Perspectives on available support motivating or demotivating adoption of agro-environmental measures

Runoff of nutrients and sediments from agricultural areas are together with leakage of wastewater among the main causes for why European waterbodies still struggle to achieve good biological and chemical status (EEA report 07/2024). Further, soil loss and reduced fertility negatively impact crop yields and jeopardize income for farmers. It is the mandate of policy makers in agriculture to regulate on and incentivize farmers for sustainable management practices by means of mandatory, cross compliance and voluntary agro-ecological schemes. Considering the ecological status of water bodies, an increased adoption of agricultural sustainable management practices is needed, which demands efforts to better understand what promotes or demotivates them. This presentation draws on work in the EU project OPTAIN (OPtimal strategies to retAIN and re-use water and nutrients in small agricultural catchments across different soil-climatic regions in Europe, 2021-2026). The project includes case studies in catchments dominated by agricultural land use that are experiencing challenges related to water management (floods and droughts) and quality (nutrient retention and runoff), soil health (erosion). We present results from an online survey with land managers, including farmers and farmers’ associations, conducted in all the sites, namely in Belgium, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, Slovenia, Sweden, and Switzerland. The survey focused on a site-specific set of already adopted/implemented measures: afforestation, basins and ponds, buffer strips and hedges, conservation tillage, cover crops, drainage infrastructures, floodplain restoration, grassed waterways, intercropping, wetlands and traditional terracing. The practitioners’ perspectives for them about the sufficiency of currently available financing schemes, the adequacy of administrative support for funds and the assistance for reporting, as well as advice and training for technical and practical implementation of measures are presented. We show that there is a need to further tailor incentives to specific measures to address the needs of practitioners in different countries.