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Author |
Pacini, G.C.; Merante, P.; Lazzerini, G.; Van Passel, S. |
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Title |
Increasing the cost-effectiveness of EU agri-environment policy measures through evaluation of farm and field-level environmental and economic performance |
Type |
A1 Journal article |
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Year  |
2015 |
Publication |
Agricultural Systems |
Abbreviated Journal |
Agr Syst |
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Volume |
136 |
Issue |
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Pages |
70-78 |
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Keywords |
A1 Journal article; Economics; Engineering Management (ENM) |
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Abstract |
A lot of attention in the debate on the 2014-2020 programming period of the EU CAP and rural development policy revolves around the policy's contribution to enhancing resource use efficiency, decreasing environmental impact, restoring ecosystems and how to ensure more efficient and effective agrienvironmental measures (AEMs). Nevertheless, studies that simultaneously address multiple measures with multiple environmental objectives and targets are underrepresented in the scientific literature. The objectives of the present article are (i) to present an integrated tool-kit for AEM design resulting from the combination of farm modelling with the Sustainable Value Approach (SVA), and (ii) to evaluate the potential of the tool-kit to support AEM design through an application to estimate cost-effective organic agriculture payments for the dairy sector in Mugello, northern Tuscany. Sustainability assessment of organic and conventional farming systems (OFS and CFS, respectively.) under the 2007-2013 EU CAP support schemes and a no EU support scenario show better OFS performances regarding nitrogen leaching (-52% and -47% under the current CAP and the no EU support scenarios, respectively), soil erosion (-24% and -34%), potential pesticide risks (-100%), biodiversity (+13% and +30%). Income foregone for the production of environmental benefits from organic agriculture under a no EU support scenario is equal to 210 Euro/ha. Sustainable value calculations combined with modelling results indicate soil erosion and nitrogen leaching as the environmental processes to be addressed with specific policy measures to further increase the efficiency of organic farming. A new organic agriculture support scheme designed based on such indications further increases the OFS SV and almost closes the GAP with a benchmark farm of the area, featured with ideal performances in terms of environmental and economic indicators. The payment scheme we designed with the support of the integrated tool-kit shows to be more cost-effective and efficient of current AEMs. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. |
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Wos |
000354503000007 |
Publication Date |
2015-03-18 |
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ISSN |
0308-521x |
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Additional Links |
UA library record; WoS full record; WoS citing articles |
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Impact Factor |
2.571 |
Times cited |
12 |
Open Access |
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Notes |
; We wish to thank all participants to the SVAPPAS project for their inspiring contributions and challenging debates. We are furthermore grateful to the financial support from the 6th Framework Programme of the EU (project code: SSPECT – 2006 – DG AGRI). The authors are most grateful to technicians Giovanna Casella and Roberto Vivoli (University of Florence) for their technical contribution. ; |
Approved |
Most recent IF: 2.571; 2015 IF: 2.906 |
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Call Number |
UA @ admin @ c:irua:127537 |
Serial |
6216 |
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Author |
Merante, P.; Van Passel, S.; Pacini, C. |
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Title |
Using agro-environmental models to design a sustainable benchmark for the sustainable value method |
Type |
A1 Journal article |
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Year |
2015 |
Publication |
Agricultural Systems |
Abbreviated Journal |
Agr Syst |
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Volume |
136 |
Issue |
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Pages |
1-13 |
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Keywords |
A1 Journal article; Economics; Engineering Management (ENM) |
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Abstract |
Farms contribute heavily to overall sustainability. To date, various frameworks, approaches, methods and indicators have been developed to appraise how much corporations (firms, farms) contribute to sustainability. Among these, the Sustainable Value (SV) method helps to determine by which economic entity resources should be used in order to achieve the highest contributions to sustainability, by comparing company's efficiency of capital use against the efficiency of a benchmark. In this work we argue that the SV benchmark does not include certain crucial environmental concepts, such as the carrying capacity of an ecosystem or the multiple vital functions provided by ecosystem services. Thus, it is not a suitable reference for companies to evaluate their contribution to sustainability. As an alternative benchmark to standard SV applications, we propose a farm whose resource use productivity is correlated to the fulfilment of pre-determined environmental constraints: the Environmentally Sustainable Farm (ESF). To design this farm, we created an agro-environmental farm modelling framework that includes: (i) methods and approaches to assess indicators concerning specific environmental issues; (ii) an integrated ecological-economic model based on linear programming. This farm modelling framework is employed to determine both the environmental performance and the economic returns of two farming systems, conventional (CFS) and organic (OFS), which are compared using the Sustainable Value approach. Despite the fact that the OFS environmentally outperforms the CFS, none of them reaches the sustainable performances achieved by the ESF, both performing a negative Sustainable Value. The environmental constraints forced the ESF towards management choices that, although decreasing the economic performance, increase its environmental sustainability behaviour. Hence, the ESF is a viable benchmark that can be used to evaluate llllfarms' environmental sustainability. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. |
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Wos |
000354503000001 |
Publication Date |
2015-02-25 |
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Abbreviated Series Title |
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Series Volume |
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Series Issue |
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Edition |
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ISSN |
0308-521x |
ISBN |
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Additional Links |
UA library record; WoS full record; WoS citing articles; WoS full record; WoS citing articles |
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Impact Factor |
2.571 |
Times cited |
6 |
Open Access |
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Notes |
; We wish to thank all participants to the SVAPPAS project for their inspiring contributions and challenging debates. Furthermore, we are grateful to the financial support from the 6th Framework Programme of the EU (project code: SSPECT – 2006 – DG AGRI). The authors thank the technicians Giovanna Casella and Roberto Vivoli (University of Florence) for their technical contribution. ; |
Approved |
Most recent IF: 2.571; 2015 IF: 2.906 |
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Call Number |
UA @ admin @ c:irua:127536 |
Serial |
6275 |
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