light et al /Introduction 15

way the functions of auditing performance indicators and validating citizen approval alsobecame intrinsic parts of sustainability appraisal

It follows from all this that sustainability appraisal will best be guaranteed by someform of sustainability obligation to be placed in law or on codes of practice for all organs ofgovernment, including rural communities Such an obligation would set a statutoryframework for the future of rural sustainability It would provide a legal basis for appraisal,participation and auditing

6 The Challenge of Rural Sustainability

Science, policy, leadership and institutional arrangements are all components of a societalproblem solving process, ostensibly They are governed by a vision of reality or worldviewthat becomes the basis for how society organizes itself to define problems, what constitutes

a problem, how it will be addressed, and who is empowered to make decisions (Figure 1).These worldviews represent a complex of ways of knowing—"the way the world works"shared by scientifically and socially privileged elites, and "ways of doing business"—used

by those empowered to legitimize ideas, tools and networks for solving problems.Different values screen reality for different information, and put the information togetherinto different pictures

Figure 1 World views.

The post-war period in North American and both East and West Europe involvedheavy investment in government agencies that were 'top-down' command and controlorganizations They provided strong, stable, predictable behavior that could be controlled

at centers of political and economic power

16 S Light et al /Introduction

Centralized decision-making can be very effective in a stable and predictableinstitutional environment However, when signals from the environment begin to influencethe periphery of the system faster than the central decision-making can respond, then things

Figure 2 Systems view of decision making

start to get interesting Figure 2 shows one center and four locations on the periphery Ifthe rules of hierarchy are in play, the units at the periphery have to wait until the center tellsthem what to do But if the peripheral units and not the center are receiving all theinformation, and standard operation procedures do not work The center becomesoverloaded with demands, and the peripheries become frustrated with the incapacity torespond to the signals they are receiving

Now reverse the situation Instead of rules of hierarchy, the peripheries are inempowered to make decisions and the center role is to provide support, and generalguidance Decision-making is decentralized As the task environment changes, becomesmore complex, more uncertain, then decisions at the periphery provide opportunities forresponding quickly and learning rapidly In addition, the number of peripheral unitsmultiplies the experiments possible, and increases the potential to learn from each other.The center is in a position to collect all the learnings, summarize them and offer use lessonslearned to offer assistance

Transitioning toward sustainability means decentralizing decision making to dealwith the accelerating speed, scale and complexity of the institutional environment Itmeans breaking up the decisional logjams and putting decisions "where they belong."Problems are solved at levels they define themselves, by increasing the number of decisionforums, and getting the right signals by matching sense making with feedback

Under the conventional model of decision-making, lobbyists and citizenstakeholders stand largely outside the three branches of government (i.e., executive,legislative and judicial) Lobbyists, backed by money and power, use both to influence

Figure 3 Collaborative model

5 Light et al / Introduction

government policymaking Stakeholders have access to agencies and legislators butwithout the resources that lobbyists, agency staff and legislators have

The problem with the conventional model of government decision-making is thatthe process is slow, largely impenetrable from citizens, and distanced from the seat ofpower both figuratively and literally Social learning is limited to those privileged by theprocess Power is positioned to maximize its access and achieve a privileged status

An alternative collaborative model of problem solving and decision-making actuallyplaces stakeholders at the center of individual policymaking processes (Figure 3).Collaborative processes have evolved rapidly in the United States Environmentallegislation in the 1960s and 70s provided numerous points of entry of citizens into thegovernment decision-making process as pertaining to environment and natural resources.The collaborative process invites all parties to a particular problem to help design boundand establish rules for guiding the process and decision-making process The process isdesigned to mirror the best of deliberative democratic principles The goal is to takepressure off overloaded government procedures and to create forums for communication,

Figure 4 Modes of collaboration

fact-finding, decision-making and implementation at scales at which citizens feelempowered, and government policies are carried out with strong local support

Social learning is accelerated through collaboration The people most directlyaffected by the problem or sets of issues are enveloped in a process that encourages thedevelopment of mutual respect and relationships among people of varied backgrounds andinterests The policy process is reversed Instead of dictating solutions, actions andoutcomes from the grassroots inform and guide policymaking Platforms for science anddemocracy are established where the spectrum of primary parties work hand in hand withthose charged with assessing and implementing solutions Government institutions andNGOs become a resource for and facilitator of action in many locations under differingconditions, rather than the primary drivers of action Instead of having a dichotomybetween policymaking and implementation, they are coupled so that reality testing of manyideas provides feedback Patterns of behavior are revealed, and eventually models of howhumans and nature interact are more fully understood and policy reforms are based on ashared understanding of what works and what actions will lead to most beneficial resultsfor both nature and society As problems become increasingly complex and seeminglyintractable, collaborative approaches to problem solving provide highly democratic ways ofworking though the differences that separate people to learn new ways of working together(Figure 4)

18 S Light et al / Introduction

Making progress toward sustainability will demand a more collaborative mode ofoperating that shifts accountability to the primary parties involved The speed, scale andcomplexity of economic, social and political changes requires a social learning responsebased on emergent, self-organized adaptation, learning how to anticipate and copeconstructively with rapid change at multiple scales Part of making the quantum shifttoward sustainability is recognizing and putting at risk conventional ways of thinking andacting Social learning is a "fundamentally messy, contingent, and ambiguousintermingling of knowledge, power, interests, and change in the workings of the world"[50]

7 Working Landscapes - Integrating Biodiversity and Rural Sustainability

The motivation to reform the CAP is "to ensure that agriculture can be maintained over thelong term at the heart of a living countryside This means that the policy is targeted not just

at agricultural producers, but also of the wider rural population, consumers and society as awhole" The recognition that agriculture is the irreplaceable engine of rural development,that agriculture shapes the natural environment and landscapes and that trade must not takeplace in such a way as to destroy the multiple functions of agriculture has been affirmed bythe EU in its representations to the WTO Committee on Agriculture Clearly, the EU,Central Europe, and North America are ripe for alternatives to existing agricultural policy.The EU is clearly seeking to move away from the industrial agriculture model in favour of

a sustainable agriculture model What does this mean in reality? The table below (Table 1)seeks to set out some of the characteristic features of these two models

Table 1 Characteristics of Industrial and Sustainable Agriculture

Management company, corporate structure

State-of-art external technology Large (generally 500 ha or more) High level of industrial inputs (biocides and nutrients in large quantities)

Major source of surface water pollution, groundwater contamination, elimination of habitat including hedges, and buffer strips

Subsidies and incentives for agricultural production

Depopulate rural communities, which leads to degradation of social infrastructure, closure of schools, collapse of housing market

Sustainable Agriculture Economically and ecologically efficient, oriented mostly on local and regional markets, socially responsible, ecologically friendly

Independent, family, or community Appropriate technology mix according

to environment; fueled by renewable energy

Appropriate to the environment, farming system, and labor requirements Few or no industrial inputs, natural inputs, ecological and integrated pest management

Low impact, diversity of production including grains, fruits, vegetables, herbs, and maintenance of woodlots provide food and shelter for wildlife Government support for production of non-market goods, and services (ecological and social); elimination of unsustainable input and production subsidies

Service local markets, provides stability

to rural communities, economic diversification, maintain cultural and landscape values, regional identity, and traditions

S Light el al / Introduction 19

Sustainable agriculture is not a purely theoretical construct It is already being developed

on the ground as a working alternative Experiments are being tried at small scales withthe objective of creating and restoring the multifunctional role of agriculture its potentialcontribution to integrated sustainability of biodiversity, landscapes and rural livelihood.There are working landscapes movements in Europe, United States, New Zealand, Canadaand elsewhere, where options to conventional industrial agriculture are emerging

For example, grassroots working landscape initiatives in the United States arecurrently seeking to develop farming systems that produce safe and healthy food and non-food products in response to market demands, contribute to rural communities, enhancebiodiversity, promote balanced rural land use, animal welfare and local food markets, andmay even contribute to other sectors of the economy, such as tourism Methods rangefrom expansion of organic agriculture, development of third crops and cover crops, free-range animal husbandry focused on integrating land, human, and animal health; on-farmrenewable energy production (biomass, wind, solar, and animal agriculture); directmarketing by farmers to consumers and restaurateurs; development of niche markets andvalue-added initiatives; incentives for arming for nature/wildlife habitat; agro and eco-tourism; creation of regional markets through greenways, identity marketing, andfoodsheds; woodlot management and certification; production of non-timber forestproducts (e.g., mushrooms); and flood control and water supply through wetlandrestoration, land use, and watershed management

The list of specific initiatives is long and varied Each is characterized by a focus

on re-diversifying the farm and increasing profitability, not necessarily productivity Theyoffer a suite of possibilities for maintaining and restoring working landscapes based on anintegration of biodiversity with rural development and a reconnection of farming with therural economy

8 Conclusions

The key research challenge for integrating biodiversity conservation into rural sustainabilityprogramming as being linked to redesigning 'top-down' systems of governance tocollaborative and participative forms governance This redesign will require a shift ofemphasis from reductionist to holistic and integrative forms of scientific enquiry, which areessential to ensuring that farming is treated not just as food production, but as a provider ofenvironmental services, land management and a part of the rural economy Formulating aresearch agenda for rural sustainability brings us to a focus on participatory social learning.Policy, science and institutional arrangements must all be approached in new ways.Instead of accepting policy dogma as gospel, policies are actually questions masquerading

as answers Therefore, patterns of collective action need to remain open to learning how todiscover, accept and reflect on transient solutions that will inevitably be found in need ofrepair or replacement Ways must be invented to address issues at spatial and temporalscales at which the problems of nature and humans define themselves Just how to achievethis is a challenge in both NATO and NATO-partner countries

Science for sustainability differs qualitatively from conventional science Itacknowledges and embraces uncertainty, both in the environment and in humanunderstanding It requires the creation and enhancement both of ecological resilience andsocial trust The former enables the functions of replenishment to operate based onprecaution, adaptive management and natural learning Valuing traditional, local andindigenous knowledge is a vital part of this process Social trust relies on comforting and

20 S Light et al / Introduction

supportive social relations, widespread acceptance of custom and rules, and mutualreciprocity in all aspects of social and economic relationships Sustainability sciencestrives for synthesis, encouraging more holistic analysis of problems to uncover keyinterrelationships and causal chains

Leadership must strive to re-couple nature and society in ways that are mutuallybeneficial Not only must conservation strategies address human economic needs, butinstitutions, economic and resource management systems are needed that are able toprovide adequate human livelihoods without degrading ecological systems—their structure,function, services, diversity, and resilience Successful conservation requires the integrateddevelopment of "working landscapes" in which human land uses and livelihoods arecompatible with the maintenance of biodiversity and ecological services, processes, andfunctions The human-modified landscape must be viewed as a critical conservation link.Calling for a more integrated approach to delivering biodiversity conservation aspart of the move to rural sustainability will require addressing a range of issues or researchchallenges not discussed in this paper but which will need also to be considered to varyingdegrees Some of these issues are briefly outlined below Many of them are linked to thebroader context of globalization Participants contributing to the NATO ARW raised anumber of other issues:

1 Feeding the world The growth of the world's population coupled with the diminishingcapability of arable land to produce food due to soil erosion and pollution will continue

to constitute a challenge How will future generations get fed?

2 Urban-rural linkages The countries of North America and Europe are highly urbanizedand so it is impossible to deal with rural sustainability without dealing with urban-basedconsumers As urban areas sprawl into rural areas, the distinction between rural andurban is increasingly blurred Indeed rural and urban economies are becoming sointertwined that it is misleading to think and act just in terms of rural economies

3 Technology Technological development has transformed farming and rural areas andcontinues to do so Whereas developments in ecological science are important tounderstand the implications of technologically-driven change on life-supportcapabilities of rural areas, so also are developments in genetic science,telecommunications, materials science, remote sensing, transportation and so on Ruralareas stand both to gain and lose from these and other technological developments

4 Decentralization Decentralization of institutions and decision-making will not in ofitself necessarily lead to rural sustainability There is a danger of increasingparochialism and xenophobia There are paradoxes and conflicts and thereby trade-offs

at all scales - global, national, regional and local A blanket embrace of decentralizeddecision-making may well be more counter-productive than seeking frameworks that donot isolate or disenfranchise rural communities

5 Poverty Alleviating poverty must be a focus for any rural sustainability program, whichmust be careful not to treat subsistence farming as a recipe for "keeping people inpoverty." A redefinition of the role and place of subsistence farming in a globalizedeconomy is needed, especially in the context of rural-to-urban migrations

6 Agriculture-Biodiversity Conflicts Agriculture and biodiversity conservation are notcompletely harmonious and it is not only the industrial farmer with fertilizers andpesticides that threatens biodiversity There needs to be recognition that farming itself-even subsistence or organic farming - fragments habitat Clearing for farming in theAmazon rain forest is less for the industrial farmer that it is for the local peasantsubsistence farmer The act of such clearing, however, threatens biodiversity The factthat such transgressions in North America happened back in the 19th century does notdiminish the fact that biodiversity was destroyed

S Light et al /Introduction 11

7 Climate change Changes in the global environment, such as climate change ordepletion of the ozone layer, will affect the linkages between biodiversity andagriculture Responses, such as the Kyoto Protocol, Montreal Protocol and theConvention on Biodiversity Conservation, will also shape the context for ruralsustainability at local levels

8 Security The reform of farm subsidy regimes in Europe and North America willtransform not just transatlantic economic relationships, but also economic and security-related relationships with the countries of the South

EU enlargement offers an opportunity for rethinking not just the research agenda forintegrating biodiversity conservation into rural sustainability for both NATO and NATO-partner countries, but also the way research activities need to be organized In this regard,there appear to be at least three needs:

1 The need for more effective approaches to biodiversity conservation and ruralsustainability The implicit assumption of the EU and the U.S dictating to the ACs theterms and conditions of entry to economic and security structures is that institutional,planning and policy arrangements, including the organization of scientific research, are'right' and that those of the ACs are 'wrong' This allows western policy-makers toexport western models of biodiversity conservation and rural development (amongother things) to the ACs as a condition for their support The difficulty with this is notonly that western approaches have not been as effective as those in the ACs in the post-war period, but it is the western countries which are the most unsustainable in terms ofresource consumption It is thus worth finding ways of taking seriously experience fromthe ACs and using this to inform changes in western approaches to biodiversityconservation and rural sustainability How this new approach to organizing scientificresearch is to be organized will remain an important challenge

2 The need to reduce the 'ecological footprint' of an expanded NATO and EU Emphasis

of EU enlargement is on money flows rather than on material flows and structuralchanges in economy and society that must take place not just among the ACs, butacross the whole of Europe and also in North America Growing interdependence of theeconomies and societies of the ACs with those of the EU and North America must bemarked by a mutual interest in finding ways of maintaining and restoring biodiversity aspart of the designing and deciding upon new economic and security structures Thewestern countries must find ways of reducing their 'ecological footprint', which willrequire a major restructuring of their production and consumption patterns This meansrestraint in resource use and the exercise of power by the NATO countries and at thesame time extending market economies and security structures to the ACs and otherNATO-partner countries in ways, which will reduce the overall NATO 'ecologicalfootprint' This will be crucial for redefining the economic and security relationshipsbetween the North (enlarged NATO) and the South

3 The need to recognize the livelihood rights of local communities Protection ofbiodiversity and natural habitats are a matter of human rights and an integral part ofpoverty alleviation Such rights need to be embodied in national and international lawand taken into account in research and development programming As clean water,fertile soils, forests secure livelihoods and health of the poor, local communities must

be granted rights of access and control, if they are to play an active role in themovement towards rural sustainability In this context, food security, farmer security,biodiversity conservation and rural communities are all interlinked and interdependent.Sustainability cannot be restricted to a circle of experts, but must be based on open andfull engagement with local communities

22 5 Light et al / Introduction

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SECTION 1 THE IMPORTANCE OF DEALING WITH

BIODIVERSITY IN NEW WAYS

The goal of those involved in this manuscript is not to further balkanize the rural landscape by

finding additional ways to partition, fragment habitat but to foster working landscapes - that work ecologically and economically There is not enough land or money to save biodiversity

by locking it up in preserves As one looks beyond the era of state sponsored agriculture,Central Europe has evolved in such a way that symbiotic relationships of rural livelihoods andnature are a distinctive, but not the dominate, pattern of landscape management Agricultureand forestry are irreplaceable as the engine of rural development Agriculture sculpts theenvironment, and agricultural trade cannot take place in such a way as to destroy the multiplefunctions it performs The following two papers give US and EU perspectives on the future ofFarm Bill and the Common Agricultural Policy The fear is that if agriculture policy is notsubstantially reformed, successful local experiments in rural sustainability will diminish anddissolve amid the crosscurrents and counter forces that are deaf to and uncomprehending ofwhat is truly nascent and emergent in relationships between nature and society

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The Role of Biodiversity Conservation in the Transition to Rural Sustainability 29

S Light (Ed.)

IOS Press, 2004

A New Agricultural Policy for the United States

Dennis KEENEY1 and Loni KEMP2

1 Senior Fellow, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy

2 Senior Policy Analyst, The Minnesota Project

Abstract Because of its unique geography, weather, history and policies, the

United States has an agriculture that has been dominated by production of

commodity crops for use in animal, industrial and export enterprises Over time

agricultural policies evolved to support an industrialized commodity based

agriculture, with the result that farmers left the land and agriculture moved to an

industrial structure.

This restructured agriculture was aided and abetted by many factors Technology

rapidly changed the way land was farmed, leading to less need for labor but also

leading to lower returns to farmers because of increased costs and lower prices

from the resulting greater production Farm policies consistently rewarded

production over conservation Continued expansion of row crop agriculture

resulted in less land in resource conserving crops, loss of biodiversity, increased

water pollution, soil erosion and other environmental damages including major

pollution flows to the Gulf of Mexico While an agriculture that harms its own

resource base would appear to be unsustainable, it continued to be promoted by

policies that provided major returns to input suppliers and land values but not to

the farmer Global trade issues have emerged to keep prices low.

The 2002 farm bill could mark the beginning of a major change in direction

for U S agricultural policy While it continued to support crops through

commodity subsidies, many conservation and environmental provisions were

included that will, if funded, lower pollution, enhance the landscape, and support

small farmers The new Conservation Security Program promises to financially

reward farms for the environmental benefits they provide, and if successful could

become the model for a national green payment program There is hope that it is

not too late to turn agriculture into a green, sustainable industry.

Introduction

Attempts to discuss the complex web of farm policies devised by the United StatesCongress and the U.S Department of Agriculture typically start at the most recentlegislation This approach misses the background that has been built into currentpolicies For we are all greatly affected by our history, even farm policies And sincethere is little new "under the sun," it is important to look at the past This paper movesfrom the past to the present in order to give hope and direction to the future